On our way to the beach!

Here we are crossing the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. Only 81 miles to go!! Yippee!

Our Atlanta Trip

I've finally gotten around to unpacking, am still doing mounds of laundry, and am finally uploading photos from our trip for the 4th of July. We had so much fun, especially being with our family!

At the park feeding the ducks:

The neighborhood July 4th parade:

Fireworks in Decatur Square (Libby learns how to put her hand over her heart for the National Anthem):

Playing at the Hiley's house:

New Orleans SNOWBALLS in Georgia (relocated there by Katrina):

A neat modern children's playground:

On the Road Again...

We're on our way back home and are almost to North Carolina. We stopped for lunch and are ready to get back on the road again!

Happy Independence Day 2010

It's Monday night and we are packing to make the long drive home from Atlanta early tomorrow.  We have had so much fun doing tons of things these past few days.  We've been on a picnic in the park, walked in a July 4th parade, watched fireworks in Decatur Square, had New Orleans snowballs (yummmm), played at the playground, made delicious treats like cupcakes and tice krispie treats, and had fun playing with the cousins!  My brother, Jeff, flew up for the weekend, too, so we loved spending time with him, too.  We've taken tons of photos, which I will upload soon, but here is a sneak peek...

I am amazed at how many people have blogs just for crafting! I came across a few just recently and am now following several (look at the left margin for a list). I have already tried a few ideas and was happy to see that the Oopsey Daisy blog had this idea posted today. I had it in my mind for days and found some exampleds on etsy.com (awesome site).  I actually made it last weekend.

This July 4th wreath took about 1 hr. to make and only cost about $10. I went to our new and fabulous Joann store in Fairfax and got some fat quarters of patriotic fabric. I bought some wire, too, but would recommend using a wire hanger instead since my wreath is a bit too floppy. But it adds to the charm, right?  I cut the fabric into strips 1" wide x 9" long (and didn't care re. measuring exactly). I ripped the fabric into the strips (I just cut notches on the fabric piece 1 " apart and luckily fabric rips in a straight line). That was a nice stress reliever, too!  I tied each one in a knot on the wire and added a gingham bow on top. I love its shabby, country look and think it looks great with my decorations I bought at Michael's last year.  Enjoy!

I'm linked to:

Swimming Lessons

Libby and Drew started their 1st "Pee wee paddlers" class yesterday. They did such a great job listening to their nice teacher, Annalee.

Baby Susanna

We were so glad to have my brother, Bryan, his wife, Erica, and their precious baby, Susanna, visit us in early June. Libby and Drew were so happy to meet their "baby cousin" and had a lot of fun with her. She is the sweetest, most easy-going baby I've ever seen! Erica and Bryan were in town for a wedding, so we were lucky to babysit Susanna while they went and had fun. We took her to our Supper Club's Crawfish Boil at the Goodson's house. It was SO HOT that day... SO HOT. We all had red faces and had to cool off inside for a while, but Susanna never complained and had fun just sitting and watching everyone. Then we played with their toys in the basement toy room and she had a ball.

Funny thing about Susanna is that she is going through a phase (at least Erica and Bryan hope it's just a phase) where she absolutely hates taking a bath. We thought being with Libby and Drew would help and it did a tiny bit, but most of all, she was just plain mad! We even tried singing "Twinkle, Twinkle" to her. She stopped for a moment or 2 to look at us, but then started crying again. Poor little girl! We got some photos:

Caterpillars BITE

I am bummed today.  We got one of those "Topsy Turvy" tomato planters and it was working great. The plant grew into a giant healthy one with 8 tomatoes. Libby and drew are anxious to check it every morning to see if the tomatoes are ready. Well, this morning it looked like this. It had about 8 huge hornworm caterpillars on it. Nice fat and full caterpillars after eating almost every leaf. I picked them all off and sprayed stuff on it. I just hope it will recover. But we definitely won't have the same feeling about Eric Carle's book now!

Testing Technology

I joined the rest of the population here and got a "smart" phone. It does all kinds of cool stuff that I haven't even figured out yet! I found out that I can post to my blog using it, so consider this a test message. And excuse any typos b/c these keys are tiny!!

I just can't quit

I have been thinking a lot about my life lately and how stressful and hectic it usually is. Teaching full time plus raising twins and having my own online business "on the side" makes for a full day... EVERY day! I've had to re-evaluate things and wondered if I should stop blogging. After all, it is pretty time consuming for me and I wondered if many people really read it anymore. Now that the kids are bigger, there is still lots to blog about, but I just wonder if others have the time to check in on what's going on around here. So, after Darrell has told me over and over that I should really take something/s off my full plate, I thought that blogging was one of them.

I've been away for almost a month now. But I just can't stop signing in and reading everyone else's blogs that I follow! Plus, I have finally started printing out my blog into books one year at a time. The last year arrived recently and I was so happy to read all of my words and remember all of those little details that happen on a daily basis all over again. Many of them (esp. in the 1st year) are things that I would have NEVER remembered. And I think Libby and Drew will enjoy knowing all of these little minute things about themselves. Plus when I'm no longer here in many many years, I think it will be nice for them to share with their own children and so on.

Soo.... I'm BACK! Hey, I figure... I'm not teaching this summer anyway plus I really am a fast typist, too. So, it will only be like the size of the icky vegetables no kid wants to eat on the edge of the plate... not the main meat or potatoes. That is small enough on my plate to handle for now so why not do it? ;)