Training

So I have started training for the Columbus Half Marathon. I figured trying to do 1-2 half marathons a year would keep me in shape and the Columbus Half is close by, cheaper than Disney and most importantly FLAT, which is my number 1 requisite!

I am in week 1 of training using Hal Higdon's Intermediate Half Marathon Training Guide. Tomorrow will be 5 miles. Today I ran 3 in about 30 min. My goal in training for this marathon is only to beat my last time of 2:21:36.

If anyone is interested in joining me, let me know!

Ainsley's Birthday

I forgot to mention that while we were in Maine we celebrated Ainsley's 7th birthday! I can't believe she's already 7. Where does the time go?

We did a big family celebration and she had a great time with grammie's and grampie's, Aunts, Uncles and cousins! It doesn't happen very often that my girls get a family birthday party since we live so far away from family. Ainsley seems to be the one that gets it most often since Mackenzie and Ellie's birthdays fall in the winter and we don't travel to Maine in February!

She is going to have a couple of friends overnight here and then to Chuck E. Cheese when I can find the time to arrange it, but I wanted to post at least a couple of birthday pics!

I didn't get a good picture of Rian. At the party she was in her car seat sleeping and the pics didn't come out that clear. I have no idea how I didn't get another picture of her! Rian is around 3 months and is a cutie! Her cousin Jordis is around 6 months and adorable too!

All the kids together! You can't see Conner since he's hiding behind his sister Rian

Here's a picture of Conner kissing a fish. He taught Ainsley to do this too!

Cousins Conner and Lexie

Lexie :)

Ainsley with some of her birthday gifts...(she got mostly gift cards so that we wouldn't have to pack up a lot of stuff...)

The cake! I meant to have them write on it but well..it was a busy day! Ainsley didn't mind :)

Ice cream cake is yummy!

Ainsley's birthday hat that she got from Grammie I :) Too Cute!

A blog worth checking out

I love reading Perry Noble's blog. He is the pastor of Newspring in Greenville, SC.

He offers a lot of insight, encouragement and often a whack upside the head.

His blog is definitely worth checking out.

www.perrynoble.com

A post that he wrote yesterday entitled Why I Believe You Can Do Exactly What God Has Called You To Do spoke to me.

Here's a portion of it. If you want to read the rest, check out his blog.

Why I Believe You Can Do Exactly What God Has Called You To Do! July 28, 2010

I believe you can do exactly what God has called you to do!

We serve a God who is a MASTER at calling those who are not “qualified” to do things that seem “impossible!”

I believe that when a person becomes obsessed with the character of God by reading the Word of God and then gets empowered by the Spirit of God…that person is unstoppable and his/her potential is unlimited as long as they will dare to continually follow Jesus and refuse to play it safe! (See Zechariah 4:6-7)

(A quick note on this…you’ve GOT to make sure you’ve heard from God and are not simply getting ready to do something and then begging Him to work!)

I believe God puts dreams and visions in our hearts that are so HUGE that it causes great desperation for HIM and HIS power…thus leading to the world seeing what HE can do through us rather than what we can do “for Him!” (The bigger the revelation the greater the desperation!)

I believe we are all GIFTED....

Check out his blog for the rest of the post!

It spoke to me specifically because I am wrestling with what God wants of me right now.

I desire to be used by God in life changing ways. Life is WAY to short to waste time on things that don't really matter. It is just a matter of seeing what the next step is...I am glad I am not alone on this journey called life and that He is with me all the time.

Amazing!

Home, sweet home

We are home! Have I ever mentioned how much I love my bed? I do. I absolutely love my bed.

We had a great trip to Maine, had lots of fun times and made lots of great memories.

Now it is back to real life and getting the house back in order.

I have started the laundry, but desperately need to clean the house.

I am pretty sure that will have to wait for another day however as I need to work today.

Just wanted to post a few pictures of our adventures in Maine...

Tail end..

So we are on the tail end of vacation. Just another day left in Maine and then off to Boston tomorrow morning to hop on our plane back to our happy home in KY. While I am really looking forward to getting home and getting back to my own bed, we have thoroughly enjoyed our time with friends in family in Maine. I have LOTS of pictures to post once we get back and get them downloaded onto our computer.

We have had a ton of fun spent with Grammie and Grampie Moody, Grammie and Grampie I and Grammie and Grampie Miller. So much fun that I am not sure how on earth going back to KY will ever compare! I am pretty sure it might be a LONG week of transitioning back...

Parades, good food, swimming in multiples lakes, kayaking, fishing, 4-wheelering, jet-skiing, a trip to the ocean. Lots of amazing fun with family and friends! We have been very thankful for our vacation!

Can't believe that it is a little over 3 weeks before the kiddos start back to school!!! Yikes...not sure if I am ready for them to go back to school!

Happy Hills 2010

I arranged for both Mackenzie and Ainsley to go to camp together this year. They are usually separated by grades, but the week that Ainsley should have gone is when we are in Maine, so they made an exception. So I sent both Mackenzie and Ainsley off to camp at Happy Hills for the 3rd-4th grade camp last Tuesday night. They were scheduled to be there from Tues-Friday but alas I got a call Wednesday night saying Mackenzie was homesick! I think next year we won't send her as this seems to be a problem each year. This is the first year I have had to pick her up but last year she did call and say she was homesick. I thought having Ainsley with her would be helpful but apparently not helpful enough. So I picked Mackenzie up early on Wednesday night and thankfully Ainsley was a trooper and stayed the rest of the time alone without her sister. Mackenzie was really very sweet though. When her counselor called she said that Mackenzie was homesick and really wanted to come home but was very concerned that her sister might be scared at being left alone and wasn't sure she should come home. When I talked to her she said the same thing. She said she would check with Ainsley and see if Ainsley would be ok to stay alone. If not she would stay. Very sweet. But Ainsley said she was ok to stay and so I left her there. I was so proud of her as Ainsley is honestly our least independent girl. She usually needs friends and people she knows in order to feel comfortable staying in new places and doing new things.

I had a good couple of days with Ellie and Mackenzie before we headed back up on Friday to pick up Ainsley. She said she had a blast! I think Mackenzie was sad she didn't stay! She did say she cried a little bit after Mackenzie left because she missed her but then she was ok once they got busy...

She was pretty exhausted though. They keep them up till 10:30 so that when the kids go to bed, they are REALLY tired. She said she fell right to sleep:)

Jeff came home from China on Saturday afternoon laden with all sorts of cool gifts. The girls got new silk umbrellas and another tea set. I am now the proud owner of seasons 1-7 of NCIS, seasons 1-5 of House and P90X. Can't wait to try out P90X when we get back from Maine.

This summer for us is basically globe trotting. We have been very busy doing lots of travel it seems! We head to Maine tomorrow so today has been spent organizing, making lists and packing! Tomorrow at 3 we depart from Cincinnati to Boston, where we will spend 3 days doing lots of cool things. I can't wait! And we hopefully will get to hang out with Aaron and Christina. Then onto Lincoln for a week. We always plan this time to land over our town's homecoming festivities so we can see more people in one place. A week with Grammie and Grampie Moody, Grammie and Grampie I and lots of other family!

Then onto Southern Maine to visit Grammie and Grampie Miller before we head back home to Cincinnati Monday the 26th!

We will post all of our great adventures when we return along with hopefully some good photos...

Here is the boat they made in arts and crafts...

Ainsley next to her bunk. Mackenzie has already taken her stuff to the van...

Ellie next to Ainsley's bunk

Ellie and Mackenzie walking into the girls' cabins

South Carolina

We spent almost a week with my brother and sister-in-law and their family over the 4th and had a blast as usual. We drove down on the Wednesday before the 4th and had that evening through Saturday with everyone. Jeff had to fly out of Greenville early Sat afternoon for a business trip to China which was a bummer but the girls and I managed to still have a great time even while they were missing their daddy. We got to experience our first swim meet and had a lot of fun watching the kids compete. Their oldest four swim for their subdivision swim team and it is pretty competitive. They all did a fantastic job! It was especially great to see Jackson swim since he is the only boy in the family and is really into swimming. He did a great job! Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera and didn't get any pictures.

The kids as always had a great time hanging with their cousins. They worked on a play while we were there and performed it for us. It was a great job by all. I did take video but Ellie fussed and was distracting so I decided not to post it. Mark preached at their church on the Sunday we were there which was really cool. I hadn't heard him speak in years so it was especially cool for me. Apparently it had been 6 years since he last preached! Their church is very large and has 2 full-time teaching pastors so rarely does he preach. He did a fanstatic job and he seemed like a natural. I was glad I was able to be there to hear him!

We celebrated the 4th of July in our usual fashion. All the people in their cul-de-sac get together and buy separate fireworks and take turns shooting them off. Jackson LOVES fireworks and is getting old enough to set them off so he had a great time! I enjoyed watching them from the sidelines. Ellie did much better this year. They didn't seem to bother her at all but she did ask to go to bed somewhere around 10..:) It was a great time with the family and we are thankful we at least live close enough to drive to visit them a couple of times a year..

Here are some pics from the week..

Dinsmore Camp

The older two girls spent a week at the Dinsmore Homestead near us doing Pioneer Camp. They absolutely loved it! Mackenzie was sick one day and I had to pick her up early but other than that it was a great week. They did it a few weeks ago but I am just getting around to posting about it. They learned about the Oregon Trail, the Civil War, celebrated a 4th of July like it would have been celebrated many years ago, and many other things. They had so much fun and they learned lots of cool stuff too! We will definitely do it again next year. Next year Mackenzie also wants to go to the Young Ladies camp where they learn how to prepare tea and do all the things proper ladies did many many years ago. I think it would be a great idea and wanted her to go this year but you have to be 10 and she's only 9.

I didn't get many pictures but did take a couple on the last day.

Haircuts

We spent the last few days with our friends the Lukes. We usually spend a week with them at the beach in NJ, but this year we were unable to get the beach house. Since they were already out in the area for a wedding, they stopped by and spent two nights with us. Trying to cram an entire weeks worth of fun into a little more than 24 hours is a bit tricky but we did have a blast while the time lasted! Two early morning walks pretending we were on the boardwalk, a trip to the pool pretending that it was the ocean, and riding out bikes around the neighborhood like our normal bike rides were fantastic times. But I think the highlight will always be quality time with our friends!:)

Today was planned on being a meet our friends at the pool day, but the weather decided to not cooperate. So instead I decided to get the youngest two haircuts! They have both needed haircuts desperately, but getting Ellie to get her haircut has been a significant trial in the past. So since we could not do the pool, and it was a great day to not be outside, I figured they would go for getting their hair cut. And I have to say, I think it turned out well. Ellie did great. I think she did fidget because honestly who can sit still that long?? Her hair cut took about 45 minutes because her hair shows any and every imperfection and they wanted it to look nice. I struggle sitting still that long so she was a trooper.

They got lollipops after they were done which they thought was great. And they got to walk through down pouring rain which is also lots of fun! I didn't get any pics of them in the rain because I was so desperately soaked, I didn't want to spend any more time digitally chronicling the event! They spent the rest of the afternoon playing with one of the neighbors which is always great fun. Mackenzie got her roller blades in the mail today. We told her that if she did a great job this year homeschooling that we would buy her roller blades. She loves them and has been using them inside since it has been so wet outside. I think she is looking forward to the sun so she can go outside and use them a bit more. Now Ainsley has decided she wants some for her birthday:)

All in all a great day of summer vacation! Next week they get to go to VBS in the evening at a church nearby. I think they are looking forward to it!

This post is for Darcy

Our friends Darcy and Suzanne Pach are moving today. And it is with a very heavy heart that I have to say goodbye. I am posting because Darcy has not yet moved to the dark side of FB and told me I need to update my blog more. So just for your Darcy, I will update my blog.

We have spent the first two official days of summer break at the pool. Have I mentioned how much I LOVE having a pool in our subdivision?? What an amazing blessing as I don't have to pay any extra to go to the pool and I don't have to drive far to get to the pool. We just love it. So yesterday and today we spent a lot of time with with the Pachs as it was our last hurrah with them. It is always hard to say goodbye to friendships that have been there through many different seasons. They literally moved here about a week and half before us. They even looked at the house that we ended up buying. Suzanne told me today that they didn't buy it because Walt fell in the driveway and got himself all scraped up. She figured it he couldn't navigate the driveway than it wasn't the house for them!:) I guess it was divine providence though since it has been the perfect house for us. God knew all along that the neighborhood would be full of girls and that would probably drive their boys nuts! So I feel like I have known them forever and is always difficult to say goodbye. The bonus is that they are moving to NC which is about 1 1/2 hours from my brother's house in SC so I hope to have many visits with them in their new home! So thank you Pachs for the many amazing memories we have formed! I personally wouldn't be the same person without your influence in my life. Our girls wouldn't be the same without your boys either!! We will miss you dearly! And Darcy...you SOOO need to move to the dark side. Get yourself a facebook account!! But just in case you don't, I will try to be better about updating our blog...

Here are two pics from today...

Crazy year

I know it has been months since I have posted. This has been a crazy year here for me and posting was just off my to do list. But as things slow down and I have a little more "free" time, I decided to try to pick it back up again.

Mackenzie is almost finished with her first year of homeschooling and more significantly my first year of homeschooling. I can honestly say I have learned a lot this year. A lot about her and a lot about myself. I have loved the time that I have had to spend with her at home and learn more about how she learns and processes and about what she loves and doesn't love. I have also learned that homeschooling isn't my favorite thing to do. I wouldn't have known that without stepping out and giving it a shot though. We are hoping to send Mackenzie back to school next year. We hope not to send her back to Burlington however. She will be testing this coming Saturday for a local independent public school called Beechwood. Beechwood has a much better academic school district and it is our hope that for now she can get in there for school. If she doesn't, than it probably will be back to homeschooling again next year. I love public schools. I love seeing kids eyes light up when I volunteer and seeing the kids learn and grow each and every time I come in their class. I want to help build and train my kids to be the difference in someone's life. But it is a year by year choice for us, evaluating each of our kids and how they handle their academics and choices. At some point, we may need to look at different choices for each of our children, based on who God created them to be. So for this coming year, we are looking at Beechwood for Mackenzie and Burlington for the other two kids.

I am hopeful this will free up more of my time to be outside my own home meeting people that need an encouraging word, a smile and/or a listening ear. I hope that in all my day to day interactions that I remember my job is not to save people but to point them to the One who does save-Jesus. I am hopeful that I will make more of my time with my own kids and that when they get home from school, I will be there with the same thing for them.

I am also looking forward to summer. Though some families dread summer and all that time with their kids, I actually love it. I love having lazy days that we have little to do and can just hang together playing games, going to the pool with friends and hanging out at the park (until it gets too hot to do that:) We are looking forward to some time spent with the cousins in SC and 2 weeks home in Maine this summer. The older two girls are doing an educational camp at the Dinsmore and will be learning about the late 1800's I believe. Lewis and Clark meet Laura Ingalls Wilder. Sounds like fun to me! So a fun, relaxing but busy travel summer planned. Hopefully it won't be time for school before I post again!

Time to post

I have no idea how people have the time to keep up their blogs! I myself have been struggling with time management or getting done everything I need/want to get done in a given week. But I do realize that I haven't posted in ages and thought I better update everyone before heading down to the treadmill for my 4 1/2 mile run. Right now I am training for a half marathon. I will be heading down to Florida (Walt Disney World to be exact) to run the Disney Princess Half Marathon the first weekend of March. I will be running with at least two of my friends..possibly more. My friend Jaime from Maine will be joining me and my friend Jane from Colorado will be joining me also! I am very excited to see both of them but I haven't been able to see Jane since they flew the KY coop over 4 years ago! I am looking forward to this time and obviously preparing to run the half marathon takes quite a bit of my time since I am not an overly fast runner. I run about a 12 minute mile though I do hope to get it to the 11ish mark.

Homeschooling seems to take a LOT of my time also. I am really enjoying the time that I have with Mackenzie and love to see how much she is learning. She is doing well and it makes me happy to see her growing and being challenged. I don't have the answer to how long we will do this...though I am leaving that up to her at the moment. If she wants to homeschool again next year, than I plan on doing it again next year. She is pretty proud that she got a question right on "Are you smarter than a 5th grader."

Ainsley is loving being in school and when I am available I volunteer in her class. Sometimes that is every week for a couple of hours and sometimes it just depends on whether I have a sitter. She loves her teacher A LOT as do I. She is a great teacher and the kids in the class are pretty good. They just had a Polar Express day yesterday which involved LOTS of cool things like hot chocolate, wearing pajamas to school, getting bells on their desks and watching the movie:)

Ellie is doing ok. We have had a few health issues and concerns in the last couple of months. She has been complaining of headaches so we finally got an MRI of her head last Friday. The doctor called to let us know that everything turned out fine, except that she has some opacification in her maxillary sinus'. She put her on an antibiotic to clear up any possible sinus infection that she might have and has sent us on the the ENT. She will see the ENT this afternoon after school. She has been having quite a few tantrums, enough that I don't like to take her out very often. So that has been difficult for me. She has speech weekly, OT and PT on a every few months rotation and various other doctor's appts, so she keeps me hopping. She is doing pretty well with preschool though starting up with the tantrums a bit again. Not sure if she is regressing or if her behavior is cyclical based on the fall season...we really have no idea. She had been doing really well at the end of last year and the very beginning of this year. Hopefully, it is just a developmental stage and she will move out of it.

Jeff has been traveling quite a bit also, which in the past hasn't been a big deal, but in the last few months has become more stressful for me. I don't get a lot of breaks from the girls what with homeschooling and not having a lot of reliable sitters to call. I am in the process of trying to hunt down more sitters but once again it is one of my most difficult challenges!

Me...I am hanging in there. Depends on the hour/day/minute you check with me. Overall things flow along smoothly, but I am looking forward to the Christmas break and having Jeff home for a while and the girls off school!

Sickness is following us

So we are sick again. Or should I say, the girls are sick again. Mackenzie and Ainsley woke with a sore throat Friday morning but didn't have a fever so I gave them Motrin and sent Ainsley to school and Mackenzie, Ellie and I to our Friday co-op. Mackenzie still didn't feel well after co-op and since we were having guests in this weekend, I thought I should take her to the doctor. So what do I do but call the pediatrician. Of course I have to then wait an hour for them to call me back. They finally call me back to tell me they have no appt times available though I can schedule an after hours appt at 5:30 and pay $50. I turned them down and said thanks, but no thanks! I ended up taking her to an Urgent Care, waiting 3 hours in the waiting room with her and Ellie and finally getting in to see a Dr. She had strep which I already figured she had and he wrote her a prescription. So off to pick up her prescription at Walgreens. We finally get home at 5:45 in time for my neighbor (who was watching Ainsley for me after school), to call and tell me that Ainsley had just vomited and she probably would want a ride home. Seriously?? And I had to be at worship practice at 6 for the Women's Morning of Praise rehearsal. I get her home and in the house and have to decide what to do. So long story short, our friends wisely ended up not coming to see us and our germs, I dosed both of the girls, which is probably illegal, but since neither Jeff and I were up for 5 hours in Urgent Care again, that's just how it goes. They are both feeling better today which is par for the course and worship went well this morning at Morning of Praise. We will be going out tonight for our annual Jack-o-lantern walk later tonight. Hopefully none of us get sick any more and we stay on the road to recovery!

Swine flu...H1N1..pigs flying..whatever you want to call it..

I think we have it! Ainsley was sick last weekend with a cough and high fever. It broke Sunday and she said she was feeling better so we sent her on to school Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday she came home with a low grade fever and was lethargic so I made an appt to take her in to our pediatrician's office this morning. I did end up taking her even though she woke up and seemed ok. She is fine and her lungs sounded clear according to the Dr. Now I am sick and feeling miserable. Shouldn't moms get a pass on sickness? I mean I understand that when sin entered into the world it was through Eve and we all have to deal with the effects of the fall. But seriously?? While attempting to care for my sick kids, I get sick...blah!

On a positive note though, Ellie seems to have the immune system of a Vitamin C tablet because she is almost never sick. She started with some symptoms but they have been very mild and not caused her to miss school and now I notice nothing. Mackenzie so far so good. And then there's Jeff. Apparently he's sick too but with his oh so superior immune system, it is hard to tell! He's not feeling top notch but certainly not as sick as I am. So I have learned I am a very bad patient and melodramatic sick person...and I wonder where they got it from?:)

Anyway, we have a long weekend trip planned for Indianapolis so I am hoping we all feel better by then which is really only 2 days away. Please pray because we are all looking forward to getting away for a bit!

Sunday and sickness..one didn't cause the other..

Apparently I need to update my blog.. :)

We have been doing well here but busy. I find that doing three different things with three different girls takes a lot of advanced planning. I am still a work in progress when it comes to this...but then I probably will be for the rest of my life!

Mackenzie continues to love homeschooling and is really thriving. It continues to be a lot of work for me but I enjoy it a lot also. Classical Conversations has been a really great opportunity for us and provides us with the basis for what we do most days. While I add a math curriculum and Spanish, that's about it because CC provides everything else that I think she needs. It makes for a very LONG Thursday for us since that is when we meet but we are still loving it.

Ainsley is thriving in school and I love being as involved with her class as I can. I volunteer once a week on Tuesday for 1 1/2 hours and then eat lunch with her. She loves this as much as I do. She missed school this past Friday because she was sick and though I have no idea, my guess is swine flu. She is now finally starting to perk up but was sick Friday-today with a cough, sore throat and high fever. It got up to 103.9 several times and though Motrin is great when the fever is high it only brings it down a couple of degrees. At least that's our experience. It was homecoming weekend at Cedarville and we had lot of plans that we had to miss. Jeff took Mackenzie with him and went to the parade and his 10th reunion luncheon. They had a blast which was cool. I however stayed home with a very sick Ainsley and a bored Ellie since we couldn't do much:( Jeff stayed home from church today and thankfully when Mackenzie and I got home she was feeling better. Hopefully she will up to school tomorrow!

Ellie is doing well. She had a Occupational therapy evaluation last Wed and that went well. She gave me some ideas to work on and the option of setting up regular therapy sessions. Not sure what we will opt to do as adding another therapy takes a lot of time and not sure where I can fit it in but at least I have some ideas of things to work on with her which is good.

The girls have a fall break this weekend so we are planning a trip to Indianapolis to have some fun:) They are all looking forward to it. I can't believe how fast time seems to fly though. It is already October! We are now enjoying some great fall weather and I LOVE it! What could be better than having it cool enough to wear a sweater but not too cold? I can't think of anything! So until my next post, enjoy fall!

I will try to post some pics soon!

Wow..how the time flies..and flies..

I can't believe it has been so long since I have updated our blog. Sorry for all of those who actually use it to keep up with us! We have been so busy the last few months and I just haven't taken the time to update.

We had an amazing summer. Relaxing and fun and refreshing which was awesome. The girls had lots of time to just hang out with their friends but also plenty of time with the family too.

School has been in session for almost 4 weeks, I believe so I should probably update on that while I am at it!

We opted to homeschool Mackenzie this year. She has been asking to homeschool for a while. So to give her more of a challenge and keep her love of learning growing, we are homeschooling her. She is LOVING it. She is doing a homeschool curriculum called Classical Conversations. It is a Co-op that meets in our area on Thursdays. We get most of her curriculum from this classical site and base most of all that we do on what she learns on Thursdays. I have also added additional things such as a math curriculum and Spanish, etc. So she is loving the challenge that she didn't get at our public school. She is taking gymnastics, playing soccer and doing theatre again this year.

Ainsley is loving school. She is still at Burlington Elementary and LOVES her teacher. She has a really great teacher. I am still able to volunteer every Tuesday morning for a couple of hours so I love that too. Ainsley really enjoys being with other kids and is enjoying all that she is doing in the first grade! She is also taking gymnastics which she loves..and she takes on the same day as Mackenzie which is nice.

Ellie is in year number two of preschool at Burlington Elementary. She is really enjoying it and doing even better this year which is really encouraging to me. She is sitting better at circle time and improving on all of her skills which is great! She has also started pre-tap/pre-ballet class at one of our local studios. She LOVES it and is in class with 5 other friends from China. So cute...so fun!

All in all the start to our fall school year has been great! I am looking forward to lots of fun this fall. We will be going to King's Island next weekend for our annual King's Island trip with P&G. The girls will have a blast. And I will have a blast watching them...and riding no roller coasters:) Early October is a trip to Cedarville for homecoming and then possibly a trip to St. Louis. Hopefully I will be better at updating in the near future. Finding time on the computer with curriculum prep for Mack, helping Ainsley with homework, etc seems to be more difficult but I am sure I will get better with my time management soon...or hope so!

Eyes

A few more pictures

Since arriving back from SC, we have been busy having fun as a family. Some bikes rides, some parks, and lots of pool time! The girls love the pool and Ellie getting more and more comfortable in the pool. She is actively kicking her legs and has started using her arms to swim. Though I don't think she will be without floaties by the end of the summer, she is making loads of progress. We celebrated Ainsley's birthday by spending the day at Coney Island while Jeff's mom was in town. Ainsley was able to invite her friend Ashleigh to go with her and they had a lot of fun. It was a great day together and Mackenzie said this was a great idea..better than any birthday party! So I guess they are now big fans of picking one friend and doing something they choose.

Jeff's mom was in for 5 days and we had a great time with her. The girls were sad the day she left. We love having family in town to visit!

We went to one of the library programs tonight with a traveling children's theatre. It was cute and the girls enjoyed it. Then off to UDF for ice cream..yum!

We are getting ready to take the older two girls to SC on Sunday. Mackenzie will be going to camp with her cousin Madelyne and Ainsley has been invited to spend the week with her cousins while the older two are at camp. Though Janice is just getting back from vacation and may change her mind! They are both really looking forward to the time with their cousins! Tomorrow is a day at the park with Cedarville grads as we have a Cedarville Alumni reunion. The girls are looking forward to the park, but not sure they care about anything to do with Cedarville...:)