HAPPY BIRTHDAY iMAN!

A tribute to our brother via Bo x 2...

(Isaac refers to his dog as Bo and plural Bos)

Bos on Isaac's bike path in the back yard.

Bos at Isaac's favorite backyard tree.

Bos at the back patio.

Bos chillin' on the chairs!

Let's try a little singing for the occasion...
(see which one you like best)


"The Warm Up"



"In & Out of the Seats"



"Off to the Races"

humm...

Raise your hands if you love iMan!

Can you see us, bro? Here's lookin' @ you!!!

We are looking after your Bos, but we really can't wait to play when you return!

All done! Mission complete...now come on home for the party & happy cakes!!!


iMan update for 2012:
likes- climbing, dancing, singing, cars, trains, puzzles
skills- balance bike, jungle gym, toilet
school- international school & dutch pre-K
interesting kindness- looking out for & bringing toys to his sisters (Ava & Isabella)
{sometimes he still refers to Ava as "sisters"}

10 Yr Anniversary - long distance connection

Hey Babe, 

I love everything about you & can't wait to celebrate with you in Greece.

Here's to what God has in store for us!!!

The girls wanted to share in the hype...

Enjoy! Love, me

Even with a little temperature this morning, Ava wanted to party with Mommy!!!

We just had to fight through...and press on to the objective--Car Ops!
You can see the smiles below....

Here's to you Mommy!

Grandma Birthday Ops!

We love you Grandma Nadine!! We did our own little celebration in your honor.  Here is a special song just for you.

Happy Birthday!!!

Happy Birthday Uncle Jon!

Is it that time again?

Ok, let's hit it! One, Two, Three...

Taking the show to the grass...

Just one left on the grass...

All done! We hope you had a sunny day with tons of fun memories!!! Any Happy Cakes left over??? :)

Pretty in Pink?

So the day started out with PB&J sandwiches with smiles all around...

Now comes the honest part of the story...Sure, a nice enough looking structure--pretty hip & happening, right?

For an emergency room!

Yes, Ava experienced a tumble in Colmar that we thought was possibly a sprain...Well, it's always better safe than sorry...

She was diggin' the "sock" for her owie...When we asked her where it hurt, she would point to her wrist all during the week, so by Friday (it had been almost a week since the tumble) Daddy figured it was time to get it verified by the doctors.

Having started the hospital adventure ~1045hrs, it was now 1600hrs and no nap.  You get the picture!

Yes! By the time that we made it home after picking up Isabella, the cast was off!  Houdini in the making, eh? Well, good thing we already had a scheduled Follow-up on Saturday.  We now have a new cast...More adventures to follow while Mommy is....Where is Mommy?

France Recap

LOTS of pictures in this post!  Can you believe that this is our 500th post!?  
These are some of the highlights of the trip.  We got a late start on Friday evening and got to our hotel close to midnight.  We knew we wanted to get an early start the next morning to continue on our way to the alps.  We barely took anything from the car and so the girls shared beds with us.  We even slept in our clothes.  Marc was with Isabella & Isaac and they both did great.  Ava was wired and kept me up a lot! :)

Isabella has a love for plain croissants and she ate a lot of them on our trip! 

Once we got to the alps there were many fun activities including this pool with a great kiddie pool.  See Ava out there?  Isaac was digging his frog googles.

The pool had a great view!

Ava is always on the go!

Most mornings we went to the local bakery to get some breakfast yummies...Isabella with yet another croissant. Doesn't she look cute with her hand in her pocket?

Isaac enjoyed the kids club.  He was number 34.  His styling' glasses were provided by the group leaders.  They were about to get on the trampolines.

Our camera died about half-way through the trip and we found the spare battery/charger when we were leaving.  This is the backside of the trip.  We stopped in Lausanne, Switzerland on the way back and enjoyed some time on Lake Geneva.  It was a beautiful day!  The kids enjoyed all the boats.

Has anyone ever told you how expensive Switzerland is???  You are looking at the most expensive lunch EVER. :) We had been craving some Vietnamese food and it was yummy.

We had a little ice cream after lunch to complete the dining experience.

The town had a great playground.  Do you see Isabella?

The kids were enjoying the carousel.

Isabella and her new friend on the carousel.

Isaac got a 2nd ride on the carousel and chose the fire engine.

We got back in the car and headed to Colmar, France which is where we stayed the night.  Daddy got Isaac a slushy and he was loving it.

They had another playground in Colmar and the girls were enjoying it.

Isabella has no idea why this boy is so close to her and seems to want to get on the ladder she is on.

The next morning we saw our friends for a few moments before they headed off.  Caravanning is too difficult with so many little ones, so we just took it at our own pace.

Marc wanted to get a few pics with the kids with the Statue of Liberty.  The artist for the Statue of Liberty was born here.

Here are the kids with the Colmar version of it.  

Next up was the long car trip home.  We even gave the kids stickers to play with (we were desperate) and somehow Isabella fashioned earings out of them.

Almost home after a great trip!  I have a few more pics that our friends took (while our camera was dead) so I hopefully will share a few of those later...