Weekend Guests

It's been a long time since we had a two and a half year old around. We had nearly forgotten the amount of energy expended. 

A little cookie dough rolling didn't slow her down a bit. 

The sugar cookies may have sped her up!

Friends for the Weekend

Since we live a little closer to the rest of the world now-days, we have the pleasure of hosting a few more weekend visitors.  This time a friend of mine and her kids for the weekend.  So we took the train into the city for a rainy day.

 

And then a bus. 

Nicholas was a touch tired from staying up the night before.

 

To the Museum of Science and Industry.

Note to self--it closes at 4 pm every day.  We didn't have much time after we finally made it there, but we made the best of it!

 

Then we snuggled in and it rained a lot.

A good time to just hang for a few hours.

 

Slumber Party

At our house that is what happens when you each have .5 friends over to spend the night....

 

And then there is a bit of basketball, until there is some injury.

At least it was one of mine, although the odds are in my favor there.

 

And the .5 friend of the boys says he'd like lemon bars for dessert.

Sure, let me just whip some of those up after not finding the box mix at the store...

I love little girls

Yes, to a sleep over because they needed more time to work on their cheers.

Labor Day, Day Trip

These two ladies, against the ocean.

Well, then these four against the ocean.

Then the five took on the ocean.

Then the daddies helped the whole crew take on the ocean. So awesome to head to and back from Destin in a day; even more fun to meet friends there to enjoy it with.

We've Got Curls!

It's been far too long since we've seen these curls!

Thinking back, the littlest one didn't even have hair to curl the last time we saw him.

Montgomery--a good stop over on the way to the beach, FYI.

So We Had All These Sugar Cookies

 And a rainy Saturday ahead of us.

 So I invited the neighbor kids over.

To decorate and eat them all. 

8, 5, 5, 4, 4, 4, 1

And so we had seven kids in the house over the weekend.

And the five-year-olds adored the eight-year-old, and

the four-year-olds adored each other, and


everyone adored the one-year-old.

You have a little donut there on your face little buddy.

There was baking.

And piles.

And swimming of course.

And there's nothing like a game of hide-n-seek in high humidity.

I was outside long enough to snap this picture, then I melted.

Emily

Has turned 3.

3!

We ate.

Ben ate a lot.

We put on our party dresses.

We had a great time.

Happy birthday girl.

When we raced back into Tennessee to make a hair appointment. Our stylist, hearing we had just come back from Forrest City, said she must be a good friend.

Yes, she is a dear one.

There's Something About Emily

And her hand-me-downs.

And it's contagious.

Really catching.

To Battle!

Love visiting friends on a Sunday afternoon.

And playing with new toys.

Halloween

Friday for the preschool party--what we thought everyone was going to be for Halloween.

What actually happened.
Third year for the boys to be skeletons--getting a little tight.
We picked up a ninja and a different Strawberry Shortcake.
Elaine decided she had to be Dorothy.
And Alida.


Alida suddenly needed to be a vampire when she heard face paint could be involved.
Cutest moment of the night: Alida eeks out a "Don't forget the wampire," as they crowd around the door of our friend's house bags extended.

Dorothy, with a somewhat creepy lipstick application.

The costume that just keeps on giving.

But the boys didn't seem to mind.

Strawberry Shortcake.

Running to keep up.

And the ninja slowing down to guide the vampire.

Randomness: Can we count summer over now?

When it was time to leave, Alida was still hanging on to the pole and I had her horizontal trying to pry her off.

When I asked her what kind of birthday cake she wanted she said a purple one with a horse. I will learn to smooth buttercream one day.

Elaine just said she wanted a pink one. So she got the one decorated second when I only had the big fat piping tips left. It was nice to eat something not baked from a mix for the first time since deployment however.

When I picked up Patric, one of things I made sure to do was get a picture of the teddy bear on the right. Patric confirms for me that I'm in love with him for good reason--he's a great guy.

He just looks it, no?

We fed the goldfish with my parents at some point this summer.

It was as disgusting as it ever was.

My first thought: that's not even all of them.

Second thought: why don't they at least have the same hair color?

Man. When he's in the mood, he's in the mood.

Wren's birthday party.

She spent most of the cake time making sure the Chik-fil-A cow didn't come anywhere near her.

Jenny.

She came over to visit and we all played right there in the entry way the entire time.

She also came over to visit faithfully on Sundays when Patric was gone to fold my kids' laundry. That was the biggest help.

I took this picture for a reason other than to point out what a mess it was. I cannot remember now why I did that.

The latest beach game: get wet in the pool, flour yourself in the sandbox, bake in the sun.

She still comes out of no where and scares me with that baby every once-in-awile. It's creepy, and she remembers that it creeps me out.

So if I had to say I missed something from Patric being gone, it would be the out-pouring of support from friends and friends of friends and strangers. That was amazing. I will remain amazed for the rest of my days. And that will be what I remember from this past year: the year that people overflowed with good will.

Even when I took rotten pictures of them.

Dork.