Epic Playdate

On Friday we had our biggest playdate yet (which isn't saying a whole lot, since we don't have a ton of friends)! We had Ryane over with her two girls Piper (5 weeks), and Meryn (3 years) and Philie with her two boys Calvin (7 weeks), and Fred (2 years). Noah was so excited, he kept looking out the window saying, "My friends all coming to my house today!?" The "bigger" kids had fun running around the backyard, splashing the the pool, running in thru the sprinkler and making a mess in the sandbox. The babies enjoyed sleeping and eating, per usual. And the mommies enjoyed naptime when we magically got just about all 5 kids sleeping at once (calvin was a bit of a holdout, but eventually he gave in). It was a lot of fun. A note about the first picture, yes Calvin is bigger than Piper, but it's accentuated by the fact that he's on the upper level of the pack n play, while Piper is on the lower. He is a giant, but not quite THAT huge :) Just think, next time we all get together, we might have 6 kids between us, ahhhhh!

Colorado Trip

Well, we made it back from our trip to Colorado! We left on Wednesday and flew to Denver, met up with our good friends (from grad school days) Meera and Jason and their almost 2 year old twins Kali and Kirin. Thursday we loaded up a rented mini van which surprisingly fit 3 car seats, 4 adults, a double stroller, and luggage comfortably, and drove 3 hours to Steamboat Springs. The trip was fairly uneventful (save for Kirin puking all over himself) and we arrived at our spacious 2000 sq foot 3 bed, 3 bath suite. God bless off season/wedding rates! The purpose of the trip was primarily to attend the wedding of Brittney and Quint, which is a bit funny since I have NO pictures of them (sorry guys!). Friday was spent at the pool and at the rehearsal. Saturday involved a trip on the gondola up to the mountain top (with a chance meeting with Elmo and Shrek!) and the wedding itself, which was lovely. Sunday was the drive back to Denver with no puking this time. Noah, Mike, and I returned on Monday, whew! It was a great time with great friends. Thanks to Britt and Quint for getting married at such an awesome place! We hadn't seen Meera and Jason for 3 years and hadn't met the twins yet. Noah was a trooper and adjusted well to crazy sleep schedules (he got to sleep in a HUGE king sized bed in a room with the twins). Hopefully we'll all get together again sooner than 3 years from now! We're adjusted back to homelife, but missing our friends tremendously!

Bob the Builder and Bellies Bowling

Lately, Noah has been sporting the "Bob the Builder" look complete with hammer and hat. It's pretty cute to hear him sing the theme song, I'll have to try to get that on video at some point. This weekend we celebrated the impending arrival of Baby Schwantz, child of our good friends Michelle and Bob. Michelle is due 2 weeks after me, and we couldn't be more excited for their first baby! We went to a lovely shower for her this weekend, Andrea and Nic came into town. So we had a kid-free night on Saturday night (thanks to the grandparents) with dinner and bowling. Yes, bowling with 2 VERY pregnant women was a hoot. We did better than expected, no major falls or errant ball releases. We even stayed out late enough for the alley to turn off the lights for cosmic bowling, how cool are we? It was a blast and we had to take advantage of the obvious hilarity of the situation to take some pictures. We know that I'm having a boy, we don't know what Michelle is having, but we gave her a pink ball for now...

Fun Family Weekend

Now that school is over (whew!), we got to enjoy our first full family weekend since Mike started working Saturdays. So Sunday we went to visit Mike's family, Noah got to see his cousins Nick and Francesca. And, of course, the ice cream truck came much to the delight of all the kids. No surprise here, Noah picked out the spiderman ice cream and proceeded to make the stickiest blue-red-purple mess ever. Then on Monday we took a family trip to the zoo. I was very happy to have Mike along to do all the Noah-lifting as I'm finding it harder to move around these days. It was a great weekend!

A study in playdates

In the first picture, we see a typical playdate with two 2 year olds. In the 2nd and 3rd pictures, we see a typical playdate with a 1 month old. My how things change!

Memorial Day Weekend

This holiday weekend all four of us (ellie included) headed up to the lake. It was very relaxing and nice. Noah helped Grandma make a birthday cake, and ended up with it all over his shirt. So, of course, he stripped off the shirt to reveal his manly physique. We also got to go swimming in the lake for the first time this season. The water was surprisingly warm for May, but still pretty cold in general. But Noah absolutely loved swimming, he didn't want people to hold him and he didn't want to get out even when he had blue lips and was shivering. On Sunday night we went over to the island to visit the rest of the family and celebrate some May birthdays. It was a great weekend and a great way to start the summer season!