Happy Birthdays!

This year we got to celebrate two birthdays in one week! Abria turned three on Monday, and Miss Z turned 4 on Thursday. Our week was filled with celebrations. On Tuesday we took the girls out to 'The Pop Shoppe', their favorite restaurant. It was great to escape the heat and enjoy dinner together. Ironically, 2 of the 3 girls nibbled at their food-too engrossed with chocolate milk and too excited about gifts to have much of an appetite.
We continued the celebration on Wednesday when Andy's family came over. Despite the oppressive heat and humidity we all had a great time watching the girls play and open gifts.
Abria is getting the hang of being 3. For a very long time, when talking about birthdays, she would insist she was turning 5-after all, her sister is 5 and she gets to do so much more than a 2 year old. Alette is now insisting that she is 5 and 1/2.

Ice Cream

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice-cream! The weather has been sticky, hot and humid. We've escaped to various a/c locales-thank goodness my girls never grow tired of visiting the bookstore or the petstore. However, this Friday we were bound to be stuck indoors waiting for the city inspector (who gave a estimated time range of 10am to 3pm). So we made it an ice-cream day. The girls had ice-cream with their morning waffles, we did some writing about ice-cream, did an ice-cream craft, and of course, made ice-cream. Making ice-cream in a baggie in your kitchen is not recommended. The bags leaked, the girls quickly got tired of all the shaking and eventually I just stuck the concoctions in the freezer and hoped for the best. A couple of hours later, the girls enjoyed some remarkably good tasting ice-cream!

Pizza Night

We've been reading 'Pete's a Pizza' by William Steig, a very funny and sweet book. We turned Alette into a pizza, did a pizza collage, made playdough pizza and then finally, made pizza ourselves. Alette usually wants to help in the kitchen but loses interest after a very short while. This time though she stuck through-mixing up and kneading the dough, then rolling and stretching it out. Of course it helps that pizza is one of her favorite meals :) and despite the whole wheat crust, she enthusiastically ate several pieces (once she had pulled off all the cheese of course).

Summer =Pool Days

We have been blessed to have wonderful friends with pools. Summer days mean pool days! We've been hanging out at the DiMarcs since Alette was 6 months old-this is the first year Abria is joining us. She is still a solid napper but can give up the occasional afternoon without severe consequences. She has taken to the water like a fish and is determined to hit the deepend soon. When I catch her trying to swim out past my reach she states 'Mommy, you no see me okay?'. Alette in the meantime is also venturing out (something that has taken her a very long time). It helps that the other little girls there are a year or two older and she so desperately loves to be with them. So while they all jump off the diving board, she steps on it, shakes in nervous anticipation, then gets off and slips into the water by the side. I'm trying not to interfere....I'm sure I'll miss her first jump in.

PAWS Farm

We finally made it out to PAWS Farm-a small farm/nature center in Mt. Laurel. It is one of Alette's favorite spots and she had been bugging me to take her since spring. Unfortunately it is not a great place to be if it is raining or too hot, so we've postponed and postponed....
Despite the threat of showers, the weather turned out terrific and we had a great time petting the animals, playing 'vet' and even got to listen to some stories and make a butterfly craft. All day I had to hear 'Mommy, maybe for my birthday I can get a turtle, ...maybe I can get a snake....maybe I can get a lizard'. The girls don't seem to quite understand that we are at maximum capacity for pets.

Our First "Camping" Trip

I'm not sure it qualifies as camping if you are in someone's backyard! Our caregroup opted out of a hotel/house retreat and instead we all pitched tents in the Messanger's backyard. The girls had an absolute riot running around with all the other children. They got to toast marshmellows and Abria even toasted a hotdog, although all she ate was the bun. Very little sleep occured....and we were all exhausted and sore the next day (funny how even sleeping on the lawn gets hard after a couple of hours).

Random Pictures

Abria enjoys her treat at our homeschool co-op. We are now done for the spring semester and while it makes my life easier (no more prepping for classes, packing lunches...), we miss our friends!


Our 'pool' is really too small for the girls...but it is the perfect size for making soup, which is what the girls were doing a couple of weeks ago. First they picked various herbs/weeds, plopped them in the water and stirred like mad. After awhile, they got bored and started watering the lawn, one cup at a time.


The girls knocked out after a long day in NYC at the children's music fest.


For mother's day, Andy treated me to a picnic in the park with the girls. It was a perfect day. I rode for awhile in the afternoon, came home to shower, then was treated to an evening out. We hung out at Cooper River park for awhile. Andy made a great salad, bread, and roasted asparagus for us-mac/cheese for the girls. Thank you for making my life as a mom so wonderful!


Alette's 'I cannot believe you are taking a picture of me' stare.