Summer Fun

 Pick a Boardwalk in New Jersey in the summer and you are bound to have a good time. Add in your 4 cousins who happen to be just about the same ages as you and who love all the same things as you....and well, it is pretty close to perfection.

 With 8 kids between the ages of 2 and 8, we often more resembled a camp group than a family. We descended on rides and games and took over. Grandma and Aunt Melissa added extra fun in the cheering section and sponsoring games.

 I think we could have stayed all night. Everyone won a prize. Everyone (even Colby) rode a million rides. We had Boardwalk fries, lemonade, ice cream, sausages, and pizza. We did it up and checked it off the Summer to do list. It was awesome in every sense of the word.

Overdue

It was long overdue, our visit to NJ. We needed our Grandma and our Pop Pop and our cousins. We needed to come home. We have discovered over the last few years that a lot of places feel like home. When you feel loved - the kind of love that only comes from the people closest to your hearts - well, then you are home. We have homes in NJ and MA...aren't we lucky?

So, home to New Jersey we went. We landed in the open arms of our family and lapped up every morsel of love and fun that we could. We swam, ate, talked, laughed, hugged and kissed. We told stories, listened, and became reacquainted to all the little details we forgot. We had treats that we always associate with Grandma's house, but we forgot to play Wii with Aunt Melissa and Uncle Dave. We were too busy, soaking it all in.

On the way home we vowed not to let that much time lapse between visits ever again. (so we returned 2 weeks later :) And we vowed that each summer will have at least a week booked for a trip home to NJ.

More pictures and details to come....because the cousin love was AWESOME!

So Fast

 "They grow up so fast..."

I hear this warning over and over again. I get it, I do. My babies went to their first full day of school today and Im still trying to catch my breath. Cliche? Maybe. Real? Yes.

Im terrified of them growing up. I feel sad and sorry when I see a family full of teenagers - do they ache for the days when sticky hands were thrown around their necks? For little bodies curled in their laps? For too wet kisses that require a stealth wipe when the baby isn't looking? Don't get me wrong, it isn't all happy, huggy, kissy moments over here. Sometimes I wish everyone could wipe their own bottom and getting in the car didn't require 15 min of buckling. But deep down, I love it and Im terrified of waking up one day and realizing my kids are too busy and too cool to hang out with me.

But this summer I figured out a secret to keeping them close. A beach sticker. All sumer I drove through the dust and over bumps to park the car on our own little stretch of beach. Time and time again I watched as SUVs pulled in next to me and gangs of limbs climbed out like over sized awkward clowns emerging from a VW bug. There they were - teenagers with their parents. They didn't build castles or practice cart wheels, but they were together. Moms sat next to tweens and their friends while they giggled about boys and pop stars. Dads grilled up burgers and dogs and passed them around to heads bobbing to ear buds. Each time I pledged, prayed and wished...."that will be us."

 ps. It is pictures like this that make me wish I never had to cut Tyler's hair. If only we could live on the beach :)