Home Vacation - Day Five

The kids so enjoy Legos and Playmobil. I enjoy it because they use their imaginations and they come up with the most hilarious scenarios! During our stay-at-home vacation one day when we couldn't go anywhere due to other obligations (i.e. my secretarial work in preparation for our upcoming trip to Austria), the kids put together something that Marshall got for Christmas this past year: a ferris wheel! It took them quite a while, but once it got done (with a little help from Mom and Dad), they had/and will continue to have hours of entertainment with it.

Home Vacation - Day Five

On Thursday, it was supposed to be rainy again, so we decided that today was the perfect day to trek on over to Manchester and visit the SEE Science Center. We've heard great things about it, but the most important thing we wanted to see was the ginormous Lego Millyard Project that they have displayed there. Marshall was so excited to see it, he almost glazed over all of the exhibits that they have set up.

On the upstairs level the had a big dental/tooth display, some mind puzzles and a play area for little kids. There were more mind puzzles, an open piano, a whisper chamber, a huge bubble maker, musical tubes, a robot and simplistic replica of a submarine. However, what we came to see was THE LEGOS!!! We were not disappointed.

Right as you come down the stairs it's there on the right. You cannot miss it and you are blown away at the size of it all! It is a replica of Manchester's mill town as it would have looked back in the early 1900's, complete with the minifigure ladies having dresses with bustles, mill, church, bank, homes, apartments, a marching band, farmer's market, baseball diamond, park, a barbershop quartet, an amusement park complete with roller coaster, ferris wheel and carosel and much, much more. I loved how they recreated the downtown and made sure to get every detail correct. It's so neat! I think we could've spent the entire time examining every aspect of this wonderful creation!

  

On our way home, we promised the kids that we would hit a McD's with a playland. They have been wanting to do this for SO long. We got our food and they scarfed it up quickly and headed in. Taigen and I were able to relax and chat as we watched them go in and out of the tunnels. It was a wonderful day!

Home Vacation - Day Four

Thursday was going to be rainy. At least that's what our Weather Channel app was saying, so we planned on an indoor activity. We decided to do something that the kids have never done before: bowling. We went to our local bowling alley. They have both candlepin bowling and (what I call) regular bowling, or ten-pin bowling. (Never heard of candlepin bowling? You have GOT to click on the link I provided and learn more! If you're ever in the area, you should try it. I'm thinking it's only in Canada and New England.)

Indeed, the weather was very rainy on Thursday so our planning was perfect. We all had a blast. Marshall and Shaylen not only loved bowling, but they loved the computer up above that would send some animated bowling pin across the screen doing crazy things after each turn. (Can you tell that they don't watch a bunch of TV?)

Of course, Taigen beat us all. Maybe I should have him try bowling left-handed for this as well as putt-putt, but it doesn't matter. We had a great time. The kids are eager to try their hand at it again someday. And that is exactly what we wanted: To create a vacation where family memories were made, using relatively little money, and just spending quality time together. Something we could do again...often.

Home Vacation - Day Three

We were looking forward to Day Three for a while. We knew we wanted to take the kids somewhere for a picnic and we decided that the weather would be perfect on Wednesday for just that. We drove up to Cape Elizabeth to Ft. Williams. If you've followed this blog for any length of time, you know that this is the place where the Portland Head Light is located. The lighthouse is so beautiful and the grounds are meticulously maintained. We enjoyed a wonderful picnic and spent the remainder of our time there flying kites, playing boccie and reading.

Around dinner time, we drove in to South Portland and met Papa Mac at Cracker Barrell. It's been too long since we saw him last. We loved just sitting around the table and chatting. (It's times like that when I really miss my co-hort in crime, Mom Mac. She and I would always just roll our eyes at the terrible jokes Taigen and Papa would tell!) We enjoyed our time with Papa tremendously.

After dinner we headed over to Cornerstone Baptist Church and enjoyed being in their mid-week service and catching up with friends. We were invited to Coldstone Creamery by Pastor and Judy Endean after the service and we stayed there jabbering and laughing until after 10! We knew we would be exhausted the next day, but this was vacation! We could always sleep a little later, right?

Home Vacation - Day Two, Evening

After a busy afternoon and evening, we enjoyed coming home and playing a game together. Have you ever heard of the game of Qwirkle? It was given to us by friends. We taught it to the kids and they loved it! Marshall decided to use the game bag as a chef's hat which added to the hilarity of the night!

Home Vacation - Day Two

Our goal for this vacation was to make mini-day trips around the area and just spend time as a family. We didn't want to spend a bunch of money, but we did want to make memories!

Tuesday we took the kids up to Wells to a family fun center that had a human maze, two putt-putt golf courses and an arcade. Marshall and Shaylen were SO excited to go! It was a beautiful day, not too hot, and so we took off in the early afternoon.

We had a wonderful time. Taigen and Shaylen beat Marshall and me at the human maze. That was hilarious. You couldn't see over anything so it was purely by guess and by memory. You had to gather four letters: M, A, Z and E and couldn't finish without your card being punched with those letters! It was hilarious.  After the human maze, we all did the easier of golf courses. Taigen clobbered all of us (someone suggested that Taigen play lefty next time), but we had so much fun regardless.

After the maze and golf, we went into the arcade with the complimentary tokens that they gave us and Marshall and Shaylen tried their hand at so many different games. We pretty much had the place to ourselves so that made it more enjoyable (and, I might add, a lot less noisy!).

For dinner we hit The Maine Diner. This had been featured recently on Food Network's Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. Since it was right down the road, and we had never tried it, we decided to give it a try. It was a great meal and a huge hit.

We had a wonderful day together.

Our "Home" Vacation Day One

This week we are taking vacation from responsibilities (kindof...more on that later). We wanted to be able to spend time as a family this summer and it was more cost-effective to just stay home than head off to somewhere like Hershey Park or some other place that would require gas money for travel (or airfare for that matter), hotels and all meals.

We had a very special guest with us this past weekend. Do you remember the Herbsters who were with us back in 2009? They travel all around the United States holding church meetings. Mark Herbster was going to be speaking this week at The Wilds of New England Christian Camp to a group of junior campers. Taigen contacted him early and wanted to know if he could come to our church and preach while he was in town. He was willing! We were so excited to have him here in New England and equally as thrilled that he could come and stay two nights with us here in our home.

Mark, his twin brother Mike, and their families are sweet friends (not to mention so likeminded) that we thoroughly enjoy every moment with them. We personally enjoy just sitting and talking with them, picking their brains on current issues, and, in some cases, singing with them! We only wish they were closer so we could spend more time with them. Mark preached in both our Sunday morning and evening services on Father's Day. We had a special emphasis on the Family and the sermons were both encouraging and challenging. It was a GREAT Sunday.

Marshall and Shaylen LOVED having Mark here at home with us and were ready to head off to camp with him if we had let them. Of course, they are too young, but we know that the time is coming when they will be old enough! Taigen and Mark took off for Deering, NH shortly after lunch on Monday. The kids and I stayed home and had a relaxing afternoon. It was a great first day of vacation. We're off to a great start this week.

Little Fingers and Little Toes

The other day, a friend of mine asked if I would help her get some snapshots of her little ones so that she could give her husband some pictures for Father's Day. Of course I would as long as she didn't expect anything professional!

We had some hot and humid weather with periodic showers, but I finally found a chunk of time that was pleasant where I could take the kids outside for some pictures.

She has four sweet kids, but they are little (a 3 1/2 year old, 2 year old twins and an almost 1 year old) so getting them to stay focused on a camera takes some work! We did all we could, but ended up just doing individual shots. Our chances of success increased exponentially once we made this decision! They are SO cute and I didn't mind snapping away at their little faces.

Afterwards we all enjoyed a semi-relaxing lunch (how relaxing can it be with six children running around, hmm?) and a sweet time of conversation.

I am hesitant to post pictures of someone else's kids on my blog, so you'll just have to trust me when I say that I think they turned out cute, but I DO have one picture that I absolutely love and I just had to share it. It seems forever ago that Marshall and Shaylen had these little, itty-bitty fingers and chubby toes. I miss it. Don't you just want to gobble them up?

Special Guests en route to Australia!

We were really excited to have friends from our college days in town to present their ministry to Australia. We were able to host them in our home for Saturday and Sunday night and they were in our church all day on Sunday.

Marshall and Shaylen enjoyed having new friends to play with. They played SO well together that we hardly saw them. They were too busy pretending and tucking themselves in Marshall's room upstairs. Taigen and I loved the time to just sit and get caught up with Dan and Amy.

Happy Twinsday!

On Mother's Day, Taigen was so great in cooking me a wonderful meal: beef tips and noodles, homemade rolls and shortbread cookies. It was all delicious. I didn't have to lift a finger the whole day! I was completely spoiled rotten.

During our dinner, Marshall and Shaylen launched into a discussion about how there is a day for Mothers and Fathers, but nothing for kids. There was no hint of whining or complaining...just them thinking out loud. Taigen and I said, "We should have a Twinsday!" We decided that we would make the first-ever Twinsday on the twins' half-birthday, June 5th. We made plans.

Well, as many of you know, plans get changed and we weren't actually able to celebrate Twinsday to its fullest on Sunday, June 5th because we had missionaries in our home (more on them later), so we celebrated on Monday, June 6th. We let them pick breakfast (chocolate chip pancakes), lunch (homemade pizza), dinner (grilled chicken caesar salad and croissants) and desserts (frosted shortbread cookies). They were thrilled...and just like Mother's Day and Father's Day, there were cards and a small gift.

It was so much fun to set the day aside to let Marshall and Shaylen know that we are thankful for them and love them so much. It is such a wonderful and special thing to have twins and I wouldn't want it any other way.

Homeschool State Fair

Last night our church homeschool group got together to do an end-of-the-year state fair. The planning for this began way back last year before summer started. We got an email from the lady who coordinates the whole thing and she let us know what the theme would be. She wanted us to be able to collect information and pictures should we choose to study a state that we were vacationing to. By this time, we knew we were going to be headed to Washington for Christmas so we immediately claimed it. It was neat to keep this in mind when we were out in Washington. I snapped up pictures left and right of things that I knew were iconic to the area.

Last week we took a couple of days to really get it done. We went to the library. Unfortunately, this proved to be only a formality for we only found two very outdated books. It was good for us though because it provided a great lesson on card catalogs (our library doesn't have a computer search engine set-up) and an impromptu lesson on how to find books within the shelves. The good news is, this is the information age and we have just about all we could ever need right at our fingertips from the comfort of our own home. (Marshall and Shaylen know the terms "Google," "Skype," "Blog," "Facebook" and "Internet" but would have no way of knowing how to navigate the world wide web.) So we sat down and "googled" away. We got it done in three days.

For the State Fair, we also needed to provide a main dish and a dessert that somehow went along with the state you were reporting on. I figured we couldn't consider Starbucks a main dish, so I decided to go with fish since that would be more widely appreciated by hungry students. I made salmon croquettes (thank you Paula Deen!). I've never made them before, and they weren't too difficult. They didn't turn out too bad either, but the smell in my kitchen sure did. Ew! For dessert I made an apple-raspberry cake. It was delish! Side note for free: Did you know that Washington is the leading producer of red raspberries in the U.S.? I had thought of Washington apples immediately, and they are the leading U.S. producer of them too, but their production is of a lesser proportion (around 58%) compared to the raspberries (90%).

Now, you all know I'm a coffee snob (trained by the best...my mother in law), so you KNOW I had to get some Starbucks in somewhere. You can't do a report on Washington and NOT have Starbucks for people to drink. So...I made a big pitcher of iced decaf mocha. I didn't make it too strong and sweetened it. I had gone to Starbucks earlier in the week and asked if we could have some of their little sample cups with the new logo on them. They did and didn't even charge me for it! (In retrospect, they should've paid ME for brainwashing young minds and providing them with future customers...but oh well.)

Even though the report is really a joint affair at this stage (me pecking away at the computer and printing off things for them to read, me searching for things at their prompting and printing off the photos they wanted/needed for their display, or me cooking and stinking up my kitchen with a fishy smell...YUCK), I am really proud of how well Marshall and Shaylen worked together and the great job they did. They worked really hard and had a wonderful, enjoyable time in the process. So proud of my two favorite little people.

Now that this state fair is over...any great ideas and volunteers to come and help M&S with next year's Science Fair? Hmmm, maybe we could come up with a Starbucks experiment of some sort...