Father's Day Photo Outtakes...

I tried to get a little creative with the Father's Day gifts this year. I ordered personalized frames ("I Love Buppy/Peepa) and put a photo of M&A together in each frame. Now I realize that it is very difficult to get a decent photo of 2 two year olds; but didn't realize the full extent until I really put in a major effort to do so. Below are my MANY attempts to take a photo of my twins both looking at the camera & both with acceptable facial expressions.

We tried at Target:


And at Home Depot (no idea what he was doing):

While watching tv together (this one's actually pretty cute):

After gymnastics class:

Post puddle stomping - this is where I caught on that they were doing it on purpose:

So we figured bring them to Friendly's, get them some ice cream, hold them hostage in a booth and we're bound to get something. Below is the best we could come up with - not too bad; though I wish Maddie's eyeballs were pointed slightly more leftward (sigh):

And it was shortly after that photo was taken that we lost control:

PHEW...that was exhausting. But it gets easier as they get older, right????

Happy Father's Day to the three best fathers around!!!

New Obsession

Can you guess what it is?

That's Dora the Explorer for those of you who aren't "in the know". No worries, we are still BIG Mickey Mouse fans too! The Wiggles - well that's another story...

Yes Folks, It's True...

Piggy does indeed have a twin!




A slightly plumper, fresher, cleaner, cost mommy an arm and a leg on Ebay pig. Of course Maddie still favors her rag tag, soiled, many times operated-upon "original" pig. Here's to hoping original piggy can hold out a few more years!

Easel a deux...

We're always looking for activities to occupy our days. Now that the weather has turned nice, we dragged our easel outside and tried our hand at painting. (Said easel has been locked away in our storage room for the entire year since I bought it on Craigslist. I couldn't bring myself to crack out the paint indoors after seeing the damage these two can do with crayons & markers!)

Maddie happily wore her smock and used her paintbrush...

Aidan screamed as if we were trying to smother him with the smock and learned that fingerpainting equals unpleasantly messy fingers...

The Master at work...

The finished product...

It never ceases to amaze how different these two are from each other!

'Nastics

We signed the kids up for gymnastics (the mommy/daddy & me type) at our local YMCA. And I'd say we're pretty gosh darn good at it! All 4 of us go together on Sunday mornings and M&A get very excited yelling that they're going to 'nastics.

Here's what they're teaching us...

The trampoline is BY FAR their favorite. I'd say they spend a good 35 minutes on it; and the class is only 45 minutes long! We've even had to drag out our Urban Rebounder (a mis-guided purchase during one of our "let's get into shape" enthusiasms) here at home to function like a mini trampoline. Watch out Nadia Comaneci...

Cause he's curious...

...that's Curious George! What a beautiful day to take a trip into Boston and pay a visit to the Curious George Exhibit at the Children's Museum.


Attempting to bribe Curious George with money stolen from his own cash register:




Maddie couldn't get enough of this block building machine thing:





Opening the elevator:





Our future engineer:






At the marketplace:






And I think this pretty much sums up how fondly we feel about Curious George:

After a very nice walk along the docks to check out boats and ducks, everyone was pretty zapped out from a very busy day:

The kids give the Boston Children's Museum a thumbs up! We won't mention that we accidentally took a wrong turn on the way to the museum and ended up at the airport since it actually worked out well giving M&A a chance to see some real live airplanes. It's always an adventure...

Fort Devens, here we come!

Mimi & Buppy were on vacation in TN this past Friday, so the kids and I decided we'd go on an adventure to occupy ourselves. We drove up to the old Fort Devens and visited Daddy at work!

Here we are lunching in the conference room:




While Maddie tried to jump rope with the telephone cord:





Aidan had to take a VERY important phone call:





Then right to work:





Maddie rockin' the safety goggles:





No worries, Piggy made it along for the adventure:

Quick engineer training session:

View from Daddy's office (not too shabby as far as suburban views go):

Happy to see he's proudly displaying his Christmas gift:

And a quick visit to the local playground to burn some energy before the long drive home:

Thanks Daddy; we had a blast and can't wait to do it again! We're thinking maybe a corner office next time??