We celebrated our 8th anniversary with a date night. The girls stayed home with Grandma for a playdate while Husband and I went out. We started with slurpees and Home Depot to price refrigerators. Onto RC willey for more price shopping. Onto Ross for some returns. And then to a nice sushi place where we stuffed ourselves silly on the good food. So maybe the errands weren't the most luxurious date night activity but we're so excited about our house and eager to get ready, especially when we have the chance to look without the girls' "help".
Work on the house is zipping along quickly and we can't help ourselves but to visit nearly every day and admire the new work. The trim work inside is nearly finished, the stair rail is installed and stained, the closet shelves are in and all the interior paint is finished. There will need to be some touch up work before they finished but it looks amazing and I love the feeling and space as I wander from room to room. This week the crew began installing tile and the stone and stucco work on the exterior. Six weeks to go! Meanwhile, home interest rates have skyrocketed, much to our dismay. But it is what is, right?
Family bike rides have become another favorite activity lately. Sometimes we even get grandma and grandpa to join. Last week we rode our bikes around town a bit and to a cute local pizzeria. We sat outside in the cool evening, munching pizza and finished off the evening with ice cream (purple ice cream, at Ladybug's request).
Another new fun family activity--Grandma taught the girls to play "no bears are out tonight", a fun night game similar to hide and seek. The girls loved it! The first time, they came out of the house, ready to play wearing their bathrobes over their night gowns and donning the arm chair covers as their hats. I'm not sure why but they declared that's their "hunter clothes". So fun.
Husband and I went rock climbing. It's been awhile and I wore out quickly but was a fun challenge and something I haven't done in years!
We celebrated Independence Day with our girls here at home. We started with a festive breakfast, donuts, strawberries and blueberries arranged like the flag. Then Husband had to work so the girls and I played at home for the morning, visited Daddy for lunch and ran a few errands around town (including slurpees and firework shopping) before we headed home for naps. In the evening we had dinner with Grandma and Grandpa and then gathered int he driveway for fireworks. The girls loved the little poppers! The sparklers had more mixed results with Butterfly dancing around waving them proudly, Lovely tentatively and eventually excited trying it out and Ladybug adamantly refusing and shying away from them. Husband ran the fireworks show, with similar results from the girls. Butterfly loved every minute, Lovely started open mouthed, sometimes covering her sensitive ears while Ladybug curled into the chair, nervously clutching her blankets as she watched. Her favorite was the Purple Rain (always a hit) and Butterfly loved the Pink Diamonds that she picked out. The dragon was a bust but the Mystic was particularly unique and fun. Our finale was the Red, White and Bling, our only aerial but very impressive.
Then we launched into our busy and fun weekend. Husband spent Friday night painting our new garage (an upgrade we decide we would do ourselves instead of paying the builder) while the girls and I played at home.
Saturday was wedding day for one of our cousins. So Husband went down early on set up crew while I readied the girls and picked up the food and layers of cake. I arrived at the church to help finish the set up and then we all went to the wedding luncheon at Olive Garden. The girls colored happily and played with the princess figurines I had brought in between devouring their food. After lunch we returned to the church where my assignment was to assemble and decorate the cake. It turned out pretty beautiful, wrapped with black lace and pearl pins over the smooth fondant and decorated on the top of each layer with pink and white flowers. I like to decorate cakes but was worried I might be in over my head. However, it turned out really nice and I think the bride was pleased. The wedding ceremony was brief, but even as quick as it was I missed most of it chasing out noisy toddler in the hallway. Then the girls and I played in the nursery while husband helped clear the ceremony and finish setting up for the reception. The food was fantastic, we loved chatting with cousins and the girls made friends with other children their size. Their favorite part was dancing at the end of the evening. But tiring quickly, we decided it was time to go and we headed north to spend the night at my mom's house.
The girls were thrilled to go to Grammy's house and especially to check on Papa and play with cousins who were also staying over. We played through the morning and attended church. We brought wedding leftovers for lunch and put Lovely down for a nap while the girls watched a movie. Lovely didn't last long though and needed Daddy to cuddle her to go back to sleep, for which he happily obliged her. There was a steady stream of visitors from church, coming to visit Papa and the girls coyly introduced themselves to each one.
And soon we were on our way to a cousin's birthday party. We had dinner, ran around and then celebrated with bubble toys. It was brilliant and so fun. Each kid had a battery operated bubble gun, filling the whole yard with the enchanting bubbles while my brother used a new bubble toy to create giant bubbles for the kids to chase. Bubbles were followed by presents and cake and the long drive home again.
This week is a couple of days at home, classes at the gym, swim lessons for the girls and readying for our next adventure. Stay tuned...
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