My Roommates

For those fantastic blog followers of mine that don’t know, I went to Penn State. So did Jon, and that is where we met – in a bar, of course. It’s a little more intricate than that, but that is the short version, and has little to nothing to do with this particular blog.
My Junior and Senior years at Penn State I lived with these pretty girls pictured below!
From left to right: Julie, Me ( in case you didn’t recognize me under the pregnant suit) Kelly, Andrea, Mickey Mouse, and my little monster.

I have known Kelly all my life since the first grade where we decided to be best friends. I distinctly remember deciding that I would be friends with her because she was the cutest girl in our class. We managed to maintain our friendship even though we attended different middle and high schools, and eventually both ended up at Penn State. Andrea went to high school with Kelly and was her roommate all four years, and I think Julie lived on the same floor as they did in the dorms, so I met both of them via Kelly.

Unfortunately, we all had to graduate and move on – and move we did. Kelly lives in San Diego, Julie lives in Pittsburgh, and Andrea lives in Richmond – which is great for me because it is just an hour and a half from our house in Hampton. I see Andrea regularly, although I wish it were more, because I know the Air Force will make us move in the near future. Kelly, Andrea and I are all from Erie Pennsylvania, so we generally see each other around the holidays when we are visiting our families. Julie is a State College native (lucky girl, as that is the town that Penn State is located in) so I saw her a couple times when Jon and I visited Penn State. We were also all together almost two years ago for Andrea’s wedding. Here’s a picture of that, simply because I looked smokin at that time and would like to be remembered like that instead of my current condition. ***Note, this is after I had Hailey, so there is hope for me***

Anyhoo, Andrea had a trip planned to drive home to Erie to celebrate her Dad’s birthday with him, and it happened to be the same weekend as my Dad’s birthday and my nephews birthday, and Jon was going to be TDY…which was convenient because I really wanted to go and my dad and my husband have the same birthday, so if he hadn’t been TDY, I probably would have had to stay home to celebrate his birthday with him. Coincidentally, Kelly was flying from San Diego to Pittsburgh to attend her cousins wedding, and Julie lives in Pittsburgh – and we have to drive through Pittsburgh to get to Erie. Basically, the stars aligned and we all got to see each other for a day. Before I asked to tag along the other girls made plans to go out that evening, and obviously I could not take Hailey bar-hopping, nor am I in any condition to want to go bar hopping, so I didn’t participate in that part of the evening. It was great to spend the afternoon with them though, and I think they all really liked Hailey, who was a very good girl until she got bored and hungry, at which point I convinced my cousin to come and get us. We were supposed to spend the night with my friend Mandi, who I have known and loved since high school but have not physically seen since the night of my own wedding (which she was a bridesmaid in) but that did not work out due to crazy child and sick pregnant mama. We opted to stay with my cousin instead – who took great care of us and pretty much gave me the night off of Hailey care.
Ann (my cousin) has lots of cool kitchen appliances and made Hailey popcorn. She was amazed as she has only ever had popcorn from the microwave or Target. She also has the nicest coffee machine ever, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

The next morning Andrea came and retrieved us and we drove the rest of the way to Erie. I had a really hard time explaining to Hailey why it was taking so many days to drive from our house to Aunt Casa’s house, so she was extremely happy when we finally got there and she got to see her cousins. As I previously mentioned, it was both my dad’s birthday and my nephews, so we had lots of cake.

When we returned home to Virginia on Sunday, we celebrated Jon’s birthday. Hailey and I got him a seat for her for on his bike and a yummy coldstone birthday cake. I made him wear my bike helmet because I knew that Hailey wouldn't wear hers unless he was wearing one. He has had this bike since college and it is amusing to me to see him on it now that it has been modified for the toddler.

After we had been home for a few hours I asked Jon if he knew what that day was. He said “ummm May 7th?” I said “No, its May 9th, but the date is not what I meant anyway.”

It was mothers day, but after all these years with him, it doesn’t even phase me when he completely forgets about those hallmark holidays. Lucky for him I have learned to not care! I ate most of his cake anyway. It was beyond good.

These next pictures are just from the things we have been up to. There is a very nice new shopping area close to our house that has a great water fountain in the middle that is truly there for the kids to play in. Hailey loves it, so my mom – who is here visiting for a couple weeks and to take care of our dogs while we are in St Thomas – and I took Hailey there on Saturday. They had a face painter and a balloon person working there too, so Hailey got her face painted.
Hailey is part fish and would swim all day every day if we let her. We are using the hot tub as Hailey’s personal pool now and she loves showing off all her new skills. She is a great swimmer, and has no fear.
Hailey pretending to be just like Daddy

Her first big-girl swim class!

Some Cuties

I don't have anything overly interesting to tell today, and other than leaving my coupon keeper at Walmart, nothing too bad/funny has happened. The coupon keeper was worse than it sounds because my checkbook was in there, so now I have to figure out what to do about that. It could be worse, I suppose.

Jon is TDY this week to Utah. Hailey keeps calling it Utop - which is an improvement to what she started calling it - which was Tater-tah. Hailey and I have an opportunity to hitch a ride home to Erie with Andrea, so we are going to leave after swim lessons on this week to go spend the night in Richmond at her house so we can get an early start the next morning. We can't miss swimming this week because it is Hailey's first class in the big girl class - no more mommy & me classes! Yay - especially good because me and the swimsuit are not a good combo right now. (Watch out people, St Thomas is going to be...interesting) Thursday is both my dad's birthday and Jon's, and Saturday is my nephew Benjamin's 4th birthday. We are very excited that we are going to have the opportunity to be at home to celebrate with him - especially since Jon is NOT here, so we can't celebrate with him!

The whole trip to Erie is actually very complex, and packed full of visiting, but more about that after it happens.

Here are some very recent pictures of two of the cutest kids I know, my favorite niece Rowan and my beloved Benjamin. My sister and I sure do make cute kids, if I do say so myself!