Trip into Boston

We took the kids on the train into Boston for the day a few weeks ago.  We like to do this about once a summer, and we make a big deal out of it, and the kids were crazy for it!  First we went across the street to Station 5 Grill for some breakfast.  We were there when they opened at 7 am, ha ha.  Little buddy ate some pancakes with his daddy.

Next up, we went to West Natick station to pick up an 8:20 train to Boston.  They thought this was SO cool.  Grant loves anything with wheels, and probably the fact that it was going fast.  Natalie is crazy about trains, so it was probably the highlight of the day!

Next we walked around the Garden for a little bit, and then took the Blue Line over to Aquarium so we could get on the commuter boat that takes you from Long Wharf over to Charlestown.  It's only about 10 minutes long, it comes every half hour, and it only costs $1.70!  You really can't beat it.  We rode up front so Natalie could see out. 

Once we got over to Charlestown, we didn't have enough time to go over and see Old Ironsides, so we just walked around the wharf area.  We found this giant anchor and attempted to take a family photo on it.  Three out of four Bailey family members participated!

After we caught the boat back to Long Wharf, we grabbed a quick pizza before heading back to Back Bay so we could catch our train back home.  We were home before 1:30, and Todd said, "It's only 1:30 and I feel like we've done a full day of activities already!"  It was a  good, fun family outing!

Natalie's 4 year stats

More on her 4th birthday in a minute...  first we need the stats!  Natalie had her 4 year appointment and is 40" tall (60th percentile) and weighs 38 pounds (75th percentile).  I don't know where the weight comes from (probably milk!) because she eats like a bird.  She tells us she eats well at school and at Maureen's but we aren't really sure she's telling the truth.

Natalie had a fantastic year at FACE Children's Center.  In her final "progress report," her teachers said, "Natalie is a kindhearted little girl.  She quietly joined our Teddy Bear class last year and has emerged into an outgoing and playful friend.  She has made friends not only in our class, but with children in the other classes as well, very popular!"

"Natalie is always respectful in group or circle time.  She will listen quietly while a story is read and waits patiently when directions are being given.  She can proudly recite her colors, shapes, and counting.  She is also a very good singer!"  (This is mommy's favorite part, ha ha ha!)

"Natalie runs around the playground or the back field with quick agility.  She just always looks happy.  Her smile has brightened our days.  It has been a pleasure working with Natalie and it will be fun to watch her grow in the next year!"

Natalie is still a great sleeper and can still nap for 3 or more hours in an afternoon.  She goes to bed every night around 8 pm and gets up around 6 am.  It's difficult to wake her sometimes (kinda like her mama!), but generally if you just open her door while you're getting Grant ready, she will come around.  She loves going to gymnastics and is really looking forward to starting CrossFit Kids at some point.  She is still an incredibly smart little girl with an amazing vocabulary.  I did a little interview with her the other day and this is how it went:

What is your favorite color:  Green

What is your favorite food: Macaroni and Cheese

Where is your favorite vacation place?  Florida at Nana and Pop Pop's

Who is your best friend: Gaby and Sarah (although this changes daily but these two are definitely besties)

We just found out that Natalie is actually going to skip over the Chipmunks class at FACE and will be a Butterfly next year with her friends Gaby and Addison, along with about 6-7 other kids from her Teddy Bears class.  She was excited because the Butterfly's are the "Big kids."  We are so proud of her!

Gym Show 2011

Natalie has been going to Planet Gymnastics for about a year now and really loves it.  She was recently promoted (starting this fall) to GymStars II.  But to wrap up the 2010-2011 year, they have a big final show called Gym Show and all of the kids get to participate.  Naturally, the GymStars I, being the smallest of the independent (ie: without a parent) students, were the cutest of all!  They practiced really hard on their routine for weeks!

The theme this year was a "Planet Gymnastics Hoedown!"

Natalie scanned the crowd before she found us and gave us a big wave.  Her friend Lili is on her left (your right).  First, they did a dance/gymnastics routine to the song "Ring of Fire" by Johnny Cash.  Then some of the older kids did their routines (along with some of the girls from the cheerleading squad they have there).  Then the GymStars I group came back out and did an obstacle course showing off some of the moves they had learned during the year.  I didn't get any pictures of that since I videoed the whole thing!

Natalie and all of the other kids got to come out and watch the teachers do a really cool routine full of flips and handsprings and all kinds of crazy cool stuff!  They were really impressive!

At the end, everyone receives a medal for their participation during the year and during the Gym Show.  Normally I'm not such a huge fan of giving all the kids medals, but gymnastics isn't exactly a "team" sport, so I was okay with it.  There aren't winners and losers in gymnastics, it's just exercise and skill!

Uh oh!  That's a pretty big reward, I think I'm going to have to turn them in!  I know where these ganstas live!

Wilmington Crew Party in Ipswich

The Catanzanos were in in town from California, so of course, that is reason to have a big party at the Morris house in Ipswich.  Naturally, I didn't get any pictures of Greg and Jan, but Cameron and Kiera made it into the first picture below! 

Grant has decided he likes to climb stairs.  So he climbed all the way to the top, but you can see that Mommy was waaaay too nervous about that, so I followed him up there.  Then later, we went down the slide together, but he didn't really care for that.  No laughter, no smiles.

But these girls were ALL smiles.  Natalie and Annabel are like BFF every time they get together.  It is SO funny. I swear they were separated at birth.  They are both total goofballs and just laugh all the time.

Grant decided he wanted to go talk guy talk with the guys- Rybo, Joe, Cooch, and Daddy.  Here he was saying, "Is this the cooler with all the beer in it?"  Sorry big guy... another 19.5 years.

Later in the night, things got a little crazy.  Apparently Karen was sitting on Cooch's lap and she got up to go get something, and he tipped backwards.  Everyone was laughing and the girls must have heard this because Natalie asked me no fewer than 15 times why everyone was laughing and "what was so funny outside Mommy?"

We decided, when the kids finally went to bed that Natalie could sleep in Annabel's room on the air mattress on the floor.  Of course, Annabel wanted to sleep down there too, and it's plenty big, so Natalie got to have her first sleep over with a friend.  How long did this last?  Well, til about 1:30 am!  The girls didn't get settled in bed until after 9 because Ipswich (or somewhere?) was having fireworks and they were really loud and the girls were questioning us about them.  (Us: Me and Andrea)  Then of course, they were giggling, and throwing their bears in the air, and talking... UNTIL 10:30 PM!!!! 

They were so funny though.  One time, I heard Annabel say something about a fart.  Natalie isn't really familiar with that terminology (we call them toots!) so Natalie said, "What's a fart?"  And Annabel said, "It's when gas comes out of your butt!"  And of course, this was really funny to them.  Then later, Natalie felt the need to explain what a word meant also, so she chose the word, "Infection."  She said, "Do you know what an infection is?"  And Annabel says, "No."  Then Natalie says, "It's where a boo boo gets red and germs get inside!"  Infection??? Really?  What the heck led up to these conversations???

Finally at 10:30, I had to go in and ask the girls to play the silent game.  Whoever could be quiet the longest wins.  At one point, I did hear Annabel say something, to which Natalie responded, "No, let's just go to sleep!"  Natalie certainly loves her sleep.

But of course, I heard some whimpering at around 1 am, just as all of the adults left the party.  So I went in and Natalie said she had to go to the bathroom.  So I took her potty, and then as I was opening the door to let her back in, Andrea said something in the kitchen and Annabel immediately woke up!  So then, the giggling commences, and after about another 30 minutes, we had to move Natalie into our room.  SO FUNNY.  It was a good attempt at a first sleepover, but we know how little girls can be.  Maybe next summer we can try it again!

Natalie's 4th birthday party

Whaaaat a day!

In the morning, we had a little Father's Day/Bean's birthday party celebration.  We were so excited to have BOTH sets of grandparents here!  PLUS... CocoBrie came up from Florida too!  They picked a nice weekend- it rained on Friday but we had really nice weather both Saturday and Sunday, something they aren't used to this time of year. 

Bean's birthday is on June 15, so we always have a little celebration for him.  Seth helped him blow out his candles and open up his cards and gifts!

Then after nap time, Natalie woke up around 2 for her friend/kid birthday party.  We invited Addison from FACE/Gymnastics, Gaby (BFF from Maureen's), Sarah (BFF from Teddy Bears class at FACE), Logan and Grace, Jackson and Sami and of course, our resident big kid Seth who was a big help when it came to the breaking of the pinata.

Natalie was trying to swing with only one arm, and had a few good whacks.

All the kids got some good hits in, especially Logan and of course, Seth.  You should have seen them scramble once it finally broke open.  Natalie immediately found a lollipop and asked Daddy if she could tear into it. 

Here's Addison, Sarah, Gaby, Natalie, Sami, and crazy little Jackson, the ham!

We also played a game of pin the tail on the My Little Pony.  Grace had my favorite "stick" (they were stickers) of the day... way out in left field.  This is typically where I put mine, and it's funny every time.

Next up was cake and ice cream.  Natalie wanted a Funfetti cake this year, with Funfetti icing.  The girls had a good time lined up eating their cake and ice cream (with Sarah's mom Karen!)

Little Buddy got up from his nap toward the end of the party.  He didn't even realize what was going on- he just wanted to push his favorite firetruck around.  Coco Brie sat outside and watched him while Natalie opened a few presents after all of the kids had left. 

Happy 4th birthday Natalie!  We hope you had a great day and we love you very much!

Sami and Jackson's 3rd birthday party

Natalie was VERY excited to get an invitation to Jackson and Sami's 3rd birthday party at Playtown Express in Hopkinton.  We had gone there for Logan's birthday party in December, and she most definitely remembered the big slide and all of the fun things to play on.  She was even more fearless this time, which is SO funny because her brother is totally afraid of things like this!  (Big slides, swings, jumpy houses, no thanks mom!)

Seriously, this slide is so fast, this is about all you capture.  But I think you get the idea!  She pretty much LOVED this once again.  She and I were going down the slide, laughing our butts off, running around, climbing the stairs and doing it all over again!  It was so much fun!

Big boy wanted to do a little grocery shopping with Sami.  She didn't want to play house with him, ha ha ha ha.

This is my new favorite picture of Natalie. I mean, have you ever seen so much JOY on a child's face????

A very unsure big boy with his daddy.  Once he went down the "roller coaster," he didn't cry, but he got up and walked away.  That was fine dad, but that was enough!

Sami and Jackson had TWO CAKES (which makes perfect sense to me, anyone who has two kids knows that you NEED two cakes for two totally different kids who like different things).  To say the least, Natalie was very excited that there were two cakes.  Even Grant got in on the cake action... they were so cute, sitting like such big kids at the table with daddy!

Playground time

Boy, for early June, the weather has just been absolutely beautiful around here! So of course, that means we have to hit up the park that we know. Sorry I don't have any pictures of Natalie. I was the one with the camera, and I was in charge of following Grant around, so I only got pictures of him!

He met this dog and kept calling him "Sky" after our neighbors dog of the same name. He loves dogs, but he never touches them. It's kind of funny.

Grant also started using actual playground equipment for the first time that I've seen. Mommy was supervising very closely, but he climbed up all by himself. We went down the slide together.

When we were all hanging out in the clubhouse, we saw an awesome dust devil develop over the softball field. This is a great pic- but it looked even better just before this. I'm such a weather weenie!

Gordon's Graduation Party

After gymnastics on Saturday, we all went to Wilmington for Gordon's high school graduation party.  I can't believe he's graduated from high school!  Seriously, thanks for making me feel really old and uncool.

Not too long after Grammi, Bean, and the South Yarmouth Bailey's arrived, Seth found a couple of small garden snakes.  Do you see now why I love my mother-in-law so much?  Isn't she so cool???  Not only did she actually pick up a snake, but then she pretended to eat it!

Big boy and the even bigger graduation boy.

Natalie rediscovered Uncle Gordie's back hoe.  She looked so pretty in her dress with her big cousin Seth.

Grant was a TOTAL MESS.  Who brought the homeless child?  His face is all beat up from various run-in's with the playground equipment and curbs.  He was digging in the dirt and was totally messy, and he got his lunch all over him because we forgot his bib.  I think he's ready for Mass Maritime though!

Natalie asked GoGo if we could cut the cake.  He totally stopped what he was doing (hanging out with his friends outside) and came in to cut the cake just so his little cousin could have a piece.  Wasn't that super nice? 

Congrats GoGo!  Helen had a picture of him when he was little put on the cake.  I totally see the resemblance between GoGo and Grant in this picture!

Ahem... the ubiquitous cake-on-the-face picture.  Love that girl!

Natalie's birthday

This is an e-mail I got from Todd earlier today...

I asked Natalie what she wanted for her birthday.

She said she wanted a puppy! Ha ha. She was so cute. She said, not a puppy at our neighbors but one at our house that is furry and wags its tail. I told her no. I said they are a lot of work and we are not home enough to take care of it. I asked her if there is anything else she might want. She said she wants a real robot that walks and talks to her.

Grant's 18 month statistics (at 19 months old)

We're kind of slackers with the doctor's appointments- Grant was a whole month behind!  Todd took him for his 18 month appointment yesterday morning (before he sliced his forehead open!) and he weighed in at 27 pounds (up 2 pounds since his 15 month appointment) which is 60th percentile.  He is 34" tall (up 1 and 1/4" since his 15 month appointment) and that is 85th percentile.  His head grew 1/2 a cm and is now at 49.5 cm, which is also 85th percentile.  He got a couple of vaccines and now he's good to go until he turns 2!

OK, pardon their sweatiness here as it was 90 degrees outside and we don't have central air (not necessary today as it's a beautiful 70 degrees, breezy, and I have the windows open!)  But this picture cracked me up.  Natalie put the shamrocks on Grant's head and he didn't even bother trying to take them off!  They looked so cute together!