6 years ago today

I love you forever.

quote of the week

While he was helping me sweep the floor: Garrett: "Mom, is it good if I hold the dustpan on an incline?" In the same day.... we were reading one of his books about a roller coaster and he began questioning what makes roller coasters work- so we discussed gravity, centripetal force, and momentum. How am I EVER going to keep up with this one?

new york in the fall

Highlights from our date to New York yesterday:

The arch, fountain, green trees, and cool breeze at Washington Square Park

Sharing a strawberry & Nutella crepe

Not having to maneuver through thestreets of Manhattan and the many stairs of the subway system with a double stroller

Seeing the memorials and photograph 

exhibit at Ground Zero

Eating lunch at a fancy Thai Restaurant to 

celebrate our anniversary and having the restaurant restroom attendant squirt soap on my hands and hand me a paper towel after using the restroom

Stopping to get a Diet Coke and discovering that the McDonald's on Broadway has a man playing a baby grand in the lobby 

Thanks for the fun day, Babe.

on the move

More pictures of Lydia because I'm kinda crazy about the girl.

She started crawling recently. She's all over the place now and getting into all sorts of trouble!

a toothy grin for Grandpa

At Grandpa's request:

I tried REALLY hard this afternoon to get a picture of Liddy's chompers.

She kept trying to grab the camera.

This is what we got before nap time rolled around and the grins turned to tears.

There really are some teeth in there!

bedtime bliss

A few days ago, Garrett moved up to the top bunk. He has wanted to sleep up there for a while, but I'm a paranoid and overprotective mother. I was perfectly content to have him sleep on the bottom bunk and Ethan on the trundle bed beneath it- nice and close to the ground. Until now the top bunk has been used for extra storage. Despite my constant efforts to clean, purge, and reorganize, it was continually collecting clutter. I couldn't take it anymore and finally made the switch. Bedtime has never been so wonderful. For 4 nights in a row now, at around 6 pm, Garrett has eagerly asked if it's time to go to bed yet. At first, Ethan was in despair as he watch me remove his mattress from the trundle bed and hoist it up to the top bunk. He quickly got over it when he figured out that he would sleep in Garrett's bed on the bottom bunk. Anything Garrett does is good enough for him. We often find Ethan climbing up there on his own throughout the day to take "a little rest".

.

They both peacefully and quietly drift off to dreamland, without a single request for water or a piece of bread. The empty trundle works wonders for that extra storage space we need, and it's all out of sight. Everyone's happy. Adding to the bliss- we got some new "CARS" toothpaste yesterday. Now they ask if it's time to brush teeth yet too. Really, can it get any better? 

silly kids

Ethan: It canNOT be comfortable in there. And he can't get himself out. I don't know why he climbs in all the time. 

Lydia: Just kickin' up her feet with a little snack.

Garrett: I was taking pictures of the other kids, so he wanted to pose with his scooter.

Camp Out

So, Matt and I both grew up camping, love camping, and vowed we'd be a camping family. But it turns out that it's a LOT of work with two little ones and a baby!  Still, we had a fun time, enjoyed the beautiful New Jersey scenery, ate tin foil dinners, and made some great family memories.

Garrett, enjoyed his breakfast by the campfire. Lydia had all kinds of fun. She was mesmorized by the fire. Ethan preferred to sit in the car and listen to his ABC's music. 

We finally got to use our 10 man tent we bought a while back. It was FANTASTIC- complete with an enclosed front porch, bay windows, back door, and room separators. I don't know that we'll EVER fully grow into it, but you can never have too much tent space as far as I'm concerned. Maybe we'll be a camping family after all with a tent like this.

Off to school

Today was Garrett's 1st day of preschool. He has been so excited to go. He was so cute getting ready this morning and has never been more agreeable. He loved it and can't wait to go back. Ethan loved being the big kid at home for a little while. I loved my quiet, interrupted 20 minutes on the elliptical machine with Liddy strapped into my front pack while Ethan sat peacefully at the table with a ball of playdough and a bucket of cookie cutters. School is a good thing.

Labor Day

No school, no work, and Boston Market for dinner at the park. Great fun.

Old Friends

At the end of August, my friend Lindsay got married. It was so great to see her, to see so many of our old friends that I haven't seen for years, and to feel like I was 14 all over again!

The van returns

We shipped our van back from California. It was supposed to arrive in New Jersey a couple of days before we arrived.  When we got to New Jersey though, there was no sign of the van. Turns out that the truck it was on broke down. We've spent 5 days trying to track down it's location, to discover it was still in Arizona!  We been cramming our three car seats into the backseat of a small 5 passenger rental car until the van finally made it back today!