VA-CAY....

We took our first ever "family vacation" (defined as all 5 of us, for FUN, relaxation, etc...) up to my extended-family's Lake House in Michigan. We were up there for 6 days and it was WONDERFUL...so great.


There's the house. Love that place. we spent many, many weeks there as kids and it was my first trip back to the place in 17 years. yikes. Fortunately, nothing ever changes there. Really, it's like a time warp. Ok, there was one GREAT change- the place now has Central A/C. The house is somewhere around 80 years old, so it never had A/C as we vacationed there as kids. That was fine with us then. Not so fine now. I've turned total sissy. It's fine, I admit it. I love A/C.

This place is very special to our family. loved it.


the greatest part, outside of just seeing/spending time with our extended family, was that our kids got to really experience "the Lake House" that i grew up loving. This is where i learned to ski, this is where we have tons of memories swimming, playing with cousins, eating tacos... not sure why I always associate The Lake=Tacos, but I do. =)

Cocktail Hour on the patio... and, this is the ONLY picture I have of my wonderful-sweet-love-her sister-in-law Jen...

our nephew Evan's first experience with the Lake. I think he loved it. you can tell.

Awesome Mitchell in his "SK8R" shirt he wore in honor of SuperUncleKelly.

Ainsley loved this ride WAY more than she liked tubing behind the ski boat.
THIS is where she spent most of her time while the boat was out... tucked under the dashboard-area. "hiding from the wind" she told us... she was happy, though!


THIS is, for sure, where Elise was happiest!! no surprise there. She's our fearless one.

She was a fan of the jet-ski, too...even after she and Adam ran out of gas on the far side of the Lake and floated for 45 minutes before SUK rescued them.
Uncle Paul took Ainsley out for a spin. She liked the dock better, but she was ok with the jetski.


Also, we WORE THEM OUT! All three kids slept between 13 and 14 hours each night. LOVED IT!

Mitchell was happy as long as he was JUMPING somewhere...into the water, off the patio, off a piece of furniture...my boy.
SUK on the tube. His back was in spasm for days afterwards... I guess we're not 29 anymore, eh, Kelly? The tube+skiing+really old crappy mattresses= many sore backs.

Ainsley, once again, was OK with this activity. She was jabbering the whole time, according to SUK, but she didn't like the water getting in her eyes.

Melanie was a trooper once again, being so patient and sweet with our kids!

It was a relaxing, refreshing, and memorable week. We love our family and are so thankful that we got some quality time with them!!!

Father's Day

On Sunday, June 19th, we spent about 11 hours in the car driving to our first-ever 'family vacation'... (cue Chevy Chase and the Wally-wagon), so the kids and I celebrated Adam on Friday the 17th when he got home from work. It was cute and sweet. He is a wonderful father to our kids and I'm amazed sometimes at how blessed I am to have married him. And he's fun. That helps, too.
The girls colored pictures. Mitchell drooled on stuff and ripped it up. We got him a cool outdoor firepit thing. I think he likes it. we'll see once it's not 100 degrees outside daily.
We had it all set up on the back deck when he got home and the kids loved hiding and yelling "SURPRISE!" since it was 2 days before the actual Father's Day.


I'm sure it wasn't actually a surprise, though. I made a deliciously yummy cake.
We ate dinner, then cake (or maybe we just ate cake...) .

The evening for kids ended (as most evenings do around here!) with all three of them tackling Adam/wrestling together in the living room until several got hurt, started crying, and we called it a night.


HAPPY FATHER'S DAY! If our kids could type or communicate clearly, I'm sure they would express their gratitude to him!

a few more pictures...

just add these shots to yesterday's blog. Elise declared Wednesday's as "PJ/Movie Day" for the summer. Mitchell doesn't like that idea. I went in to the bathroom for 2 minutes (is that TOO much to ask for!?!) Apparently... When I came back, he was on the (very tipsy) 3legged stool on top of the coffee table. And he was so proud of himself.

"huh? who me?"

Then he was happier when he started jumping OFF the coffee table. hilarious. and fairly coordinated, actually.

BOY

Elise and Ainsley were/are pretty 'active' girls. They love to run and play, Ainsley has tons of energy, Elise loves to be crazy and goofy, but NOTHING prepared me for a toddler BOY. So many people said, "Oh, just wait until he's mobile- he'll never slow down. Wait until he runs everywhere and crashes into everything and is a little tornado". I kind of dismissed them and thought, "whatever, my girls are active and exhausting...how much more can a boy do?" Uh... We're there.

Mitchell is a total riot and absolutely a crazy little boy. Ok, I MAY still call him a 'baby boy' around the house, but you didn't hear that from me... it's hard to let this one grow up... and regardless of what ANYONE says, he's NOT TURNING TWO in 3 months.

He's developing quite a little attitude (it was bound to happen- he's around females all day!) and is so adorable..as he's trying to scale the couch, the kitchen table, the tv stand, etc... He also likes to jump off each item as soon as he gets to the top. At least we get warning sometimes- he's got a cute little yell that means "HERE I COME!"...I can recognize it from 2 rooms away and usually get to him in time. usually. The great thing about a boy, though, is that even when they fall from 3 or 4 feet up, they crash, MAYBE cry for 10 seconds, and then want to do it again...

It's really fun. and tiring. I now have more sympathy for my friends that have 3 young boys to chase around... but, whatever... I'd rather deal with THIS than the drama of girls most days!

I went in to get him up the other morning and this sweet little face was smiling at me. I promise his shirt didn't start out like that.


Then he started giggling and pointing to the corner of the guest bed in his room... where he'd thrown every single item out of his crib (with pretty stellar accuracy)...

And then he 'told' me the story of it all... with giggles, pointing, and TONS of joy. I love it.

Also, with the girls, we NEVER had 17 items in the bed with them...I promise! We followed every American Pediatric Association guideline about 'almost nothing in bed until they're two' or something... the girls give him this stuff, he loves it, and then throws it out every day... pretty cute, really.

Cute, cute, cute

The last two weeks have been pretty busy around here. Not only is it GORGEOUS (ok, maybe a little TOO hot at 95degrees, but i'm not complaining...) outside, but we had a few 'end of school year' programs for the girls, and they were adorable. We're thankful that Adam was able to make all three events- the girls were ECSTATIC that Daddy could come and see them even though it was a 'work day'. I think that made it extra special for them.

Ainsley's little school performance was the first one we went to. She and her four classmates were PRECIOUS! They sang 5 songs for their families, complete with hand motions and little dance moves. Ainsley was by far the tallest of them all, she did great with the moves/motions, but her singing voice was very quiet and kind of shy...which is hilarious because at home she's NEVER quiet or shy!



The next week, we went to Elise's school show. A little bigger group with all the 4/5 year olds and it was funny. Elise has been practicing her songs/moves for probably 2 months now, but it was supposed to be a 'secret' for the parents. So for the last few weeks, I'd catch her singing quietly or practicing her moves only to stop immediately and screech, "MOMMY! You can't watch this! It's a SURPRISE!"... cute.

Ainsley and Mitchell heading into the show. Ainsley loves playing the role of 'big helper sister' when Elise isn't around. =)

Best part of the show? Elise and the little guy next to her... they're kind of enemies in her class and were constantly tattling on each other... I got multiple notes from the teacher about it during the year (most often, "He was picking on Elise again..." kind of thing.) Well, during the performance, he kept flailing his arms 'into her space' and bothering her. So she started kind of pushing him away and GLARING at him. It was hilarious. The teacher told us afterwards, "well, that kind of summed up the whole school year for the two of them." Great. Click on this picture and you can see a little bit of it...in that very front right corner. =)

We also got her some cute flowers just to say CONGRATS on a great school year. Kindergarten, here she comes!

Last, but not least, was Elise's gymnastics performance... it was really just their same weekly class with a few extra 'showy' things. And they got little trophies at the end. Elise actually carried around for HOURS that day. Clutched to her chest. Sweet.

Cinderelly, Cinderelly...

I'm SO THANKFUL that all three kids still take some form of "naptime/rest time" everyday. It keeps me sane. Mitchell sleeps almost 3 1/2 hours daily, Ainsley usually rests quietly for one hour and then sleeps for 1 to 1 1/2 hours (seriously, AMEN!), and Elise plays and reads quietly for about 1 1/2 hours and then plays a little louder (recently with her Leapster thingy...) for another 45 minutes. Either way, I almost always have 2+ hours of almost total peace. ....aahhhh, do you hear the angels singing and birds chirping for me? I do!
I usually fill the time with prepping for dinner, cleaning up lunch, exercising if I didn't meet my running buddy that morning, taking a quick shower, catching up on Facebook, emails, blogs, etc... and then cleaning the house. I procrastinate on that one lately, augh. It's just so never-ending. And it seems pointless when I spend 30 minutes cleaning the bathrooms to have them FILTHY again by bedtime... phew.
I realized today that I could procrastinate no more when I could see the slime, filth, paw prints, mud residue, and milk splatters on the floor. I HAD to (on my hands and knees, nonetheless) SCRUB the kitchen/foyer floor. I love my hardwood floors, but hate the fact that the (glaring/blinding) afternoon sun shows all hints of dirt. And there are lots of those 'hints' around here!
As I was working, Elise came downstairs for a second and asked what I was doing (!)... not sipping a margarita, that's for sure... I told her that I had to clean the floors b/c they were a mess. As she walked back upstairs, she mumbled, "wow. my mommy is just like Cinderella."
I guess she's NOT referring to the glamorous-princess-at-the-end-of-the-movie version of Cinderella?! Oh well...it was cute.

I may have mentioned...

that AINSLEY tends to be a bit of a HOARDER (like, REALLY is a hoarder. Her collections of "stuffs" is getting out of control.


This was last weekend. Just riding her bike around the driveway..she can't be content with just riding it. She has to be loaded down with three containers (EACH filled up, of course). The item that day? Some Nerf bowling pins- she would FREAK OUT if anyone got near them...but was perfectly happy to just move them from one bucket to another and then ride them around the driveway. She kept saying they were her "school stuffs" and she was leaving for school that day...
maybe I should actually be concerned about this trend...

(and, yes, Mitchell was heading right for the street. We stopped him in time. Ignore the pink car he's on...ok?_)


But then she goes and gets all adorable about it like this:

These were a set of free bracelets my mom gave us. They're all different colors and say "Ralph Lauren Fragrances" on them (not shocking if you know our family...). She couldn't just wear one or two...but had to have ALL of them on at once. She also got dressed "all by myself" that day. It's hard to set personal pride aside and let her wear outfits like that, but it's really cute, too.


She and Mitchell were being TOO adorable playing on the empty boxes like it was a boat. And, yes, the backpack is full of stuffs too.