summer (fun) - in - review (august)

the beginning of august we celebrated harrison's 2nd birthday at my aunt's house in hershey. it was a fun day of swimming and relaxing in the sun. apparently i didn't have my camera at that event, so i will have to enjoy my sister's/mom's pictures and unfortunately, unless you're friends with my sister on facebook (yes, folks, my sister is now a facebook junkie -- actually worse than me!), you won't get to see them. sorry. bad kiki! next up...

deep creek lake, or bust! that's right folks, august brought vacation with the scollick-d'angelo family!! once again, john's mom and step-dad gary rented a house and boat at deep creek lake in western maryland for a week. it was 2 1/2 years ago that we did this, and this year was even better than that trip which i talked about here and here.

when we weren't boating, fishing and swimming in the lake, we were hanging out at the beautiful home, spending time with each other and just relaxing. we played wii, poker, had pleeeennnnnttttty of wine and margaritas...and the occasional mo-ji-to too! we stayed up late and slept in and plain just had a good time!

we all had so much fun in fact (as evidenced by the 150+ pictures i took which you can view here) that not even a week after returning from the trip, a different house (this one with a pool for some of us folks that are freaked out a bit by swimming in the lake) was booked along with a yellow pontoon boat for next year's trip...kathleen's crossing, watch out for the scollick-d'angelo family trip 2010!!

front of our home-sweet-home for the week

side deck overlooking the lake

tony, ready to head to the lake

what a ham!

daddy and his little buddy sportin' some shades

mommy and her little guy

not one's to stay at home for any period of time, the weekend immediately following our return from deep creek, we loaded up the camper and truck and headed to knoebel's for a long weekend with jack and sam for our annual trip!

despite the downpour of rain (which also seems to have become part of our annual trips) we all had a great time. my parents, and sister, dave and harry joined us for the day that friday (the worst rainy part of the weekend) and after a brief hour+-long downpour and waiting it out under some shelter, we enjoyed the rest of the day together.

tony on his "international harvester"

in line for his first roller-coaster!

tony ridin' rides with harry b!

tony and sam

tony and jack

i think jack and sam were pretty excited that tony can go on all of his rides alone now and they don't need to cram in kiddie-rides with their knees up to their eyeballs anymore! we are already excited about next year's trip...if jack & sam aren't done with it yet!! i didn't take a ton, but what pictures i did take, you can view here.

a surprise for the tone-ster

realizing on our way to the deloretta cabin that we had to drive past knoebel's, john and i thought it would be a fun idea to surprise tony on the way home with a visit to enjoy some of the rides and yummy park food (ok, that part might have been for the pure benefit of john and i). we told him to take a nap in the car on the way home and that we would wake him up for his surprise when we got there.

we woke him up right as we were heading into the parking lot of the park...he woke up and knew exactly where we were and couldn't wait to get out of the truck. the first question he asked was "are jack and sammy going to be meet us here". this was so cute because he's only ever been at knoebel's with the boys (my cousins, now 10 and 13) during out august camping trip.

to say he had a good time would be a complete understatement. we had no lines to wait in and the weather (despite being a little cold) was perfect as typically we are sweating bullets during our trip there.

you can view more pictures of our trip by clicking on the album link in the post below - i combined them with the pictures from the cabin weekend.

snow day fun

we received a "decent" amount of snow and considering we are the last street in exeter to get plowed, i figured it would be better for tony and i if we stayed home today. i say "decent" somewhat sarcastically as the amount of snow we got is nothing at all to right home about if you're someone like me that actually enjoys the snow, but it was a fair amount for this winter so far.

tony and i enjoyed a lazy morning of snuggling in bed watching caillou and mickey mouse clubhouse on demand. he slept until 8:30 and then came and crawled in bed with me for about another hour or so...yeah, we were bums.

then we forced ourselves out of bed and i finally fed my child some breakfast...good thing he's as much a morning person as i am. after a yummy (and fun!) breakfast of egg and cheese breakfast burritos, we bundled up and headed outside intending on shoveling (tony) and snowblowing (me)...only to find that our awesome neighbor across the street had already snow blowed the entire block's sidewalks and service walks! all we had to shovel was the little bit of the driveway that wasn't blocked by our cars.

because of the kindness of our neighbor, we got to do this instead of shoveling...

"shorty" the snowman...

"but he needs a hat mom..."

then after coming inside to warm up by a cozy fire...some of us decided it was a perfect time to take a snooze...

this guy here wanted to lay on the floor...next to the coffee table...almost on top of dad's slippers...nice!

while this little lady here decided she'd take her nap on the cozy couch...with her baby...brat!

boy do i love a good snow day!!

ready for fall

with my mums planted and pumpkins purchased, i can finally say i'm ready for fall and the cooler weather that comes with it!!! it truly is my favorite season and i love seeing all the colors God shows us this time of year!

you can click on the image to make it larger

and then there were 2

we attended may day last night dodging rain drops all along the way...but we were successful in our mission...we won another fish....after daddy dropped $3 (for 15 balls) unsuccessfully trying to win a fish, mama thought she'd try her hand and and put down $1 for 5 balls, getting the 2nd one she threw into the little goldfish and winning fin a friend...meet gil! gil is much smaller than fin, although i'm sure in enough time in the new tank, he/she will grow to be quite big like fin did too!

p.s. we finally got to see fireworks too! luckily we watched them from mimi and poppop's house and were able to stay under the patio umbrella so as not to get too wet as it was pouring til they set them off!

postponed

is anyone surprised? yes, the company picnic is postponed...the actual game part of it anyway. we arrived at the stadium at 6 p.m. for the buffet to start. although our tables were under a pavilion, the rain, mist and wind caused them to be sopping wet. luckily john has the forsight to bring along some bar towels to wipe off the tables/benches with, so our hineys were only damp, not soaking wet.

we enjoyed the buffet for about an hour before hearing that the game would be delayed from the original 7:05 p.m. start time. then it was another hour of eating before finding out we would be receiving vouchers to attend a game anytime we want in the future. so with the 2 vouchers for reserved seats from tonight and the 4 i received for being the event coordinator, i would say it appears we'll have some fun with the phillies in our future this summer!

needless to say we left first energy stadium with full (some would say too full) bellies and drenched clothes...but it seemed that everyone had fun. tony got to spend some time with his buddy aden, so he was happy...and daddy got an unlimited supply of ribs and chicken, so he was happy too...and when my two guys are happy...mama is happy!!

let's hope the weather is better for the berks homes company picnic at the r-phils on july 25th (the weekend before my birthday in case you didn't realize)!

busy week, beautiful week

this week has been so beautiful, but such a busy one! my work is very busy and we have a huge dinner reception this friday evening in hershey that i had planned all by myself...so i've been finishing up the final details, putting final touches on the centerpieces, last calls to caterers and limo bus company, and making up the questions/answers for the road trip trivia game...whew - can't wait until friday when i can take a deep breath and enjoy myself! our dinner party on friday night is at the antique automobile club of america museum in hershey, pa...i'll be sure to take pictures of everything and post this weekend once things have settled down.

unfortunately b/c of my busy work schedule this week, i haven't been able to spend as much time outside after work as i would have liked, but tony, john and i did manage to get a good walk in this evening and spend some time together which was very nice.

hope you all have a great rest of your week and upcoming weekend!

p.s. i posted some new pictures under the "catch me if you can" heading of our friend brian (and one with our friend jess in it too) from sweeny todd last weekend.

bring on the snow!

it's about time...after my favorite season fall, comes a close second winter, so i am more than ready for a major storm. i just hope this one doesn't fizzle out to nothing too quickly like the other's this winter have so far. tony is gearing up for some fun on his "snow bike" (what he calls his sled) and mama is hoping for the day off to spend with him...both of us are sad and miss daddy (who is away hunting until Sunday)! i hope everyone stays warm and drives safely!