Eva and Ellie

Updated pictures of the newest babies.  Eva is the oldest by about 3 minutes, and has the darker color. Ellie has a thicker bone structure and is a little lighter in color.  They are about 14 hours old here.

Our first fall babies arrived tonight. 7 lbs each. Kyla is the mother.

Kisses

Molly and Rosie really like to share kisses. Molly is 4 months old now, growing even faster than Rosie.

Happy Birthday Luke!

Today is Luke's birthday. In the old days, when Luke was young, it was so easy to celebrate his birthday. Anything with a motorcycle, a train, a super hero, or Davey Crockett was likely to make him happy.

Luke's 5th Birthday in Tahoe City

Now that Luke's grown up I never know how to tell him Happy Birthday - I doubt if these days a train cake would thrill him like it did back in the Tahoe City days.

Since Luke's birthday is just as important today as it was in 1985 I just want to say Happy Birthday - even if I'm not baking a cake. Probably just as well, cake is over-rated.

Happy Birthday Luke!

And then

Vacation in Orlando last week was so much fun. Getting to start of the celebratory season so early, with costumes and cocoa in the Magical World was the perfect ending to a busy summer. Rosie was an amazing traveler, happily accepting (so unexpectedly) her confinement to the car seat for so many hours, patiently awaiting our stops where she could run around.

The week following Orlando should have been another vacation, and for everyone but me, it pretty much was. Rest is always needed after such a fun and busy vacation.

I managed to snag an assignment for that next week, though, having to leave the house only a few hours after getting home from Orlando. I headed out to Boise early Sunday morning, hoping to get to enjoy a little of the rugged west. But it never happened. This was the busiest and most demanding assignment all summer, I took exactly zero photos, and the only thing I learned about Boise after six days was why this dry, brown, rippling city has a nickname of "The City of Trees."

Boise, Idaho is one of those places you can't get to directly from anyplace. With the complication of having that same issue from Nashville, travel to and from Boise was a bit challenging. It's a lovely place, if very different from Nashville. Certainly its nickname caught my attention.  Yet, when driving from the Boise airport to my job location, I noticed only a small pencil edging of greenery. Where were these famous trees?

I asked this question on my first morning at work in Boise. This generated a chuckle followed by the explanation that, for Idaho, this is a LOT of trees. The rest of the state is even more desolate than Boise, and yet, I couldn't help thinking that, even with all the brown, dry land, it still has its own unique beauty.

I managed to see no sights while working in Boise, except a little of the terrain. I did make it downtown to eat at a fancy Thai restaurant. That's the great thing about any city; fabulous international foods.

After an entire week on a challenging project, I am not  at all rested. Now I'm looking forward to sleeping more than 4 hours in a night, and going to bed at least once in a week before midnight.

Yeah, I know. Good luck with that.
Meh.

Small wonders

It was the cutest thing, seeing Rosie enjoy the Small World ride.

You probably won't appreciate this the way we did, but she is so fascinated with this and loves watching the (more or less boring) video of the boat ride where she can see the characters.  I'll spare you that, but thought you might enjoy seeing Rosie's reaction to this ride.
It was adorable.

Princess meets princesses

Rosie really loved seeing the Princesses.

The first one she met was Sleeping Beauty, but sadly for that Princess, all Rosie could do was point to the one further on who was wearing a blue dress.










Momma's favorite is Belle, and while Rosie did like her pretty dress, she kept looking ahead to the next princess.

 It was Cinderella our little princess loved best. Rosie was mesmerized with her.  She was so happy to finally talk to her and then sit with her- she could not stop staring at her or her pretty blue dress.

Very cool baby on a very hot day

Epcot

The only thing better...

Michelle says the only thing better about Disney is Disney dressed up! 

A few more pics of our dress-up night.
 

Spaceship of the future

Today the four of us divided into partners to design bits of our future.

Michelle and I designed a country home with the latest technology, where we would be most concerned with keeping the house clean, while simplifying what we should wear each day - two important necessities (and things we struggle with the most).

William and Rosie designed a future that would offer more efficient means for city living while  staying focused on good health.

Each of the designs were published for our entertainment (since that's about the only value it's really worth). Still, we're proud of these and hope you enjoy them.

Tired tourists

Start the MAGIC!

I have forever loved Disney. Since 1971, the first year I ever visited DisneyWorld in Florida with my grandparents (that was the opening year, too!), Disney has been magical.


We came to DisneyWorld to celebrate Michelle and Rosie's birthday. I'm not sure who enjoyed tonight more - they both were mesmerized by the magic.

Tonight was the opening night of Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween and we dressed up in Peter Pan attire. We had after-hours admissions, getting to stay till mid-night. It's after 1 am and Rosie is still running around happy.

Let the Magic begin!

Spaghetti-fest (gluten free)

Nana's goes to Neverland!

Tinkerbell visits Fairyland

Tinkerbell meets Mr. Pumpkin

Road trip play

A few days ago Michelle told Rosie we were taking a road trip soon. That helped her today, she didn't complain at all the entire day. Even getting back into the car seat.

I was a little worried about this trip, with Michelle pregnant and nauseous plus she gets car sick so easy, then yesterday spent the day in bed with a migraine. But all was good today. We saw Ruby Falls in Chattanooga then drove to Georgia and went swimming. What a fun beginning to vacation.

Fair enough

I usually love a county fair.  With the exception of  Humphreys county, the fair is one of the most fun annual events I know of. Yesterday was the last day of Dickson county and we were so glad we made it, I have renewed faith that Tennessee just might have a few good county fairs after all.

When the kids were little we always looked for a fair in the autumn. My favorite of them all was the Ventura county fair. It had a lot of livestock, great food, great 4-H stuff and the most wonderful crafts and canned goods that I've ever seen.  I can honestly say I have never once ridden any of the carnival rides at a county fair, that seems like a waste of fairground visit time. There's always much more to do and look at and not enough time to do it.

The Ventura county fair was the first time we'd ever seen the pig races. This year was the first time we'd ever seen the pony pull.  This is where large men use small ponies to pull a trailer full of cement blocks to see whose ponies can pull more the heaviest load. It's a version of "my dog's bigger than your dog" or "my dad's stronger than yours." I casually mentioned that, if they were real men, they'd use men sized horses, but William pointed out that they could hear me.  It was fun though, and baby loved it.  


The best display was the farm animals. They had a lovely chicken and
duck display, and Rosie even got to see her first real bunnies and ride a
pony!  She was SO happy about it. We decided it's time to start
shopping for a pony next year.


Of course, I loved the goat show the best. It was so much fun to see
goats of all sizes, and see how the judge taught the kids how to show,
how to stand, how to respond to his instructions. It was especially fun
to see the Pee Wee group (kids 5 and under) lead their own little goats
out to show in the ring. They were adorable and Rosie really liked this
part, too. 

We decided that, after looking at some of
the 'blue ribbon' goats, that our own goats look pretty darned good. I
should teach one or two of them to walk on a lead so we can enter a fair
one day, too. Rosie would look perfect walking a lead with her own
little kid behind her.

Such hard work

It's a good thing it's Labor Day.  Papa has a quick vacation - but he's finding out how hard it is even here to keep things in order, especially when it comes to Rosie's evening entertainment.

Papa always did find it hard to stay awake anytime after 8 PM. Baby doesn't seem to mind though, she's happy to be watching Peep - one of her favorites. Even if Papa is sound asleep.