P E A K

Em was one of five 4th graders selected from the entire school to participate the the county's PEAK music festival. It was a fun day of workshops - ukulele, recorder, and chorus - with a final performance of everything they learned throughout the day. We were very proud of her and it was a fun day. 

We celebrated Savannah's birthday afterwards at The Pie. The girls were adorable sitting at their own table while the mommies enjoyed uninterrupted adult conversation.

We went to our pals in the evening for a costume party. This was my fancy butterfly costume. ;)

Time is flying by...

Hard to believe it's the end of October already. Our schedule is so full that I think it makes time go by too fast! A typical week for us is Monday, piano right after school, dinner, then karate. Tuesday, Sarah comes to kidsit so I can go to the office 6-9. Wednesday - karate right after school. Thursday tends to be our relaxing day after school unless we choose to get out of the house and go to karate at 6:40p. Friday, karate right after school...

That's a whole lot of karate! But come Nov 15th, we will be pushing the pause button on karate and diving into basketball for the Winter season. Ben is joining the league this year - I'm excited for him to play especially because he enjoyed his one week of camp so much this Summer.

The kids have settled into the school year and love their teachers. I'm grateful our little island village attracts such quality educators. Ben is more focused this year and his teacher reports in that he is thriving in class. Emma has a teacher that is being a little tough on her (in a good way) and seems to truly understand her sense of humor. Homework is at a minimum but is still a battle with Emma - especially if it involves writing. She hasn't overcome her laziness yet. Here is my beauty's 4th grade picture - she looks like a teenager!!!

4th and 2nd

And here we go again!! The 2016-17 school year has begun. The 1st day was a bit rainy here and there but we got a 5 minute dry window as the bus arrived. We are grateful Ms Laura has returned for her third year as our bus driver - she's delightful & patient and we adore her so much. 

I was trying to get the children to hold up 4 fingers and 2 fingers to indicate their grades, this was the best pic out of 20. Emma-lemma-ding-dong indeed. At least my wingman is still giving me giant smooches and blowing me kisses as the bus pulls away! ❤️

Two weeks in and I think we are going to have a winner winner chicken dinner year. Em is thrilled to be back in class w her BFF (not since K) - it's actually amazing to know these girls are still BFFs after 4+ years. That's true friendship right there. I really like her teacher, she is tough but has a huge sense of humor which is something Em can relate to. Ben's inclusion class teachers are the perfect mix for him. Daddy & I have already met with them for a quickie 25 minute game planning session. They GET him. They LOVE his quirks as much as we do. And we are confident he will thrive under their tutelage. 

Mommy has dove back into running doing 4 and 5 mile courses. I'm scared to death of the 15k I signed up for in October. 9+ miles of hills. I'm confident I'll finish, but will I finish in the allotted time??? That remains to be seen! ...giggle

Winding down

As Summer winds down, we are taking advantage of our Village fun as much as possible. You know, things like eating ice cream on the last Wednesday night of live music at the brewery.

Thank goodness Wendy's serves frosties year round! #happy

We hadn't been out on the pier all Summer! How'd we miss this??? So of course we needed to mark our territory with cart wheels and round offs...

Em busted out her too small roller skates and toured the neighborhood stopping only to teach daddy how to correctly use a bow staff in our backyard. 

We decided this day to tour the neighborhood on scooters! Daddy is an absolute champion riding with the kids - I walked briskly behind. Our neighborhood is all hills, so they got a good lesson in speed and braking! Daddy's gluteus muscles we quick sore the next day - pretty good work out!

Ben has fallen in love with Calvin & Hobbes. We discovered these books after cleaning out the basement one humid & hot Sunday morning - the basement is the coolest place, so we had a good excuse to just get it done finally. 6 boxes of trash later... and our basement is tidy again!

Of course we had to take advantage of the warm waters of the Sound in the end of August. Ben loves to lay at the edge of the water and let the waves plow into him and take him where they may... Sensory much?

Daddy was the hit of the beach party teaching all the kiddos to fish. We caught tons of porgies this day and had the yummiest ceviche for dinner!

Sunset... We are so very blessed!! And Ben is blessed because he got to eat doritos at sunset.

Our tomboy...

Don't goooooooo, Summer! We love being lazy with you!!

Osprey Kid intro day

We were out the door bright and early Sunday to enjoy some fishing on the Sound. It was kid intro to fishing day - a shorter session with a kid fishing free with every paid adult. 

The weather was perfect, sunny but not a scorcher and we cast our lines and crossed our fingers!

Ben pulled in the first fish - a porgie that happened to be our best catch of the day!

I wish I'd gotten a picture of it still on the line, but the mates were too fast. We all caught something which is a nice change! We had 7 or 8 total. 

Chef daddy got to work and made AMAXING porgie & shrimp ceviche. Yum!!! We enjoyed it Ecuadorian style with popcorn to soak up the broth!

Such a relaxing and fun day!! 

Can't stop. Won't stop.

Summer is winding down but that's not stopping this bunch. We took advantage of the low humidity low 80s weather the other day and hit up Heritage Park. The kids ride bikes and I ran behind them. Well, ran behind Ben - Em took off way ahead and lapped us numerous times. Ben did GREAT, he is starting on his own, mostly safely stopping on his own and is going long distances without stopping. We are very proud of both kiddos and are confident Ben is ready for a bigger bike for next Summer. He was so determined to complete an entire lap without stopping that we did three laps of the park (we usually do one because he gets "tired") for a total of three miles. Good run for me, too!! 

Em and I enjoyed the second to last live music night at the brewery last night complete w ice cream and friend fun. Actually, we didn't see any of our good friends until we were ready to leave so Em hung out w a young girl from her karate class blowing bubbles and making chalk art. You could tell the girl was thrilled to be playing w a big girl - it was too sweet and I was proud of her for stepping up as a role model. Way to go, Emsadoodle! 

We came home with ice cream for the boys and watched the last part of the movie Daddy & Ben were watching before heading to bed. Ben was sugared up and couldn't fall asleep so I received this note at about 10pm! 😜😂😍

weird day;];];]

so well today i went to heritage park with the kiddos an  benny he rode his bike 6 laps 2 nonstop ben is sooooooooooooooo amazing ;];];];];];];];];];];];];];];]

places places places

#SWAG
Hilo its em & ben
right now ben is piling  stuff once and he pinched me he said OW
ben is going crazy
soooooooooooooooooooo much bedding & folder
i have minions on my eyes
 to be continued by emma

Quickie PA trip

We enjoyed a quick trip to PA this weekend to celebrate cousin Frank's 16th birthday. PA in Summer = swimming! Summer birthdays in PA = swimming! Thank goodness for Grandpa's pool - it was steamy on Saturday and it was a good cool off. Sunday brought us some solid storms but we managed an hour of swimming even so! The drive home that usually takes 4 hours took 6 but the kiddos were awesome and we white knuckled it pretty much the entire drive. Gotta love an East Coast Summer!

 

Brown town!

Look out, people - the Bunch knocked their BROWN BELT test out of the water! I was confident they would pass, we have been hitting the mats 3-4 times a week and they knew all the required moves. 

I had to remind Ben to "not ask any questions" and "stay on his feet" the entire testing hour which is a real challenge for him. He had strong moves for about 20 minutes then slowed down, but he made it the entire time without talking or falling!! A huge accomplishment. 😃

Way to go, super kids!! We are so proud of you!

Connecticut Calling...

Every Summer we try to squeeze a quickie trip across the Long Island Sound to our neighbor state CT to explore the beautiful countryside and experience the rich history that it offers. 

This year we let AirBNB guide us. We typed in Connecticut and scrolled through the available spots, settling on an old school farmhouse in Madison. WOW, it was perfect. 

We caught the 2pm ferry from our port on Sat, and were at the farm by 4. We got settled in, walked the grounds, went out for dinner at a local seafood shack, the relaxed the evening away in a 200 year old home. 

Our hostess lives in the downstairs master suite and rents out the upstairs two bedrooms / bathroom. She was a great conversationalist and before we knew it, it was after 11 and time for bed. The kids had a sleep over the night before and were exhausted, so they crashed by 8:30pm and slept in on Sunday. #hoooooray!

The farms had chickens which provided us s delicious breakfast Sunday morning. It also sported a cow named Cappuchino, an Alpaca named Latte, a donkey named Cookie and a mini horse named Snickers. 

An uninvited guest tried to eat the chickens as the wandered the yard, bad FOX! So we got to see nature at its survival of the fittest finest! 😜

We headed out Sunday after breakfast to explore the local towns. We stopped / stalked by Jacque Peppin's house just down the street from the farm. Daddy was hoping to catch a glimpse of his chef idol!! 

Then headed to a local orchard to pick fresh pares and zucchini. It was crazy hot so we had some whiny kids - boo, but ended up at a hole in the wall diner from Triple D that made everyone happy - Emma drank Sprite and Ben got a Mickey pancake. 😊😂

We love that the ferry is literally one minute from our home and we can avoid all the NYC traffic for an overnight escape. It truly was a great family 24 hour trip. ❤️

 

Guest bloggers... Can you guess who is who?

The kids have been DEVOURING the blog books this Summer laughing up a storm at all their antics over the years. I gotta say, if there is one thing I've done right in the past 7 1/2 years, it's this blog. #grateful

They have now asked to contribute to the blog, which I think is PHENOMINAL. Ben is writing from my point of view which is freakin' awesome and fascinating. Emma, well, she represents all AMAZING nine years olds with her entries. Hope you enjoy all our perspectives!! 😘😘😘

Let my kid blog

Today was hot and sunny. While mom&dad cleand the basement me and b played minecraft i made a gold sword  called.................................          !WAIT THIS AINT A BANANA! it had fire aspect 2.

daddy iz doin something with the tabele i watched ''THE MIGHTY DUCKS'' ben popped in and out watching it.

Musical.ly

@laxgoale89

Em

Baseball Mania

i went to a baseball game with benny an emma an daddy and all are friends.the barnstormers won.
there were also amazing fireworks.it was very fun.the kids were very sleepy.