A Visit with Grandpa Sean

As you know, Aoife and Aine are very blessed to have many wonderful grandparents and this summer they got to see most of them.  Unfortunately, we didn't get pictures with all of them, sorry Grandma and Grandpa Koonce and Grandma Bernie, we will remedy that they next time we are together.  Promise!

You've already seen some of the pictures of the girls with their Great-Grandma,  we feel so fortunate to have had the opportunity to visit with her this summer, but here are some from our visit with Grandpa Sean, who we're going to get to see again in October on our side of the pond!  Yay!

 Grandpa got the girls one of those recordable books from Hallmark in which he sang to them You Are My Sunshine so they can listen to it again and again -- and they do ; ).  So sweet.

 We were treated to an afternoon at the Children's Museum.

Here are the girls playing, "I'm a little airplane now ..." after lunch.  We ate at this really cool place called "Fresh Start." The name is totally apt for multiple reasons.  It's right next door to the juvenile detention center and is staffed, in large part, by young people trying to start over -- finishing part of their sentence by working, learning what customer service is about, and doing some community service.  They specialize in fresh food for a reasonable price, much of it is grown on the premises, again part of the rehabilitation project, and is really reasonable priced!  We experienced both great, simple food and some of the best service we've probably ever had anywhere.  My hat's off to the endeavor!  

 Kisses from our lovey girl.

What a beautiful day and a great visit!

See you soon, Grandpa.  XO

...And Family

Part of our busy visiting and working in the States was blessed by visits with family.  In fact, it was a great summer in that regard.  It was kicked off by a nice long visit with Grandma and Grandpa Koonce and finished with a visit from Grandpa Sean and Grandma Bernie!  In between, we were hosted and spoiled by my family in Illinois and enjoyed some fantastic relaxation and beach time courtesy of Trish, Rob, Piper and their extended family.  We couldn't really ask for more.  It was really a fantastic summer!

A quick note - I come from some of the sweetest most wonderful people I've ever known and that's not just bias talking.  My mom's family, the extended Fitzgerald clan, are kind and good the simple kinda good AND the thoughtful kinda good.  I love them so much and am so proud to be a part of this family.  I hope this is one of only many occasions my girls will get to spend time with this family and feel their love the way I have my whole life, no matter where I am or what I do.

Thank you!  We love you!

The big girls with the little ones.
These are some of my younger cousins (there are 19 of us) with our girls.  They were so good to our kids and Aoife and Aine LOVED being showered with all of the love and attention.

Aoife and James are standing just outside the "Indian Caves" along the Kankakee River that I used to hike to as a kid with my cousins, so many fond memories. 

It was an absolute delight to visit there again with my own little nuclear family.

 Fun with the big girls.

 Did I mention my little girls were enamored with their big cousins?

 Aoife sits with her darling cousin Natalie, who is 1 year younger than she is.  They hit it off from the start.

So did they ... rock, rock, rocking together.

Sweet cousins.

On the last night we were with my family in Illinois Aine spent a little too much time being spun around in a chair and "pukey-pukeied" all over herself.  I may have mentioned before that Aoife has an unnatural ability to spin-and spin- and spin (like until everyone else, including her sister is lying on the floor vomiting all over) they were sitting together and, well, poor little Aine just couldn't keep up.  But she worked one of her grown-up cousins old little league shirts!  Stinkin' cute!

Aoife loves this picture of her littlest cousin, Reagan, and her.  These two little dolls are 2 of 5 great granddaughters (yes, all girls so far) on this side of the family.

Aine and Zachary playing piano together.  He's qualified, going to be a music teacher ; ).

My girls and my grandma.  I will treasure this picture always.  My grandma is the wisest, kindest person I have ever met in my life.  Again, no bias.  I'm so glad my girls have gotten to spend some time with her.

The next time we visit I will insist on getting a picture of me with my aunts and of me with my cousins because as I look at these pictures now I regret now having done so this time 'round.  Don't get me wrong, I love what I've got but as one of my beloved aunts said in a conversation I had with her:  My sisters are my best friends.  They've extended that to me, their often difficult and still learning and maturing niece.  I'm grateful and I'd like to capture that sentiment with a picture.  So, here's to next time -- may it not be too far in the future.

Thanks for everything.  We love you!

After that visit we jetted on to Seattle to visit Trish, Rob and our absolutely darling new niece Piper.  Rob's Aunt Val and her family treated us to an amazing getaway at their family beach house -- and I mean, AMAZING!

 Practice for later.  Land kayaking.

 Oh, yes.  Those crab pots did provide some delicious crab meat.  Oh, yes.

 The view from their deck.  Did I mention this was amazing?!?

 Heading down to the beach at low tide.

 Not so sure.

 Rearin' and ready to go (sort of).

Low tide here was great.  We were able to walk pretty far out into where the water otherwise would have been and explore and find all kinds of fantastic little creatures and squish around in the sand and seaweed.

The girls.

Rob's Aunt Val (and Uncle Steve) took such great care of our girls while they visited the island.  There was never a dull moment between bubbles, chalk, glow-stick and wands, campfires with s'mores, sea-kayaking, coloring rocks and shells with paint pens ... the list goes on.  It was wonderful.

One of the highlights for the girls, which they still talk about fondly, was The Treasure Hunt!  There were clues left about to lead them straight to their booty and they couldn't have been more delighted.

Checking out the goods.

How are our pirate faces?

Another highlight was meeting their new cousin, Piper.  Aine has renamed her baby Piper, if that's any indication how impressed they were.

 Some of the tasty crabs.  I thought I had eaten fresh yummy crab before, I'm forever ruined after this experience.  Wow.

 The clan at Happy Hour (at the only establishment -- General Store+gas station+restaurant/gathering place on the island).  Maybe it's not the best picture ever, but hey, it's Happy Hour.

 Love.

 We spent a lot of time here.

All ready for sea kayaking and sweet sign off.

As you can see, we had a great trip and were spoiled.  You'll have to see our next post for a couple of cute, quick pictures with our Grandpa Sean because maximum picture capacity has been reached for this post.

See ya real soon.

XO,

Los Stuhan

Frienship and "Girlfriends"

- Friendship isn't about who you have known the longest. It's about those who came and never left your side. - Anonomyous

I read a study once that indicated that women who have good girlfriends with whom they share life and have fun have lower stress levels and live longer, happier lives.  I count myself lucky to have some truly great friends.  Even though I've moved far away from some of them they are near and dear to my heart, as are their beautiful children.   

I think Kim and Jamie (with me (in that order) above) helped me discover what it means to be a real friend, how to love and learn from the ways we are different not just those ways in which we are similar.  How to share happiness and heartache.  I learned how to be a mom next to these two amazing women and am forever grateful.

Angela, with whom I always grow and am constantly safe.  I can tell her everything "like it is" and am consistently challenged to be better.

And our children, who make the bond that much sweeter:

 They can play and eat together.

Be (to borrow from Kim) "the six cutest children that ever were." 

Share a hug.

Or take part in good-natured competition.

I feel fortunate to have been able to visit with these friends on our whirlwind tour in the States, I hope it´s something we´ll be able to do again in the future.

Here's to all of us living a bit longer and, certainly, a lot happier.

XXX OOO

fly little butterfly, fly

We've kinda just been hanging out the last couple of weeks.  We're all officially out of school and we've been waiting for our adventure back to the States to start ... it's official countdown now, fewer than 18 hours 'til take off.

It's been so hot and since it's August half or more of everything is closed for the month.  That being the case, we've been doing a lot indoors or during the first part of the day:  zoo, science museum, beach walks followed by videos, baking and art projects.  Often I look at other blogs for inspiration with projects but every now and then I come up with something of my own.

 Getting started (and yes, it's that hot, just undies around the house for most of us).  I cut out some butterfly stencils and then taped some saran-wrap securely to the table on top of the stencils.  I left enough wrap at one end to fold back on top of the project when we were done.

 We mixed up some more "glue-paint" (white glue, water and food coloring) and used it to paste down our old scraps from other projects, collage style.

 When they girls were done with their designs, I folded the extra bit of the saran-wrap over the top (smoothing it carefully to avoid bubbling) then taped the edges with clear packing tape.

 The white stencil, or pattern behind is gone, and just the colorful outlines and collages remain.

 The tape and hanging them up turned out to be a really good idea, in this case...

 ...'cause the "glue paint" ran down the pictures and then pooled at the bottom leaving a really clear project, above.  I just trimmed off that bit where the much pooled and didn't have to re-tape the edge because it had dried quite well.

Aine's Butterfly

Aoife's Butterfly

 

It will probably be a while until we take on a project like this again.  We'll be really busy for the next month.  Our flight departs at 6.50 am tomorrow morning and it's going to be a really...long...day!  Our adventures include a stopover in Illinois to visit and give ourselves a break in all the travel.  Then, we'll head to the Pacific NorthWest to visit with Trish, Rob and to meet little baby Piper.  Then down to Oregon to work, work, work where we'll also have visitors (a grandma and a grandpa -- yay!).  Wish us luck! 

Abrazos.

un cap de setmana molt bo - a really good weekend

We were fortunate enough to be invited to spend the weekend with some friends in their family country house in the village of Arbeca in the Catalan countryside.  I didn't get nearly as many pictures of the highlights as I would have liked but I suppose that meant I was having too much fun just enjoying it.  It was so nice and we're still happily recovering ; ).  Ahhh.

For this post some guest writers are joining me because they have a lot to say about all of this --

Aoife & Aine:  We're going in the car to see Maria's little house.

Aoife:  We're still riding in the car.  I love Maria a lot and we're going to her house.
Aine: Hey, there's Maria's car (the little blue one to the right)!

 Aoife:  I liked playing dominoes.

 Aine:  We didn't do the horses one yet (that's still to come).

Aoife:  We're drivin' that truck.
Aine:  Where's Maria, Mommy?  I don't see her.

 Aoife:  I'm riding the horse that was at the toy museum. 

 Aine:  It went around.  Around.  Around.

 Aoife:  Here I am riding the Mickey Mouse thing.

 Aine:  For starters, I'm the one with blue and the really big smile.  We're riding with each other.

 Aoife:  We're going to ride with the horses and we're going to have lots of fun.

Aoife:  And I had fun on it.  And Maria had fun on it.
Aine:  Me too!

 Aine:  Daddy and Aine riding the carousel, the horses ... carriage!

 Aine:  I don't see Nuria and Isaac.

 Aine:  Now I see them.  There's Nuria and Isaac and Maria and Aoife!

 Aoife:  We had fun on the horses and I got the purple balloon, Maria got orange and Aine got white.

Aine:  Those are the chickens and roosters.  They're a little the same.
Aoife:  But they're a little different.  'Cause the roosters have a crest.
Aine:  And the chickens go, "Bawk, bawk."  The roosters go, "Kikiriki, Mommy."
Aoife:  You mean, "Caca-doodle-doo."  ... and that babies say, "Pio-pio-pio."  And the chickens lay eggs for the babies to come out.
Aine:  And we get the eggs and eat them up.  Like we did this morning.

 Aoife:  We were picking tomatoes in the garden.

Aine:  It's Maria's little house.  We're playin'.

 Aoife:  It's Maria's little house (all four stories of it).

 Aoife:  We were peaking out the door to see the flowers.

Aine:  We each had our own umbrellas.
Aoife:  And this is of us seeing the really old castle.

 Aoife:  Jumping.

 Aoife:  And petting the horses.

 Aine:  I have my baby and my hat and I didn't want to pet the animals.

Aoife:  That's a picture of us leaving and wanting to go back home.
Aine:  And we sleeped in the car 'cause we were sleepy.
Aoife:  'Cause we did lots of things.


Aine: My favorite thing was riding the horses and the balloon and the toy museum.

Aoife:  The most favorite thing that I liked was riding with the horses and getting a balloon and going to the toy museum.

Some quick notes:

Arbeca is about an hour and a half drive away from the city, so it was a quick easy get away.  Nuria is Ana´s, Aine's teacher, sister.  Maria and Aoife are in the same class at school, and great friends, as you can see.  This is the home that their mother grew up in and it now serves as a great little family retreat.

The ruins we went to are Iberian and nearly 3000 years old, so I suppose "old" is a bit of an understatement.

We ate a ton of great food including the best paella we've ever had, made at home by Nuria -- she even made the fish stock to cook it all in from scratch!  We also had the best baby clams we've ever had the next day at lunch.

The village was fantastic, the neighbors incredible.  We came home with fresh eggs and tomatoes that the children gathered plus a full tray of fresh, delicious nectarines.

It was a wonderful time and we feel so fortunate to be making such great friends.