She's home!

Mimi is home! Mimi is home! Mimi is home!
After what felt like an eternity to Zoe, her Mimi is back from Singapore safe and sound. Zoe is one happy camper and ready for lots of quality time with her Mimi.

Children's Museum

Zoe, Jaylyn, and I enjoyed the afternoon at the children's museum in New Hope. These girls sure know how to keep me moving!!!

 

http://buckskids.org/

Hiking 101

Zoe's had a rough couple days missing her Mimi so to get her mind off of things we decided to get out and do what we love best.... HIKE! This was our first time at this park and boy did we love it. It's called Bowman's Hill and it's a 134-acre Preserve that features more than 800 species of native plants. The park was beautiful, it has a pond and a creek running thru it with wildflowers, birds and wildlife everywhere. 

 

Simply amazing, and by the end of our exploring we hiked about 3-miles. The only complaint Zoe and I had was that we were covered in spider webs from head to toe. We made the best of it but us girls (especially me!) don't always like to get covered in bugs!

 

 http://www.bhwp.org/

Skype

Anyone who knows us or follows this blog knows that Shelli travels for a living and well, it’s just a way of life. I, for the most part have gotten used to it, but the older Zoe gets the harder it seems to be on her when Shelli goes away on business. It takes her several days to get her emotions under control.

Shelli is in Singapore and being half way around the world doesn’t sit well with Zoe. The 19+ hour flight about put Z over the edge. Shelli left Saturday night and didn’t get there until Sunday night which was really Monday in Singapore! Anyway, she was supposed to call when she landed and Zoe had my cell phone in a death grip checking it every other second to make sure she didn’t ‘miss’ the call. Turns out, Shell’s cell phone took a few hours to work when she got there so, we didn’t hear from her until almost 2 hours after she landed. Zoe had herself worked into a complete frenzy!

When we did finally hear from Shelli, we were just happy to know she made it safe and sound. Hours later we were able to Skype and that made all the difference in the world. Zoe got to see her Mimi face-to-face. Mimi showed her the hotel room and even took her outside on the balcony to see all the huge buildings. It’s amazing how fantastic technology is these days. What’s more amazing is that Shelli is so far away and on a 12 hour time change and doesn’t miss the opportunity to say good night to her favorite little girl. I know a little girl who sleeps so much better at night knowing her Mimi is safe and sound.

Compost

The amount of compostable waste that gets thrown in the trash is horrific.  I felt so guilty every time I throw out something I know can be composted.  We eat lots and lots of veggies and I always have a bowl filled with remains from cooking.  We have a compost ‘pile’ in the back yard, but we never had an ‘official’ compost bin – until NOW!

It’s not a fancy one but, it does the job and I love it. Zoe loves taking the scrap bucket of compost out to the bin.  I'm not sure what she enjoys more, the dumping or turning, but whatever the case, she is very methodical with it.  We’ve got all the neighbors using the bin too.  Both Shelli and I have always tried to recycle, buy from local farms, use environmentally friendly cleaners, eat as vegetarians (for the most part), and just waste less in general.  So it’s great to see Zoe picking up those habits and always perusing the landscape for recyclables. 

Back to school outfit....

2^nd grade is all we’ve talked about since Zoe graduated from 1^st grade.  Now as it gets closer, Zoe is more and more excited. We’ve already tackled getting all her school supplies but today we went shopping for back to school clothes.

Zoe wanted to pick out her own outfit for the first day of 2^nd grade. I didn’t know what to expect, but I couldn’t wait to see what she was going to pick out.  Z took her time and strolled around the store and picked out a few things that caught her eye. Once she narrowed it down, we went to the dressing room to try everything on.  As expected, some she liked, some she didn’t.  But the items she picked were just ‘perfect’ (her words).

After Zoe settled on her perfect first day outfit, she managed to sweet talk Mimi into getting her a new pair of shoes too.  I mean come on, an outfit just isn’t complete without NEW shoes, right?

We had a blast. Zoe was excited and I was excited to watch her pick out her cute little outfit. I think she might be the cutest 2^nd grader at her school but, I’m a little biased.

New Arrival

There was big news while we were on vacation… My best friend Ariel, and his husband Joey became daddies to a beautiful healthy baby boy. The baby was born July 20^th at 12:08PM, weighing 7 lbs. 10 oz. They have been trying to adopt for a long time and after all the emotional highs and lows, their patients have paid off.  They are finally daddies, and are over the moon in love with their son.
(So am I!)

It’s surreal that my two closest childhood friends and I are all parents now. There isn’t too much we haven’t gone through since the 3^rd grade but things continue to get better as we get older. We are all in different states but that has never gotten in the way of us being there for each other. We have plans to all be together in November and I’m counting down the days. I’m so blessed to have two amazing nephews and two of the most wonderful best friends a person could ask for.  I know Ariel, Christina, and I will never be far apart despite our time zone differences.

Congrats to Ariel and Joey -Welcome to parenthood! I’m counting the days until I can hug and squeeze that sweet baby boy!

Shawn

Zoe spent the whole day with her friend Shawn & his daddies at the water park today. By the time she got home, she was exhausted.  Enough said...

Poconos

This summer has been hectic. Between Shell’s travel schedule, and everything else that is going on, it doesn’t seem like any of us are in the same place at the same time. This morning Zoe woke up and said, “let’s all go and do something together today!”.

Despite the fact that it was supposed to rain all day, we packed a bag, picked up some subs for lunch, and went to the Poconos to check out a new state park that we've never been to. We knew it had hiking, swimming, bike trails, and boating but, wow this place was amazing.

Zoe didn’t know what she wanted to do first. She saw the amazing lake and wanted to be in it so, we walked over to check out the boat rentals. We ended up renting a pontoon boat and boy was that fun. Mimi even let Zoe drive the boat, the lake was beautiful. While we were on the lake we noticed they had a man made beach. Once we returned the boat, we went to check out the ‘beach’. Mommy opted to just watch while Mimi and Zoe went swimming.

On the way home Zoe said, “Now I can drive a tractor and a boat!” Life is good!

Grammy Style

I did it! I took the plunge and made fried green tomatoes -Grammy style.  9 times out of 10, after a visit to GA, I’m always asking for recipes from Aunt Pam and Grammy before I leave.  Of course every time I make the dishes myself I’m never convinced it will taste as good, but this time… it was pretty darn good! Thanks Grammy!!!!

Frozen Yogurt Bites

Greek Yougurt

Fresh Fruit

Fun Ice Cube Trays

 Fill.Freeze.Eat