18

That's how long Andy and I have been married. Hard to believe we started as a family of 2 and are now a family of 9. Since getting married we've moved 5 times (not counting the 2 times we moved before that), bought 3 houses...one of which we had built. I still work for the same company that I did when we get married...makes it easy to remember how many years I've been working there as I started there the year we got married.

Andy has some before and after pics if you'd like to check them out. You can see them here.

We went out to dinner tonight to celebrate at a place right in our own neighborhood...we were a little worried because the last two years the places we have picked have been terrible. Tonight, though, was a totally different story. The food was great! And the service was quick. We both had crab brisque to start...then Andy got NY strip w/garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus while I got a crab cake sandwich & fries. For dessert, we had chocolate cake and strawberry shortcake. Yummy!

The only problem was that they were too quick...we were back home again an hour later...not nearly long enough away. LOL

Happy Anniversary Sweetie!!

Reunited

After a week apart, the entire family is finally all back together. The 3 older kids had a great time at the beach with their aunt and uncle. They all seemed to have grown some in the time they were gone and all have gotten nice suntans. Kenzie was so overcome with emotions that she burst into tears upon seeing me. I guess she missed me. ;) Connor, on the other hand, burst into tears because he wanted to go to vacation. LOL

While they were gone, the twins participated in a VBS where they got to play games...Ty picked basketball and Tay picked soccer and they both loved their individual sports. With them at school, that left Andy with just Bekah and Keari so it was a relaxing time for him. And the first 3 days of the week I was gone to Cape May with my mom. That was nice relaxing time. Mom's already planning on when to go next year.

A Tooth

Keari has her first tooth...bottom right one. Yay! Of course, she decided to get it while I was away but I'll just pretend that it broke through on that day I got back. ; ) She hasn't figured out yet that she can chomp with it so lets hope that takes her a while to figure that out. LOL

Vacation Time

Whew, it's about time. I was more than ready to get away for a few days...just my mom and I...no kiddies to worry about. Although that's going to be weird because I'm definitely not used to being away from them for any length of time.

It was a foggy morning to take a trip on the ferry but we were able to see a few dolphins playing around in the water. Wasn't about to get any pics of then because of the fog, though, but I did get a foggy pic of the water. Kind of eerie looking.

Before heading to the bed & breakfast, we took a detour to see a lighthouse and a bunker, walked around on the sand a little and looked at their exploration center.

We stayed at a place called the Linda Lee in Cape May, NJ. It was a lovely room which had a private balcony off the back. Bathroom was super tiny, though. And the parking was atrocious...definately can't park a decent size car in their lot.

We spent the days walking around Cape May and eating way too much. We did take one excursion to Atlantic City to go to the Tropicana to watch a magic show and play the slots a little.

All in all, it was a lovely trip and I'd love to be able to go again next year. Maybe my sister will be able to join us next year.

Carnival

Since it was such a gorgeous evening, we decided that we’d go to the carnival tonight. Alex was working at the fish bowl stand as part of his volunteer work for the firefighters so he didn’t get to go on any rides. Andy and I split up…Andy getting Connor, Kenzie, Ty and Keari and I got Tay and Bekah. It was such a fun time watching Bekah on the rides. She thoroughly enjoyed them this year which was evident by the fact that she rode every kiddie ride available and then started back through them all again. LOL Since Tay isn’t as adventurous as his brother, he made a good partner for Bekah…although she didn’t need one. She definitely had no fear about getting on any of the rides. In fact, when we wandered over to see what the older kids were up to, she was insistent on riding on the big kids swing…which is the one big kid ride that Tay will ride…and was very upset when I wouldn’t let her. Older kids had just as good a time…they love a ride that looks like a big roller…takes forever to load and unload that ride but they stood in the line to ride it twice.

And it wouldn’t be a carnival without a funnel cake and this years was delicious.

If you’d like to see a few pics, click here which will take you to my hubby’s blog where he posted the best of the pics I was able to get. Very hard to take pics of kids on moving rides. ;)

Last Baseball Party

Tonight was Alex’s baseball party down in Tower Gardens. Alex has been with this same coach for a number of years now and the party always begins with a parents vs kids baseball game. When we first started years ago, the parents had no trouble beating the kids…today is another story. It was a rousing game of baseball with family members pitching to each other. The game ended when the last parent batter ended up getting hit with the ball during the pitchers warm up throws. Oops! I think the parents just used that as an excuse to end the game since they were losing. LOL

Then the party progressed to the beach at the bay where a cookout, kayaking and tubing took place. There was a huge turnout this year and everyone seemed to have a great time. We noticed towards the end of the party that one of the kids was paddling a kayak along the shore up the bay and was quite a distance away from us. When Andy finally caught up with him in his own kayak and asked the kid where he was going, he was told that he was paddling to the bridge. Mind you, the bridge was probably 5 miles away from where we were and he just matter of factly stated that he was paddling to the bridge. Kids! What are you going to do with them?? LOL

On the way home, we dropped Alex and Connor off at their youth leaders house from movie night and a sleep over.

New Altar Server

Kenzie is sooo excited. Altar server training class was scheduled for tonight and she's been anxiously awaiting this day for months now. Needless to say, she came home from the class beaming. =)

Alex came home from youth group tonight talking about a white water rafting trip that is scheduled for the middle of next month. That got Connor thinking because his youth group is also able to go on the same trip so it looks like we will be losing both boys for a couple days next month. ;)

Car Woes

Cars are definitely more trouble than they are worth. I took my car in for it’s 120,000 service and $1,600 later, I get my car back. And this is on top of the $2,400 car repair bill I had last year. This time is was everything from needing rear brakes to transmission fluid to a thermostat. Oh and don’t forget that when the tech went to start my car, he stated that the key just spun in the ignition. Ugh! That’s the only part of the repair that I didn’t do as I’ve never had that problem happen to me and it would have cost an addition $500 and take 4 weeks to get the part. Hopefully this will tide me over for awhile but that's what I said last year too.

Party Weekend

Saturday we spent the day at my SIL’s house. It was a beautiful day to hang outside…kids swam (although their pool was freezing!!), played badmitton, had scavenger hunts. Everyone thought Keari was an angel child…boy did she ever have them fooled. LOL

Sunday we had a pool party for Connor’s baseball team. It was another fun day although the weather was a little warmer/muggier than it had been on Saturday. We supplied the pool while everyone else supplied the food and there was more than enough to feed everyone…even my hungry crew. LOL Kids had a great time playing volleyball in the pool and having races to see who could swim the length of the pool the fastest. The adults sat around and chatted the afternoon away. All in all, a good day. =)

High School Youth Group

Tonight was Alex's first night with the high schoolers for youth group...he's previously been going to the middle school group. I think he was a bit nervous because he wasn't as proactive with getting information about it as he normally is. During the summer months, the youth group is held at a house located on a point of land where every where you look, you see water. And the houses in this community are huge! Makes our 7 bedroom house seem puny...which it is compared to these houses. He seemed to have a good time if his smile when I picked him up was anything to go by. They started off by talking about a C S Lewis book, then did a cook out and played volleyball. I can't say enough about the youth groups that Safe Harbor Presbyterian Church hosts...they open it up to any kids of the appropriate age which is wonderful since we don't actually attend this church...the youth minister is awesome. He just has a knack for putting people at ease and relating to the kids.

9 Months

Wow how time flies. Hard to believe she's 9 months already. Here's a pic of her from today.


And here she is the other day on the move LOL What a big girl she is. =)

Moo?

I saw this on Venessa's blog and I had to laugh cause I most definitely am not!! LOL

Cool Letters

I saw this letter maker the other day on Meari's blog and finally had a chance to play with it. You can make your own here.

Off to the Races

Okay, not literally but Kenzie does get to visit a horse farm today and to say that she is excited is a huge understatement. Andy met a gentleman almost a month at Southern States...he was there to buy chicken food and the gentleman was there to buy horse food. They struck up a conversation and it turns out the gentleman owns race horses and has a grand daughter named Mackenzie. He invited our McKenzie to come play with his Mackenzie anytime. Not sure that he really thought we would call though. LOL I'll be back later to tell how things went today. =)

What a fun day! We were at the farm for about an hour and both Kenzie and I got to ride on a horse...although I'm not sure if having a horse walk in circles truly qualifies as riding. LOL Kenzie got to start and stop the pony by herself and tell it to turn in whatever direction she wanted. It's the first time either of us had ever been on a horse. When they offered me the chance, I couldn't turn them down...couldn't have my 9 yr old daughter show me up. LOL Kenzie is on a pony named Autumn Falls and I'm on a quarter horse named Marshall. Here's a few pics of our morning

Happy 4th of July

What a fun 4th we had although the day did start off with some cleaning...seems like a never ending job around here. After lunch, the kiddos all headed off to watch a movie while Andy and I took the kayaks down to the creek. We paddled all around the creek, watched some guys putting out some kind of traps in each of the little coves...not sure exactly what they were trying to catch although we are speculating maybe muskrats. We actually saw one swimming around...it was pretty cool as I've never seen one that close before. At one point during our paddling, I ended up running aground and had to walk my kayak to deep waters...deeper being past my ankles LOL To say that creek is shallow is an understatement. In alot of spots it's less than an oar lengths deep.

After dinner, Alex and I ended up going back down to the river as he really hasn't had the chance to do much kayaking. I was so tired but I couldn't turn him down and we had a great time although it was tough for us to pull the kayaks from our house to the water and back. Guess we aren't as strong as Andy.

A Day on the Water

Yay! Our kayaks arrived this morning, so after a quick lunch we headed down to the river pulling our kayaks on our homemade carrying cart. Amazing what you make out of old stuff that you have laying around the house. I had Kearsyn and Taylor in the kayak with me while Andy took Bekah and Tyler. We had a great time although it was a bit windy which made steering the kayak a bit challenging. Keari did great! I was a little worried that she wouldn't stay still but she did and at one point Tay said she was even trying to fall asleep. Of course, I kept dripping water on her from paddling so that didn't work too well. LOL Alex, Connor & Kenzie missed out on the maiden voyage as they spent the day on a friends boat but Andy did take them out when they got home. They all seemed to enjoy it. Now we know to what to ask the grandparents to get them as Christmas presents...two kayaks for all of us just isn't going to be enough. ;)

Andy has some pics of the kids and the new kayaks here if you want to take a look.

Family Time

It started out by us going to by an early family Christmas present...yes, I do know that it is only the end of June but we'd been talking about what we were going to get as our family Christmas gift this year when it dawned on us that we should by kayak's since the kids enjoy them so much and we live within walking distance to the river, and if we get them early we could use them this summer...so, this morning we went to the marine store and purchased two RTM Tango kayak's. One looks like the one below which is a fishing version...which means it includes a hole to put your fishing rod in and a built in tackle box and the standard version in blue.

After that, we headed to Sykesville to visit my aunt and family for the day. It was a beautiful day...we played outside, ate crabs, shrimp, hotdogs & hamburgers then headed home in the afternoon so we could get to church on time since the boys served...not that we don't normally make it to church on time. ;) LOL

A Fun Day at Work

Today was our semi-annual department outing. This year we dined at Carrol Creek Restaurant for lunch. I had a salad, crab cake and vanilla ice cream and it was delicious. Our tables were overlooking the water which was just beautiful. Afterwards, plans were to take a boat ride. Since we had some time before the boat was to leave, we all decided to take a walk through downtown Annapolis. If you looked at the linked map, we actually started our walk at the bottom right hand corner of the map. If the map was extended farther down, you would see that Compromise Street goes across a bridge into Eastport. Carrol Creek Restaurant is on the other side of the bridge. We walked from the restaurant, across the bridge, up Main Street to St Anne's Church and then back down the other side of Main Street (had to make sure we saw all the shops and restaurants on both sides of the street ;). Downtown Annapolis is such a beautiful place with all it's old buildings and unique shops. It was a fun way to pass the time. We then all regrouped, got a few drinks...which our boss paid for ;) ...and then headed for the boat where we took a 40 minute ride offered by Watermark aboard the Harbor Queen. It was a lovely trip on the Severn River that included sights of historic Annapolis and the Naval Academy. It was a wonderful way to spend the day. Too bad every work day can't be this way. LOL

I wonder how we'll top this outing next year. In the past, we've done games at Jillian's and picnics in Centennial Park.

Glue

Last night we had our first experience with getting a cut glued shut instead of getting stitches. I want to know why kids always seem to hurt themselves after hours. Around 9pm last night, Bekah tripped walking up the steps and somehow got two cuts around her eye. By the time I got to her she had blood pouring down her face. Amazing how two small cuts can bleed so much and it sure it a scary sight. You could tell by looking at them that they would need to be stitched to heal right so that prompted a call to the urgent care center. After playing 20 questions with them about where the cuts were located, how big they were, how deep they were they gave us an appt at an office almost 30 miles away stating that they would evaluate her but if the dr didn't feel comfortable with where the cuts were in relation to her eye that we'd have to take her to ER to get them stitched. Thankfully Andy, along with Kenzie took her to the drs, thank goodness as I was dead tired from being up the night before with Kearsyn who still isn't sleeping well. Of course at that point I couldn't have slept anyways but still felt it safer to not have me on the road. Andy said the drs there were great and that Bekah did amazing. She didn't make a peep while they cleaned out the cuts with soap and water. Ouch! Not sure I could have sat there without making a peep. The only time she cried was when they inadvertently glued her eye together a little but Bekah was able to correct that problem herself...her tears dissolved the glue. LOL Here's a few pics of her...think she's a ham when it comes to picture taking? LOL

Good news

Just a quick update on Kenzie...I took her to her drs appt this morning and the test results show no fracture, no infection and no tumor. Whew! He's thinking that's it's either a deep bruise or possibly a damaged nerve. If it's a bruise, it will go away and if it's a nerve, it won't so he wants to reevaluate her pain in another month.