Family vacation

I am dying to share about Korea, but first, I must share of all the fun things we did before we traveled across the world. (If you want a sneak peak, you can check out a couple of my niece's posts since she was already here to visit! http://ashleyswonders.blogspot.kr/2012/07/if-we-survive.html (the second half of the post) and http://ashleyswonders.blogspot.kr/2012/07/lifes-like-novel.html. She gives a great account of how we accidentally climbed a mountain!) 


The best part of our month-long family vacation (a few weeks longer for me) between moves was spending a lot of time with almost all of our family. There were also some highlights like Maddie's baby blessing, our NYC trip, Claire's first visit to Strong National Museum of Play, and a couple ER visits that I'll also touch on. 


We arrived to Chris's parents house on Saturday, April 28. It was so nice to be back with family, and was the first time Chris had been home in a year and a half. Things were a little different because while we were gone, his parents moved from their home more out of town to a home in the middle of town, right next door to the dry cleaners they own. That meant we got to make some new memories since one of our favorite restaurants in town, an awesome bakery, and a yummy ice cream shop were just a couple minutes away by walking. 

Claire missed her Grammy. 

We arrived to Chris's parents house on Saturday, April 28. It was so nice to be back with family, and was the first time Chris had been home in a year and a half. Things were a little different because while we were gone, his parents moved from their home more out of town to a home in the middle of town, right next door to the dry cleaners they own. That meant we got to make some new memories since one of our favorite restaurants in town, an awesome bakery, and a yummy ice cream shop were just a couple minutes away by walking.

She also missed her Pop pop. He even read her a story! And she loved how he called her "Squirt."

Chris's sister, Sue, came down with her family one afternoon. It was so good to see them all. Claire had a great time with her cousins too. 

Claire of course LOVED playing with Duffy. Here she was blowing bubbles at him, and he would try to bite at them as they floated past. She thought it was hilarious, as you can tell.  

Duffy was also very interested in Maddie.

We also had a great time visiting with Chris's brother, Jamie, and his family. Claire had a great time playing with her cousin, Eli, and it was fun to have Maddie together with her cousin, Alannah, who is just about 1 month older than her. We hope they will grow up to be great friends just as Claire and her cousin, Megan, who is just 2 months older than Claire, are great friends.

Maddie and Alannah checking each other out. We let them stay there like that for a while. They were talking away at each other and eyes were poked and hair pulled only a couple of times. 

Eli with Maddie

 Eli goes to school right in Montoursville, and one day they were having a spring festival at the school with rides, games, prizes, etc. We knew Claire would have a great time at something like that so all went together. Claire LOVED the bouncy house. She thought the slide looked fun, but got scared when it was her turn, so I went with her. She also got her face painted and won prizes playing games. We had a great time.

From far away it looks like she's smiling. When you zoom in a bit more, there is also  a bit a terror in her eyes. That slide was really fast and to me, a lot of fun!

Claire and her face painting. 

We also of course, went to visit Chris's grandparents. Claire had a great time playing at their house. She played with their dog lady, and even though it's been a year and a half, she remembered right where all the toys were. One of the most exciting parts was when she helped Great Pop pop throw away some weeds by riding with him on the lawn mower while pulling a trailer. She hadn't done that before, and it was a sweet and exciting moment for her with her Great Pop pop.

(Pop pop was wearing a hat so she had to find a hat too. :))

Maddie was excited to meet her Great Grammy and Great Pop pop too. 

 After spending about a week at Chris's parents house, we headed to Albion to visit my family. My sisters, Lori and Wendy, and their families came out that weekend as well to attend and participate in Maddie's baby blessing. We had waited to do the blessing until family could attend. Chris's parents also drove up for the blessing. Here's the clan of everyone who was able to make it. 

Maddie wore the same dress Claire wore for her blessing - my grandfather's over century old beautiful, lace, dress. (Back in those days, dresses weren't just for baby girls, and neither was pink.)

Chris gave her a beautiful blessing which I transcribed for her baby book. It was a wonderful day and I was so thankful to have so many of my wonderful family members surrounding me.

We spent the rest of the week following Maddie's blessing at my parents' house. When we lived in Rochester, I was excited to take Claire to Strong National Museum of Play, but at the time, she was just a baby. While visiting, we thought she was the perfect age to go enjoy a day there. We went as a family along with my mom and had a lot of fun!

On the stoop of the Sesame Street area. 

Playing with the Cookie Monster and Bert puppets. I love Claire's expression when she  talks for other people. 

Playing in the silly mirrors

Going shopping at the little Wegmans. (Yea Wegmans!)  She could pick 5 things and then go through the check out. 

Playing at the Wizard of Oz exhibit.

While we were there, we also visited my grandparents who are now 96 and almost 94! I hope I get some of those longevity genes!

Check out those pretty blue eye genes too. Those beautiful blue eyes I look into every day come from many beautiful blue eyes for many generations on both sides. :)

Our sweet family with my grandparents. I thought it was so sweet that Claire really wanted to hold my grandmother's hand for the picture. 

It is a tradition to share a picture of my mom reading Claire stories. Maybe it's because I have so many fond memories of sitting on her lap as a little girl as she read me stories. I love that my children get to make those memories now. 

After spending a week at my parents' house, we drove to Albany to visit my sisters for the weekend. We were also able to celebrate my birthday (which was the Monday after) and Mother's Day. Chris made us yummy pulled pork and also made a peanut butter brownie cheesecake. Yum! We went to church with Wendy and her family where the Primary children all sang a Mother's Day song. Claire has been wanting to go to the front of the church for a while, but hasn't had a chance yet. She was so excited to go up front with the girls. She didn't know the song they were singing, but since she rode in the car with her cousins and Aunt Wendy, and they practiced singing the song the whole ride there (about 20 minutes.) I was amazed that she sang along the whole song and knew the words better than many of the other older Primary kids. It was so darn cute!

The girls all wanted their hair like Princess Leia and they looked so cute!

The weekend was of course filled with lots of fun cousin time for Claire and Maddie and we just loved visiting with everyone!

Maddie looking up sweetly at her cousin

Maddie's turn to wear the Australian hat

Maddie, Claire, and Jason all holding hands and playing. They could not be any sweeter. <3

Maddie loved this jumper. 

Sweetest. Picture. Ever. That is some cousin love right there. They played so well together and even got into some mischief together too.

I just think this picture is funny. "Are you talkin' to ME?"

 After our fun weekend in Albany, on Monday (my birthday) we headed down to NYC for a couple of days. I had been wanting to go to a French restaurant for quite some time, so Chris found a really cute, and very nice French restaurant for us to go to. (It was also featured in the movie Julie and Julia.) It was AMAZING and so fun to try out not only a new cuisine, but one of the most well respected in the world. We had a delicious 3 course lunch and enjoyed every morsel.  

We then headed over to Times Square and went to the Toys R Us there. Outside were some scraggly looking kid characters including this Elmo and Cookie Monster. Claire jumped out of her stroller faster than I've ever seen her do to run over and give them hugs. Unfortunately we weren't fast enough to get the camera out for such a sweet, candid encounter, but we did get this picture. Claire is beaming.

Claire, Maddie, and I rode this indoor ferris wheel too.

 We stayed in a hotel in Brooklyn which was a first for us. We had fun exploring there as we usually only explore Manhattan. On Tuesday, we stayed in Brooklyn and went to the aquarium there. We had a great time, but I have to say, I was totally spoiled by the awesome aquarium in Monterey. Nothing really quite compares. Unfortunately it was also raining a lot that day which made it hard to enjoy the outdoor exhibits. Unlike in Monterey, the different exhibits are also in different buildings in the area which was tricky in the rain. I did like that they had more of the larger creatures like walruses and sea lions. They were really fun to watch swim around.

That night we also went to an Ethiopian restaurant for dinner. (Chris was on withdrawal from the one we found in San Jose, and the one he loved in Rochester. The Rochester one was closed when we went there one day. :() It was very good. One yummy, different thing we had there was probably our favorite and for sure Claire's favorite thing we had there. Chris loves this raw ground beef dish that is common at Ethiopian restaurants. This time, they took the pancake-like rolled bread you usually use to eat with (you pick food up with it instead of using forks) and filled it with the raw beef and feta, rolled it up like a burrito, and pan fried it for a bit. YUM! I know it sounds a little weird to the squeamish, but after you get over the idea of raw beef (they do irradiate the beef to make it safe to eat raw), it was quite good.

On Wednesday, before we headed back to Pennsylvania, we went back into Manhattan where I bought a new temple dress (my birthday present) at the distribution center there at the temple.

Not the temple, but a really pretty church!

 We also went to F.A.O. Schwartz where we had to play on the big piano again. :) We also bought Claire a toy of her choice (pink butterfly binoculars or "biocodurs" as she calls them) and Maddie a litte elephant holding a blankey toy.

We also spent a while in central park where Chris got some great shots like these:

And we went to the cool carousel. Chris rode side by side with Claire and they had a blast. Chris and I found it hilarious that they take regular radio songs like "9 to 5", "Ring of Fire", and also more current popular songs and put them to hokey carousel-style organ sound.

We also took Claire to a little playground area where she and Maddie got to swing together (Maddie's first time.)

 And she got to go down this cool slide that was built into the hill.

We were pretty tired by the end of the day, and headed back to PA to spend a few more days with Chris's family before he flew out to Korea. 

On our way out I got a shot of the new World Trade Center Tower they are building!


It was hard saying good-bye to Chris as he left for Korea, but we were grateful that it was just for a few weeks and that he wasn't being deployed for a year where we would have to be separated. 


Maddie turned 5 months old the day after Chris left. Isn't she cute?

In those few weeks, I made the rounds visiting his family, my parents, and my sisters again which meant more time for:

More trips to the playground

more time with Grammy and Duffy!

More fun times with cousins!

And ER VISITS???????

Ok, one last story. So I went to visit my sisters in Albany the weekend before I was supposed to fly out for Korea out of Rochester. On Saturday night, right as I was about to put Claire to bed, I noticed a bulls eye mark on her arm. I kind of freaked out because I know this can be a sign for lyme disease and I know the ticks are really bad this year in that area. I also have a friend who battles with the disease and was really worried. Since I don't have a regular doctor to go to, I decided to take Claire to the ER to get it checked out. My sister, Lori, went with me. By the time we got there and saw the doctor (which by the way they were really quick at Saratoga Hospital), the bug bite was looking more like a C and less like a bulls eye, so I was less worried. Plus, we hadn't actually ever seen a tick on her.  I was so impressed with how calm Claire was when they had to draw blood. It was a first time for her, and she was so calm. She didn't even flinch! So we got her an antibiotic just in case and went home.

The next day, just as I was about to pack up our things and leave my other sister's house to go back to Albion, I hear Claire crying as she ran up the stairs. I was surprised when I saw her chin split open and blood everywhere. I felt so bad for her, and after a while, realized that it was deep enough that she would probably need stitches. Wendy's RN friend up the street came over to tell me for sure if I should take her to the ER. So this picture above is Aunt Wendy entertaining Claire on her tablet while we waited for the doctor. Claire got 3 stitches and was so brave. By the time I got back to Wendy's house, packed up our stuff, and got out the door, it was 9PM, and I had a 4 hour drive ahead of me. I had to go that night because at 8AM Monday morning, I had to have a root canal! Oh, it was so crazy, it was almost funny! I couldn't believe the timing, but was grateful for all the family support around me. We spent our last few days in the states at my mom's house. Oh, and what about getting those stitches out, you ask? Well, I had to take her to another ER in San Jose on our way to Korea where Claire got to go to another ER with another family member - Uncle Ken. But I'll save those stories for next time.