Summer Week 10 {Beach Week} : Crane Beach
31 Wednesday Aug 2011
31 Wednesday Aug 2011
26 Friday Aug 2011
25 Thursday Aug 2011
There were lots of colors to be found on Kite Day.
Colton got to choose the color of his kite and tail. He chose green and orange.
Papa helped decorate it . . . and then taught Colton how to fly it . . .
Colton loved flying his kite . . .
And he loved seeing all the other kites . . . the many colored kites . . .
What a wonderful way to celebrate summer!
22 Monday Aug 2011
This week of summer we are exploring colors . . . and we found some right away when we went to pick up some summer corn . . .
Cole is doing a great job on his colors (much better than my dad – who is color blind).
We talked about the colors as we looked at the different vegetables . . . until we got to the berries and then Cole just wanted to eat them.
It was a sunny, yellow day . . .
And it ended with the yummiest yellowy corn, shucked by Colton.
A great beginning to color week!
20 Saturday Aug 2011
Posted Celebration, Marriage
inThis is why we decided to head to Charlottesville Virginia. To celebrate the wedding of Ashley and Ross.
When I worked at Houston Baptist University I had an incredible staff of young women. Ashley was tremendous at planning events that were personal and so thoughtful. This was just the same a beautifully personal and thoughtful wedding.
The ceremony and reception both took place at a sweet inn. Ashley and her party walked from the deck of the room she stayed in into the sweet and simple courtyard. The welcome table had a handwritten sign and wedding pictures of Ross and Ashley’s parents. The guestbook was handmade by Ashely.
The wedding ceremony was beautiful. Andrew and I read a selection from Dietrich Bonhoeffer. We were so honored to be part of such a sacred time.
The reception was at the same location. The little touches were tremendous. Everything was handwritten in Ashley’s beautiful handwriting. From the big thoughtful signes to the little “gluten free” pennants on the cupcakes. It was stunning.
Our deepest love and best wishes to the happy couple. Marriage is the most wonderful gift!
19 Friday Aug 2011
Posted Celebration, Family
in19 Friday Aug 2011
My brother is already rolling his eyes. He pointed out long ago that for some reason Andrew and I visit animals a good deal. He is right, if you want to see random pictures of random animals we have plenty of them from various adventures . . . visiting the Houston Zoo, a place in Texas ironically called Natural Bridge Wildlife Ranch, and almost monthly visiting the alligators in Brazos Bend State Park. We have visited plenty of zoos as seen here, here, and here. Our favorite place thus far has been Bayou Wildlife Park in Texas. Whenever people visited, we brought them . . . as seen here, here and here.
So we are embracing it . . . we like to visit the animals. So we checked out Virginia’s Safari Park on our road trip.
It was a drive through experience where we got to feed the animals from our car . . .
We all enjoyed the animals. Colton is a true member of the Sharpteam.
15 Monday Aug 2011
I grew up doing local theater. From the age of nine I was in this opera house about three days a week May – October.
The theater has a hand-painted proscenium curtain, painted by a Vermont artist, Charles Hardin Andrus, in 1911.
Every show I was in sat guarded by this curtain and when it lifted, a new adventure began.
For years I had no idea what the painting was of . . . but then in college my boyfriend’s car broke down in Natural Bridge, Virginia and I saw this place in person and it is stunning. Hardin, the artist said it was one of the seven wonders of the world . . . and that Vermont was the eighth, so he he painted Natural Bridge, with Killington, a Vermont mountain, in the background.
Interesting.
On our road trip I got to share Natural Bridge with my boys, and how happy my heart was that they both loved it. Honestly, pictures do not do it justice, it is magnificent.
Legend is that George Washington carved his initials into the rock, there is a white box around it. Thomas Jefferson bought 157 acres including Natural Bridge and built a cabin here. It is a beautiful and historic place.
It was a great stop for all of us, and with your ticket one received entrance into the butterfly exhibit, the indian village and the wax museum . . . so we explored everything!
We loved visiting Natural Bridge, Virginia.
One last note . . .
My favorite blog is Young House Love. It is the first blog I started following and I am convinced that we would enjoy hanging out with its two authors, Sherry and John.
Well when we arrived home from our Road Trip, I saw this post on their blog . . . we were there around the same time! Oh my goodness! Now that would have been my celebrity moment, meeting Sherry, John, and there little Clara . . . almost serendipitous . . .
12 Friday Aug 2011
Tags
So we have been blogging about our Roadtrip, driving 1500 miles with Cole, and the places we stayed.
We did a lot of driving, including into and through New York City . . .
But we did stop and play along the way. We believe in the philosophy of “Adventure & Retreat,” so we did a good job of balancing those two joys . . .
When we saw this sign as we headed out through Amish Country in Pennsylvania, we couldn’t pass it up . . .
Buggy after buggy drove by us on the road. I told Andrew I wished someone would do a documentary on what it was like to grow up Amish. He told me he thought someone had . . . got to find out the name of that.
I always think of myself as connected to the Amish . . . because I was an extra in a movie in high school (not a very interesting movie; I am in it for under 1 minute movie called The Wizard of Loneliness). The movie is not about the Amish, but it stars Lukas Haas, who was in a movie about the Amish, called Witness . . . I digress
We went on a buggy ride. Colton loved it.
And we enjoyed the Amish countryside at a slower pace . . .
What a lovely road trip.
11 Thursday Aug 2011
We did a LOT of driving on our five day road trip. We drove 1500 miles . . . with our two year old.
Here is what our trek looked like
We stayed in three different places, and we LOVED them all . . .
Our first stop was in Coatesville, Pennsylvania where we stayed in a KOA Kabin.
Cole loved it, and loved having his own room.
Our second stay was in Charlottesville, VA, where we rented an apartment from homeaway.com, this is our second time with homeaway and we highly recommend it. It was so nice to have a kitchen and living space. It was very private and had a great back deck.
Here are Andrew and Cole reading . . . loved staying here together.
Our final stop was in Somerset, New Jersey. We decided that since it was just a stopover (from 11:30 pm – 9:00 am) we would go with a hotel. We also decided that it is now easier for us, as a family to have a suite, so we went with Homewood Suites. It was a great place to stay and because of an issue on their part, we stayed there for under $55! So great!
So fun to stay in three different places. And even more wonderful was that our little guy did great in all three.