Mid May Festivities

Per Aunt Jeanette's request, I will be adding more text! 

Below is Jack's hair on a humid day, looking the bomb.  It is beyond me why she won't tie it back unless she is in gymnastics, but I am going to lie to her and tell her part of the Catholic school uniform is tying your hair back. 

For Mother's Day we went to Grammy and Pops.  Benny had his shirt off because they were eating pasta with red sauce and I'm lazy and didn't want it stained. He hates taking his shirt off if nobody else does- he hates doing anything that the big kids aren't doing (so he will no longer sit in high chairs, blah blah)

On the way home, the kids saw their first rainbow over their school.  Considering Jackie's fave color is "rainbow," this was a pretty big deal.

Courtesy of modern technology (ahem, Aunt Jeanette), I was able to capture their expressions of joy upon viewing this rainbow.

Monday my friend Betsy and I went running and afterwards our youngest kids played together.  I don't remember what I thought was particularly cute about this picture below, but... I took it.  Are they eating? Playing with something cute?  Not sure. 

Now THIS pic, I can get behind.  These 2 goons.  Benny is looking at her with love and adoration and she is looking down like, "Whatever.  I'm ready for preschool.  This little guy is beat."

The girls and Betsy's kids had yoga/soccer after school Monday and we had lunch there.  We basically took up an entire aisle of seats.  And an appearance by sweet baby Kate below!

Then we played in the indoor playground for a few hours.  All the kids worked together to build this really awesome castle.  I don't take for granted teamwork among young kids.  This was awesome.

The pic above is Hilly- who picked a seriously awesome outfit for the first time in probably her entire life.  She is eating toast watching her morning cartoons.  A daily tradition. So that I don't have to wake up quickly.

Below- we babysat Hannah and Payton and Betsy brought her kids over for an hour so everyone could play and take turns holding baby Kate. The kids LOVE her and are so gentle. This was the first time Ben ever held baby Kate. I will call these next few pictures "the baby Kate chronicles." I've been in this position with Baby Benny and at the end of the day when your baby is calm, the last thing you want to do is pass her around the laps of little young people who you have to oversee and who may or may not distress the baby.  So God bless Betsy for sharing Kate with everyone this evening. 

Above are Ben and Hannie watching Caillou.  This girl totally got the vibe of the house and joined right into our favorite TV watching spots.  This was Benny's goodnight episode and he was completely devastated to go to bed while his friends were still here.  I said to Hannie "Wanna go downstairs and play now?" and before she could answer Benny yelled "YES!" it broke my heart to break it to him that it was his bedtime.

We went downstairs and found this insanity.  I have no clue what game they were playing but they played it all night and obviously involved royalty.

On Wed morning I hit up the gym for kickboxing and Benny had QT with his buddy Drew.  They were screaming and diving onto these couches as we chatted before we left.  He was being such a boy all I could do was stare.  What is this species they call boy?  Amazeballs.

Then we hit up Trader Joe's.  Me with 3 kids in the world's smallest and most crowded grocery store.  Just giving myself credit.  I let Hilly walk for the first time in awhile and now I remember why I keep her caged in the cart.  She was running around putting random crap in the cart.  It was insane.  Then at check out she ran behind the aisle so she could hand the guy all the items we were buying.  She tried scanning them herself which was pretty stressful to watch.  It was insane.  But we got groceries and that is what's important.

During quiet time Hilly and I took selfies and I taught her how to take a selfie.  As you can see below, she ran with it.  She is now a selfie junkie.

Last night after gymnastics we headed to Allentown to see cousin Conman's tball game.  First Gma and Pop-pop took us out to a diner at my request and we had dinner, then we hung at their house and then headed over to the game.  It was ADORABLE.  Connor was so happy to see the kids and the feeling was mutual.  He was great at fielding ground balls and he could throw the ball really far. Aunt Jeanette brought nail polish and painted the girls' nails which is basically a first class ticket to their heart. 

Every time Connor was up to bat (above he is on base and my kids are watching with admiration), Jack stood up to watch.  So glad we made the trip.  There were a lot of tears when we left but that's just the way it is when we visit Atown.  All these little visits add up to the kids growing close to their cousins and family.  This is what makes life meaningful.