Our Town

A couple of weekends ago I was running some last minute errands late Friday night in an effort to be prepared for Saturday morning's festivities that were to take place in our town.  I ran to the grocery store, it's 24 hours, but at only 11pm on a Friday night it was practically empty except the employees and myself.

Then I took some of the items I had purchased over to drop off at a friends where they needed to be for the next day.  She lives directly in the square of our town.  And this is what the biggest stop light looked like at 11pm on a Friday night.  Incredible!

And I couldn't help but think this is one of the reasons I love this town.  Sunday afternoons are quiet and relatively unbusy as people are all in church.  Late evenings even on weekends the roads are practically empty as people take to their beds or at least make plans other than loitering on street corners.  It reminds me just a little bit of Rexburg.

It's one of the only towns where you can still find total solitude during certain times of day.  I wish more towns were like this.  And I wish more churches looked like this although this is really the town next to ours.  You won't find this church in Rexburg, but you will find it in rural Pennsylvania.

Party X 3

It's just another manic Saturday.  And as I plan as strategically as possible I can't help but love my friends.  Saturday morning included tons of work, but not without reward.  And so Saturday afternoon we went to Prestige Gymnastics for an adult only gymnastics party.  I was in heaven.  What a brilliant idea! 

Christie you rock my world.  And happy birthday Derek.

Then we raced home, I got a little freshened up, but just barely and then headed down with the family to a neighbor bbq.  These people are some of the funnest and funniest people.  Let the good times roll and of course they did.  Thanks to the hostess with the mostess - Dawn!

And last our whole family headed over to a Dancey Dance party with Panda and the gang.  Everyone dances their hearts out, jumps on the trampoline, plays in the sandbox -if you are little- and just lets loose.  Isn't it the best to have friends to do that with?  And after that broke up, we took four tired kids home to bed.  Some falling asleep on the car ride home.

As we drove into our neighborhood we could hear the bbq still under way.  So Travis said why don't you go back down and I'll finish putting the kids to bed and maybe meet you.  Well you don't have to give me permission twice and so I did just that.  And nothing makes a girl feel better than to pop around to the back yard and hear an excited chorus of "Mary's back!"

Nothing feels more rewarding than a hard working/hard playing Saturday!  Nothing!

What Is It?

And now for another installment of What Is It?

A. a half formed fetus                               

B. part of a brain from a Med School Lab
C. serious mold growth                            

D. an impromptu compost pile                 

Seizing the Moment

After many days of rain, my neighbor said the news reported

39 of the past 80 days had rain, my kids were getting restless. 

What could they do? 

I looked at Bella and asked what would you do if it weren't raining. 

She answered that she would be jumping on the trampoline. 

So I then said, go jump it's not like the rain is going to hurt you.  And guess what she did.

 And of course it only takes one strong leader to have a good attitude and set the mood. 

And quickly the minnions follow rank. 

And it becomes a happy mosh pit of jumping children.

But I could only snap a couple of pictures because

the inner child in me longed to play in the rain with them too. 

And so we jumped together. 

And I was glad that I had postponed dinner and laundry and

whatever else I had been thinking about doing because it was totally worth it.

Field Trip

Despite living one county over my whole life long, I am often amazed at the little treasures I find while living here in Lancaster County.  One of those treasures happens to be Mt. Gretna.  It is a cutesy little town that caters to tourism with a sweet lake and awesome kid's equipment in the lake to amplify the fun. 

Additionally there is a great ice cream shop called The Jigger Shop, a roller skating rink, and a little camp called Gretna Glen.  Cue Wyatt's first grade field trip.  We went and spent the day traveling through four stations as well as opening and closing ceremonies with a halftime break for lunch, some of which were partially eaten by the ravenous squirrels.

Stations included Pond Adventures where they let the kids scoop out pond goop with nets in hopes of finding hidden treasures of a turtle, tadpole, minnows, and other stuff which we discovered.

We had a field games station, a hike around the lake learning the ins and outs about wildlife, and Wyatt's personal favorite the Animal Awareness station.  It was a blast and the rain held off till we were on the bus and then it poured. 

They Say...

breakfast is the most important meal of the day!

Well if that's the case let's make it yummy.

This is one happy eatter!

It Never Gets Old

Every year my husband and sons go camping at least once together without us girls.  The one guaranteed date is always in May and it is with our church to celebrate the restoration of the Priesthood of God upon the face of the Earth once more.  They attend firesides and camp and do all the things that camping entails but while they are away, the mice -or girls of our family- will play. 

We started an tradition of Bella having a girl's sleepover.  She invited four friends, three came, and two spent the night.  Our night included doing nails, hair, makeup, eating more unhealthy and fat filled foods than I consume in a week, and watching movies till late into the night.

Arielle, our friend living with us, and I painted four sets of nails with polka dots, swirls, stripes, etc...  They then got in pairs of two and did each other's makeup.  The piece d'resistance for the girls was that we let them do our makeup.  Let's just say I was covered in a thick layer of glitter gel.  Seriously my face was sticky all night, and although I don't normally wash my face before bed you can bet I did that night.  Then they came to the computer where they picked hair options from the princess hairstyles website, I previously blogged about, except for one little girl who let Bella do a handful of braids so it would be crimped the next day. 

I think everyone had fun, perhaps most of all Arielle.  But I was surprisingly thrilled to relive the girlish wonders of the preteen years right along side of them.  Somethings never get old and and I think girly makeovers may just be one of them.