Fall In Michigan! 10/8

We spent Five beautiful days (sunny and 70 degrees) in Michigan. Seth had a job interview (we don’t know the outcome yet) and the rest of us joined the fun for donuts and friends. We left a day early because Seth was furloughed due to the government shutdown so our vacation was longer. The drive was uneventful other than the adults listening to Dracula in the front, Conrad screaming in the middle, and the big kids watching shows in the back. We crashed at the Bryners and were able to see, do, and EAT lots (five pounds to show for it)!

I spent Wednesday morning at Gallup Park (our old favorite park) and then we spent the afternoon strolling through Kelly’s neighborhood and meeting up with my dear friend, Wendy. We played the afternoon away while Seth went to dinner with his maybe future employers.

Wendy, Sharon (baby Theo), Kelly

On Thursday morning, the kids and I were visiting friends at Forest Hills when we decided to get pita and hummus at the Mediterranean market down the street for lunch. The boys begged to have me take them to the spider web park to play and eat. When we arrived at the park there was a women there who looked familiar and I realized it was my dear friend Jill Mitchell!! The Mitchells lived across the street from us during our first year in Ann Arbor at Woodchase. She was an amazing support to me while I adjusted being so far from family. We made a massive quiet book together and I was with her when she sent her oldest boy on the bus to kindergarten while I held baby Charlie in my arms (her son is now 14). They moved from Michigan in 2009 but came back in 2012 after we had left. I hadn’t seen her in FOUR years and believe this meeting to be a sweet tender mercy. What were the chances? ). She doesn’t even live on that side of town but happened to be babysitting someone who lived close to the park. (I would have eventually seen her at a shindig later in the week but it was fun to have lots of time to catch up

That afternoon Kelly and I took all the kids to Erwins Orchard for apple picking, cider, and donuts. Seth was gone to his interview most of the day. We were quite the circus with all of our kids and strollers getting on an off the tractor but we did it and have a whole bag of delicious apples to show for it. The donuts were good too and the weather ideal.

Thursday night we took the kids downtown to walk around and see the fairy doors. Nothing beats downtown Ann Arbor in the evening in the fall (we also snagged some food at Frita Batdtos!!) It was a great day other than the fact that three out of four of our kids threw-up at some point during the day due to car sickness..weird.

Friday Morning Seth and I drove out to Plymouth to get a feeling for the area. This is where the company Seth might work for is located. It’s about 15-20 minutes east of Ann Arbor. We drove back to Ann Arbor to have lunch with my cousin Steven and his wife Christie at The Cottage Inn. We walked around a little afterwards before they had to get back to school (they are both in PhD programs). We then went to Wasems to pick up more donuts and cider for the evening festivities.

We drove back to Forest Hills to say a quick hi to our old next-door-neighbors Darlene and Shannon. I was sad we couldn’t visit more but happy to see them doing well.

We met a group of old friends at a park on Friday night. It was pure joy to reconnect with all these wonderful people. It finally got so dark we couldn’t see anything so we had to call it a night and stop talking.  Early the next morning I walked with my old walking partner Andrea and Kelly came too. My heart rate might have gone up a little but mainly we just walked and laughed.

Aubrey, Pam, Lisa, Sharon, Kelly, Candice, Kirsten, Jill

Since we didn’t have enough fun the night before we met up at Jenny’s Market for more cider and donuts the next morning in Dexter. The Gibsons are building a new home across the street (literally) so we were able to walk through it and oooww and awww. We drove strait out of town after stopping for me to run in and buy the hot ticket toy- Rainbow Loom at The Toy Kingdom. Seriously, it’s selling for 30 bucks on Amazon and the Toy Kingdom has it for $17!! The guy who invented it is from Michigan and Charlie is going to be one happy boy on Christmas morning!

I was trying to figure out why all my pictures looked horrible  when I realized that I had set it on the crappiest setting, oh well.

The babies! 9/23

I’m not sure a 3 1/2 year old and an almost 18 month old would be considered babies but that is how I refer to them. It truly is amazing how much kids this young change from month to month. Here are a few highlights of Lucy and Conrad.

Lucy was playing outside one day when she came inside screaming that her mouth was burning.  When I got her a little calmed downed she told me she had eaten a “potato.” A potato is the word Lucy also uses for tomato and pepper but I was still confused. I told her she needed to show me exactly what she ate. She led me outside and showed me a tiny red Pepper. AAAAhhhh!!! I immediately gave her nearly a gallon of milk to drink and she calmed down more. Then the mystery began. Where did she find a red pepper to eat? She told me she got it from “Allen’s House.” I walked over to Allen’s house and this is what I found:

Allen’s mom felt really bad when she heard about what happened. Her in-laws are visiting from China and had planted them as a decoration. She said, “those are too hot to eat and were never meant for that.” The story is even more interesting when you see that this plant is hanging high above the ground. How did she get to them?  My precocious little girl finely met her match.

Lucy’s conversational skills have grown so much and for the most part I know exactly what she is talking about. She has given us some great imitations of words/phrases I hope to never forget. She says “water-lemon” for watermelon, “Keen-a-butter” for peanut butter,  “And it came to pass” for The Book of Mormon, “skeetobite” for Mosquito bite and red peppers (mild sweet versions she loves) and tomatoes will forever be “potatoes”. She also got in an intense fight with Matthew over how the baby dolls in the American Girl magazine were “real babies” when he tried to tell her otherwise. She always wants to go somewhere and will frequently ask me, “where are we going tomorrow?”

She has started another round of “ABC School” this year with four other kids from church. It’s once a week for three hours and we rotate homes every week. Every morning she asks me if it is an ABC School day. They are a fun group and now that they are all a year older everything is a lot easier.  Squabbles are easily resolved and they are understanding more about letters and sounds. We have two new girls who Lucy has loved getting to know.

Conrad is the love of the neighborhood. We have a large group of kids that live by us and whenever Conrad is outside in the afternoon playing he is surrounded by a group trying to make him laugh. He recently became obsessed with all the kids skateboards and they happily hand them over for him to play with when he demands.

He usually takes two naps a day and is growing like a weed. He has a baby mullet but I can’t bring myself to cut it. The minute that mullet is gone he is going to look like a little boy and I just can’t do it. There has been talk of making him a pirate for Halloween and putting it in a ponytail.  We’ll see.

 

He seems to be figuring out a new word each day. Ball, all-done, and hot are some of his new ones. He also has fallen in love with Lucy’s white stuffed kitten. He often carries it around laughing at it and if you ask him what sound a kitty makes he will say a cute little, “meow.”

This is Conrad’s buddy Allen who lives a few doors down (Lucy ate his decorative hot peppers).

The Bryner’s Birthdays. 9/22

The Bryners stopped by for a short Sunday afternoon visit in between work conferences in Philadelphia and DC. We ate Café Rio and we celebrated Ben’s birthday (which was that day) and Kelly’s birthday which was the next day. It called for two very specific desserts partial to each persons liking. Seth was in charge of Ben’s coconut cake (it was four layers of awesome) and I took over Kelly’s apple pie. I had not made an apple pie in years but after doing way tooo much research I found the best recipe and the pie was a success! (I had a pie crust disaster on Thanksgiving so I was happy not to repeat) The kids played happily and cried when their time was up. The visit was too short but we will be seeing them in Michigan in a few short weeks.

The National Book Festival. 9/21

Scanned polaroid they took of our family!

We all went in to DC for the National Book Festival. Seth took the boys two years ago when I was newly pregnant with Conrad and opted out. It was held outside on the grass at the Mall. They have lots of authors doing readings/signings and then other tents for activities. We mostly hung out in the kids tents. The kids favorite activity was visiting the Pavilion of States. Each child received a passport that had a spot for each state and territory to stamp after you visited their table. We battled a massive crowd but the boys visited each table. Each state was different as far as their set up. Most presented books where the authors were from their state and handed out book-marks, pencils, pins, pamphlets, beads, and more. Maine takes the award for the best hand out with a gummy lobster. At the end they all got a reusable shopping bag for completing (lame). The kids also got to make their own book, decorate a book mark, get their picture taken with a PBS character, and received s Skippy John Jones Book (I really struggle reading those books). They were completely entertained for FOUR hours when it was decided Conrad was done so we were done (he was actually done hours before but thankfully he had a patient Daddy who entertained him). We hauled an incredible amount of crap souvenirs back to the car and stopped for ice cream to top off the day.