Sorry Sean

Here is the food you missed out on...  Your dad was hard at work with the Big Green Egg.  I think he even pulled an all nighter at one point last week.

Sweaty cousins

Who cares about record heat, these kids need to hang on the porch and get sweaty.  Emily was obsessed with all the cute decor out there and she kept rearranging it and destroying parts.  At one point I had to rescue her from the birdhouse where she had gotten her hand stuck.  This is a shot of her just rehydrating before she got back to work.

 Oh Sienna, that looks delicious!

 Patrick must be the winner here somehow.

Here Patrick is making sure that Nicholas knows Patrick is the winner.  It works for now, Nicholas is too sweet to realize what a bad influence Patrick is.  I've had visions of the future with these two and it's going to be trouble.  Some high energy there.  I believe there was some furniture destruction even.  Sorry boys, Nana is getting her chair fixed for your Christmas present.

Bold Rockers

As fate would have it, Bold Rock Cidery opened when I arrived in Virginia.  I dislike beer, I enjoy most wine, and I LOVE hard cider.  So I was slightly excited to hear that in between the microbreweries and wineries someone had built a cidery. Caroline, Andy and I went to investigate as soon as someone recklessly offered to watch six children.  The owner gave us a tour and it's a pretty fascinating story that we were thrilled to hear about on the air conditioned part of the tour.  Anyway, our part of the story is that it's the best cider we've ever had and I bought four cases since it isn't distributed outside of Virginia yet.  I should say that I bought a six pack for Sean so he isn't wondering where the rest of it went.  Come on, he isn't going to be home for ten weeks still.  That is like 70 days, right?  Oh dear, I better slow down because the rate I've been going I won't even have 6 left.  Maybe I should just delete this post.

 Anyway, here are the delicious vats of cider.  My camera was on the wrong setting.

 This is an expensive piece of machinery.  I kind of want one.

Slightly out of focus banners in the non-air conditioned tasting barn.

Caroline mulling over the choices.

How much room do I have in the Acadia?  It's going to be tight.  I could always fly some kids home with their bags...

This was towards the end, we look so happy, so oblivious to the total chaos awaiting us back at Stoney Creek.  My photo with Andy was blurry, again, wrong setting on my camera, but there is a shot of all three of us on their facebook page.  John told us we were his favorite tour group.  Of course we were, it was pretty clear that I'm going to be a big customer.  Don't quite have the cash flow to be the big investor he is looking for to build the restaurant part though.  Cheers!

Random fun at Nana's house

 Once in a while Emily just does something that makes her look like a big girl.

 ND versus SBU corn hole game thing.  Patrick declared himself the winner with every single throw, even if he had to go up and put the bean bag in the hole directly.  He was pretty good at it though, I see potential for corn hole hustling at tailgaters.

Megan thought she was the winner too.  Sorry, I forgot the trophies!

Poppers with Pops

 Popper distribution by Pops.

 Slam them down.  Emily would jump at the same time for added oomph.

 Don't eat it!

 Whoa, watch this one.

 Kind of into it...

 Hmm, what's the weather like in Tokyo?

Fourth of July poppers were a huge hit of course.  And no one popped them between their fingers or put them in their mouths or ears, so I was happy.  Pops and Uncle Joe were caught on their smart phones though.... I know some videos were being sent to Sean though so that's allowed.

Fourth of July, Wintergreen Style

While traditions are good, I think it's better to mix it up once in a while and make different memories so all the holidays don't meld into one memory.  Remember the time we went to the club to see fireworks? Five years in a row?   The only way I keep all those memories separate is by if I was pregnant or not and which kids were with us.  Well, no one will forget this year, definitely different.  We sat out on the ski slope with thousands of other people, listening to the live bands, eating too much kettle corn and red, white, and blue Italian ice (hence the blue faces), and then watched the best firework display we've ever seen.  Patrick was very enthusiastic about it, such a great age.  He had to describe every single firework to us and most of them were GIANT!  Or Christmas!  (Red and green).  Most people thought he was a charming four year old.  Anna thought he was beyond annoying and she kept asking us to shut him up. It was such a great show that I didn't want to miss any of it while looking for my camera so I didn't get any photos.  We all know what fireworks look like, right?

Anyway, here are some random photos from the evening for poor Sean who missed all the fun:

Blue lips

 Kids dancing with the band.  Connie did take Emily down there and put her on stage which confused her.

Some of the crowd

 Anna loves all the older cousins.  Here she is talking Cailin's ear off.

 A brother and sister not fighting.  Is there hope for Anna and Patrick some day?

How innocent does he look??

 Here he is staring down this girl because he wants her to get off the swing and give him a turn.

 A little down dog on the blanket.

 Discussing going to dance with the band.

Megan insisted on bringing her Kindle to keep her busy while we waited for the fireworks.  She was reading by glow stick at the end when it was dark.

Operation Tire Out Boy

It wasn't foggy but it was steaming hot!  And my camera lens fogged up.  But that didn't stop Patrick from demanding all the attention he could from the unsuspecting Lowry Crew.  I always tell the kids to stop competing over every little thing and I remind them that I don't have any trophies to hand out.  Well, if I did have a trophy Joe would get it for outstanding effort in the heat.  Not only was he shagging balls for golfer Patrick but he then turned it into baseball with golf equipment.  Considering how much Sean and I do not umm, appreciate baseball, it was alarming how well Patrick did hitting like that.  And then while waiting hours for the fireworks to start up on the mountain, Joe played a game where Patrick would race into him and then he'd lift him up in the air.  Many, many times.  I was relieved to see Joe walking around normally today and not in extreme back pain.