the big sleepover

Grace' s sister had her first sleepover friday night...I was not sure why I said OK to diapers, up at night, tantrums and all that go with a 2 year old but Grace was excited so we go...Grace and I pick her up after dinner...I thought she would be a little excited...she was vibrating when we opened the door...she was just bouncing around like one of those excited little atoms. She has got her stuff on and her bag packed...she is babbling incoherently about her blankie, she jumps up on Grace then jumps into my arms...I guess she is ready.


She has not been to our house in at least 6 months so the whole way (3.2 minutes) she is chanting something about dimmy's house. If nothing else children can bring to you an excitement for things we jadedly take for granted everyday. Fun.


We had a good night. Grace and I read to her and she was ready for bed she was so happy to be in Grace's room sleeping with her. She is doing better with her language. I think she is picking up about 90% of what we are saying to her. Whoa ...is she a firery little thing....the "NO"s come leaping out of her if it's not her way...we had to "convince" her a couple of times to see things our way.



Good night sleep...only two "pops" for blanket uncoverings and the girls are ready for a little saturday morning cartoons. Maria approved of the Bravia XBR9. "Dimmy I wan wa TB". OK buddy.


I dragged the girls out for a little leaf jumping...Maria was not as comfortable with the concept as Grace but got used to the jumping in slowly.




We included a shot of the stump...thats where we removed the silver maple hanging over the





house...big tree.


After a few dance classes and books we got some lunch. Grace has a new afinity for Big Macs so we got a couple of those on the way home and some fries. Maria said she would like some fries so we arranged for her to enjoy those as part of her lunch. You can see that convincing her to eat was not really an issue.






I think Maria enjoyed her stay...I dropped her off at 5 staurday and she just sorta looked at me as if I just called her a name on the playground. She was strong and did not cry but clearly she will be wanting a return trip soon. Grace loves her so much and Maria loves her big sister in a big way so I am sure there is more to come.

Mom Mom

Grace and I created this remembrance for Mom Mom at our church.

orange tree

Joe @ 50

The BIG 5 - 0, the half century mark...wow he's old.

Let us all take a lesson from Joe in his grace and dignity...he made it look easy. Thanks for the fun party Cathy (and Amy).

opening the vault

I have almost 2000 pictures (color prints on photographic paper from Kodak...remember those?) that some of you have never seen except for the rare case where I shared double sets and or scanned a few and shared electronically...well there are some good ones and once I finish digitally archiving all of them you will get a nice dvd w/ them all on it...yeah for us.

so here's an old one I shot on slide...was supposed to be for mom and dads 30th maybe...never quite got it to them...I have 7 in the sequence...this was the best one...some are pretty funny.

More to come...

Das is Cobbler!

The Prato family came down in mid September for the Jones Pond Friends and Family weekend. Aside from some chilly weather, there was much golf cart driving lessons and the saturday night potluck. We made our annual cooking show video to show our popular BlueCherry Cobbler in the making.

another pool pic

A couple more groovy shots

....I am beginning to think I only do this stuff so I can take more pictures of kids in pools

flowers

I thought the blog needed some color...shot these at seabreeze after the rain...

warning...author not responsible for suden loss of balance , dizziness, and or sudden destabilization of personal color balnace....

Should you dare to click on these images...

back at you

Well we are just going to have to keep up with the Jones/Myers' aren't we???

Last night was the big sleep over with the follow up Seabreeze day...not sure what I was thinking when I let Grace do this one...but it turned out lovely...

So some diabolical tendancies are emerging...note to self to make sure Grace gets lots of driver's ed. Here we see dear sweet Grace BASHING into the nearest old lady on the Bumper cars...

Then she lines up her next old person....

BAM....she puts the old guy into the rail...please not the hand over hand technique (nice Grace)

but that's not enough for Grace she puts the poor old dude into the dreaded power slide setting up for the "accidental" head-on.

Better watch out grampa Jim...I think she is in serious training...just waiting for an opportunity to take you on and then out.

It rained pretty hard for the first 2 hours making the waterslides the thing to do....I sat under my umbrella watching the lumbering greyness envelop the bay. People watching was always fun...ever amazed at what some of the poulation is willing to wear in public and have burned onto their skin.

The sun came out after cheeseburgers and there was much rejoicing....beautiful afternoon.

The girls recant the gloiries of the day in the back of the Element and we begin talking about what we will do the next time we are here.

Slainte ladies.