Quite ready

Dan's last night of work (until Sunday night) is tonight, and my last day for the work week is tomorrow. Thank goodness!

Dan's overtime has been over the top the past several months, and it's too much these days. We are really, really looking forward to just being together the rest of the week. We have some plans (surprises for our girlfriends) for mini-adventures, but mainly we're just looking forward to hanging out around here and enjoying our time together.

"The ball game" (in Faith's words!) kicks off our staycation tomorrow night. These girls are so excited to go to the Reading Phillies game. Tickets were free through the library-- added bonus. This will be their first sporting event; Dan's really excited to see how they react to it all. I have a feeling Faith will be his buddy for the game (she keeps talking about "the ball game" while Maddie will probably be rooting for the Eagles- she keeps insisting we're going to a football game, and Abrie will probably be wandering around looking for food, food, and more food!).

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Girlies enjoyed making their summer "passports" this weekend. They each picked out a little $.29 folder at Redner's the other day (* on a sidenote, they've been calling themselves the 3 good Fairies ('Sleeping Beauty'- Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather) because of how they always are drawn to one particular color: Maddie has always been pink/red, Faith has always been blue, and Abrie is always drawn to green-- and yes, their folders are red, blue, and green since those are again the colors they picked) and decorated the cover of their passport. I had printed out a little picture of each of them, and they started writing things that they've done together since Maddie's been finished with school. They're looking forward to adding more pages to their "passport" with other fun things that they do this summer.

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Father's Day was a great day this year. Dan ended up going in early yet again, but he absolutely loved their little gifts. We made him a big poster that they all decorated and their homemade cards. Maddie's was adorable this year; she was sitting there Saturday night working diligently on her card and was taking a long time writing a message. I couldn't believe it when I went to check up on her progress and saw an entire paragraph that she had written to Dan. It was the sweetest message I've ever seen her write, and he just loved it.

We had baked a carrot cake the night before (his favorite) and we decided to make him posole for lunch that day. So, they all made up a little menu (it was really cute) and we made the posole the night before and then walked to Redner's yesterday morning for our remaining ingredients for the rest of the menu. They wanted to make him his favorite salsa dip for chips and Maddie picked a fruit dip for some fruit. They set the table for him and picked some flowers for a little vase. Abrie was napping when he woke up for lunch, but I could tell he just loved it.


We're dog sitting this week, so Dan's choice for the afternoon was to walk over to the duck pond in the afternoon. It was a nice day!

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Didn't get a chance to mention that our beloved cousins came over on Wednesday of last week! Oh, how these girls just adore their Donovan, Ella, and Cho Cho!!! (Chase). It was a wonderful time:

They hung out here for awhile... and brought us back some awesome souvenirs from their Disney trip-- I am enamored with our new Jack Sparrow Mickey for the car:

And, girlfriends were so excited with their new Alice pouch!! (not to mention, SWEET pirate eye patch, earring, and hook hand for these pirate girls!) They broke out their "bendy arms" on Thursday and have been playing non-stop ever since:

Our day with cousins was extra fun since we followed Aunt Lisi back to her Y pool and got to be their guests for the day. I hadn't been there since Maddie and Donovan were babies (Madison was 19 months old and Donovan had just turned a year!), so it was deja vu going back with 6 kids in tow this time!! Their pool is amazing, and they all had an absolute blast. Maddie and Faith are constantly begging to go swimming (these two are water babies to the core) and Abrielle blew me away with how much more tolerant she was with getting splashed in the face. She LOVED the splash pad and the slide, and the water in general! Not to mention, the trio of Donovan, Maddie, and Faith went from water source to water source to literally douse their bodies in water! It was great: