Tuesday, August 24, 2010

First "Real" Vacation

Well, we've been up north and such as a family, however, we just got back from our first real family vacation. I actually started planning this about 4 years ago when I first heard about Sesame Place in Langhorne, PA (outside of Philadelphia). It's like Disney only a theme park with Sesame characters and the entire park is made for little kids! I figured this would be the perfect year to go since the boys are 2 and 4.

The drive was 10 hours long (which I wasn't looking forward to) and I figured that if we're going to drive that far, we're going to stay for awhile. I found a steal at a hotel outside the city in New Jersey. We had 5 full days to enjoy the city. The first two days we were at Sesame Place. To sum it up, Mark said it perfectly, "The first day at Sesame Place with the kids made my whole year." The kids enjoyed every minute of it, especially meeting Elmo for the first time. Even I was excited to meet all the characters.



After we had out fun at Sesame Place we spent 3 days doing "kid stuff" in the city. I wouldn't have thought that Philadelphia would be a good place for kids, but I was wrong! We spent one day playing at the Adventure Aquarium. We pet sharks, sting rays, and starfish. We even walked through a tunnel with sharks swimming over us. The next day we spent 4 hours (yes, count them, 1, 2, 3, 4 hours) at the Please Touch Museum. This museum was so much fun! We played in a life sized car garage, city (complete with hospital, construction site, and grocery store), water room, music room, and everyone's favorite Alice in Wonderland. Our last day didn't disappoint either. We toured quickly through the Franklin Institute (which is a child's hands-on museum teaching them about all of Ben Franklin's inventions). Julian's favorite was the planterium show and Mark liked the Sky Bike. We left there and toured the city on top of a double-decker bus. The first for all the boys!




We had tons of fun, and made great memories!



Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Liam's Two!


Dearest Liam,

Happy 2nd Birthday Bubba! I am so proud to be your mommy. We have been through some rough times in your short life, but I am so grateful to God that he saw us through that journey of your life and you are now a happy, healthy, amazing little boy.

This past year you have learned to walk and talk. And with each day you're melting our hearts with your abundant love for life. Daddy and I can see how much you love to run, sing, dance, and be as active as you can. And you have a talent for sports already. You're constantly hitting balls and saying, "shoot" ! You love to snuggle with us at night and always want to have a book read to you. Our favorite moments are when you wake up from a nap and want to lay in our arms as we're reclined in the brown chair. You love to watch the Golf channel with your Dad then. Sometimes you even get mad if it's not on!

People can't get past your adorable big eyes and smile. You are such a flirt too! Too bad for the other lady's out there, 'cause you are mine!

Liam, I can't tell you enough how much I love you and how happy you make me! You make everyone in our family so happy. I look forward to many years to come, but with sadness we say good-bye to your baby years! But don't forget, I will love you forever, I'll like you for always. As long as I'm living, my baby you'll be.

Forever and Always,
Mommy

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Family Movie Night

This summer we've started the family movie night tradition. Liam's finally getting to an age where he'll sit (sometimes only for a bit) and watch the movie. Most of the movies I've been getting are older ones that I can pick up from the library, but the kids love them just the same.

I remember movie night as a kid. We would spend some time on Fri. night after dinner going to Blockbuster and each picking out a movie. Then we would get home and watch something together. What is it about watching a movie together that seems so bonding??

Our movie nights start out by ordering a pizza, followed by eating popcorn and watching a movie on a big blanket spread out on the living room floor with lots of pillows. This last week, however, getting a movie from the library backfired on me. I wanted the kids to see Aladdin, but the DVD was so scratched up that we couldn't even make it to the menu. Well, Uncle Stephen rescued the night with his netflix account. We were able to watch Cloudy with A Chance of Meatballs on my laptop. We ended up moving movie night that night to our bed so we could all see the tiny screen.

I think just having us all together, doing the same thing, snuggling, and happy is what I love about movie night.