Happy Father's Day!

We packed it up and headed to the river Sunday to celebrate Father's Day! It was a gorgeous (VERY windy) day.
Claire was in charge of handing out the cards...

Claire and Daddy opening gifts...

This special "Daddy Hugs" book is just for Daddy and Claire to read together!

Then a photo album of all the pictures of Daddy and Claire from the last year and a poem written by Claire (and Mommy). We did the same thing last year so we called this book "Volume II."

After naps all around, Daddy wanted to try out the new pool in the yard. Claire seemed interested so we put on our suits and joined him!

She LOVED it! The water comes up to her neck so she could stand on the bottom and jump. We had a great time splashing around - thanks PoPa for all your hard work to get the pool up this summer!!

We took a little post-dinner cruise before hitting the road.
Just before leaving as we were packing up the car, I noticed Claire dancing to the music with her own relection in the dishwasher :-)

100!!!

Wow, this is my 100th blog post!

Today we went to Stony Point mall to play in the fountain after our stroller strides class. The place was PACKED! I guess we weren't the only ones who thought it would be a fun thing to do on a hot day. We met up with most of our playgroup friends and let the kids go wild. Claire wasn't too excited by it - maybe just a little too overwhelming. I think she had fun, but she never really got in the water.

Today is also a special day because...

It's our 5 year wedding anniversary!!!

Good Morning Neighbors!

I told the neighbors ahead of time that we would be causing a lot of noise early Saturday morning so they can't say they weren't warned!

We had a tree in our backyard (the tallest one actually) that needed to come down and a few other dead ones nearby. Andy and his crew worked so hard all morning and it was very interesting to watch. See the little red speck up in the tree? That's my brother!

Now we have a big gaping hole in our backyard where the tree used to be. What to do with that space???


The guys did a great job. If anyone out there needs some tree work done, here's my recommendation...

See the resemblance?

This was a dress of mine that my mom had saved. In the picture, I was 17 months and Claire is actually 20, but I do see a resemblance! (Most people always say she looks just like Daddy.) She was not interested in doing a photo shoot that day, but I managed to get one similar to the picture of me.

Memorial Weekend

Why do long weekends seem so short?! We crammed alot of things into our Memorial Weekend and it feels like summer has begun now!

We headed down to the river Sunday to spend the day. (Also an early birthday celebration for PoPa!) The weather was great and we got to play outside, read and relax, and enjoy hanging out with the family. The only time it rained was for the 10 minutes or so that we tried to go for a boat ride!
Claire played with bubbles, sidewalk chalk, and in the sandbox (horseshoe pit)

This was Claire's first trip back since last summer and so the first time being there that she could walk. Kind of a different experience now that I have to chase her around!

Claire is definitely in "mommy mode," but every once in a while I was able to sneak away and have some quiet time to myself. At one point, I was literally hiding on the pier while she played with PoPa and Abu. (She's fine with everyone when I'm not around, but if I'm in sight it's "Mommy Mama Mommy Mama" Cute at first, but it gets old!) Here's Claire and Uncle Jake watching cartoons and having a snack.

For Memorial Day, we took it easy in the morning and after naptime headed over to Uncle Andy and Aunt Tara's house. They just got back from vacation and we were excited to hear all about their trip!

Claire had a fun surprise waiting for her in the backyard...

She doesn't understand that you're not supposed to get in the water table so most of the time she had one foot in and one foot on the ground.

Tara showed her the beanbag game and Claire showed Tara that it's much easier if you sit on it and throw from there!

Having a delicious cook-out with the family.

Racing with Sam The Man

Claire and I were out supporting the Autism Society of America this morning at their annual 5K. We knew a couple teams this year and we were really proud to cheer on my cousin, Sam "The Man!" Here he is coming down the home stretch...

Congratulations Sam for raising a ton of money and doing a great job in the race!

Here's Claire with her first official race bib! Even though I've done a couple races with her before, this is the first one that she was registered...if I could find where they are posting the results I will have to take a picture of her name and her "official time" :-)

*Edited to add.....I found the results! And look who won first place in her age group :-)

I'm not sure if they were kidding, but when we crossed the finish, they told me I was the first one with a stroller to finish! (If it's true, I would have pushed to go a little faster so I'd have a decent time! I think I take after my Dad with my competitive nature!)

She got her own race packet with t-shirt....just a tad too big.

We were happy to participate and support a great cause - over $35,000 was raised for the Central Virginia Chapter of the Autism Society. WOW!

A Berry Fun Day!

(yeah, I know it's cheesy.....couldn't help myself)

Claire and I joined our buddy Tanner (and his mom Lisa) at the Chesterfield Berry Farm today for some strawberry picking! I remember going as a kid to pick berries and my favorite thing was roasting hot dogs on sticks over a fire. (They still do that by the way!)

Here we are on the hayride over to the berry fields...


As soon as we got there, Claire knew exactly what to do...

Lisa and I only picked up the small baskets because we really thought it would only keep the kids interest for a few minutes. To our surprise, they stayed right by us and let us pick berries as long as we wanted.

one for each hand...

Covered head to toe in strawberry juice!

After the hayride back, they had all kinds of activities for the kids including farm animals and a bounce house...

They also have a huge corn kernel play area - what a fun idea! Claire could barely walk through it. Mostly, I was trying to make sure she didn't eat them since she loves to eat her freeze-dried corn!


I got in with her and managed to get corn kernels all in my pants! (You should have seen the look on this guy's face when I was going into the bathroom and asked Lisa to watch Claire so I could "get this corn out of here!") Even at home, corn was falling out of Claire's shoes, shirt, and diaper!


Yummy! Time to go to the store for some pound cake and cool whip!