Fun with the Girls (and Emmett)

Ok, so over the weekend we had a lot of fun. At the hotel that we stayed in, we were able to swim in the pool on the 19th floor. Let's just say, I'm glad I wasn't staying on the 18th floor (we were on the 3rd). I mean, seriously, that would be a huge bummer if the pool fell through the ceiling of your room. Who ever thought it was a fantastic idea to put the pool on the top floor? I guess it works and all, I just wouldn't think of it as a genius idea. Uncle Andrew and Aunt Jill took the kids swimming on Saturday night, and Josh and I took the kids out to dinner and then swimming on Sunday night. It was a whole lot of fun! Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of the trip...Josh had the camera packed up in his truck :(



Our dinners out were fantastic! Josh went out to dinner on Thursday, and the place they went prints new menus every night for dinner. In honor of Amelia's birth, the gentleman that was taking Josh out had the menus printed especially for us. Every menu that was delivered to every guest that evening had "It's a Girl!" printed on the top of the menu. How cool is that? We have a few copies, and they also gave us a card. So nice. Anyway, so one of my favorites was getting macaroni and cheese at the nice steakhouse on Saturday night. Who knew? Mac 'n Cheese at a steakhouse. It was mmmm...tasty! So unique too. And a HUGE thank you to Jill and Drewski for watching the kiddos while we had a couple of nights out! So nice.



The good news is that Julie had her camera when we visited there, so we have a few pictures of our trip to Julie and Emmett's. Emmett was lucky enough to sleep in a house with 6 girls! Wow, that is a ton of estrogen in the house. He survived pretty well, I think. Julie cooked us some awesome lasagna on Tuesday night. She claims it came off of the back of the Barilla box, but I'm skeptical. It was really good...so check it out if you need a new lasagna recipe. BONUS: You don't even have to boil the noodles. Anyway, so we hung out with a fun Moms' group, played in a fun play-area at the mall, shopped at 2 stores (you can't shop for long periods of time with 4 little girls), rescued Harper after she ran out of one store...she's kind of a shopaholic, played at a super-great park, and had lunch at a Panera-type restaurant. I had a grilled brie cheese and apple sandwich. It was great, and I'm ready to go back and have another one.



The kids got along pretty well. Claire, of course, was trying to "help" Harper do everything. This proved a bit troublesome for Harper at times as she didn't like Claire in her face all of the time. On a related note, Harper (16 months) really liked Amelia. She thought Amelia could be her own little baby doll. As most 16 month-olds do, Harper thought she could pull Amelia's hair and drag her around by her legs. Thankfully, Julie was always nearby and Amelia wasn't scarred for life :)



Julie also just became a Creative Memories consultant (scrapbooking supplies), and I know she is going to be great at it! I can't wait to hear of all of her successes. She already has some events planned, and I'm ready to buy a few products (and I don't even scrap!). They have this fantastic picture frame that I'm going to have to put on my birthday wish-list. For any of you planning to get me something great, I am turning 30 on Thanksgiving Day this year! Ok, back to Julie and Creative Memories...anyway, so she has this software from CM that can create scrapbook pages and lots of cool stuff. So, we put our heads together and created Amelia's birth announcements! So cute. I'm pretty sure most of you will be getting one. If not, I will be posting the announcement here for all to see once I get them mailed out. Thank you Julie for helping me!



I've included a few pictures from the trip. Getting all of the kids to look at us in any one picture was impossible (as you all know!). And Julie and I are trying to figure out how we didn't get any pictures of the two of us...oh I can probably figure it out. I think it has something to do with 4 little adorable girls in our lives!

Harper and Amelia (who doesn't look like she's having much fun)

Emmett, Harper, and Claire swinging in the hammock.
Julie and Emmett have a beautiful backyard.

Claire, Meredith, and Harper in the cool airplane at the park.

Harper, Julie, and Amelia: Amelia really did love Julie!