Maine Vacation!

Lily, Stella, and Claire - our Alpha Delta Pi Legacy ladies!

We took a break last weekend because we were on vacation in Maine visiting Mommy's friend Stacy from College.  She, her husband Aaron, and her daughter Lily were such gracious hosts!  We all had a great time away!  We visited the Ocean, Mom got to indulge in a Lobster feast (the rest of us weren't all that interested in the delicacy from the sea) played and played and played, and had a fun stop in New Hampshire on our way back to New York.  Here are a few pics:

Claire snuggling with Lily

Stella making the best of riding in the car

Lily's doggy Harris keeping Stella company

First smore's experience - yummy!

Sisterly love @ Popham Beach, ME

Claire toddling along - she walked about a million
tiny steps that day!

We spent the night in North Conway, NH on our way back to NY to have some family time.  This little gem of a town had so many fun things to do.  We were there just a short time and spent most of it at the Children's Museum.  They hosted a live animal viewing the day we were there - we saw a fox, and were also able to pet a baby pig and an iguana too!

 Dad played an early round of golf while we there and we enjoyed the playground at the outlets for a bit!

Making music on stage!

Climbing around at the Children's Museum

Playing dress up at the Children's Museum!

Center Stage at the museum!

Playground fun in North Conway!

As always there's plenty to do at home as well.  Daddy and Stella enjoyed a little nap this week, probably the last one of the summer.  We also went to the SUNY Potsdam Welcome Weekend Carnival this week which was really fun.  Most of the activities were too advanced for Claire-Bear but she didn't care - she had a blast anyway!

Claire making her own stuffed animal Duck
at the carnival.  Stella made a unicorn!

Claire and her own game of twister!

Hot Days and a Road Trip

with 'Auntie' Caroline and Esme at the NICU Reunion

We took a road trip with grammie today for a visit with Caroline and Esme and to check out the annual NICU Reunion.  We had the chance to see the Mars Family, Carlene, Eddie, and Ty, and had a few moments with some special staff from the NICU.  A great time was had by all!

Children in the Corn! @ Shelburne Farms, VT

    Claire playing in the barn at Shelburne Farms.  She loved the horsey, and found a book and some play food to occupy herself after we pulled her away from the corn pool...

Stella in her new NICU Graduate tee

Stella got to cool off in our neighbors pool this week and she had lots of fun!   Thank you Lorri for inviting us over!  Claire-Bear loves to toddle around the yard with her new Mickey watering can (and Stella's Dora can when she can steal it away) and water the grass.  Here she's taking a little break from all the hard work!

Summerfest

This weekend the girls had fun at the Tri-Town Summer Festival.  They enjoyed having Aunt Mary Jane and cousin Logan and his step sister Alisa over to watch the parade.  This year we checked out the Carnival of Fun for the first time and other than some tears over waiting patiently for their turn the girls absolutely loved the games and bounce houses!  We didn't get any pics this time but it was a fun weekend!  We are looking forward to heading to Burlington next Sunday for a visit with Caroline, Caleb, and Esme and for the NICU Reunion.

July 2013 Photos

We are continuing to have a fun summer and are enjoying lots of family time.  It's sad to realize that summer is just about half over.  We plan to make the most of what's left during August.  We have a day trip to Burlington planned as well as a trip to Maine to see Stacy, Aaron, and Lily.  We can't wait!
(For those of you on Facebook sorry for the duplicate photo posts!)

Climbing at the playground!  Claire loved this too - she tried to climb onto the top so
taking a picture wasn't an option...

Helping sweep out Miss Katy's trailer

Stella's new shirt Pastor Gregg helped her make!

Passing some time on a rainy day

Enjoying the Sunshine!

The girls are enjoying the summer sunshine and spending lots of time at home with their dad.  Claire is getting so big and is starting to put sentences together with her growing vocabulary.  Here are a few pics from the last few weeks!

Their new slide is really fun!

Both girls love to swing super high!

New dolly - Claire picked Tiana

New dolly - Stella picked Sophia

Sleeping Beauties :)

Racing down the driveway is always fun!

Summer Fun!

 The past week was rather eventful...Stella attended princess camp every morning, and had a wonderful time!  She made crafts, played dress up and got to meet four disney princesses.










This created some quality time for Daddy and Claire to spend together with lots of funny moments like the one below...

With the warm weather we try to find some different ways to stay cool.  A small pool has been very enjoyable; as well as a slip and slide! 

Stella is a Diva!

It is also a great time of year to spend time with friends.  The girls were able to play with the Britton girls on a couple of different occasions.  They seem to truly enjoy each others company and look forward to our girls growing up together.

Old McDonald's Farm

Pony Rides!

 This week was lots of fun!  Mom had a nice long weekend so we planned a day trip to Old McDonald's Farm.  The girls had a great time!

Here are some fun pics from the day as well as a few others from this week!

Stella thought the tractor was really cool!  Both girls picked out a
toy tractor to bring home with them too!

The bounce houses were LOTS of fun! 
Possibly the highlight of the farm...

                                          Feeding the goats was also a treat both girls enjoyed!

  This week we also enjoyed a cool ice cream treat at Stewarts down the street and bought a new pool to splash around in!

Playset Under Construction!

Both girls love to be pushed high and tell us so frequently!

The girls are so excited about their new swing set!  The slide has been together all week but they were able to enjoy the swings for the first time this weekend.  They just LOVE having this in the backyard and we do too!  Once the roof is on it will be complete!
 

Splashing around on a hot day!

Todd's in NY & Todd's in OH

This weekend half of our family traveled to Ohio to be with the Hooley's.  Stella and Daddy ventured off on a trip to help with their church's 'Believe in Belize' golf tournament to raise money toward a mission trip Dan will be going on with several youth group members this summer.  Based on a few phone conversations it sounds like the tournament went great and that Stella is having a fun time with her cousins!  Mommy and Claire stayed home this weekend and they had fun too - at Bella's birthday party on Saturday and dinner with Aunt MJ and Uncle Neil on Sunday.  It's definitely different having just one little girl toddling after you rather than two, but having time one-on-one with the girls has also been a special treat.  Everyone's looking forward to seeing each other again tomorrow night though!

Earlier this week going for a walk on campus after Mommy finished work

Happy Father's Day 2013

As we've heard Dora sing over and over again this week 'Feliz dia de los padres' today is Father's Day!  Our girls are so fortunate to have a 'new school' dad! (at least that's what we call it)  Millennial dad's are involved with their children's lives in very different ways than previous generations and our house is no exception.  Stella and Claire are blessed with a lot of quality time with their dad - all summer vacation, the commute to and from daycare most days, at school events, shopping trips with the whole family - even if it's just to the grocery store, golf lessons (yes, they've already started!), story time, and bedtime snuggles.  There's no parenting task I do that Randy won't and for that I'm very grateful.  I know our girls are going to really look up to and appreciate their dad when they are older and all of this time they have together now will bring back such fond memories for them!

We want to give a big shout out to all of the people who helped us out this Saturday.  Although I wasn't home most of the day it was really productive around our house!  Thank you to Adam Britton and the McCarthy family for helping Randy start the huge project of putting together the girls new swing set.  The rain put off any hope of continuing work on it today but we have a great start thanks to everyone's help.  Thank you to Aunt Mary Jane and 'Niece for looking after the girls while everyone was preoccupied.   And lastly but certainly not least, thank you to cousin Logan for putting together Claire's new dresser.   We are so blessed to have such great family and friends in our lives who continually support us!

Cousins!

Cousins, from left to right: Haley, Skye, Stella, Claire, Cailin, Dana, and Logan!

 
We had a terrific week spending time with all of our cousins.  We are so glad everyone was able to visit NY and that we could spend time with family and friends.  We finished off the week with a surprise celebration for papa's 60th birthday - great fun was had by all!

Parade Week

Claire-Bear snuggling with Papa before bed

This week the girls were able to enjoy not one but two parades!  Spending time with Grammie and Pa in Canton for both made them all the more fun!

Claire's Memorial Day T-Shirt

On Monday we watched the Memorial Day Parade.  Grammie was in the parade as usual and Stella thought seeing her march by was pretty neat!  Neither of the girls seemed bothered by the volleys of shots in memory and honor of our fallen soldiers.  The Boyscouts were handing out flags and the girls caught on to waiving the red white and blue pretty quickly.While the girls are a little young to truly understand the meaning of this important day we hope the parade will become an annual tradition for them just as it was for us when we were growing up.  For this year we made some fun t-shirts and just watched the groups pass by. 

Waiting on the street for the Memorial Day Parade

This weekend was the Dairy Princess Festival in Canton.  On Friday night Grammie and I took the girls to the park to see the Big Wheel Race.  Stella will be old enough for this next year so we thought it would fun for her to see it.  There was a lot of excitement in the park.  We had some dinner there and the girls played in the bounce house for the little kids.  Claire loved it so much it was hard to pull her away from it!  On Saturday Aunt Mary Jane and Grammie came along with us to the parade.  (I really enjoyed their company but I was also so very grateful for their help because Daddy's out of town coaching golf).

The girls completely wiped out after a fun day
at the Dairy Princess Parade.

Stella hanging out waiting for Claire
to come out of the van after a quick trip to the store.

The girls are getting really exited for another fun week.  The Perrin's will be visiting from Hawaii this week so we'll be spending more time at Grammie and Pa's house.  The Hooley's will be coming in for the weekend too so it should be lots of fun!