Connecticut (vacation part 2)

After New York City, we headed to Connecticut to stay with Nate and Kylie for a day. They took us on a walk up to a lighthouse on the beach in the late afternoon. It was so pretty.

I'm holding a little crab that we found in the tidal pools among the rocks. Funny story - Jed and Ryan were both betting each other to pick it up, and they were touching it timidly and then chickening out every time. When I walked over and saw it, I shamed them both by immediately picking it up. GIRLS RULE! :)

We hung out at Nate and Kylie's home on Sunday. Jed and Nate enjoyed watching clips of Office highlights together. Benjamin sure enjoyed it too! He wiggled in between them until they made a space for him too.

New York City (vacation part 1)

Leaving for the East Coast... Let's get this show on the road!

We left for the East Coast on June 27 for a week and a half of family visiting and fun. :) We drove to New Jersey first and arrived just as Jed's parents, Ryan and Michel, flew in. The following day we met up with Nate (Jed's bro) and Kylie (who live in Connecticut for law school) and headed out on the train for a day in New York City. We walked from Penn Station to Times Square, Madison Square Garden, Central Park... We even passed the Naked Cowboy. I begged Jed to let me get a picture with him, but alas... :)

Benjamin is pointing to an approaching train. Look at what a cute Daddy he has. Jed is holding Benny up and sharing in his excitement. These train rides to and from NYC were very exciting for Benny!

The highlight of our NYC travels: the Gershwin Theater to see Wicked! :) Here's Nate, Kylie, Ryan, and I just before the show. Jed and Michel babysat the kiddos at Central Park for awhile, and then hung out in a hotel lobby while Ben and Eliza both slept and it poured rain outside. They were sweet to forgo the show. (Michel had tickets to see it later in the week during Ryan's conference, and Jed didn't mind babysitting so I could go, as he's seen three broadways and this was my first. Sweet husband!) It was a clever play and very entertaining. The experience was awesome! Thanks Dad, for taking us to a Broadway!

Here's Benjamin and Michel playing at Central Park.

When Life Gives You Lemons, Make LEMON GRILLED CHICKEN!

I was asked to do a 'Summer Dining' Cooking Demonstration for the ladies in my church a few weeks ago. I decided to do a Citrus Theme, since I love using fresh lemons during the summer. We made Spinach & Strawberry Salad and I demonstrated how to make the tangy Lemon Dressing that goes with it. I passed out servings of my all-time favorite homemade Lemon Ice-cream. Then I demo-ed how to make the marinade for Lemon Grilled Chicken, how to make Jamba-style Orange-Strawberry Smoothies, and then we discussed the secrets for delicious muffins. Everyone got to sample the icecream, salad, chicken, smoothies, and lemon poppyseed muffins, and take the recipes home. (Click on the link for the recipes - some of them are already on my sisters' and my cooking blog, The Sisters Cafe.)

It was lots of fun - I seriously LOVE to cook, so it was fun to get to talk about it and discuss cooking with the ladies in our ward. Now I know what my sister Melanie means when she says that doing cooking demonstrations is a lot of work. It certainly is! But it was definitely a blast too. :)

a day at the park

We're back in town! We had a great trip, but before I post pics of our vacation, I want to catch up with some activities we did before we left...

We recently discovered this cool park nearby. In June we went with four other families for a picnic. We played with the frisbees, fished and explored. After we were there for a few hours there was a sudden cloud burst and it started POURING! We had to run to our cars in a torrential downpour! Michigan weather is fascinating - it will be hot and sunny one moment and then pouring cats & dogs the next moment. It's kind of cool. Anyway, our Saturday at the park was fun! :)

Video: water gun wars... in the house!

Lately Benjamin has been saying funny things. He uses real words to describe sounds. For instance, he will say, "I will hit this bat and it will say 'SWING!'" and then he will swing the bat in the direction of the door and say, "I will say 'SLAM THE DOOR!'"

The other day he showed me a mosquito bite on his cheek and said, "One of the mosquitos eat my head. It went, 'buzz.... EAT!'"

During one of our conversations earlier in the week he said, "I can turn into a I-couch." I said, "What's an I-couch?" "It's kindof like..... a I-couch. It says, 'Ah! Eye! Eye!'"

He got an ear infection on Sunday and on Tuesday morning he said to me, "My ear hurts. My ear says, 'HURT! HURT!'"

This morning during breakfast I was telling him the story of how Angel Moroni appeared to Joseph Smith and showed him where he hid the gold plates in the Hill Cumorah. He asked me to tell him the story again, and then at the end he said, "And then Angel Moroni went to bed. And Joseph Smith went to bed. And the gold plates, the scriptures, went to bed." I thought that was funny, because when I tell him stories at bedtime I always end with, "And then they went to bed." It's his cue that the story is over and he is going to go to bed now too. So now I guess all stories end with going to bed. :)

Just now while I was typing this he came up and said, "I'm using my bat, so I can cut the bad mens' arms off. I cut one of their arms off." Yikes. I always thought scripture stories were a little gruesome. I try to skim over the gory parts of the stories, like Ammon cutting the Lamanites' arms off, but sometimes the real story comes out! Think of David chucking a rock at Goliath, hitting him on the head and killing him, and then getting cheered for it. Hmmm... mixed message to a child, perhaps? :) Anyway, then he said to me, "I'm cut your arms off now." Then he lightly touched the bat to my arm and said, "CUT!" Then he said, "I just cut your arm off." That's just wrong. :)

smattering of pics

Eliza playing with the exersaucer that Jed got for her. He found it on Craigslist and brought it home for a surprise. She loves her toy, and her daddy. :)

Father's Day. Eliza was zonked in her crib, so it's just Father & Son in this picture.

This is how I find our cheese sometimes. Benjamin has reached a whole new level of independence.

And these are some pictures of a playdate we set up with some other ladies in our ward. We all met at the park and played in the water fountain all morning. We packed lunches and had a little picnic too. It was very fun. First time Eliza's worn a swimsuit. This is her 4th of July suit. :)

Discovering a big beetle was a highlight of the day. Kids are so funny - all gathered around the poor creature, poking at it and flipping it over...

Couldn't pass up including this photo. Benjamin's classic "BLAAAAHHH!" face.

eliza rolling over

About two weeks ago I got this footage. I didn't catch a real roll, but it's still a cute video.

Greenfield Village

There is a family attraction here called Greenfield Village, which is a pretend village modeled after the early 1900's. Three friends and I took our kids to this village last Thursday for the afternoon. There are a lot of interesting buildings and homes of interest, like Henry Ford's birth home, the house belonging to the Wright brothers, etc. But we didn't go into any of those with the kids. We went on the carousel a few times, ate a picnic lunch, checked out the glass blower shop, took an 'omnibus' ride which is a type of wagon pulled by two big horses, and enjoyed a long ride on a train (pictured above). Last of all we went to visit the farm, and that was the best part! Unfortunately my camera ran out of batteries, which was lame because Benjamin had so much fun with the sheep! There was one really big ram that walked right up to us in his stall, jumped up with his front legs onto the fence and swung his head over to see us. Benjamin would shoot his hand out to pet him quickly, and every time the ram felt him he would move his head to see who it was. It's hard to explain, but this ram was so responsive. It was pretty cool. I mean, normally animals don't flinch when you touch them, but this big old grandfather ram was attuned to every touch and seemed to be really interested in the kids. Anyway, we also saw lots of chickens, cats, and a rooster in the barn. We had to keep the kids from chasing the chickens, which is always so tempting!

I went up to the boys while they were gathered around this grate and asked them what they were looking at. They told me there was a crocodile down there and they were watching it. Benjamin is telling me about the crocodile in this picture.

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These horses that pulled the omnibus were huge! They let the kids pet them as they drank out of their trough.

oh, were you tired?

Benjamin is right at that stage where he gets tired in the early afternoon and needs a nap, but if he does happen to take a nap, he doesn't get tired for bed until really late. So, this past week I've been keeping him up and then putting him to bed early. As you can see, sometimes he just gets too tired to play and ends up taking an impromptu nap! I found him like this the other day during his alone playtime. Can you believe that position? I stepped over him in order to get this picture. I took a few pictures, then stepped over him again and left, and he slept on without so much as a flicker.

I thought his expressions in these Home Depot pictures were cute. As usual, his awesome Daddy took him to do the project this month.

And here's the beauty of the family. Her latest achievement: Rolling over! She can roll from her tummy to her back now. She has been laughing a lot lately at all of Benjamin's antics. He will jump off a chair and bounce over to see if she is going to laugh, and sure enough, she laughs and laughs. Then he does it again, and again... They are a perfect pair. He performs, she laughs. It's an unstoppable combination!

Wanna come over? We're normal, I promise.

Long lost brother ;)

Guess who stopped by on Monday?! My brother who I haven't seen in over a year! He lives in Utah and had a quick business trip in Detroit, so he squeezed in a visit to his littlest sister between all his meetings and conferences. Isn't he great? I thought he would only be able to stay for 30 minutes, so I felt pretty spoiled when he stuck around for two hours! He got to hold Eliza (the only granddaughter in the family) for the first time. She officially welcomed him to the family by spitting up on him. Lucky guy. (Good thing he's used to his own baby, so he didn't mind too much. :) ) Benjamin had fun with his Uncle Matt outside for awhile, and then he and I watched as Jed and Matt had a darts championship. :)
Thanks for coming by to see us Matt! I was so happy to see you!

Parade!

We went to a city celebration last Saturday with two other families. (The same families we went on the Memorial Day bikeride with.) It was such a fun day! The kids loved the parade. When the Firetrucks came blaring by, Benny covered his ears. :) There were lots of old classic cars, drummers, police cars, firetrucks, motorized mini airplanes... And best of all - the cheap parade candy! :) Ugh! But kids love it! Benjamin hasn't had so much candy in all his life. He was going through it like there was no tomorrow... (and there wasn't. I threw it all away the next day. But he seriously had free reign on his candy bag all that day, so don't think I'm a meanie!)



Afterward, we went to the local small airport and they had a few helicopters that the kids could go inside and look at. And the navy and airforce pilots were showing the kids the equipment inside - they were so cute with the kids! Here's Benny in the cockpit - I had to do some serious bribing to get him to smile for me here.

So much fun! And here's a random 2 1/2 minute home video, for your viewing pleasure. :) The first part is a clip of our family scripture study. Benny is holding Eliza. Every now and then he will ask to hold her, and he always feels like such a good big brother when he does. It's pretty cute. The second clip is of Benjamin making Eliza laugh. Unfortunately, I didn't get any of Eliza laughing, but I did get Benjamin falling off the bed, which is pretty funny. It's right before the 1 1/2 minute mark. :)

Memorial Day

On Memorial Day we went on a big family bikeride and picnic to a metropark. We went with two other families and it was such a blast! Between the three families, we had 6 adults, 5 children on bikes (including a 3 year old), and four little ones distributed among three bike trailers. :) Eliza was strapped in her carseat and sitting in the bike trailer pulled by Jed. And Benny and his friend Abram were sitting together in a trailer - just behind Jed in the picture.

After the bikeride we had a picnic, and then we explored the nature center (and saw lots of cool turtles there). Then the kids had fun skipping rocks, and just throwing handfuls of rocks, into the water. What is it with throwing rocks in the water that can keep Benjamin occupied and having fun for hours on end? He kept jumping off the dock, just where the water lapped on the rocks, and once he fell back and soaked his pants. So we took them off, and laughed as his little bare white legs were seen running back and forth on the dock as he worked on eliminating rocks from the shore, one handful at a time. :)