pennsylvania (summer vacation part 4)

We had a blast on the next leg of our vacation in the lovely state of Pennsylvania! It was a visit full of family, and we all had a lot of fun.

Benjamin got lots of love and snuggles from everyone - especially his two great-grandmothers! Once or twice I was afraid there might be a tussle over who got to hold him - he definitely got used to napping while snuggled up to his loving grandmas! What a lucky boy.

And at times he was doted on by a grandma and two great-grandmas all at once! Tell me, does it get any better than this?
Ben also had some quality time with Aunt Lissy (and Duke) and Uncle Alex.


Daniel had SO much fun during our visit, mostly playing outside. Daniel thinks the hose is just the absolute best toy in the whole world, so every chance he got, he dragged someone out to play with him. He also managed to shed his clothes just about every time he went outside - must be a guy thing? Anyway, I'd post more pictures, but he's naked in most of them and I just can't do that to him! He tried out the pool, but the hose was more fun.
Wrestling with Uncle Alex was also a lot of fun!
He even managed to drag us outside to play in the rain!

Daniel and his second cousin Samantha got together to play some tunes on Daniel's new guitar.
They were also forced by their moms to hug each other. I'm not sure they were happy about it, but they obliged! It was so much fun seeing them play together and interact with each other!

Of course, Daniel had another birthday party, this one shared with his Aunt Ashley. He got his own personal cake since he couldn't eat the cream cheese frosting on the big cake. He was getting pretty good at blowing out candles by this point! And he also learned to respond, "two!" and hold up two fingers when asked how old he was.


Before we left, we had to snap a couple of group shots! The proud grandparents...
And the whole crew (at least, the part of the crew that was still there when we left).
Finally, just a couple of photos of my sweet boys - Daniel trying to pull Mike up off the ground to play, and Benjamin just hanging out!

Can you tell they had a good time? I'm pretty sure we all did! We are so lucky to have such wonderful families.

traffic (summer vacation part 3)

What would a road trip be without a traffic jam? And really, not just a little slow rush-hour traffic. I mean the kind of traffic jam where people get out of their cars and hang out on the side of the road like this:
The kind of traffic jam where you can stand in the middle of the interstate and take a picture like this:
After we realized we weren't going anywhere in a hurry, Mike and Daniel took a walk, petted a dog, and chatted with a trucker. Meanwhile Benjamin was hungry so I stayed in the car and fed him. Fortunately, traffic started moving again after an hour or so. Mike and Daniel ran back to the car, I strapped Benjamin back in his carseat, and we were on our way once again!

new york (summer vacation part 2)

After Raleigh, we made the looooong trip up to New York, with a brief stopover in Wilmington. We had a fantastic time with Mike's family, highlighted by a birthday party for all of the July/August birthdays in the family - which I hesitate to list for fear of missing one! This was the first of three birthday celebrations for Daniel, and to say he enjoyed it would be putting it mildly.

"Mmmm, sugar!"

Meanwhile, Mike pretended to be taller than John...
... Joanne, Nana, and Grandpa enjoyed some cake too...
... Benjamin got some love from Aunt Cathy...
... and Daniel convinced Aunt Joanne to give him more dessert.
One of the most fun things about this trip was seeing how much fun Daniel had with his cousins. He absolutely idolized them, and just couldn't get enough time with them. This is one of my favorite pictures of Daniel with his cousins - he just loved being one of the big guys!
And of course we had to get a photo of all of the boys together: Richie, Joey (holding Benjamin), Andy and Daniel.

And Benjamin had a great time hanging out with Aunt Betty while Daniel played with the guys!
Trips like this make me realize how much I miss being closer to family. Can't wait for our next visit!

murphy (summer vacation part 1)

We took a marathon three-week trip up the east coast this July-August, covering over 2900 miles, so we could take the boys to visit all of their grandparents, aunts, and uncles. Obviously this trip will take several posts to detail, so stay tuned for more! We made two important purchases before we left, this being one of them:
The second was a portable DVD player. Believe me, a steady stream of Curious George and Little Einsteins is a good antidote to looks like this (which are often accompanied by pleas of "OUT!")
Benjamin, fortunately, slept during a large portion of the driving, although only occasionally did he fall asleep with his fingers in the rings hanging from his carseat. Mike and I both became pros at reaching behind us to blindly replace the pacifier in his mouth. Really, though, they were both great travelers.
We began with a stop to visit our friends Holly and David and their adorable boys Matthew and Ethan in Winston-Salem. Unfortunately, I completely forgot to take any pictures during our overnight stay! We did have a great time visiting with them, and Benjamin had probably his best night of sleep to date while borrowing Ethan's pack-n-play (I threatened to move in).

From there, we moved on to Raleigh where Mike was attending a conference. Not too many pictures from that part of the trip, but I did capture one of this notable first in Daniel's life - in our hotel in Raleigh, he got to sleep in a Murphy bed! Really, how many 2-year-olds can say they've done that?

mom's weekend out!

I am a lucky woman. I have the best husband in the world, one who is more than willing to let me go away for a weekend of rest and relaxation while he stays at home chasing after a very busy 18-month old. (Okay, the boys may have had a pretty good time too, but I'm still very lucky.)

I'm also lucky to have the best friend in the world, Holly, who I was fortunate enough to live next to our freshman year of college, over fourteen years ago (holy cow, can we possibly be that old?). Fortunately Holly has a pretty great husband too, so when I suggested that we leave our little boys at home with their dads and meet up for a girls' weekend, she was all for it! Holly is pregnant with her second baby too, so we figured it was a perfect time to get together and catch up before our lives get significantly more complicated again. Here we are with our pregnant bellies - can't wait for our new little ones to meet!

We had a fantastic time last weekend in Greenville, South Carolina, conveniently located halfway in between our homes - which was our prime reason for choosing it as a destination, although I think we were both pleasantly surprised at what a great little city it is. We went to the spa for massages, relaxed at our hotel, walked along the river, and just generally enjoyed spending time together. Such a great weekend!

photos from the beach

Silly siblings Daniel with Great-Grandma
The happy couple
Pensive Ashley
What a good-looking crew!
Aunt Lissy and Daniel
My handsome (little) brother
Daniel with Grandma

friends and fun

We had a fabulous time last weekend visiting our dear friends Holly and David and their adorable little boy Matthew (who may also be the smartest 2-year-old I've ever met!). Daniel survived his longest car trip to date - 6 hours. Thank goodness for Cheerios, they got us through the last 30 minutes when he had finally had enough of sitting in the car! He had a great time playing with Matthew, who has lots of fun toys to get into. I'm not sure Matthew enjoyed the companionship of the pesky little toy-stealer quite so much, but I'm sure as they get older they will have lots of fun getting into trouble together - at least I hope so!
Holly and David's new house has a fabulous swingset in the backyard, and Matthew was kind enough to let Daniel have the baby swing, while Matthew took the big boy swing.
Matthew is such a handsome little kid!
Our friends Kristin and Sam and their baby boy, Brady, also came over for an afternoon while we were there. Holly and Kristin and I have been friends since our freshman year of college, when we all lived on the same hall - almost 14 years ago (yikes). I'm sure 14 years ago we never imagined that today we'd be sitting around a table together with our husbands and our little boys. As a side note, how did we all end up having 9+ pound babies? Was there something in the water?
Our lives now are a far cry from the nights we spent back then, studying calculus and chatting into the wee hours of the morning - now we're ready to drop by 10 pm. Those were some great times, but life just continues to get better.

catching up, part 2 - aunts and uncles and cousins, oh my!

The second part of our trip was up to New York to visit all of Mike's family, some of whom Daniel had never met before. They are a great bunch and we had a wonderful time! Daniel had great fun spending time with his Nana and Grandpa as well as his aunts and uncles and his cousins - Aunt Betty, Uncle Kevin, and cousins Andy, Joey, and Richie, Aunt Cathy and Uncle Mike, Uncle John, and Aunt Joanne.
Daniel hadn't seen his Nana and Grandpa since he was about a month old, except over the webcam. He must have recognized them though, because they took no time at all getting reacquainted!
Daniel especially liked meeting his cousins - they're a little closer to his size! Here he is with Andy, Joey, and Richie.
Daniel with his Godmother, Aunt Joanne.
Check out the matching hats on Daniel and Aunt Cathy!
Just the guys - chillin' on the sofa with Daddy and Uncle John.
Thanks to all of you for the great time! It was so nice to see you and spend some time together - I wish we didn't live so far away.