We're on the Rock

No. I haven't fallen off the face of the Earth. We left Ontario on August 1st for our annual Newfoundland vacation. I've honestly been too busy, and having too much fun, to spend much time sitting on the computer. However, today is my birthday and DH took the girls over to his parents' house to give me the night off and I thought I'd sit here and start getting caught up on all the goings on.

As per usual, the photos will have to tell the stories (I should have tried to do this earlier because I'm forgetting things). This is a quick synopsis of what we did the first week home.

1:

Here are the girls on the day we left home. This might sound nuts but whenever we travel I a) dress them as close to alike as I dare and b) take their photo before we leave the house. Why? Well, I have this notion that if I somehow get separated from one of them I have strategies to get the child back. I can either point to the non-missing child and say, "she's dressed a lot like this one except her shirt is a different colour" or I can show the authorities the super recent pictures of the missing child.


They were both very excited to be going on the plane to Newfoundland and the flight was very peaceful and uneventful. I was pleasantly surprised.

2:

My brother-in-law arranged a river rafting trip from My Newfoundland Adventures and on one misty day the first week we were home, the whole family (sans kids) floated down the Humber River. I grew up in this area but never saw the river from that perspective. It was a lot of fun. Here's our self-portrait:




3-4:

My parents have a cherry tree in the backyard. One day Claire decided she wanted to pick cherries and my father humoured her. He got the step ladder out and she picked cherries for a nice long while:


Of course, little sister had to get in on the act:

She insisted on picking them from the tree and popping them directly into her mouth.

5-6:

DH's parents live near a park and the kids like to go there sometimes. One day I toted the camera and took some pictures of the fun. Here's Jillian with DH:


She would get spitting mad if we wouldn't push her as high as humanly possible. We even had to have a conversation with her about how it was physically impossible for her to swing any higher. She's such a daredevil.

Claire, on the other hand, would get sort of screamy if she gained any height at all on the swings and preferred less risky activities. The slide and the teeter totter were her favourites. Here she is sliding:


The day after this, we went on a road trip. I think I'll save those stories for next time (or I'll never get this stuff posted).

My apologies to everyone I've been neglecting in the blogosphere. I honestly haven't spend more than five minutes a day on the computer to check my emails. I'll get all caught up when we get back to Ontario next week.