Recital weekend

This year was the first year we had both girls in dance class. Luckily for us their classes were back-to-back every Saturday morning, though it would have been even better had they been at the same time. Two birds, one stone and all. Unfortunately for us their recitals were on separate days, so instead of having a single recital we had a recital weekend: Friday dress rehearsal, Stasa's turn on Saturday, and Lexi's on Sunday.

Now, Lexi wasn't the most patient ballerina during the year and hardly ever paid attention during their recital routine practices. I was fairly sure that she would break down crying when we left her backstage and then either refuse to come out on stage or just stand there. Well, she did neither. During the dress rehearsal on Friday night both girls were amazing. In fact, Lexi was the best in her class and did EVERY move. I was so proud of both girls and took them out to eat for a special dinner that night. The next day was Stasa's recital and she woke up so excited for STAGE DAY! This year I put a bit more makeup on her than I had in the previous years. She sat still the whole time and let me apply a little eyeliner, light eye shadow, mascara, blush and tinted lip gloss.



And look at that pose! The kid has it DOWN. She did a great job on stage, as always. Tom bought her a bouquet of flowers and gave them to her at the end of the recital.
The next day was Lexi's turn and since her recital was late afternoon we were able to get her to take a nap first. I should have planned better though because for some reason I thought we had to leave the house at 3:00, but really that's when she needed to be backstage. EEP. Thankfully I pulled everything together and was able to grab her and speed off to the school. Tom and the kids came after and got in their seats right before the recital began. And again Lexi made us so proud. She remembered every move (with a little help from her teacher in the stage curtains) and had the biggest smile on her face. Actually both girls had smiles that lit up the stage. After Lexi's recital Tom gave her a big bouquet of flowers, too.

Check out their routines:

Keep on rollin'

We hit another milestone with the little man this weekend. I was chatting with friends and absentmindedly playing with Tommy on the floor and saw him reaching over farther than he had before and then BAM he was on his belly looking up. I put him back on his back and within a couple of minutes he had rolled over again. Determined little dude.

Now, I love watching the kids grow and hit all of the milestones they should, but this particular milestone has always come at a price for us at bedtime. Back is best, they say. Well, yes, it is and when your baby is used to only sleeping on their back and end up rolling over in the middle of the night (over and over and over again) they wake up pretty ticked off. So last night was a bit of a bust. Tommy kept rolling over and each time he did, he'd get so angry it would take quite awhile to soothe him back to sleep. Then at some point he was just mad for no reason at all or at least nothing I did calmed him down. Needless to say I'm on my second large cup of coffee for the morning and in search of a caffeine IV. 

For now here's Tommallama rolling over last night and again this morning. 

Merkel TV: sisters sing and compete for brother's attention

Lately

Lately we've just been trying to get through the week while still having fun with the kids and making time for ourselves. That means that a few things have fallen off of my must-get-done radar, like vacuuming during the week. I think we're getting the hang of getting all of us ready in the morning and out the door at a good time and then making time to play with the kids in the evening. So, in pictures here's what we've been up to.

Spontaneous play in the rain




Can you tell they love the fact that it was okay to stomp around in the rain?



Playing with Tommy is a family affair




Dinner time with these three is crazy sometimes. The other night the girls were belly laughing over something ridiculous and it got me laughing and we couldn't stop. Vicious laugh cycle. And the little man just likes sitting up to see what's going on.

I like the beach! I like the beach!

We decided to take advantage of my leave before it's over and take a quick trip down to the beach with the kids. I wish Tom could have taken more time off, but I'm happy with the time we spent together. Before we went to the beach Tom went off to the lake for a bachelor's party so it was just me and the kids for the weekend. Me and the kids for 36 hours. And we survived. As soon as Tom left on Saturday I quickly formed a game plan for our time alone. I figured I needed to plan out as many hours as I could to keep us all from going crazy. So after breakfast we took off for "the farm" aka the Reston Zoo. Too bad I didn't realize it would be about a hundred degrees out. The girls still had a good time and ran around from animal to animal with their feed cups and bottles.

After visiting the birds, none of whom wanted anything to do with our budgie sticks, we stopped for an ice cream and some shade to cool off. 

After the Reston Zoo we swung by Wendy's for a special lunch and brought it back for an indoor picnic to really cool off. Since we were all still hot and sticky after our picnic we all took some cool baths and then got dressed to walk around the Reston Town Center. Saturday evenings in the summer they have free concerts and I figured between that and the big fountain the girls would stay entertained. The girls happily ran around, threw pennies in the fountain, and danced to some jazz.

The girls got out a ton of energy between the zoo and the town center and passed out early when we got home that night. I decided that we'd hang around the house on Sunday and work on packing for our beach trip. I let the girls help pack their own stuff. Stasa carefully laid out her outfits and then folded everything up, packed it, and zipped up her bag. Lexi needed more guidance, but happily told me what she wanted to pack and tried to fold her clothes. By the time Tom got home we had most everything packed, the house cleaned, laundry and dishes done, and the car ready to be packed. 

Monday morning we got up bright and early, packed the car, and headed down 95 to Virginia Beach. The trip down was pretty fast and the kids were okay, but got antsy for the last 20 minutes. As soon as we got checked in to the hotel they started chanting "I like the beach! I like the beach!" We all got suited up, grabbed our beach things, and headed out. 

Storm clouds rolled in after about an hour so we packed up and took the kids to the hotel pool to wait out the rain. Before the trip we looked up a few places to eat in the area and settled on four that were rated highly. We headed over to The Beach Pub for our first lunch and had amazing flounder and crabmeat in butter. And hush puppies! I've missed hush puppies with every meal.

After lunch it was back to the hotel to suit up and head back down to the beach. I'm pretty sure any kid could spend hours happily playing in sand and water. I know I used to spend hours just walking the shoreline looking for seashells. Lexi plopped down and starting digging and destroying every sand castle I made. Stasa was happier splashing around in the water.

After a couple of hours playing around on the beach we were all a bit tired, even though the girls kept saying they weren't. We packed up, washed up in the outdoor shower, and headed up to our room to take a real shower and rest. Stasa tucked herself in bed and took a nap without us saying a word to her. Lexi chose to stay up and play on the balcony while Stasa snoozed. 

We let Stas nap for an hour and a half then woke her up and got everyone dressed for dinner. Parking at the hotel was limited and since we had a good spot we chose to walk the boardwalk to find a place for dinner instead of driving somewhere. On the walk Lexi asked for a ride and fell asleep before we found a place to eat. 

She missed the entire dinner and slept in Tom's arms the whole time. Stasa helped us finish off a whole pizza and chatted with us while we ate. Lexi finally woke up on the walk back to the hotel when we mentioned stopping for ice cream. There was a DQ right by our hotel so we stopped there and got blizzards, something we've been craving for a long time. We took our ice cream up to our room and ate it on the balcony while we watched everyone on the boardwalk and bike trail. Our kids are becoming expert people watchers and are so observant, especially Stasa. When we were at dinner that night she was drawing on her placemat and then started practicing her numbers. All of a sudden she pointed out what she wrote. 112. "One one number two. That's our number at the hotel." Pretty damn close. We stayed in room 211. Smart cookie. For bed we each took a kid in our bed and put Tommy in his Rock-n-Play. I ended up with the perpendicular sleeper, Lexi. I kept moving her back to her side and turning her around all night. I kept waking up to her taking up most of the bed.

We woke up Tuesday morning to beautiful weather. Tom and I both wished we had caught the sunrise, but said we would try the next morning. We got the girls up and dressed and headed down to breakfast. Tom and I tried to get them to eat a hearty breakfast since we planned to spend the majority of the day on the beach. This time we decided to rent one of the big sunshades instead of using our umbrella since we almost lost it the day before. 

We were practically the only ones on the beach when we got there, but it got packed pretty quick.

The girls alternated between digging in the sand and splashing in the water. I taught them both how to dig up sand crabs and that kept them busy for awhile. We searched for more seashells and Tom buried them both in the sand together.

Tommy spent his time resting under the canvas sunshade and hanging out in our arms.

We packed up around 3:00 or so and headed up to our room to bathe and rest before dinner. We went for an early dinner at the Lynnhaven Fish House, somewhere Garu and my mom used to take me. The food was delicious and we had some amazing she-crab soup and more hush puppies. After dinner we opted for ice cream on the boardwalk, something we all enjoyed. 

Stasa finished hers and then came over to me asking if I could share. Stinker. That night I ended up falling asleep with both girls in bed with me while Tom had Tommy snoozing on his chest. Wednesday morning we missed sunrise again, but I didn't really mind because I preferred the sleep after being up and down all night with Tommy. He must be going through another growth spurt because he wanted to eat the entire vacation.

Since checkout was at 11:00 am, we chose to forgo the beach and pack up and head to the Children's Museum in Portsmouth before heading home. We all had fun at the museum, especially the girls. 

I'm glad we did the museum before heading home because it got enough of energy out of the kids so they actually napped half of the way home.

After a quick stop for gas, the girls woke up and happily snacked on their lunch leftovers and played on our iPads.

All in all it was a great mini-vacation with the family and makes me want to take more trips to the beach. This trip brought back so many good memories from my childhood and I want my kids to love the beach as much as I do.