Happy Birthday Matt!

A quick post to wish my wonderful husband a happy happy birthday!  You are the best Dad and partner a family could hope for and we all love you very much (and you are pretty good at your job too - check out this article: Matt in WBJ!)  Looking forward to our next adventure together...Mwah!

Where you do nothing and do it all day...

Cape Cod seems like a distant memory now - it's hard to believe that only two weeks ago we were living seaside in one of the world's most picturesque summer getaways.  Doing nothing and doing it all day...

The view from our patio...c'mon! 

This year we really blew it out and rented a house for an entire month in Dennis.  The house was beautiful, located a 2 minute walk to the beach with views of the ocean from almost every room. And to really spoil us, we had a pool in the back!  The kids logged some major pool time and Hank surprised us all by swimming like a fish, sans floaties, from day 1!  I guess those swim lessons paid off.  He discovered goggles early on and fell in love with putting his head underwater and seeing what he could see.  Gus went from hanging out on the stairs and playing with his trucks to swimming in the deep end with Daddy.

Hank showing Benson how to swim with goggles.

Pool time with Daddy...

Lobstah prep Kelly style.  It's a dirty job but somebody has to do it. 

Handsome boys! 

Happy boys at the beach

Sunset beach walk

Gus turned two!  Look at him eyeing that cupcake...

Besides sitting by the pool, we had plenty of days to explore the beach and check out local towns and activities.  Being on the Cape for an extended period really allowed us to get to know it in a way that we've been unable to do in the past.  Matt and I checked out local restaurants and shops, Hank went to an awesome camp for a couple of weeks that he really enjoyed (well, truth be told, he was quite reluctant for the first 12 days of camp but then loved it on days 13 & 14 - only to learn it was over). The kids checked out a county fair, a local puppet show, the CC Museum of Natural History, and the CC Potato Chip factory.

Hilarious craft project from camp - the art teacher told me Hank refused to smile for the photo to go inside his frame. 

We were also able to host a whole slew of friends over the course of the month which gave us some much needed time to catch up with folks we don't get to see too often.  From Boston we had a nice visit from Andrew and Karen Lackner.  From New York we had Jenn & John Lancefield with their two little boys Benson and Henry and my oldest friend Ali with her brand spanking new fiance Hugh (engaged the day before!!!).  Fran and Elliott Slocombe came up from Toronto with their little girl Georgia.  Last but not least, Dode and Barbara Gladders visited from New Hampshire.

Jenn, Benson, Hugh, Matt, Gus, Me, Hank, Ali, Henry and John

It was kind of weird to be away from home for so long but it did force us to try to relax and enjoy the summer instead of spending it in a panic over preparing for the babies.  The pregnancy has been going very smoothly so far but you never know with twins so we were lucky to get away while we could.  School starts next week and with that comes nesting with a vengeance!

For all of our Cape Code photos, visit our Shutterfly site here: La Famille Shutterfly

IT'S A.....AND A....

Drumroll puhlease!

Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, get your dollhouses and tutus ready because this family is about to add two little ladies to the mix!!

Baby B and Baby A as they are affectionately known at the OBGYN. 

That's right - not one, but two girly girls are joining the crew in December!  Matt and I had a doctor's appointment this morning that confirmed we have a whole lot of woman going on in the womb. We are excited and a little bit scared at the thought of suddenly having so much girl power in the house.  I have, of course, not so secretly been hoping for a girl since my first pregnancy so I guess this is a case of "be careful what you wish for"...

At the very least, the promise of their arrival will help me get through the next 4 months of fart jokes, penis talk and spitting contests, the top three favorite activities of Hank and Gus (and Matt) right about now. Finally someone to talk dresses, ballet and Barbies with!

Twins!!!!

Oh boy - where do I begin?  As most of your know by now we are expecting again, and surprise, it's TWINS! We found out the news back in May and frankly it floored us (well, me mainly. Matt has taken it all in stride of course).  It took me about a month to pull myself together and move into the acceptance stage of this insanity which is where I happily reside now.  Acceptance seasoned with a healthy dose of fear/panic.  I am having brief glimpses of true excitement though, like when we had our 12 week sonogram and saw these two little sweeties sticking their tongues out at us.  It's going to be crazy around here for a couple of years but we'll survive as long as we can keep our sense of humor in tact. We are counting down the days until we can find out the genders in mid-August.

Twinsies

Anyhoo, I haven't much been in the mood/had the time to write of late.  But life has gone on. The boys have been busy busy with camps since school let out.  We were in Arizona for almost a week visiting Nana and Papa and celebrating Whitney's bridal shower. Matt and I have gone on two weekend trips to Boston and NC without the kids.  It's been a fun filled couple of months!

We leave tomorrow for our longest trip to Cape Cod to date (one whole month!) and we could not be more excited.  It's been a hectic week getting ready to leave but we are looking forward to some serious unwinding on our trip.  Stay tuned for some posts from there! 

Gus at camp

Hank at his school picnic - he LOVED this bounce house obstacle course and was right in there with all the big kids! 

Hank's end of year class party.  Surrounded by the ladies! 

Boys being boys in Bryce. 

Gus playing it cool at camp. 

Hank the camper after a long day...

Some serious poses at the farmer's market one weekend.  "Yeah, we're in our PJ's. So what?"

Getting spoonfuls of ice cream from Daddy. 

Me and Matt at our friend's wedding this past weekend in North Carolina. 

A day in the life of Gus...

What does Gus do all day you ask?  His life in photos...

It all begins with a nutritious breakfast.  The food should consumed both via the mouth and through smearing on the skin. 

Time for playgroup!  Who needs to get dressed when I look this good in my pjs?! 

It was gettin' real in the playgroup parking lot that day.  Isla tried to slip in beside Gus but he was having none it.  Don't get between the man and his car! 

Back at home, time for a happy pose at the kitchen table. 

Getting ready for his evening stroll through the neighborhood - sometimes he needs to go incognito so he doesn't get swarmed by admirers. 

Bath time...Whoops!  Forgot to take my clothes off. 

Relaxing with a nice read at the end of a long day...

Spring Breakers

Long time no post!  This is a long one to make up for lost time. 

We had a great time on our spring break trip to the Dominican Republic with our friends the Heravi's back in March.  They have 3 kids ages 7, 5 and 2 so it was a full house of little rascals running wild.  We stayed at a gorgeous home with a view of the ocean and our own pool so the kids spent every day, all day swimming in the sun.  Hank made some good progress on the swimming front and even treaded water for a few seconds by himself.  Seeing the older kids running and jumping in the pool definitely helped motivate him.  Gus is a water baby probably won't need much to get him swimming independently in short order.  Lillia Heravi celebrated her 5th birthday while we were there and we all went to swim with the dolphins as her birthday party.  Gus and daddy had a good time.  Hank was not so into it and I have some moral issues with dolphins in captivity thanks to my animal planet days (see The Cove, it will ruin dolphin shows for you forever and have you thinking about bringing wire cutters with you to the aquarium, trust me), so we observed the dolphin petting from the dock.  Fine by us. Other highlights included massages for mom and dad, swimming in natural lagoons and playing on the beach.  Heaven. 

Our view. Le sigh. 

Gus liked the view too - so much so he forgot to put his pants on! 

Here is Master Gus in his resort wear.  He calls this his Cuban Barber look. 

Hank and Daddy in the natural lagoon.

Happy kids in the sand...

Gus at the beach...

Chilling at the pool

The whole crew...

It was a week of amazing weather (yet not a tan line on either Kelly child - they are the whitest boys ever), lots of fun adventures and catching up with old friends. It was just what we needed after the longest winter in the history of the world.

We returned to a city in full bloom. The spring is the best time of year in DC, with an amazing variety of trees blooming in a rainbow of pastels.  I have never been a big nature person but I have to say I'm like a kid in a candy store when the trees come out here.  I'm driving around going, "oooh!  look at that dogwood! wow!  gorgeous cherry blossoms!" Our saucer magnolia was glorious as usual.  Unfortunately we had a brief spell of nasty weather again last week with lots of wind, rain and near freezing temperatures (including a bit of snow) that took most of the blossoms down on the earlier side :(

We headed to Rosemary Beach (near Panama City) for Easter in the hopes for some warmer weather but alas it evaded us. The temps hovered around 58 degrees the whole time we were there. It was warmer in DC!!  We had a good time nonetheless with plenty of family bike riding (Hank has graduated to a big boy bike with training wheels!), pool time (dad got in the pool, mom sat under a pile of towels), and some beach time. 

The highlight of the weekend was Easter Sunday.  The kids woke up to a house that had been visited by the Easter bunny - a first for us.  Hank is finally old enough to get the concept, sort of.  He came upon his first chocolate egg and excitedly asked "can I eat it?!"  and then was so focused on doing that he didn't notice the dozens of other eggs hidden in plain view.  It took quite a while for them all to be collected.  But that's not all - we joined the stream of other families heading over to the neighborhood park to partake in the BIG egg hunt.  The town had put out 10,000 eggs for the kids to hunt in a mad dash.  The excitement/anxiety level was high before the kids were let loose and then chaos reigned.  Gus quickly got down to business picking up eggs and placing them in other kids' baskets.  Hank, the purist that he is, insisted on picking up only green eggs "because green is my favorite color."  

Stress before the start of the hunt...

The field of eggs...

Collecting collecting

His "basket" - we improvised with a bike helmet - filled to the brim

The green egg dance

It was a nice family weekend with a good balance of quality kid time and some nice date nights thrown in for Maman and Daddy.  We feel so lucky to have such great little boys to hang out with - they just keep getting better every day.  

Bros on the beach