Visitors from Seattle

Along with Amy visiting from Seattle a childhood friend and her family (who live in Seattle) were also visiting family at the same time!  I've seen Katie a handful of times since she's moved to Seattle... mostly when she comes home in the summer time.  We decided to meet up at the park by her in-laws, a place that we met up two years ago when she was pregnant with her twins to watch the kiddos play.  Its incredible that her twins are almost 2 (time flies!) and how much life has changed for us as well in that time.  It was a short and sweet visit as it was around lunch/nap time and the little ones were definitely showing it was time for just that.  While I was visiting with Katie, Gaetan took the kids to the children's museum and they played hard.  When we were done with our visit I went back to pick them up and we kept heading north to Muskegon to see our sweet Amy!

Norah enjoying a nap in the park while we waited for Katie

The kids and Gaetan built a pirate ship

Captain T at the helm!

Lucy... being Lucy

I had texted earlier in the day that we were going to be in GR and wanted to know if she was free for lunch or something and we got a better deal!  We got to visit and hang out for the rest of the day!  Whoo!  We went to her parents house and hung out a bit with her family.  I got to meet her niece, Camille, who was teething, poor thing... and talk a little bit of Momma talk with her sister Mandy.  We then walked down to the beach which the kids LOVED of course.  The water was pretty warm and the sun was shining... it was absolutely beautiful.  We just let the kids go in their undies and they had a blast playing in the water.  Dude was even getting a little brave and sitting so that the water was almost up to his neck, which is something he generally doesn't like (even in the tub!).  Lucy was doing this weird bear crawl thing to the water each time which was really funny to watch.  It was nice just to watch the kids play and be able to talk with Amy while basking in the sun and listening to children's laughter and waves crashing.  That's what summer should be about.  :)  Anyhoo, we had to leave the beach far to early (for the kids liking) because Amy and I were going to try a spin class!

On the walk to the beach

Best buds

She was trying to push all the sand back into the water... so she would do this weird bear crawl.  It was impressive and weird at the same time

You always have a dig a hole when you're at the beach

Now, I don't know if many of you have done it before but all I have to say is that my bunda is bruised! I thought that it was a good workout and I would definitely try it again (if I brought a pillow!)  My legs were sore a few days after, and we definitely did get our sweat on... but the overall thought I have about it was how much my bunda hurt haha.  The instructor was a friend of Amy's from high school so we went to support her and try it out.  It was fun to do something like that with Amy too :)  My gracious husband watched all the kiddos while we sweated our lives away for 45 minutes.  The instructor did say that it takes about a month to get used to how to ride so that your bunda doesn't hurt... but I'm not sure I liked it that much to suffer a months worth of bruised bunda!  haha.  I had a good time though for sure.

After that we went back to Amy's parents to have some din din... pizza!  yum yum!  That gave us more time to hang out and Brian came too! The kids really liked their cat but weren't so crazy about their dogs.  They eventually did get used to them a little bit, but for the most part they were not a big fan... oh well.  Amy's mom made a bunch of cookies earlier in the day so the kids got to have lots of cookie treats!  It was so good to be able to hang out and just be with the kids and Amy and Brian.  I think it did Mandy and Camille good to be around other young Momma's and kids too.



On the drive home all I could think about was how lucky and blessed I was to have that day.  That I had an amazing husband who is so flexible with our schedule and is willing to take day trips on a whim so that I can get my fill of my best friend.  A best friend who is willing to share her precious time at home with our crazy family!  And for our kids who know who good peoples are and are excited to hang out with them.  Even though we were exhausted by the end of the day I would do it all over again and again and again.  :)

JVG