Summer is here

We are at the pool every day there isn't thunder. Juliette is making great strides with swimming and Evie is staying longer and longer under water.

Last week was vacation bible school with friends from the day school, but not our church.

Evie kept calling it VBS.com (like pbs.com for kids) - it completely cracked us up.

My Magpie

I pause from laundry to offer the following list of contents of Juliette's bed when I went to change her sheets--

2 sinkrags from the kitchen
panda
6 other anonymous stuffed animals
4 books (2 stolen from Evie)
1 hairbow
1 pair of socks
1 neck soother
1 hairband
a dirty shirt
a quilt
a winter hat

No wonder she's always crawling into our bed, even with us it is less crowded there.

S T O R Y L A N D

So my brave sister and I just returned from a 5 hour round trip car ride with Ju Ju Bee and Lu Lu the Lobster girl to visit Storyland in northern NH.

This is their first theme park visit with their momma and they both did swimmingly well.

We weren't sure at first. Juliette burst into tears halfway through the teacup ride. The catch was she wasn't on it at the time - only me and Evie. But it stressed her out enormously to watch us whipping around in those teacups and laughing hysterically. After that she and I had a chat about how she didn't need to worry and no one was going to force her to go on any ride she wasn't ready for.

Juliette is a driver. She drove the swan boats, the cars (twice) the tractor, and also did several train/tram kinds of rides.

Genevieve rode the roller coaster twice and wanted to do everything that remotely looked scary. Going up to North Conway and visiting the Storyland of our childhood was a trip for me and Heidi. We had such fun reaquainting ourselves with the 3 bears house, Cinderella's castle, the swan boats and going on new rides too.

We both remembered different things about the park and we also drove by our Aunt's old place for good measure. She and her husband built a lovely Swiss chalet into the side of a hill with beautiful mountain views. We were especially pleased to see the new owners are keeping it up so nicely.

Funny to think of Juliette and Evie taking their kids to Storyland in 35 years. I have a feeling the old woman in the shoe will still be there.

Juliette Ballet

Evie Ballet

In case you are wondering....

Why you haven't seen pictures of the girls for such a long time, we had a flood in the basement during a heavy bout of rain and our guest room/office is completely deconstructed down to the cement block.

All furniture is in the living room, mattress, tables, desk, etc. willi-nilli. Our downstairs is in shambles and the computer has suffered a dislocation (although no damage!).

So, I've finally figured out how to put pictures on the laptop.

The above pictures are from a trip to the arboretum in April - the columns are from the Capitol Bldg. Aren't the lilacs lovely?