Is this Even the Same Child?

Before:

After:

College Reunion!

This is me and a bunch of my college buddies in Ocean City, MD. For my birthday we went down for half a day, wishing we could stay longer and taking hours to say goodbye. (It really stinks that visits together are so few and far between. Somebody needs to get married or something! (love ya, H!!))

Due to wrangling the kids I took almost zero pictures while there, but am hoping to get digital files from D and H and M, who all took many more photos than I did. Here's the best one I got, of D and R on the beach. I LOVE it!

More Silly Songs

Wheels on the Bus

RUS: Ba ba ba ba ba ba uh uh uh ba ba ba

J: All through the town

R: Can I do it now?

J: Uh huh

RUS: uh uh uh ah ah ah

R: Wheels on the bus go round an round

RUS: No Romay No!

R: round and round round and round

RUS: No Romay

R: Wheels on the bus go round and round

R: My fair lady.

Old MacDonald Had a Farm

R: O l d M a c D o n a l d Had a farm. RUS: My da na my da na

R: EIEIO RUS: Romay

R: And on that farm he had a sheep RUS: duck

R: EIEIO

R: And on that farm he had a sheep RUS: ba ah ah

R: EIEIO

R: With a baa baa here and a baa baa there

R: Everywhere a baa baa

R: Old Macdonald had a farm RUS: mmm ba

R: EIEIO

Rock-a-bye Baby

R: Rock a bye baby on the tree top RUS: ahh ba by No My Ba Ba

R: When the wind blows the cradle will rock

R: What else? Can you tell me?

J: when the bough. . .

R: When the bough breaks the cradle will fall and then

R: Then baby will fall

J: Down will come baby. . .

R: And down will come baby cradle and all

J: Thank you RUS

Some Silly Songs

Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star

R: Twinkle twinkle little star RUS: Wah wah wah aaa ra wah

R: How I wonder what you are RUS: Wah wah wah wah wah wah

R: Up above the world so high RUS: Ra ra

R: Like a diamond in the sky RUS: wah ra ra waa waa waa

R: Twinkle twinkle little star aaaa RUS: Hmm mmm mmm

R: How I wonder what you are RUS: mmm mmmm mmm

Baa, Baa, Black Sheep

R: Baaaa Baaaa black sheep RUS: Baa Baa

R: Have you any wool RUS: Haa maa My my

R: Yes sir yes sir three bags full RUS: my ba eep my ba eep my ba eep

R: One for the master, one for the dame

R: One for the little boy who lives down the lane

R: Ba Ba black sheep have you any wool

R: Yes sir yes sir three bags fullllllllll

R: RUS, you weren’t singin

Rock-a-bye Baby

R: Rock a bye baby on the tree top

R: When the wind blows the cradle will rock RUS: my ba ba

R: What? (sigh)

It's Hot.

Swim Lessons 2011

R absolutely loved her swim lessons this year. She made huge progress, too! She went from refusing to even dip her chin in the water to realizing that she loved going under, and she can swim herself around holding on to the noodle. We're still working on pushing off from the side of the pool and getting her head more fully underwater while dog paddling.

RUS 21 Months

Dear RUS,

I was just telling Daddy tonight that you are my little ninja! Your favorite thing to do is slip silently and stealthily into the shadows and escape out of whatever room you are in. Sometimes you're not so silent, as when you announce "bye-bye! bye-bye!" over and over again as you walk away, but I can't even begin to tell you the number of times I've gone to get something and then turned around and gone, "Where's RUS?" and had to search the house for you.

At home this is no big deal, because we live in a ranch house and the number of places you can be--now that we've locked you out of the two hall closets, our bedroom, and the bathroom--is fairly limited. But when we were on vacation, oh man, you were a little escape artist. I lost track of the number of times we had to run around the house (and outside) looking for you. It was so bad that Uncle A asked me at one point, "Do you ever watch your kid or what?" He had a point. Nobody else's kid was always disappearing!

Your favorite place to escape to? The bathroom in Uncle Surf and Aunt Cali's bedroom. Once Grandpa found you in there sitting on the toilet reading a magazine. Another time Grandma found you in there having opened all the drawers (so that nobody could open the bathroom door) and shaking baby powder all over the place.

It's not just us, either. Twice Daddy has gone to pick you up from school and happened to find you randomly wandering the hallways.

Now, in both of these episodes the teacher came running out looking for you right away, but you really are a little sneak! Now, you talk a lot but it's often hard to tell what you're trying to say. But the teacher said that in one of the cases, it really sounded like you said, "I'm going to find Daddy, Bye-bye!" and sure enough you ran into Daddy in the hallway. Kind of eerie!

Lately your favorite word is "Outside!" which I am starting to be able to recognize. Most of what you say is tough to understand although you are very clearly trying to say a lot of different words, and you have a lot of fun imitating things we ask you to try to say.

You absolutely adore spending time outdoors and every chance you get you put on shoes and knock at the front door demanding to leave. I am dreading the day you figure out how to open our front door. Thankfully it's kind of hard to turn that knob otherwise you would ALREADY be escaping out that way.

I love you, my sweet RUS,

Love,
Mama

Philadelphia Zoo With Friends

"Write it on the blog"

While washing her hands just before bed, R says to me, "Mommy, where's the sink?"

Mind, at the same time she's saying this she is rinsing soap off of her hands, in the sink.

"Right there," I said, pointing to her hands.

Then she says, barely hiding a huge grin, "Mommy, I can't find a towel."

I said, "You know where the towel is!" and then the laugh she's scarcely holding in erupts and she laughs and laughs.

Then she says, "Write it on the blog!"

Bedtime Stories

I just love pictures of J reading to the kids. These were taken at bedtime and you can tell it's summer by how bright the room is at 7 p.m. (Please excuse the rumpled bed. We are really bad about making the kids' beds except when we're changing the sheets.)
I just love how goofy RUS gets by the end of my little photo shoot here. He's focusing on me more than on the book by this point! R, on the other hand, has acted this whole time like she hasn't even noticed I'm there.

40th Anniversary Photo Shoot in San Diego

My dad organized our San Diego get-together as a surprise for my mom for their 40th anniversary. As part of the surprise Cali and I arranged for a professional photographer to take pictures of all of us together on the beach, along with pictures of Mom and Dad to commemorate 40 years.

Here's a link to the photographer's website and blog post about our photo session.

This picture of Mom and Dad with all the grandchildren is one of my absolute favorites.
The pictures we ordered of RUS and R really capture them perfectly. I just love them.

Family Gathering in San Diego

Reason #4,723 that we love Philadelphia

So, the day we were set to leave for San Diego, we received an unwelcome voice mail from American Airlines letting us know that our flight had been cancelled and they'd re-booked us for the next day. To make a long story short, after many tears were shed, fists shaken in the air, several phone calls to unhelpful AA representatives, and much help from online resources, we got booked on a flight leaving that evening (instead of morning) that would get us in at midnight, California time.

Determined not to waste our first day of "vacation" we decided to try out Smith Play Place in Philadelphia for the first time. It is a free park in Philadelphia with a TON of things to do for the kids. We had a blast, and honestly, I was astounded that all of this is open and free to the public (they do accept donations but they're not required).

Both R and RUS had a great time, and there was a lot of playground equipment I'd never seen before. I only snapped a few photos with my iPhone, and they don't convey at all the size and scope of this place--it is supposedly the size of five or six football fields, just jam packed with things for kids to do and play on.