Sunsets

I know some people love to take pictures of the sun rising. I am not one of them. Instead, I like to take pictures of sunsets. Before children, I'd take pictures of sunsets everywhere we traveled. I've got great sunsets from Ireland, New Hampshire, Maine ... to name a few. In the last five years I've taken pictures of ZERO sunsets.

So when we were in Cape May, I decided I needed to get sunsent shots. We decided to take the girls to Reed's Beach which is a tiny ticky tacky community about five miles from Rob's Mom's house. It's also known as horseshoe crab beach because thousands of horseshoe crabs beach there each year to lay eggs and then try to make it back into the ocean. Let's just say that not a whole lot of them, do. If the tide hits a horseshoe crab wrong, it gets flipped over onto its back and it can't turn back over, so it bakes in the sun until nature takes its course. Back when I lived in the area I'd go down to Reed's Beach and save horseshoe crabs (being the humanitarian that you all know that I am!) by tossing them back into the surf to live another day. PETA would be proud!

So we decided to take the girls to Reed's Beach to see the ticky tacky houses, the beach covered with dying crustaceans and the sunset.

When we got there there was a huge dredging operation about to get started, absolutely NO crabs and about a gazillion biting bugs. Seriously, Rob RAN back to the car to escape them. However there was a spectacular sunset, so the girls and I risked life and limb to get a few shots. Here they are:

Beaches

We spent a week at the shore. And during that week I think I spent more time at the beach than I spent the entire six years that I lived there. Hannah and Lizzie LOVE the beach. But really, what five year old wouldn't love the opportunity to get completely covered in sand? Not mine!

We had spectacular beach weather (hot and sunny most days) and took advantage of that. Not that we had any choice -- from the minute the girls got up in the morning we started getting the "When are we going to the beach?" question.

We usually managed to stay a couple of hours each time, and, thanks to Hurricane/Tropical Storm Bertha, the waves were really rough at the beginning of the week. Hannah LOVED the big waves and sat at the edge of the surf and let the waves crash over her. Lizzie would bravely walk out to meet the waves and the first time one hit her in the face (which was usually the first wave) she'd scream "I WANT TO GO BACK!!" She liked the tiny waves that crashed around her ankles but she screamed everytime that happened too. I'm sure the lifeguards were talking about us. We were a very noisy family, even for the beach.

Here are some pictures from the beach. (I took these with my little camera, so they are a little blurry.)

Each day they insisted on wearing the same bathing suit:

Sandy Hannah:Hannah working on a sand village:Lizzie collecting shells (we now have about 47 million clam shells that look exactly the same to everyone except Lizzie):Sandy Lizzie:Dad at the beach:Mom at the beach (notice my spectacular tan???):Happy Beach girls:

And now a word from the travellers

We're home ... as hard as the Schuylkill Parkway tried to keep us from it. The usual 2 hour trip took closer to 3.5. We had a great vacation and I'll post scads of pictures later, but for now, Hannah and Liz have a few comments...

Funny Funny Funny!!

Since I am not able to post pictures to my blog while we are vacationing, and I know you are all checking for them (I'll post some on Saturday!) I thought I'd post this video to make you laugh and pass the time until I return. Seriously, this is FUNNY.
Enjoy (just like I am enjoying my vacation!!)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=T4_MsrsKzMM

One day I'll learn how to post the actual video, but this link will take you there. And did I mention that it's FUNNY!!!

Summer of Motherhood

Due to necessity and reality, I have changed the theme of this summer from the Summer of Motherhood (where I work less and parent/play more) to the Summer of Turning Off Lights Because No One Else in this Family Ever Does (where I turn off lights because no one else in this family ever does).

So far this experiment of less work and more mommy has taught me that when my daughters are good they are really very very very good. But when they are bad ... well, when they are bad Rob gets a phone call about about 2 in the afternoon asking when he's getting home.

It has also taught me that if you make something a game you can get away with it about four times. Right now we have played the Leave Mommy Alone So She Can Read the Paper in the

Bathroom game four times, so I don't know what I'm going to do tomorrow.

I have also learned that peace and quiet is really NOT over-rated.

I have learned that my children love to cook and will cook anything and everything. I have also learned that they are really bad cooks. However, I have ALSO learned that even if it tastes burned and soggy and overly salted, if they made it, they will eat it.

So that's what I learned this month. I've got about another six weeks to go before they start kindergarten and I'm hoping that they will learn something during that time.

Of course at the end of the day (when they are SLEEPING!) I realize that they are really the two most adorable children in the entire universe and that even if they don't ever learn to cook or to read or to leave me alone they at least have that going for them.

See what I mean:

Total cuteness!

Happy 4th of July

Happy 4th of July from VERY RAINY Pottstown!! We spent the morning trying to find umbrellas so we could go to the Pottstown parade (I don't think Rob has missed a year since we've lived here and girls haven't missed one yet, either) and, even though we only found two, we figured we'd chance it and go to the parade.
For those of us who GOT the umbrellas (those two up there...) the parade was a laugh riot. But for those of us who were soggy down to the soul it was ... actually pretty fun, too. Here are a couple of scenes from the parade. This is some classic car that Rob made me take a picture of:

Here is Rob pretending that the sun is going to come out by wearing his sunglasses. Luckily I do not embarrass easily...
Lizzie still managed to get wet, even though she was under the umbrella (and had a second umbrella covering her legs because THEY were getting wet, too) and complained for most of the parade. It was too rainy, too cold, too slow, too noisy ... but whenever I asked if she wanted to leave she'd say NO MOM, IT'S FUN. So we stayed and listened to her complain some more.

Hannah, on the other hand, really just loved the whole thing. She didn't say much, but her face told the whole story. She has always loved the parade and didn't mind the rain one bit.
The highlight of the parade for us is always the giant duck. The very first year we took the girls (when they were infants) they immediately saw the duck and started to laugh. So we know that no matter how hot (or rainy!) it is, we can't leave until we see the duck. The parade also had a lot of veterans marching, several bands (including two bagpipe bands, some Mummers and the Rah Jah band which has about 40 members and none of them are under the age of 98 or so. We also saw Clydesdales and motorcycles (including one motorcycle ridden by George Washington) and two guys riding those old-fashioned bikes with the huge front wheels. Oh, and we also saw the ambulance that rescued me when I broke my ankle. Oh, the memories of the Pottstown 4th of July parade!!
It's almost sunny out now, so we are hoping that the fireworks will still happen tonight, but we'll see. Rob's getting ready to grill some burgers and dogs, and that's more than enough partying for me!!

Another World

This post could have been titled Lunch with the Quartermaines, too. But I like to remember Matt and Lorna when they were together (albeit briefly) on Another World, my all time favorite soap opera ever.

I had heard at Curves several years ago that Matt Crane (who played Matthew Corey on AW) and Robin Christopher (who played Lorna on that show, but is probably much better known as Skye Quartermaine on my second favorite soap of all time, General Hospital) had built a house in the area. In fact, I even made Rob drive me down the Nantmeal so I could stalk the house. Then, being the really bad stalker that I can be, I promptly forgot that they even lived around here, much less that they have two children, a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old.

Until today.

Today was the day that the girls and I went to Monkey Joe's, a bouncing, playhouse type thingie (http://www.monkeyjoesphilly.com/) that opened on Saturday about two minutes from my house. So I was sitting in the midst of the mayhem (a local day camp had about 150 kids running around) trying to pretend that I was ... well, ANYWHERE else ... when this couple came in with their two children.

My first impulse was to mock them because they were holding hands. Serious posing, I thought. Sure he's cute, but really NO ONE comes to Monkey Joe's to steal someone else's husband. You don't need to hold his hand, even though he is VERY cute. Then it dawned on me that his cuteness was familiar. My next thought was that I had dated him once a long time ago. Then I figured that I probably knew him from a former life. THEN it dawned on me that it was none other than Matthew Corey who was somehow managing to talk on his cell phone in the midst of the chaos (not to mention that MY cell phone wasn't even working in this building). Then I checked out the wife and it was, indeed, Skye Quartermaine.

I tried to call my sister Tina, who is also a crazed GH/AW fan, but, as I just mentioned, my cell phone did not work in the building. Luckily Tina is not so crazy about Skye or Matt, so there was nothing really lost. If it had been Jason, I would have had to ask to borrow HIS phone to call her.

Anyway, so after I realized the celebrities were in our midst, I had a dilemma. I am a BIG fan, and I think that people like to know that their work is appreciated. However, I am also TOTALLY COOL and did not want to look like the slobbering, stalking fan that I know I could be. At least until I was distracted by the concession stand or the giant monkey walking around the place.

So instead I figured I'd just hang out and wait for an opening. For the next hour I sat next to them, eating pizza (they were eating pizza, too, although I'm sure they followed their pizza with a 4 mile run and a Pilates class instead of coming home and napping on the hammock) and we watched some of the tennis match together. I almost said something about the tennis, but thankfully thought better of it because, I actually don't know anything about tennis.

It was getting time for us to leave (because I was losing what little hearing I have left) and, of course, Hannah and Lizzie did not want to leave.

Hannah had hugged Monkey Joe, but Lizzie had not. Lizzie had the same chance, but at the moment that the giant purple monkey made his appearance, she said she wanted to finish her pizza. Then when it was time to go she decided that she had to run all the way to the back of Monkey Joe's to accomplish this task. Then she had to bounce on every inflatible and slide every slide on her way back.

So that gave Hannah time to play with the hula hoops

Which, it turns out, gave me my opening.

Hannah was hula-ing away, very badly, as I'm sure you can imagine since she has never hula-ed before and she's not the most coordinated of my children. Or anyone's children.

So it only took a minute before she hula-ed right into Matthew Corey's son. Skye was sitting in a chair across from me. First I told Hannah to watch out. Then I said to Skye: "You know when we come to these places our goal is not so much fun as it is to not end up in the emergency room."

We smiled at each other and I'm certain that she went home and told her husband all about the incredibly charming and funny mom with the uncoordinated, yet equally charming child that she met at Monkey Joes.

Or maybe not.

Anyway, it was fun for me because even though I talk to celebrities every week, much of the time I don't even know who they are.

I hope you all had a fun day today, too! Here's a picture of them (not at Monkey Joe's -- it's not a formal place...)