Every Day is Earth Day

I realize I’m two days too late on this post, but that’s the glory with Earth Day. In truth, we should be celebrating this glorious planet every day and we should be teaching our children to do the same. We’re pretty good about recycling and trying to reduce our waste, but of course we can all do better.

Cue conscious kids. I have been doing various “learning” activities with Colin and sometimes it results in my printing out coloring or activity sheets. For Earth Day, Aiden pointed out the irony of wasting paper for Earth Day activities. Nailed that one buddy. Back to the dry erase marker activities it is!

So what else are we doing everyday? Well two things we’ve been kept busy by almost every day are nature walks and working in our garden. So here are a few highlights. I’ll share more details about each of these later, but here are a few fun ones in honor of this week and this post.

Recent hike at a nearby county park

Our garden! flowers, peas, spinach and arugula pictured, with lettuce, kale and radishes also growing!

38 Days of Quarantine

Well for the last oh, 17 days, I’ve been thinking I should resurrect the blog. Well I guess the time has come. It’s only taken 38 days by my count to make it happen. I figured a perfect way to celebrate this milestone was to go over what we’ve done, and haven’t done over the last 38 days at home.

What we’ve done:
Played outside
Planted vegetables and flowers
Played board games
Read books
Gone on hikes
Baked
Put together puzzles
Gone on longer runs
Watched a lot of Netflix
Catchy frogs and salamanders
Ridden our bikes
Laughed
Cried
Gotten cranky and fed up

What we haven’t done:
Massive purge and clean
Mastered new skills
Skipped dessert
Watched Tiger King
Slept late

I don’t foresee anything coming off that “haven’t done” lost coming anytime soon, but I sure do hope we keep up with all the stuff on the “done” list...though I could do with less crying and getting cranky. Here’s a photo to show you our real life right now.

Adjusting to life

It's been a while...almost 2 months! It's easy to count that since C made his arrival almost 2 months ago and it was just before his birth that I last posted. I'm sure everyone already knows this by now,  so that's not news. Instead I'll share some photos of everyday life and how were adjusting. They'll mostly happy, but to keep it real I'll throw in a surprise!

Sleepy and snuggley

Reading time 

Family walks 

Learning about the important things in life (i.e. Star Wars)

Lots of poop 

Family outings 

And big smiles and giggles

I'm sure we're in store for all of the above and more over the next few months!

Final countdown?

Well baby M has a mind of his own and didn't come early as I predicted. I shouldn't be complaining of course...he's just getting more perfect in there :) In the meantime, I've been making sure we have lots of fun as a family of 3. So, here's a quick photo recap of the last few weeks!

We saw "Finding Dory" (accompanied by the Nemo A made at school)

We've had lots of fun on the slip 'n slide

And gone to the pool as much as possible. 

We had a quick getaway to VA Beach (adults only!)

And we celebrated Independence Day (2 days early) with a parade and fireworks. 

Baby M will arrive when he's ready, but I'm glad we've had so much fun in the meantime!

A Final Trip as 3

We decided to take advantage of all of Kyle's hotel points and make a little weekend adventure if it in Williamsburg. Williamsburg is always a special place for us to return to, though trips now usually involve amusement parks sandwiching our time on DoG Street and campus.  

This time around we hit up Busch Gardens AND Water Country USA. Being 37 weeks pregnant means I didn't get to do many crazy rides, but I tried to get a few fun pictures since I couldn't participate otherwise! 

Despite having been to BG several times before, we still managed to find a few new fun things to do...probably the big winner was riding the adult bumper cars (Der Autobahn) with daddy, or maybe watching the show at the Festhaus. 

Water Country was a first for A, and he loved it. He's turning into quite the little fish, and the water slides were a blast. 

We always have fun and mange squeeze in a few favorite spots. This time around that included a stop at Queen Anne's Dairy Shack and A's first stuffed Sno to Go, which was a huge hit of course. 

Next time we visit will be quite a bit different, but I can't wait to share these places and experiences with another little boy!!

Home sweet McNEW home

We've been just a little busy around here these days. At the end of April we packed up our rental and finally moved to our new house!! 2.5 years in the making (not that I was counting...) but we're finally in and with 10 whole weeks (well no more like 6 weeks) to spare before baby M arrives!

Here are a few pics of the new place. 

And last but not least our favorite space...

We hope you'll come visit and see it soon!!

Disney Wow!

Last weekend we took the plunge...we went to Disney World! It was so much fun and we all had such a blast! A was amazing and never threw a fit once, possibly because I listened to advice from others and made sure we had every afternoon free for various non-crowded activities. 

So here's a quick recap:

We met Mickey and friends for breakfast which was a great start to the vacation! As you can see we all got in the fun...including donning our vintage WDW hats from the late 1980s!

After an amazing start we moved on to the Disney castle which had a little magic in store for us...

We met lots of other great characters too, our favorite being none other than Winnie the Pooh! Seeing A literally shaking with excitement to meet Pooh had us grinning from ear to ear and made the trip worthwhile in itself. 

Don't think we only saw characters though...we made it to Seven Dwarfs Mine Ride twice, Star Tours, Toy Story Mania and of course the classics like Its a Small world and the teacups :)

We can't wait to go back in a few years with 2 boys and see what they love most!

Snow Day!

Obligatory "snow in the south" freak out post below...here's your warning!

We've gotten the first 5" of a supposed 20-24" snow storm and I figured I'd go ahead and post some pictures while we're still loving the snow. A made it longer than both of us expected (he hates cold as much as this girl!), which meant ample photo ops. So far we've been sledding, made snow angels & pirates, and snow sharks, and had fun digging and running in the snow. 

And don't forget Fella of course...I think he is really a snow dog at heart! 

Happy 2016!

I didn't post around Christmas but unsurprisingly the world didn't stop...I've been a bit tired and preoccupied. 

But, that's no reason to start of 2016 on the wrong foot...especially the two small feet that walked 4 miles across DC on Saturday. Can you believe this kid? And he didn't complain or slow down until the last few blocks...

We had fun exploring 2 Smithsonians in some amazing January weather. 

We had a blast. I can't wait to take him to the others and see the monuments up close! Until next time DC...

All of the Inflatables

In annual tradition we travelled across town to see the spectacle that is Santa on Mountainview. 

It seems impossible but this year is probably even better. It seems as though the Mountainview house's neighbor has now fully extended the lights to the corner and it really makes that walk up even more spectacular. 

But don't worry...Santa didn't disappoint. Rudolph was there to greet us 

And there's the big guy just inside too!

We managed to grab a shot wth the Avengers in Hooville...

And a family photo too...

If you haven't been yet, head on over. You can't miss it off 20S (you can even see it from 64). It won't disappoint and will bring holiday cheer to even the grinchiest of you out there!

Walking in the Sea of Santas

Well Thanksgiving has passed and we ate our fill of turkey and cranberries. Now we're moving along to Christmas and are getting our fill of Santa too! We already saw Santa a few weeks ago with John and his older son. The boys loved making Gingerbread houses and hearing the Grinch Who Stole Christmas before getting some QT with the big guy. (No sneak peaks yet!)

Today we took the event a little further and decided to participate in Arc of the Piedmont's Santa Fun Run & Walk.

Ready for the Santa Walk!

A was even excited to do it, so we walked the event (it was only 1 mile) and he kept it up for a strong half of the walk before getting on mine and then Daddy's shoulders. It was fun seeing the sea of others dressed up like Santa and his elves...we may even have to make it a new tradition!

Happy happy birthday!

Today we celebrate 4 years of happiness and craziness with our fun loving A. He certainly has a huge personality and makes his presence and opinion known, and we wouldn't have it any other way. He also gives the best hugs, snuggles and high fives of anyone out there. Here's to many more buddy!