Feed Your Face 2008

On Saturday, we drove up to New Hampshire to attend the annual family cook at Grammy and Grandpa's house. The entire family was present for what I believe was the tenth annual cookout and everyone had a blast. We jammed six months worth of visiting, eating and playing (oh, and picture-taking!) into less than five hours of time. The day ended too soon, but everyone had a great time.

This was the first year we didn't have corn (too much rain in New Hampshire this summer), but we were able to devour cucumbers, tomatoes, boxes of rice, zucchini, yellow beans, 16 pounds of ribs, gallons of milk, bottles of wine, beers, ice cream, and a couple of blueberry pies....
Before and after the meal, we spent a lot of time hanging off of Grammy and Grandpa's clothes line (40+ years of fun!), playing whiffle ball, and just talking.
Meghan and Uncle Lee, monkeying around...
The cousins
The first family photo since Lee and I were married - and the first that includes Jillian, Elizabeth and Emily.

New Camera in Action

And the Party Just Goes On and On....

This weekend, Sarah and Rohan kept the party going (apparently, the wedding of the century wasn't enough for them!) with a gathering for Sarah's 29th birthday. We were only there for a few hours, but it was enough time to consume some excellent food and for Lee to relieve his college glory days....more pics here.

I know this is supposed to be a "family" site, but when your husband does TWO keg stands...
The birthday girl, in action.
The boys partake in some good, clean fun.

Acting Silly...

Is one of Elizabeth's favorite things to do!

Silly face (as in, "I'm makin' a silly face!")
Fish face

P.S. For those of you that might have noticed that recent picture quality is a bit better, I finally took the plunge....thanks to some interest-free financing, the SLR is mine! This just makes me even more obnoxious with the picture taking (if you can believe it). To spare CSC readers, I'm posting un-related pictures at my photo blog, which I've added to the side bar.

Tea Party

We have been thinking about getting the girls a tea set for a while, and after Elizabeth had such a great time playing with Julia and Charlotte's, we bought them one. It was a smart purchase, as they have "tea" together almost every morning before breakfast, buying Mommy and Daddy a few precious extra moments of shut-eye.

Notice the princesses scattered among the plates, cups and utensils...

"I Look Like Daddy"

Well, not quite....but we know what you're getting at....

Dinosaur State Park

On Sunday afternoon, Elizabeth and I went to Dinosaur State Park. It's not as exciting as the name sounds, but we did see real dinosaur footprints in the ground where they were originally found. We hiked through the park and saw all sorts of bugs, flowers, trees, you name it. Elizabeth loved it, although she was a disappointed to not see a real, live dinosaur. More pictures from our day here.

Dinosaur footprints
A thirst for knowledge

EGG-alicious

Our family breakfast on Sunday mornings always consists of eggs. For two years, Emily has scorned the eggs and happily eaten just wheat toast. The last two Sundays, she's been dipping her toast in yolk so this week, Lee made one just for her. And yes, she liked it!

Loving Lambie

Emily's love affair with Lambie continues. Lambie goes for rides in the stroller, has its own blanket, and gets more kisses than the rest of family combined.

Grounded: Elliot's Tale

This afternoon, when no one was paying attention, I snuck out for a little adventure - which was a lot of fun (but dangerous, apparently) until someone noticed me and brought me to a local vet. I wasn't wearing my collar so the vet didn't know who to call and decided to keep me for a while. Three hours later, Mom and Dad finally noticed that I was missing and went searching all over the place. Dad found me at the vet, so now I'm home safe and sound. Dad blames Mom for letting me out (but she wasn't home) and Mom blames Dad (but he was working in the basement and the doors were all closed). As for me, I'll never tell....I'm grounded anyway, so it doesn't really matter.

Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head...

For months and months and months, Elizabeth has wanted an umbrella. We thought it was a phase, but she just kept asking for one. Thanks to Grammy and Grandpa, she finally got one for her birthday and was simply thrilled!! She must be the only little kid that looks out her window every morning to see if it IS raining!! With the wild weather we've had over the last few weeks, she's rarely been disappointed and at the first sign of a raindrop, she runs for her umbrella.

Sometimes it's more fun to get wet first, then use the umbrella!

Countdown to Santa Fe

Elizabeth is obsessed with her new cousin Felix and visiting him in Santa Fe. Almost every day, she asks us "is today the day we're going to Santa Fe?" and she gets upset when she finds out that it's not. Yesterday, I asked her if she would like me to make a calendar for her, so we could count down the days and she got very excited - "and baby Jesus will be on it?" (we had an advent calendar at Christmas and she loved having baby Jesus in her kitchen). Baby Felix is not quite baby Jesus (sorry Mike and Kelly), but I made one yesterday and this morning, she crossed off her first day. Six weeks to go!

She's still struggling with all of the letters in her name, so I think that we'll try to teach her to how to spell Felix during the course of the countdown.

LeBlanc Girls Meet the Cooper Girls

Today, we met up with one of Lee's friends from high school, Aaron, his wife Kara, and their daughters, Julia and Charlotte. We had a great time playing in the water (even though there were jellyfish), playing in the sand, hunting for crabs and having a nice lunch together. We are so glad that they invited us to visit them while they are vacationing in the area and maybe we'll see them next time they are in Connecticut. You can see more pictures from our visit here.

Elizabeth and Mr. Cooper
Emily in the kayak
The girls share a snack
Searching for creatures and critters.

Our First Jewmaican Wedding

This weekend, we attended the various wedding festivities associated with Sarah and Rohan's wedding. Friday night was the casual, baseball-theme rehearsal dinner in Debby's amazingly manicured backyard. Everyone was so nice, the food was great, and the fun lasted into the night. Saturday, the girls and I watched part of the wedding photo shoot (Elizabeth likes nothing better than getting a close-up look at a real-life princess) in the same beautiful yard. Saturday evening, Lee and I were honored to be part of Sarah and Rohan's wedding and reception - the first Jew-maican (that's Jewish and Jamaican) wedding we've ever attended! Sarah did an amazing job planning every last detail of this multi-cultural event and the wedding was perfect. Mazel tov!

Rohan and Sarah, sporting appropriate team attire (Mets for Rohan, Yankees for Sarah)
The rehearsal dinner was served under the setting sun.

The beautiful bride

The wedding ceremony
The martini luge
Rohan's "men only" toast - with .87 proof Jamaican rum!

Grammy and Grampy Visit

On Wednesday, Grammy and Grampy came for a visit and to bring Elizabeth her birthday present. The basketball hoop was a big hit with both of the girls and they had a great time playing with it and also playing bubbles with Grammy. Lee and I can blow bubbles for just so long, but we are finding that grandparents seem to have endless patience for such things. More pictures from their visit here (I hijacked Grammy's SLR for a while, and those pictures are included as well).

Blowing bubbles with Grammy.

Emily's bubble blowing face.

Elizabeth was delighted by the sheer size of her present, as well as the princess wrapping paper.
Grammy helps Emily make a slam dunk!
Rudy waits for one of Grampy's ever-present dog treats.