Trick or Treat

Traditions feel good.  My kids like having them.  I love repeating the rituals of my own childhood.  We do these fun unusual things that set the day apart from all the others.  Sometimes we can see too many magazine pictures, Pinterest posts, or movies of the perfect holiday, that can cause our own holidays to seem inadequate.  I wasn't going to carve the pumpkin because I had no unique clever idea or the energy to execute it.  Thankfully I changed my mind.  I had the best time making  a simple jack-o'-lantern with Libby and Tommy.  It was a wonderful reminder for me heading into the holiday season (which I insanely love), to keep my focus on the people and the reasons that we do all these things.

They're off!

 I have dreaded this day.  But he was full of excitement.  My youngest one is off to kindergarten!  Thus ends my 14 years of having at least one little companion during my days.  I so loved those days.  Now to stop crying and clean my house...

 My older two wanted mug shots this year:). This is a big year for us with first timer, Tommy, James in first year of middle and Luca freshman in highschool.

 We said goodbye to our first house.  It was a sweet little place.  We laid the floors ourselves and they are such a pretty warm color.  It was always a bright and inviting place to come home.

 This room used to be Luca and James's.  It wasn't pink back then.

Jeremiah built the kitchen Island.

 This was Libby's room.

This was mine.

Spring happens

The Easter chaos with all the grandkids.  I love how Drew has Mom-mom in a choke hold.

Tommy wanted a jersey party for his 5th birthday.

My parents spent a day at Ladew with me.

 Tommy is on his first baseball team.  He is ready to go at 9 am for a 6pm game every baseball day.  "How many sleeps until baseball?" He asks.

Tommy is also really interested in the game settlers.  The game involves trading resources like brick, wood, or wheat.  Tommy seems to have trouble with the word wheat.  "We have so much weed to trade." He says.

Lastly, it's that time of year again.  My kids have grown into such good pickers that we had 2 pecks in no time at all.  It is one of our favorite days of the year.

San Juan & Culebra

Back in March we spent a week exploring the beaches of Culebra.  The kids finished making this yingyang our last morning on the island.  Just feet out from shore we snorkeled amongst brain coral and fan coral and sting rays.  Our other two favorite beaches were tamarindo, with giant sea turtles, and Carlos Rosario which took a mile hike to get to, but had soft white sand and amazing coral.  One of the craziest things was that when we exited the boat on this remote island, one of the first people we saw was one of my closest friends from high school whom I hadn't seen in years!

James yelled excitedly for me to come to see a cardinal outside of the kitchen window this morning.  I'm so glad he did.  I would miss out on so much beauty without these guys.

 This was Libby's hairdo for crazy hair day.

 Luca ready for his first dance.

Winter sunrise on the deck.