4th of July & Fireworks

Ha!! I just realized I never finished posting about 4th of July. To make a long story short on the 4th we made one more attempt to see fireworks. Our view was slightly better this time but still not great. The girls saw enough though. Samantha would say "boom" with each one that caught her eye. While we were at Busch Gardens one of the reasons we stayed so late was to catch the fireworks show. That show was amazing. However, both of the girls were ready to leave about two minutes into the show!! Oh well!! Maybe it had been just too long of a day to enjoy fireworks or maybe they were too loud or maybe a combination of both. Either way, our girls have seen fireworks and we don't feel so bad about the 4th now!

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

How cute are these little girls????

From My Little Sunbeams

Another Fun Week of VBS!!

We were home from our vacation barely a full day when it was time to pack up again. This time the girls and I were going to my mom's for a week to attend her church's VBS. The theme was Saddle Ridge Ranch and both Samantha and Gabrielle had so much fun.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

While we were there we were the unlucky victims of a nasty stomach bug. Samantha threw up just a little bit the first day. On Wednesday I was miserably sick and we missed VBS that night. Then late Thursday night through early Friday morning Gabrielle was sick. Some of our plans like going to the beach a couple of mornings were canceled. I had promised Gabrielle we would go to the beach though so on Saturday night after dinner we went. It was incredibly windy and we didn't have much time at all. But the girls did get to play in the sand and put their feet in the water. Gabrielle LOVED it! I'm hoping we can get back for a short trip before it gets cool so that Ed can have fun playing at the beach with the girls too.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Vacation Highlights

I am way behind on blogging and I know at this point it is probably pointless to get caught up. Because I still want to share some photos from our crazy busy month I'll just post those with a few highlights.

We went on our first family vacation this year - the start of a new yearly tradition I hope. We took the girls to Busch Gardens where they now have Sesame Place. We had lunch with Elmo and friends, got wet at the splash pad and rode some rides. We all had so much fun!

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Samantha only liked the characters if they kept their distance.

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From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Elmo cupcakes after lunch.

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From My Little Sunbeams

Ed was in line to ride this one with Gabrielle but she informed him she wanted to ride by herself.

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Samantha did not want to get wet I guess.

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From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Gabrielle's favorite character Zoe. She had already met Zoe earlier but after buying her 'little Zoe' from the gift shop she insisted on going back to show 'Big Zoe'.

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From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Yes, Samantha was on vacation with us. As I mentioned earlier she did not like the characters to get too close. While Gabrielle was meeting everyone in the photos above this is what Samantha was doing -

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

I think we definitely will have to make another trip to Sesame Place - maybe next time the original and bigger Sesame Place in PA. Hopefully next time Samantha will be as excited to see the characters in person as she is when she sees photos or Sesame Street on tv.

It was a very long and very hot day - we were at the park for 12 hours, literally from the time the gates opened until they closed. We had no catastrophes - no meltdowns, no injuries, no lost stuff - the day could not have gone better. OK, well maybe it would have been better if it had not been so hot but other than that a perfect day and perfect first family vacation.

Samantha's First Haircut

Samantha refuses to keep her hair pulled back the majority of the time. Usually she ends up pulling some of her hair out just to get the bow and hair band pulled out. Because of pulling her hair out and the fact that it was getting really long and hanging in her face we decided she needed bangs. So Ed held her in his lap while I did the cutting. At first I wasn't so sure how I liked it but now that I've had time to get used to the new do I think it is kind of cute.

From My Little Sunbeams