Busch Gardens

We spent the day at Busch Gardens yesterday to take full advantage of our season pass before it expires at the end of the month.  It was a lot of fun but extremely HOT!  We thought we had picked a cooler day, but when you are pushing a double stroller and walking on concrete, it doesn't matter if it's 90 degrees or 100.  We dragged Nana along because Aunt Amy is 35 weeks pregnant and can't go on a lot of the rides.  We had a good time riding all the rides with Nana while Aunt Amy stayed back with Ellie. Our friends Jenna and Liam also joined us.  We also bought tickets to the Elmo Lunch which was a lot of fun and gave us an hour of AC while was wonderful!  Here are some pictures from our day at Busch Gardens:

Madelyn and Cora on the Elmo "Drop" ride.  Madelyn usually likes this ride but got scared this time around!

One of our favorites, the worm!

 Waiting our turn.   It was a great day because the lines were nonexistent!

Nana and her girls!

Madelyn and Cora are now tall enough to ride all by themselves and were very happy!

Ellie's first ride...Not very happy!

Ellie was hot and tired!

Madelyn going on her first roller coaster.  Her lips were as white as a sheet afterwards. She said it was scary!

Madelyn and her man, Liam!

They rode this ride about 3 times!

Ellie cried at first but liked it once it started moving!

Waiting for Elmo and Friends!

Look Mommy, it's Elmo!  Can you tell Ellie likes to sweat?

Madelyn not so sure about Ernie and never took her hand off Aunt Amy!

Cora loved the characters!

Ready for lunch!

Madelyn ended up on my lap!

Our friend Bert!

At least no one was crying this time around!

Ellie loved the little show!

Ellie hardly ate any of her lunch because she wouldn't take her eyes off of the characters!

One tired little girl but she never took out her bow!

Ellie loves to brush her TWO teeth!

Ellie LOVES to brush her teeth and asks to brush her teeth every time we go upstairs.  There are some days she brushes her teeth at least 3 or more times a day  Ironically, Ellie only has two teeth at 16 months but at least those two teeth are clean!  She even likes to mimic her Big Sister and spit in the sink which is really funny to watch so I just had to get a video.

Little Red Hen

On Saturday morning, Nana took Madelyn on a special outing to see Theatre IV's production of The Little Red Hen.  Afterwards, they got to meet the actors and have Chick-fil-a for lunch. Madelyn really enjoyed her special time with Nana and is already asking about going again!

Summer Days

This week has been filled with lots of sun, water and sunscreen.   We visited a friend's pool, our own pool quite a bit, played in the Stony Point fountains and took a trip to the bowling alley.  It's been a fun week but I can honestly say I need a break from water and sunscreen.  I love the summer, but I think I've reached my limit for the week.  The bowling alley was a nice change of pace today!  Here are some pictures from our week:

Sweet cousins!

Ellie very unsure of the fountains!

Madelyn loves the fountains and ran around all morning with a huge smile on her face!

Madelyn encouraging her little sister to play in the water.  Too sweet!

This is about as close as Ellie got to the water!

Madelyn and Cora hanging out with their friend, Shay!

Looking pretty tired at this point!

We had planned a trip to Busch Gardens but decided to go to the pool instead because of the extreme heat.  Madelyn and Ellie love playing with the Schaefer girls.  Sophia and Ellie are starting to interact which is fun to watch!

We had such a great morning until Madelyn had a HUGE tantrum at the pool.  Not fun!

Madelyn and her friend Lee had such a fun time bowling together!

Nana's Birthday and VBS

We have had a very busy and productive week after getting home from CT on Monday.  Madelyn attended Vacation Bible School at a local church with her preschool friend, Jane.  Madelyn had a really good time and wants to go back again next Summer.  During VBS, I enjoyed having some alone time with Ellie and ran lots of errands.  Last night, we celebrated Nana's birthday at the Nolan's house with pizza and cake.  We made Nana a stepping stone to put in one of her new mulch beds and the girls were really excited to give it to her.  After VBS today, the girls and I stopped by our favorite store (Nordstrom) to get Madelyn some shoes for the Fall.  Ellie is really into holding purses and bags and was having so much fun carrying around the bag, I just had to snap some pictures.   Her new word this week is "bag"and she kept saying it over and over again with a big smile.   Here are some pictures from our fun week:

Madelyn and Jane at Christ Church

Ellie and Elle had a play date at Ms. Nancy's music class

Madelyn showing Nana the card that she made.  She's working on writing her name and is very proud!

Nana loves her new stepping stone.  It has pictures of the three girls and says "Nana's Flowers"

I love Cora's face in the photo!

Nana and her girls. We'll be adding a little boy to this picture very soon!

Ellie doing a little shopping at our favorite store!

Bill is in trouble!

Too sweet!

Summer fun in CT!

We had a great time visiting our family in CT.  The weather was awesome with hardly any humidity and the kids had a blast playing with cousin Jack and all their other cousins.  Since Grandpa has a pool in his backyard, we spent a lot of time swimming.  We also took a trip to a really cool park, visited the town nature center to see animals, took a day trip to Brandford to visit Vera's condo and go to the beach, and had a big pool party on Saturday night.  The kids did great in the car thanks to our DVD player.  They are troopers when we travel because we wake them up at 4AM to leave but they did great and even slept in the car on the way home.  We are getting settled back home now and trying to get Ellie back on her normal sleeping schedule and Madelyn has started Vacation Bible School this week.  The temps were close to 100 today with terrible humidity so I'm wishing we had stayed in CT a little bit longer.  We can't wait to go back again!