Behind Again...

Yep... it's been more than two weeks. I'm still not mastering this blogging on top of two kid raising. And the kid raising is more important, so this may be a sparse few years. But someday I'll appreciate the fact that I have at least recorded some of the craziness.

We had a really fun mother's day weekend enjoying the beautiful weather that has finally arrived in the upper peninsula. It's been a long wait for spring, but it's finally springing up all around. Yesterday the girls and I spent a lovely afternoon planting things in our garden and pulling up weeds. We added a mature poppy plant (who wants to wait 2 years for flowers?!?), a hydrangea, and a wide assortment of annuals, thanks to Abby's great flower picking skills. She loves red. A lot. But she also got pink, purple, and yellow flowers, so it's going to be a very colorful garden this summer.

We also enjoyed a free trip to Mackinac Island on Saturday. The Star Line ferry company was offering free trips to the island for Chippewa and Mackinac county residents, so we took advantage of that and enjoyed a beautiful walk along the waterfront and into the woods on the island. We even enjoyed some wildflowers and a squirrel who was pretty friendly. And Abby enjoyed eying up the horses, without getting to close of course.

Eruption!

Abby's top left tooth is just about to break all the way through into her mouth! We all hope that will help with some of the general crabbiness we have been experiencing lately. And hopefully she starts getting to bed better at night. We had another late night last night, but while she was crying I was figuring out how to make a baby "Ugg" bootie, so it wasn't totally unproductive.

















We've been testing out my new sewing machine lately - it makes incredible stitches, like the flowers that we trimmed Abby's blanket with. The pattern is just as cool on the backside of the blanket as it is on the front. We can't wait to take a trip to JoAnn's Fabrics to pick up some more flannel to experiment with.

We've also been experimenting with our new camera reflector (that Steve got me for my birthday). We tried hard to get some cute pictures of Abby in her Brazilian outfit from our friends Fred and Vanda, but the little squirt wouldn't sit down and was wiggling all around! She is officially an escapee as well. I have to get all of our downstairs clean since Abby can now cruise from the living room into the dining room at record speed. We've also got to get the baby gates and cabinet locks up as soon as possible.

We barely got the Buick home last night. Since it was running straight off the battery, we knew it would be close. Steve made it all but the last 6 blocks with headlights and taillights. Good thing I was following him! God was also on our side - the car made it into the driveway and died before Steve could turn it off. It was a very exciting adventure! And now we are on to the next adventure - catching the European Starling that somehow flew into our back porch and now is stuck. The fact that it got in there says we may have a hole in the wall or something. Yikes! I almost had a heart attack when it flew up into my face while I was trying to do a load of laundry (since our washer and dryer are also living on the back porch). This could be a real trick...

More Boyne Fun

Abby and Aunt Emily checking out the old sled in the lobby.



















When you fall asleep in the carrier, you may get a mark on your head.









Family photo in front of the bear (Nate and Courtnie already used the bear's backside for their photo).

















Wearing our Michigan shirts for the football game! Go Blue!



















Eating taco chips with Grandma Mary is fun :-)










Wearing a birthday princess crown for Emily's birthday. We didn't have enough for Aunt Hannah to wear one too.







Playing in the pool at Avalanche Bay! Lots of splashing going on.


















First trip down a water slide with mom. Dad took her on her second trip the next day.













Watching Michigan beat Wisconsin with Grandpa Scott.

Boyne Water Baby

We are back from Boyne and we had a great time! Abby had lots of fun with her Grandma and Grandpa and really liked playing with her Aunt Hannah and Aunt Emily. She also had fun with Uncle Nate and Aunt-to-be Courtnie. We all had lots of good times in the pool and in the hotel suite. Abby did lots and lots of splashing in the pool all three days and even played until she was asleep in my arms in the pool on Sunday. She was one tired girl last night.


Abby got to do lots of new things this weekend. We let her play in the fountains in the kids pool, ride down a waterslide, and cruise in the lazy river ride. She really had a great time in the water, especially in the kids pool. She is quite an inquisitive girl and was checking the whole place out. She did a lot of splashing too.


We also were able to ride to the top of the ski hills on the chair lift. We rode up Friday night to have dinner at the little restaurant on the top of the hill. It was a beautiful view. In a few weeks it is going to be even better with all the fall colors. We rode up again Saturday afternoon so we could hike around on top of the ski hills and check out some of the slopes. Abby was very good on the chair lift, which is good because being 20 something feet above the ground with only a small safety bar is a little nervewracking. It is a good thing we had the carrier to strap her in with.

We hope Emily had as much fun on her 13th birthday weekend as we did! And... Michigan even beat Wisconsin in football. We were really excited about that too. Go Blue!