Keeping Cool in NJ

So a couple of Sundays ago, our air conditioning broke.  I thought it wasn't too big of a deal because we were headed down to visit my family in NJ for a week, anyway.  We had one pretty hot night, where we slept in the basement (it was still so hot and I got very little sleep) and then we went down the next day.

It was so fun to be able to spend time with my family.  We went in the pool almost every single day and the boys loved it.  Geoffrey was home for a week as well, so we got to spend some good time with him too. Played a lot of dominion, watched a lot of baseball, ate a lot of ice cream... the usual. :)  We also got to go to a Phillies game and meet Joan- a foreign exchange student who was staying with my family.  He was a ton of fun and very patient with us and my boys!  Scott came down for the weekend, and the plan was to come back home on Sunday night.

But when it turned out that they weren't going to be able to fix our a/c for another week, I was left with the option of staying at my parents and braving a bus ride with the boys, or spending a week without a/c.  I might mention that these were by far the two hottest weeks of the summer.  Hands down.  No thunderstorms cooling anything down.  Terrible humidity and high 90 to 100 degree weather all week.  Knowing how terribly I had slept the one night we didn't have a/c, it wasn't too hard of a choice.  We decided to stay in NJ for an extra week and enjoy the pool and a/c a little longer.  The bus ride wasn't fun, but it was over in 6 hrs. :)

We had a wonderful time on our trip.  Here are a few pics!

Alan randomly had this huge ear one day.  He woke up with it.  It was the weirdest thing ever, and in a day and a half it was fine.  Must have been some sort of bite??  We're not sure.  It was so funny and sad.  We just called him Hitch.

Jamesy loved the water. 

Cheese!

Alan also had lots of fun and was able to walk on the bottom.  He thought that was awesome.  Maybe a little too much fun with the splashing...

We also got to spend some time with Lindsay!  She's due a month after I am.  Don't worry, I could not even put the sideways shot we took up because I am seven hundred times bigger... it's just funny.  The straight on shot is better. :)

We had a fun ward picnic.  The boys loved this little racing car.

Nate and Joan shooting some hoops.

Uncle Geoff played some ball with James.

And speaking of James, can someone tell me what happened to our little baby???  He looks so old in this pic!

Daddy had some fun on the playground too.

This is more typical James.

Loving the balloons

And one final shot of the swimmers!

The a/c is fixed, and of course, it has been so rainy and cool this week that we've hardly run it.  Yesterday I don't even think it made it to 70.  Go figure. :)  But we'll take it.  And thanks again family, for letting us crash for longer than planned!

Happy 4th!

We had a very fun Fourth of July this year!

We started off with the annual pancake breakfast at the church.  Scott went early to cook pancakes and Alan went with him.  I guess he was quite the pancake flipper!

After the breakfast we went down to the town common for some family fun.

They had mini golf, a bounce house, hot dogs, balloon hats (or swords in our case;)  The boys had a blast.

They had some of these little games.  Good thing there wasn't a line for this one, because the boys kind of took it over.

James could have done this all day. 

It was a pretty hot day, but we got some yard work done as well as some swimming time afterwords.  Here I am giving the riding lawn mower a try.  It was fine...but we'll leave it for Scott. :)

The boys each got to pick a special treat to bring to the fire works.  James was pretty excited about the McQueen fruit snacks.

Waiting for the fireworks.

Alan did not want to go.  He sat like this for most of the time but he wasn't screaming or crying, which was a major improvement.  And he really did like watching them.  Afterwords he said that he liked watching all the pretty colors, but did not like the loud noise.

James on the other hand was terrified.  He didn't cry, but he buried himself in our laps or chest and we could not pry him away.  When we would try to turn him around he would be all clenched up with his eyes shut.  I honestly don't think he saw a single one.  He kept saying things like...no boom...loud...scary.  The minute they got over he sprung up and said "a boom.  a fun."  Such a funny guy.

Despite the super hot day, it was so fun to be able to spend time together as a family!  Happy 4th!

A New Job...

So I am a little late in posting about this, but we wanted to document this new little chapter in our lives. Scott started a new job last month and it has been an exciting adventure for us.  We have loved our time at Lincoln, but Scott has been anxious to try new things.  He wanted to try his hand at the private sector in a more traditional software engineering environment. And so far he is liking it.  We are now officially part of the Amazon world (in Boston).

Scott went out to Seattle for orientation the first week and got to see a little bit of the city.

And here is Scott on his first day of work. :)

The commute has been the biggest adjustment about the job.  He now works in the city, so it is a little bit farther than his previous job, but the traffic is much, much worse.  He has tried it a few different ways, and so far has preferred the commuter rail train as the best way to get into the city.  We have a station very close to our house and he is able to get things done on the train ride.  He then has a pretty good walk to his office, but has been enjoying that as well.  It may take longer than driving (depending on the time of day) but is much more flexible and enjoyable.

So Scott is becoming fairly familiar with this train. :)  Big congratulations to our wonderful husband/dad.  We are very grateful that we have been blessed with good jobs and that he is such a hard worker.