Girls Weekend in Boston

This past weekend we met for a Happy 30th Birthday to Renee weekend! We flew in from all over; Seattle, Houston, Dallas, Denver and Buffalo and arrived in the historic city of Boston. It was such a wonderful time to explore, site see, walk, shop, ride, walk some more, and eat! I think we ate the most cannoli's that we possible could have without feeling too too guilty!

Here we all our as we set out for a boat cruise of Boston Harbor.


We finally got the hang of the trolley system (really getting the hang of it was not quite our fault due to the wrong trolley maps we were given but hey---that took us a bit to figure out) and enjoyed some narrated tour of the city.
Stephanie and Christina getting ready for the Charles River Boat Cruise were we watched the college student out practicing crew, and got to see some of the sights of downtown from the water and views of MIT, Boston University, and Harvard.
Renee, Amy, Christina, Lauren and Stephaine

Mom and Renee in the North End where we ate at a fantastic Italian Restaurant.

On the way for cannoli's once again!
Amy's long time friend Laurel even came up for a night to visit and enjoy a beautiful Sunday of walking and shopping.
Thanks Nee for turning 30!

Indian Princess

I am not really into the whole "princess thing" but really...this is adorable. Natasha dressed up Brenna in Sophia's outfit from India and she just loved it. She was quite willing to pose for the camera and loved her pretty clothes!

School Days Have Begun

Oh how time does fly. Finally we are in the swing of things with 2 in school now. I sure do miss my boys around the house...Brenna asks where they have gone then answers herself "at school..come home soon". Brenna is fun to have home, and we started music class today and it was fun to be with great friends and meet some new ones too.

Here is Joshua on his first day of 2nd grade.

Daddy and Josh before leaving for school.
Brothers!
We got to walk Josh down to his class and he found his locker..placed his things in it

and then Brenna reached out and put her backpack in also, turned and waved to me and said "Bye Mommy". She was dead serious and was planning on staying there.Josh sitting at his desk for the first time as a second grader.
The next day Matthew and I got a special time to go into school by ourselves and meet his Kindergarten teacher, bring in his school supplies and get used to his classroom. Our school system has the kindergartner's start school 2 days after all the big kids start so they get their own special day.
Matthew found his own locker with his star above it.
Mommy and Mac..what a big boy he has become.
Here he is standing outside his classroom.
The next day it was time for the first day of Kindergarten.

Brenna and Mac as we left for school. We all got to go together to bring him..that was a lot of fun.


At the beginning of this week the boys begged to ride the bus. Joshua was so sweet and I watched as he asked permission to sit in the front of the bus so he could have an assigned seat with his brother instead of moving back with the older kids. Nanna came early that morning so she could see the boys off on the first bus ride of the year.

Love this picture of Brenna with Nanna...what great friends they will become this year as they have special girl time together.

Quick Summer Summery

Just a few pictures to show all the fun we had this summer. Many many hours were spent just in the back yard playing and playing. We really enjoyed the time back and forth between the yards and even were able to steal some time in the neighbors pool!

No summer is complete without a trip to Fantasy Island...here are the kids one evening when Brett and I took them up for a few hours

And of course there is always fishing. This afternoon it was Matthews ideal to go so we packed up and headed off to the pond. Brenna loved it - no hooks on her pole though but she sure thought she was "fishing"!