A Spring Photo Shoot

I've been thinking a lot about the things I'm going to miss when we move. As hard as it can be to live in a big city like Philly, there are also some really wonderful things too. Like the cherry blossoms every spring. Oh, how I will MISS those! Every year I've tried to get pics of the family by the cherry blossoms, and luckily got them just in time this year, these are just down by our apartment building. They're so pretty!

A Day in New York

It's embarrassing to admit, but after three years of living here, this is the first time we'd visited NYC. I have a serious aversion to crowd, a phobia if you will. Add my two small kids to the mix and I may as well be rocking myself in a corner. But Teresa put on her brave face and snagged this opportunity to see the Big Apple. After all, we won't be this close for a whole lot longer.

My rockstar friend Aubrey was running a half marathon in NYC so we went out to support her. Unfortunately we didn't make it in time to see her finish, but it was still fun to hear about it and meet up for lunch. We rode the ferry over, catching a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty on our way. After that we relied on the subways to get us around. Once we figured those out, we were golden.

We had lunch at the Rockefeller Center, and got to see the sites there. We checked out the Big Lego Store, 5th Avenue, FAO Scharz, and a lot of Central Park. We kept it as kid friendly as we could to keep them interested. It was a lot of fun. We didn't see quite as much as we wanted, but for a first day we counted it as a success. New York is amazing. I don't think I've ever seen so many people in such a small town. But I can also see why people want to live there. It's got an incredible vibe, richer in culture then any other place I've ever been. I really hope we go back, not just now, but when the kids are older so we can really explore.

Climbing rocks at Central Park. You'd be surprised how much time we spent doing this. The kids LOVED it. Rocks. Go figure.


Street performers. They were cool.

FAO Schwarz had some pretty fun and huge candy choices.



You don't even know how exhausting it is to be pushed around the city in a stroller. Jack and Sky could tell you all about how tough it is. Not right now though, they need to sleep it off.



I got to give Jayda credit too. This chick walked around the city the entire time and took it like a champ. She got tired, but had a good attitude. She loved NY. She must have felt the vibe too because she mentioned that when she got older she'd like to live there and be an artist.



Riding the ferry. The weather was gorgeous that day. We had a great time.

Spring and Stuff

I LOVE the spring. I just love feeling like I can get out of my house and breathe some clean fresh air again. And luckily I feel like spring comes pretty early here. These are just pictures of us getting out and enjoying the non-blizzard weather last spring.
Check out the clip-on shades. Oh yeah, it's what's happenin'.

Philly Photo Shoot

Before the Kelly's took off, they wanted photos in front of the Philly skyline, which I think it so cool looking. So we decided to run our families out there for a quick photo shoot. It was fun and turned out great!

A Long Time Coming

Hellllllooooo (hello, hello, hello)! Is anyone still there, I realize it's been about fdjfx months since last updating. I would say we haven't been up to much, but that's not necessarily true. I've probably had the busiest years yet, I just don't know how much of it is really blog worthy. However, there are still plenty of moments over the last few months that I would like to remember. So here are the random snippets of our winter and spring.

January through March have never been particular favorites of mine. The ending of the holiday season combined with the bleakness of weather and reduced sunlight just isn't the best combination. However, we do our best. We read, put puzzles together, play games, and make people out of clothes I have neglected to put away.




Our winter wasn't quite as snowy as it was last year, but we definitely got our fair share of snowstorms and snow days. We didn't get out in it much, but had a blast the few times we did.

For Christmas, I told Glenn the only thing I wanted was to see Les Mis. I grew up OBSESSED with Les Mis (seriously. obsessed. ask my mom). I have owned the 10th year anniversary tape since I was fifteen and have probably watched it over 100 times. Anyway, Banna and I got to see the 25th anniversary back in November and it was SO good except for the fact that NICK JONAS played Marius. It was a travesty, don't even get me started. So, seeking redemption, we saw it when it was touring through Philly in January and it was absolutely fabulous. I could spend an entire week just watching shows if only I had the dough.



We've also gone to Burger King about 3,474 times. We have such a great BK up the road with a playplace that Skyler rarely gets tired of. There is always usually a good group of moms with their kids there as well. I don't ever get sick of hanging out, chatting and drinking my diet coke. I do get sick of burgers though and have had to pack lunches lately to avoid burnout.

This year has also been much more unique because collectively Glenn has been away from us for over two months. Two weeks in Texas for an externship, one week in Haiti on a humanitarian trip,one week in Oklahoma City for another externship, three weeks when I was away in Idaho, and one week in Loma Linda for an externship. All of these experiences have been incredible for him, especially Haiti, which I will hopefully post about later on. It didn't come without a bit of struggle for us, but it has been good for me to learn how to get by without him. If anything it helped me rediscover how much I love him and never want to live without him!

To help my kids understand how long he would be gone, each trip we made a paper chain (excellent idea Amber!). It made it fun to see exactly how much longer until he came back.


Every once and a while I'm able to get some sponge rollers in Jayda's hair. How cute does she look? Like a modern day Shirley Temple if you ask me :)


Jayda also got to give gymnastics a try, which she really loved. It was all very basic, but definitely gave her a chance to learn cartwheels and somersaults. It was also a very nice way to break up the long winter days.

Alright, I think that's it for now, I'll have to start digging through my pictures to get more caught up!