9 Years

Today Paul and I are celebrating our 9 year anniversary. It's hard to believe it's been 9 years already..in some ways it's hard to remember life before we were married. In other ways it seems like our wedding was just yesterday. We've both changed a lot and been through a lot of changes in these past 9 years. I'm thankful the changes have brought us closer together. And I'm so thankful to be married to a man that puts family first and works so hard to provide for us. He is a wonderful father, a great husband and a good friend. I can't imagine my life without him.

He is in a bit of trouble though..we were not going to exchange gifts for our anniversary this year. I obliged. He didn't. He surprised me with diamond earrings hidden inside a new purse. He gave that to me before our trip over the weekend. (The earrings were actually a replacement pair - I had lost a single diamond earring a few years ago and now I have a complete set..Isn't that thoughtful) And today he had flowers waiting for me downstairs when I came down for breakfast. Tonight we're going out to dinner to celebrate..maybe we'll stop by the mall and I'll let him pick out something...

Crabs, the Worlds Largest Beachball and a Celebrity Sighting

The girls and I had our first girls weekend this weekend! My bff Erin came from Ohio and we all drove up to Baltimore to visit our old friend Jayna and her adorable 3 year old daughter Lexie. Paul took Jacob to Florida to visit his grandmother (and though I really, really missed him I totally did OK with the separation). They had a great time in FL and the girls and I had a great time in Baltimore.

After we dropped the boys off at the airport we headed out on our road trip. The first stop was Aunt Pam's where we had lunch and a nice time running around her yard to get out some energy. Luckily we missed rush hour traffic in DC and got to Baltimore late in the afternoon. On tap for Friday was a crab dinner and we were not disappointed! I've had crab legs a ton but never whole crabs. They were good but a lot of work. Emma and Lexie had a great time using the mallet to smash the crabs. Helpful really.

Saturday we decided to spend the day at the Inner Harbor. Another old friend from Philly met us down there. It was a beautiful day and when we got down to the Harbor we discovered that Carnival Cruise Line was holding a Festival to promote their upcoming sailing from the Port of Baltimore. First up was pictures by the Worlds Largest Beachball. As we were waiting in line we overheard two promotions girls talking about Ace of Cakes. We made Emma go ask them if Ace of Cakes was coming and lo and behold they told us Duff was on his way! We love, love Ace of Cakes and on our list of to-do's for Baltimore was to drive by Charm City Cakes. We were so excited when Duff came out and we got to see him do some filming for the show. If I can figure out how to upload pics from my phone I'll post one! It was very cool!!

The rest of the day we spent checking out the Carnival attractions and the Inner Harbor. We did go up to the Top of the World or whatever that tall building is there and check out the whole city. The girls had a great time though I did have to bribe them to keep from waiting in a one hour plus line for a balloon animal! We did drive by Charm City Cakes and I got some pics...sadly the bakery is only open by appointment. Saturday night we ordered pizza and watched a movie.

Today we went to a park and lunch then headed back home. A return to stop to Aunt Pam's to visit was also on the agenda. All in all a great weekend! Lots of fun with just the girls, lots of fun catching up with old friends and lots of fun visiting a new city and seeing a celebrity!

And That Makes Three

Jacob's top left tooth finally cut through last night. That makes 3 teeth total..the two bottom ones which are completely up now and the top one. Oh my..my baby is growing up waaayyy too fast. My girls were just getting teeth at 6 months and this one has 3. Crazy...

Trash and Treasures

A few months ago my friend Joy was telling me about a yard sale they had last year and how she and our other friend Frances made almost $500 each. I said “sign me up”...I’ve got an attic full of crap, I mean treasures , that I could sell. Of course I waited until this week to start getting stuff together for the sale. So, I’ve been working all week to go through the house and get things together. There are three families participating and that equals a lot of crap, I mean treasures. Joy lives near some pretty major streets so hopefully we’ll get a lot of traffic. I almost choked when Joy said we had to be at her house at 6am (seriously! 6am) to get everything in driveway and organized. I guess the hard-core yard salers get started before the crack of dawn. Which seems pretty crazy to me but then again I think needing to be somewhere before 8am on a Saturday is just crazy. So here's hoping my trash is someone's treasure....

Yummy!

My little man started eating food about a month ago. He hasn't been a big fan of food so far but he did seem to enjoy the carrots he had last night. See:

Easter

Happy Easter! Hope you all had a wonderful holiday weekend! This year we went to Easter service at church on Saturday night. The pastor had been asking regular attenders to think about going on Saturday night to make room for more visitors on Sunday morning. Since we're a family of 6 that would free up 2 seats in service and 4 spaces for kids we decided to do that. (Note to self: next time double check the service times so you get there with plenty of time to spare, not right on time so that the parking lot is full and you have to ride the shuttle) It was a little strange not to be going to church Sunday morning but we had plenty to do! We checked out the Easter baskets in the morning then headed over to Nana's for breakfast and an egg hunt. Cool Aunt Mimi brought several friends over so the kids were totally entertained the entire morning. After that we came home and rested then Nana and Mimi came over for a nice dinner. Dinner came out well and Paul made a great pie for dessert. A great day! Here are a few pictures:

Back in the Day

We're at the dermatologist office this morning for Emma. We're waiting for the doctor, Emma is sitting in the examine chair and I'm sitting across from her. There's soft music being piped into the room via an overhead speaker.

E: Mommy, do you hear that music?
Me: Yes, I do
E: Do you know this song?
Me: Yes, I do
E: Do you know it because you were, you know, born back in the day?
Me: laughing...I guess so
E: Yeah...you know all kinds of songs because you were born back in the day....

Life from a 6 year olds perspective...

At Your Age

So, ya'll know I've been battling with Strep Throat this year. I'm up to 4 times now since December. Yes...that's a lot and yes, it's annoying. My last bout was the weekend before last and I ended up in the ER all for them to tell me I had a sore throat. Seriously. But, that's a whole other story. So I kept getting told to follow up with an ENT dr to see about getting my tonsils out.

So today was my appointment with said ENT doc. I arrive promptly on time and wait about 3 minutes in the waiting room..go back to the room..waited about 1 minute and the doc came in. He examined my mouth, nose and ears. Said my tonsils were OK and that it was a bad year for strep. Very bad. Then he goes into a speech about how "at your age" getting your tonsils out is not an easy procedure. "At your age" the recovery time for a tonsillectomy is about 1 1/2 - 2 weeks. So "at your age" I should wait and see..if I get strep 2 more times in the next 4 months then we'll talk seriously about the tonsils coming out. He seriously said "at your age" about 6 times. Geez..you'd think I was 100 or something. He was in and out of the room in about 7 minutes. So from my arrival to my departure was about 20 min and about $150. Good times..."at my age"...

Goodbye Letter

Dear ER,
I can't believe our relationship has come to close. I remember when I first met you 15 (holy crap!) years ago. I remember how my roommate Tobi really wanted to to watch you and I agreed. We were hooked from the first episode. That innocent Dr. Carter just grabbed our attention and our hearts. I've seen many of your characters come and go and come back again. I watched you faithfully on Thursday nights for years and then when I could no longer stay up until 11pm to watch you live I DVR'd you to watch on Friday nights. I seriously can't believe we've had 15 years together. It's been a great 15 years...you'll be missed but thankfully you are in syndication so I'll see you around. One more thing, thanks for doing a great job wrapping up the characters stories this season. I have a thing about closure and I'm glad to know everyone is happy. I think you've had a great finale season. Goodbye....

Table For 12

Have y'all seen this new show on TLC? Now that Jon & Kate are "taking a break for a little bit" this family has replaced them (at least for now). This family not only has twins and sextuplets like J & K but they also have another set of twins (that's 10 kids total!) and one of the sextuplets has cerebral palsey. The family is VERY different from the Gosselins. Now, you know I've been a big fan of J & K in the past but lately I feel their "celebrity" is taking it's toll on the show and on them (and their fake orange tans are really grating on my nerves). I think their show is totally staged now and it's like an oversized commerical for some product or place. Plus Kate's OCD drives me nuts. On the contrast, Betty Hayes seems totally laid back and so into her family. In the first episode she hestitated to enjoy her birthday day at the spa. I noticed the kids weren't in matching Gymboree clothes and she wasn't obsessed with cleanliness. The mom seemed so normal to have so many kids. Anyway, if you are obsessed with big family shows like I am you should check them out...