A Day In the Life...

Lately, Jason and I have been joking about how we feel like we are living the retirement life right now.... minus the income, of course. His program will start on August 15th, so in the meantime, we look for free things close to home to do with the girls. As luck would have it, there are so many beautiful parks around here with tons of things to do! We get creative too. I'm just grateful for the time we have to spend as a family before school starts for Jason. It's going to be a tough two years, but we are ready for it!
Yesterday, our agenda consisted of swimming at the pool here at our Condos with our friends (thanks to our Landlord giving us free guest passes!), and then visiting a new park. It was a great day!

Our Landlord snapped this picture of us getting ready at the pool. It was crazy watching all the kids by the water, so we didn't get to take any other pics... We love our friends the Kesler's!

Poor thing was so exhausted after swimming, that she couldn't even finish the bite of graham cracker in her mouth. We failed miserably at keeping her awake. This nap occurred at 3:30pm... Yup - late night!

A little bit of "Go Fish" after nap time, and before the park. 

Ready to explore a new park!

 

This is Curtis Arboretum (park). It has tons of green grassy hills for you to frolic in, or sit at a bench and enjoy the view. It also has a dog park! We miss our dog Esme, so we went in and pet the dogs...

Best Daddy EVER!

Another successful find! We really do feel blessed to have been led to live where we live right now. It's absolutely beautiful, and we feel so safe. Anyone who wants to visit, we have a room!

When the light's go out...

I LOVE THUNDERSTOMS. I love the booming of the thunder; the crackling of the lighting; the pitter-patter of the rain. It's just beautiful to me. And as luck would have it, we get a lot of those where we live now!
A few days ago, we had the biggest thunderstorm I've ever been a part of. The thunder and lightning were right above us, and so loud that it almost hurt my ears! Lilly was really scared, wanting to hide under blankets. Abby kept asking for the "boom" noises after the fact. Then, at about 6pm, the power went out. It took awhile for the girls to understand that trying to turn the light switches on wouldn't work. So we had lots of fun playing together as a family amongst the lamplight. We made s'mores, had a hula hoop contest, and were just plain silly. It was such a wonderful memory to make!

Making s'mores! Thank goodness we have a gas stove!

A Sunday Stroll...

Yesterday we decided to help get some wiggles out by going to Alverthorpe Park - located just a couple of miles from us. This park actually has a security guard at the front gate checking your ID to make sure you live in the Township. Technically we don't, but I think since we live in a little bit of a nicer area than where the park is, they look past it and let us in. I'll let you make your own conclusions as to why they have that rule.
The park is INCREDIBLE. It has so many fun things to offer, and most are free! Playgrounds, a wading pool for kids, a beautiful 1.7 mile path around the park, baseball fields, tennis courts, basket ball courts, a golf course (for a small fee) and a miniature gold course (for an even smaller fee). It's absolutely beautiful. They even have some campsites that are off the trail and in the woods. We spotted 6 deer yesterday, including a tiny baby fawn!
We just stuck to the trail on this trip, and it was tons of fun. Here are some pictures of our little stroll...

Did I mention it also had a lake? Yes..it does. 

  
 

   

Daddy thought it'd be fun to have me ride with the girls while he raced us downhill! 

Thank you Alverhtorpe Park!

We went to this park a couple of weeks ago too, so I thought I'd go ahead and post some of those pictures as well...

Trail off the main loop that leads to some campground spots. 

Campground spots...

Lilly found the biggest feather ever! There are lots of Canadian Geese all over this park. 

Piggyback rides!

 

MowFam Visit!

We LOVED having Grandma Lori, Auntie Em, and Auntie Saren come to visit us for a week! We went on so many fun adventures, and made lots of lasting memories. Here are just some of the things we did during their visit:

The Philadelphia Zoo: Oldest Zoo in the United States!

The Meerkat exhibit was lots of fun. The girls loved crawling around next to the cage where the Meerkats get to crawl in.

Lilly of course LOVED the flamingos! She wanted to make sure and bring her flamingo stuffed animal that we bought the last time we visited. She said, "I have to bring my flamingo! I will show the flamingos my flamingo, and they will say, 'Awe, that girl loves flamingos!' Then they will come up to me and give me a kiss!" Cutest thing ever...




It was a HOT and HUMID day! In the 90's, along with around 84% humidity. A little cooling off was just what the girls needed...



Here are some of the other exhibits we saw. Lilly was in Heaven watching those baby chicks. The Gorilla exhibit was definitely my favorite. This male gorilla would sit right next to the glass and look at you. Then suddenly, he'd jump up, bang the window or his chest, and run around. It was AMAZING!

This warms my heart!

They have these tunnel cages going all through the Zoo for the animals to travel in. They even have some for the lions! How cool is that?!

An unwanted guest joined us for our lunch. This guy was trying to walk over to us to sneak some food! Jason eventually had to use Abby's stuffed animal elephant to scare it away. It would always come back though. It was quite the show.



Fun times with the Aunties! (Notice the cooling rag on Abby? It was that hot!)

Another amazing experience we had, was getting to clean the Philadelphia Temple to get it ready for the open house! Jason was amazing and watched the girls so that Lori, Emily, Saren, and I could share that experience together. It was incredible.



Around the house. And yes - I did just discover I could caption photos. That is SO much easier!

When's not a good time to do Yoga? (And thanks Em for showing us that awesome yoga lady on YouTube that does fun stuff for kids!)

 

One of Lilly's favorite new games that she got for Christmas from the Garrison Family! We had fun playing all together as a family!

Cuddles with Auntie Saren

These girls are all about the Hula Hoop!

Movie time! Auntie Saren's first time seeing, "A Goofy Movie."

The fail-safe way of soundproofing for when the girls want to jump and go crazy. Your welcome down-stairs neighbors.





We love when family comes to visit, and can't wait for our next set of visitors (That's you Peterson family!!!)