Memorial Day Weekend

This picture isn't actually from Memorial Day weekend, it's from a few weeks ago at a big party at Ashley's house.  I just think it's cute.

These are all from this weekend:

Grilled steak, grilled romaine!

Oly's very first S'mores.  She was a fan.

Don't worry, her eating habits didn't complete fly out the window after having roasted marshmallows.  Here she is eating some celery in the city.

Lounging on Monday:

Pretty awesome weekend.

Tom-Bone

These pictures are a month old, they've been sitting in my favorites folder waiting for a post that's about our favorite person in the world, Tommy.  Tom-Bone, Thomas Dutton, TomTommyThomas, T-Man, Tomma.

Oly mentions him at least 8 times a day (and we see him about 5 times a week!)  Last week, after he'd been at our house for several hours that morning, she woke up from her nap and the first words out of her mouth were, "can we hang out with Tommy today for a change?"

I've said it before, it's like they're cousins or siblings.  They're constantly bonking each other over the head.  They love to push each other's buttons.  Did you know Oly has buttons?  Tell her the sky is green and she'll become hysterical.  And Tom-Bone will laugh hysterically.  But they love each other madly.  Thankfully his move across the country has been pushed back until 2013, because I don't know if Oly will ever recover. 

Tiny Emma

Back in July of 2010, little tiny Oly and I went to the dinosaur museum and met a girl named Emma.  It's one of my favorite memories.  She was about 9 or 10 and little Oly fell in love with her.  Well we came home from the museum, took a nap and then went to the Tot Lot to play.  On that afternoon, we met another girl named Emma!  This one was about 10 months younger than Oly, so she christened her "Tiny Emma", compared to the 4th grader from the museum.  Tiny Emma has been in our lives ever since.  We see her at playgrounds around town all of the time and she's even been to all of Oly's birthday parties.  

Last week we walked over to the Tot Lot and Oly and Tiny Emma played on the trees nearby banging sticks on things and rolling down the steep hill.  It reminded me how much I love our little town of Media and the wonderful people in it. 

The Peony That's Preparing For World Domination

First and Second Cousins

My cousin Stephanie grew up in California and lives with her family on Bainbridge Island now. She had a conference in NJ so she brought her 8 year old daughter India along and met us for dinner in Philadelphia right off the plane.  

These second cousins got along just perfectly.

Oly is now looking forward to visiting their house and being babysat by India in the future!  One dollar per second is the rate she negotiated with us.  Seems fair.

The Rest of My Mothers Day

Mothers Day was beyond awesome.  Oly seemed to understand it and treated me like a queen all day.  

One very special present that Tim left out is the fence that we've been building for my home vegetable garden.  I was fine with last years net wrapped around sticks stuck in the ground, but he was longing for something a little prettier.  Here it is:

It is GLORIOUS.  And let me just say for the record, that the next fence we build will be even better. 

Here is the fantastic dinner he cooked for me:

Close up of pork:

It was the best weekend ever!  Thanks family. 

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we're waiting for a table at a restaurant

Sums it up

Mother's Day Weekend

Yes, that's right.  She's such a good mom, she gets a whole weekend, not just a day.  Friday night started with steak frites (sorry, no photos, you'll just have to take my word that it was awesome).  Then on Saturday we went to Moore Brothers to sip, and buy some wine. It is one of our favorite places and we realized we hadn't been in years (we have a grabby toddler, they have racks of wine).  It is now one of Oly's favorite places too because they have a kids area, and she commandeered one of the oenophiles to play with her.  Here they are in the kids area, behind boxes and boxes of wine, playing with a coloring/painting program on an ancient Macintosh.  

Saturday night, Ashley and Tommy came over for pizza.  Moms and margaritas on the lawn.

Mischief and mayhem for the toddlers.  If you can't tell, Oly is bossing Tommy around.  We appreciated him taking some of the brunt of her bossiness.    

Apparently a week's notice isn't enough time for a Mother's Day reservation at any decent restaurant...so I said screw it, I would just a make brunch that would put those restaurants to shame.  Instead of getting dressed up, we ate a feast in our PJs. Here is the spread: 

  

Crepes with orange-mascarpone-cream cheese filling (and just a touch of orange liquer), topped with balsamic berry compote.  Chicken sausage.  Fried Eggs.  Bagels w/ cream cheese and smoked trout.  Tomato and basil salad.  Fresh watermelon.  Orange juice and coffee.  Take that snooty reservation guy at Lacroix!  I couldn't get a decent picture of Oly without her mouthful, so I think that means the brunch was a success.  At least she is looking at the camera!

And that was just breakfast!  Right now Oly is sleeping, Hallie is shopping for flowers for her garden, and I'm tending to the Pernil (look it up) and getting ready to shuck the oysters for dinner...Happy Mother's Day Hallie!

Ballerina

Today was Oly's last ballet class for the season, and parents were invited to finally watch.  She was so excited for an audience.

It only took her 5 tries to look away from the pom pom and at the camera.

With her school classmate Scarlett behind her, with the fabulous curls:

We took videos, but they're not much.  They're on our youtube channel for you diehards.

My Aunt Kathie sent me copies of pictures from when she and some of her sisters were ballerinas as girls.  They're dressed in fantastic costumes that my Grandmother sewed.  We framed a few for her room and Oly's fascinated by them.  She is so interested in these girls who are related to her who dance also!  I try to explain to her that they're not girls anymore, they're women who are older than Grandpa Mac.  This does not register in her brain.  She wants to dance with the girls. 

I'll see if I can scan them to show the blog.