Independence Day

Happy (belated) 4th of July! I hope everyone had a fun and safe holiday, celebrating our great country's independence!

We had a fantastic holiday. Chet was off Thursday (and obviously Friday). We were  invited to go to both Ocean City, MD and Salisbury, MD (approximately 30 minutes from each other), so we did both! 

We left for Salisbury at 6:30 a.m. on Friday (we wanted to avoid Thursday afternoon/evening holiday weekend traffic), and it was smooth sailing all the way. We stopped in Easton, MD (a little further than halfway to Salisbury) and had breakfast at Panera Bread.  It was the perfect place to stop, and Hurricane Arthur was keeping the July temperatures very low -- a nice surprise!

Us leaving early, all decked out in their 4th of July garb:

We arrived in Salisbury at 10 a.m., and had a fantastic, relaxing day (we also spent the night).  (The people we stayed with are the parents of Chet's good friend James -- an Academy roommate.)  The girls played with new-to-them toys (we literally brought two toys from home with us -- a stuffed dog and a stuffed horse) that our hosts had on hand for their own grandchildren.  We also ate a ton of amazing food.

(Bubby wasn't feeling well Friday or Saturday, but he rallied on Sunday morning.  Hence the reason there are hardly any pictures of him from this trip.)

The weather cleared up early Friday afternoon and we spent the rest of the day outdoors, mostly fishing:

(See that cat in the background?  Sydney loved it so much it scratched her -- lesson learned!  Maybe...)

Chet dipping Syd in the lake:

Post-bath and pooped:

Saturday morning, before we headed to Ocean City, Chet and I took the girls on the paddle boat:

L's Permahawk

Pre-Ocean City hair braiding:

It should have only taken us 30 minutes to get to Ocean City from Salisbury, but it took us over two hours, due to holiday/weekend traffic.  The kids were troopers though.

The sponsor family I was assigned at the Academy owns a condo on the beach in Ocean City, and they were who invited us down.  I went to two of their three daughters' weddings last year (in Baltimore with Sydney) and the year before (in San Diego with Lorelei).  They are so much fun, and they really do feel like family.  When we finally arrived in Ocean City we changed into our bathing suits and spent the rest of the day on the beach (from 2 p.m. until after 7 p.m.).  You'd think the girls had died and gone to heaven.  And we had so many extra (adult) hands to help us that Chet and I weren't even a tiny bit stressed out.  Bubby mostly napped; the warm (but not too hot) weather and roar of the ocean waves kept lulling him in and out of sleep.

Our original plan was to head home after the beach, to avoid Sunday traffic, but we were convinced to stay.  We ate crabs and chicken wings for dinner, and watched the 4th of July fireworks show from the condo's balcony (the show was moved from Friday to Saturday due to Hurricane Arthur).  Adding our family to the mix meant there were 12 people staying in the two-bedroom condo, but we all made it work (and we were generously given the master bedroom).  Bubby slept in the Pack 'n' Play, and the rest of us slept in the king-sized bed.

Bubby feeling better

We left Ocean City at 10 a.m., and ran into plenty of traffic on the way home (I'm SO glad we left when we did -- I can't imagine how bad traffic got as the day progressed).  We stopped at the same Panera Bread on the way home, and arrived in Alexandria around 3 p.m.

It truly was the perfect weekend.  Chet and I couldn't get over how happy and well-behaved the girls were.  It seems we were all in desperate need of a change of scenery.  (The girls reminded me on Monday though that they are human -- not angels -- so don't be gettin' jealous.)  :-)

In case you think your eyes might be failing you because you didn't see a single beach picture, rest assured that your eyes are fine. We left our phones in the condo, so we had nothing to document the occasion.  It was nice to "unplug" for a while.  Here are our beach babes (soon after we returned home), and Syd's tan line:

I hope you're 4th was great!  On to Labor Day!

Maintenance

I fixed the pictures on my last post, "Twins and Breakfast," because they were gigantic, and you may have noticed that there were two different fonts and that they kept flip flopping.  All of that is because I usually blog from my iPhone, the most convenient medium for me to blog.  It all looks great on my phone, and then I bring it up on the computer and WHOA!  So, just in case you are Type A and the devil-may-care fonts and gigantic pictures give you a nervous twitch, please know I am not purposely torturing you.  Trust me, it bothers me too.

(By the way, I still can't make the font all the same size on the "Twins and Breakfast" post.  Sometimes blogging is more enigmatic than that electrical engineering class I had to take at the Academy, where the professor was from China and spoke very little English.  True story.)

I am working on a 4th of July post, so stay tuned!

Happy Monday!

Twins and Breakfast

Maybe not TWINS, but they do look an awful lot alike (Lorelei and Ford). I still think Ford will turn out to look a little like each of his sisters.

This was a weird angle, therefore Ford appears three times larger than Lorelei, and it impossible to compare their looks. Lorelei doesn't like to get too close to Ford (even though I kept telling her, "Scoot closer to your brother!"); his grabbing at her tends to freak her out. (Syd loves it.) And check out L's perma-hawk (what I'm calling her permanent Mohawk). 

Besides looks, they have the burp rag thing in common (neither is a paci-aholic like Syd was):

These were both taken in the car this morning (Lorelei thought I was handing her my phone, which is why she is reaching out, desperately). 

Speaking of being in the car this morning, the thought of cooking breakfast today was dreadful. So we loaded into the car early and motored over to the closest McDonald's drive thru. I am running out of breakfast ideas. I feel like we do it all, but part of the problem is that someone is always slightly miffed at breakfast because Syd and L have opposite tastes in food (although that doesn't mean I make two different meals, no siree).

Syd's likes: anything sweet (donuts, cinnamon rolls), oatmeal, bacon, hard-boiled eggs

Lor's likes: toast, sausage, scrambled eggs

Both like fruit, neither likes waffles. And if one likes a certain cereal, you can guarantee the other doesn't. I'm convinced they are conspiring against me.

Chubby Bubby

Ford took a three-hour and eight-minute nap this afternoon (unheard of), so I figured he must be growing. Then I proved myself right when I compared a picture I took of him yesterday:

...to a picture I took a little while ago:

He obviously gained at least three pounds in 24 hours. No, it could not possibly be due to camera angle or his position or a too-full diaper--it was all the nap.

Lorelei, according to my iPhone

Time for Lorelei's iPhone picture dump!

Syd actually took this picture. Isn't it sweet?

I guess you can call this a bit of a sneak peek of their room (I REALLY need to post house pictures!). I've tried to break out of my comfort zone regarding wall hangings at this new house, and this is a perfect example (although part of the reason I hung their names so high is because I don't want them tearing the letters off the wall). And she's wearing toddler work out gear.

She's a pretty good eater, most of the time (she might not be my child since she doesn't simply devour sweets). She also no longer sits in this high chair (which we got for Ford, used)--she has graduated to Sydney's Sweet Seat (a type of booster seat), and Syd has graduated to a regular chair.

Wingnut (wearing Syd's night gown).

Chet was feeding Ford some baby food (not sure why they were sitting on the couch for that), and Lorelei announced she wanted to help. She retrieved a baby spoon and a Croc, and commenced "feeding" him. It was equally hilarious and disgusting. (Don't worry, we shut down the operation pretty quickly.)

She loves making play messes. Sydney never really did that (DEFINITELY my child), but Lorelei has taught her well, and now they both do it. Here is an every day scene in our house.

Peeking out of the playhouse Chet built.

Her "passport" pictures from the two weeks she and Syd went to camp.

Chet wanted to visit Trader Joe's on Father's Day.

At Syd's gymnastics class.

Sacked out on the couch later the same day (gymnastics meant a missed nap).

At her camp sing-a-long--she was so little and cute (and was thrilled when she spotted me in the crowd)!

Having a snack outside of the library (in her bathing suit--in her/my defense, there IS a fountain nearby).

See! A fountain! Her hair is completely out of control, by the way. She has always had baby-fine hair, but now there is TONS of new growth, causing all of that fine hair to stick straight up and make her look like a troll. Watch, she'll probably have thick, luscious hair some day, more than all of us combined. And I will be completely baffled as to where it came from.

Uncooperative.

We love you, Lor! (Try not to covet the peach-colored tile in our bathroom.)