This is one of two posts about our glorious vacation at the shore. The weather was gorgeous (went from too cold for the beach to heatwave!), the company was grand and the behavior was ... well, let's just stick with the good stuff, okay?!
This is my new favorite picture of Hannah and Liz. This was on our first day at the shore. We always go to the beach after dinner and the girls always seem to go in with their clothes on. So I took some photos of them jumping for joy that vacation had begun:
We actually remembered our beach umbrella this year. YAY! We always go to 101st Street in Stone Harbor , which is the same beach that Rob went to when he was a kid. This year Grandma, Uncle Dude and Aunt Linda didn't join us at the beach. :( But we had fun anyway because the water was warm and the waves were awesome AND there were no beach inspectors to force us to buy beach tags!
You'd think the digging in the sand thing would get old after nearly 10 years, but it's still a favorite. Unfortunately while we were patting ourselves on the back for remembering the umbrella we were hanging out heads in embarrassment that we didn't remember all our beach digging stuff. So we went to WalMart and Rob spent $2 for these lovely buckets.
This is Hannah's Sand Art:
The waves were great for boogie boarding -- probably because Debby was lurking somewhere in the ocean. Trust me, you rarely get three waves in a row like this in Stone Harbor unless it is actually storming. So both girls took advantage:
Here they are riding a small wave into shore. One of Lizzie's friends from zoo camp taught her to body surf later in the week, but I didn't get any picture of that. She had so much fun doing it that she didn't get out of the water for the whole 2-plus hours we were at the beach:
There's a boogie board in there somewhere ... but I just liked Lizzie's crazy face:
As you can see, the waves were pretty big this year. Here's Rob saying Hello to Hannah and Goodbye to his sunglasses. :( I believe the sunglasses were the only casualty of the trip, so that was a very good (albeit expensive) thing:
In honor of Way Back Wednesday falling on the 4th of July I am offering this picture of my very patriotic mom.
I don't know anything about this picture except that my dad wrote on the back that it's mom during a parade in Somers, NY.
My guess is that it was probably taken during the late 1990s but that's just a guess - I do think it's a great picture though, whenever it was taken. (EDITED TO ADD -- Dad thinks this picture was taken in the early 1980s when Mom was on the Somers School Board because of some of the people she's marching with!)
When I think of mom, this is almost always how she looks in my memory -- smiling, waving a flag, enjoying herself!
Since I'm vacationing at the shore I thought I'd post a Way Back Wednesday taken at the shore.
This picture was taken at my bridal shower in 1994 at The Doctor's Inn. We were the first people to have any sort of event there (the house had been a private residence that had fallen into serious deterioration and it had been bought by a doctor the year before and extensively renovated to be a bed and breakfast/restaurant and it was well known that I loved the place and had written a couple of stories about the renovation).
The story goes that I refused to go to my shower, but that's not entirely true.
I did refuse to go to The Doctor's Inn because I was told that a salesperson at the Cape May County Herald (where both Rob and I worked) was going to be selling them an ad and we were going to tag along and beg for a tour of the new bed and breakfast.
Well, I didn't think that it was appropriate that I just TAG ALONG when a co-worker was trying to sell an ad. So I said No Thank You when my then fiance brought it up.
Of course there were a dozen or so of my closest friends awaiting my arrival and since it was a SURPRISE shower,but I didn't know about it.
(And in case you're wondering how I was able to be surprised -- since I am so nosy -- it's that my sister Tally was traveling out of the country that weekend, so I assumed that my surprise shower would be when she returned, so even when my very unsocial husband started insisting that I go on this impromptu tour with him I didn't catch on.)
The good news is that eventually Rob was able to change the story to say that we WERE invited to take a tour of the place, so I agreed to go.
And when I got there, a dozen or so of my friends and family yelled surprise and we commenced with shower fun.
Plan B was to have my mom come over to my house (which was only about a quarter mile from the Doctor's Inn) and surprise me there and then take me to the shower.
It was a lot of fun and the place was wonderful. It's a great memory and I think of it every time we're at the shore (and the girls know that's where I had my shower, too, although they are still unclear why something is called a shower when there is no water involved...)
Oh, I could have also posted a picture of the cake which had the sentiment: Best Wishes Tracy and Tom. Yes, my husband's name is Rob (or Bob or Robert or even Sparky) not Tom. Some creative frosting re-arranging fixed that problem. Oh and the air conditioning wasn't working yet and it was summertime ... but we managed with fans and lots of iced tea.
All's well that ends well though. I was surprised and had a great time.
Here are Aunt Tina, Shelby and Aunt Anonymous (and me, with the lovely corsage!) during the luncheon. As you can see I got all dolled up for the impromptu tour. :(
I know that I skipped a week with the WBW but it's all good because today you get TWO photos. Yay You!!
Here's the first:
This is a picture of Aunt Anonymous, 7, me, 6, Martha Thomas (our sort of cousin), 4 and Terry, 5. It was taken on July 21, 1965.
I know all of this because this photo is one of only a handful that is actually labelled. And the reason it is labelled is because Cousin Martha's mother (Aunt Ann) took the time for posterity to know who is in the photo (seriously I have GOT to label photos!). I have got to give props to Aunt Ann because just looking at the photo I would have said that I was a couple years younger (but then I have always looked younger than I am ... ahem...) or that this was the next summer when we were sent to Weymouth because the twins were born.
We used to see the Thomases (childhood friends of my mom) a lot when we were younger, but once we stopped spending a lot of time in South Weymouth (we spent several weeks there each summer when we were in elementary school) I don't recall seeing them. I do know that Aunt Ann and Uncle Wayne are Terry's godparents and I believe that Uncle Wayne has passed on. I have no clue where Martha is ... maybe Aunt Brenda knows! I think this photo was taken at the Thomas' house, too, as Ging Ging would have lived on Great Republic in 1965 and this isn't what the door looked like, to my memory.
And since "the twins" have a birthday on Friday I thought I'd enclose this photo of them trying to kill my cat, Bob. I use the term "my cat" rather loosely because I had the cat in my custody for about six months before the super in my apartment discovered my illegal pet ownership and Bob (her name was actually amaretto bobcat in case you were wondering) went to live in the country with my parents. Then when I moved to New York a few months after that my mother told me that Bob had become a country cat (even though she had never been outside) and that she could not live in the city. She lived about another 17 years in the country, despite the jealousy of her siblings T.A. and Tina who, as I mentioned already, were trying to kill her in this photo.
Judging from the size of T.A.'s fro and Beanie's Farrah Fawcet "wings" I'm going to say this photo was probably taken in 1983 or 1984, in the front yard of our house in Somers. I have no idea what the cat was doing outside because when I got her from the ASPCA shelter I had to swear that I'd never let her go outside because she was born without a tail, thus making her defenseless in the wilds because she could not climb trees. It never deterred her from walking on the railing of the stairs though.
I cannot believe that school is over for the year (has been since last Thursday!) and that we are already in the summer groove (fight, go to pool, fight, eat dinner, go to pool, fight, go to bed...)
Here are some photos from random spring events (not in chronological order)...
I took this picture the first time we had a picnic at Pool Forge. It's a horse. :)
The girls' dance demo was in June. It was the weekend after the pageant weekend, so I had a mental block about inviting anyone to it. They were great, as usual, and are more into the technique of ballet this year.
I took these photos at the actual performance. If you come to my house I can show you the video but since they made the TRACY ANNOUNCEMENT in which they tell everyone that video is not allowed to be shown on the internet under any circumstances whatsoever, including relatives who live far away and can't get to the show. So, I am abiding by the rule, even though I think it's overkill.
After the show with their flowers:
This is the picture I submitted for the photogenic category at the modeling contest. Lizzie won first place -- which I think makes ME a winner, too, since I took this photo...
I volunteered at the 3rd grade picnic this year. There were all sorts of games and snacks and a good time was had by all for the hour they were allowed to picnic. Here is Lizzie eating something:
And here she is hula-ing a bunch of hoops:
Hannah having a snack with her BFF Phoebe:
And getting her face painted:
I also took my Brownie troop roller skating for a year-end party. My troop swelled to about 20 girls for much of the year, but by the end I think I had only 17 active members. It was a really fun year and the roller skating really capped it off, although it was hot in the rink, which is pretty much as it was in the 1970s, including the disco ball and solid rock walls. Here's Lizzie taking a break:
Hannah and Lizzie with their pals Keira and Maura:
Hannah gliding along. Lizzie went waaaaay too fast for me to get a picture of her moving:
Here's a picture I found from the pageant weekend. It wasn't all hair-dos and nail-painting. There was a great pool and I took the girls there to relax. It was right next to the arcade, so we had to go relax in the arcade, too:
We also met the 7 Springs Mountain Resort mascot one morning. He's the one in the middle:
We also had fun with our hamsters. Here's Cinnamon (I don't think she's been on the blog before because she spends most of her time hiding in one of her tubes.) Hannah is able to hold her now so we think she is getting tamer. She is most certainly getting fatter so she can't run as fast, away from Hannah.
Sunshine continues to be very tame and very adventurous. In this picture she's earning her keep by checking Lizzie for ticks.
And here's something you don't see very often, a picture of Hannah and Lizzie and ME! This was at the Leader-Daughter (a girl scout thing) event with our service unit. We learned to country line dance:
So this is something you REALLY never see on the blog ... ME DANCING!! It was a lot of fun and I managed to get through most of the dances!
Finally, Rob discovered a nest of baby rabbits in the backyard when he was cutting the grass (these rabbits fared MUCH better than the other rabbits he discovered while cutting the grass at our old house....) We looked at the rabbits (there were five of them) for about two days before they hopped away. A few days later we saw them in the woods in our backyard with their mom so we new they were okay!)
I think many of you have seen parts of this picture, but this is the full shot of the day that has come to be known as "the night Tracy did not go to the prom when her two sisters did..."
Okay, maybe it's only ME who calls it that, but this is Aunt Anonymous' senior prom, which would have been my junior prom. But no on asked me to the prom. So instead I acted as family photographer and made sarcastic comments to myself.
This prom was attended by AA and her date Paul, who happened to be the captain of the football team.
And then my sister Terry was accompanied by a kid named Kevin who was in my grade and had starring role in the spring musical. Terry was a freshmen. When I look at this picture I can really see how much my nephew Casey looks like her.
The middle couple were friends of AAs and mine. The girl is Lori who was friends with Aunt Anonymous and the boy is Dave who was friends with me at this time but the next year became my sworn enemy when he was named editor of the school newspaper instead of me because, according to the English Teacher, girls were not newspaper people.
But I digress ... I don't have much to say about prom because I didn't go (see paragraph one) but I assume a good time was had by all. For some reason I have a vague memory of going to school the next morning and seeing some of the prom-goers come to school still in their prom finery, but I don't see how that was possible unless prom was on a Sunday, which may have been the fashion in the 1970s. It was during regents, so I suppose it was possible, but I probably dreamed it, as I often dream of prom...
Oh, and here's some good news. The next year I wore Aunt Anonymous' prom dress for the chorus concert which means 1) It fit because I had lost 75 lbs and 2) I looked spectacular. :)
Oh, and don't worry about me never going to prom. I went to a local carnival instead and won a giant teddy bear or snake and saw the woman who played Rachel on "Another World" which was my favorite soap opera at the time, so it was a win for me, too.
It's taken me a week to recover from the Cinderella State Pageant last weekend -- and I wasn't even the one competing. Although I WAS doing the hair and fingernails and toenails and outfit matching and yes, MORE hair.
It was fun and both Hannah and Lizzie did well and enjoyed themselves and made friends, so it was worth it. Oh, and Bob got to eat his way through a whole new resort, so he was happy, too!
Here's the recap (and I assure you this is the SHORT version!!):
We left Friday afternoon after the girls got home from Nature Club. It was about a 4-hour drive so we stopped for dinner at Burger King and made it to the Seven Springs Mountain Resort by about 9 p.m. Which would have been fine except once we got there I had to throw Lizzie into the shower, put curlers in her hair and do her nails.
So it was at least 11 p.m. before anyone got to sleep.
Then we had to get up at 7 a.m. to get ready for the pageant and have breakfast.
Lizzie was competing in a modeling competition, even though I begged her to do the talent competition. Lizzie dances and plays both piano and violin and I thought she'd do well in those categories, but you know Lizzie -- she wants to do what SHE wants to do.
Lizzie has never modeled before. Lizzie gets upset and worried when she thinks the WalMart checkout girl looks at her too long. Lizzie hates to fuss with her hair. Lizzie hates changing her clothes more than once a day. Lizzie wears a shirt and pants to the pool in case someone looks in our car during the 30-second ride.
So you can imagine how much fun she had getting ready for the pageant.
And you'd be right. I believe she broke her own personal record for blaming me for things when she told me it was bragging when I told her that her hair looked nice. She said I should just stop thinking about myself and how great I am at doing hair. That's my girl Lizzie.
The good news is that those of you who know her, know that she ENJOYS being a pessimist. So the opportunity to complain is one of her favorite things. And she took EVERY OPPORTUNITY!
However, her innate beauty and competitive spirit won out and despite her trying to do everything to the contrary, my little tomboy won third place in casual wear modeling and 1st place in photogenic. So there!!
:)
Here she is in casual wear:
And party wear:
Modeling party wear (they had these little taped runways they had to stay inside, but they could model however they wanted):
Lizzie and her medals (taken with my phone - sorry):
When it was all over she told me that her modeling career had come to an end. To which I said (to her), "Okay, if that's what you want." and (to myself) "Whew!"
And here's m y new favorite picture of Lizzie -- gorgeous, isn't she? And every bit as beautiful on the inside, too (even when she's complaining!) Oh and those are Grandma Jo's pearls, which they both insisted on wearing because they wanted Grandma to be with them. I told them both that she had a front row seat in heaven and would be cheering the loudest!
The next day was Hannah's big pageant. And let me tell you that girl loves to be on stage, loves to talk to people, loves to have her hair done, her nails painted and will sit for hours and talk to me about dresses and hairstyles and pageant songs.
Here she is getting ready the night before (I had to do this again on Sunday night, too):
Hannah LOVED every single second of the pageant and that makes it extra fun for me, too. (Since as you know, I am not exactly a pageant person, favoring grey hair and leggings as I do...)
Sunday Hannah had to compete in interview (which is closed to spectators, but she told me it was fun and she wasn't nervous and I believed her) and then we had a break before talent. She wowed everyone with her song and I was crying by the second note. You'd think I'd stop crying because I've heard this song at least 14 million times, but she just nails it each time and I'm so proud of not only her talent but the work she puts in to make it better. She thinks that MAYBE she might want to take voice lessons, but only if MAYBE we might do riding lessons, too. (Both Hannah and Lizzie are negotiators -- luckily so far I am better at it...)
Here she is in her interview outfit. Is it just me or does she look about 22 in this picture?:
And here's a link to her talent presentation on youtube:
After talent, she modeled casual wear and then we had a long break until the Western-themed party that night. That was a real fun time for both Hannah and Lizzie who danced and laughed and drank enough soda to keep them up for the rest of the weekend!
Here are Lizzie and Rob getting ready to giddyup!
The next morning Hannah had to be back at the ballroom at 7:45 a.m. (ZZZZZZZZZZ!) to rehearse for the production number.Then she had to hurry up and get into her party dress for the final part of the judging to see if she made the top five girls.
Here's Hannah modeling her party wear (and yes, that's her first communion dress to which I added some appliques and she's also wearing Grandma Jo's pearls!)
YAY!!! She made the top five!!! One of the judges came over to me and told me how difficult a decision it was because there were so many wonderful contestants in this category, but that Hannah's abilities in both interview and talent put her in the top five:
Then she had to model and do talent all over again.
YAY!!! She was third runner up overall. Crowning was nerve wracking but Hannah was so happy to be in the top five that she didn't care what place she was. I love this picture of them all holding hands ... this pageant really does promote kindness and friendship. The winner is on the left, followed by 4th runner up, 1st runner up (a spectacular tap dancer who also won the talent-- she was extremely talented!), 3rd runner up (our Hannah Banana) and 2nd runner up:
Hannah getting her trophy:
Then there was a luncheon (although to be honest Hannah and I had a piece of pizza because it had been 7 a.m. when we had breakfast and seriously I don't think that pizza ever interferes with anyone's appetite!) It helped to pass the time before the luncheon, too.
At the luncheon we sat with Hannah's new friend Isabella. Isabella was at the same preliminary pageant and was named most photogenic girl. When Hannah saw her at states she was SO EXCITED!!! The two of them spent most of their time sitting together and chatting and it worked out that their numbers were next to each other so they even got to wait in line together. Isabella is a sweetie (as are her parents and brother) and I think there is a playdate in our future as they don't live that far from us!
Hannah and Isabella modeling party wear together:
Then it was time to name the category winners. Here they are waiting to see if they won anything else:
Isabella won 3rd (I think) in the beauty category and Hannah won 1st runner up for her talent and I was SOOOO proud!!! She was happy, too, although she had really wanted a crown. She said NEXT YEAR she'll get that crown!!!
Here are the happy winners and new friends:
Then it was time to come home. Here's Hannah and the two trophies she won (another phone photo, sorry):
Both girls fell asleep for part of the ride home (and I'm not going to tell you how short the ride was or how fast Bob was going....)
As you can see from this picture, I spent so much time getting Hannah ready on Monday morning, we sort of forgot to even brush Lizzie's hair. Luckily that gave her something to complain about:
Oh, and speaking of Bob, it turns out HE came home with a crown....
Hannah's already choosing a new song for next year (we've all been singing "Tomorrow" in our sleep!)
She and Lizzie both want to thank everyone for their support and facebook messages. They loved reading them in between all the pageantry!!
