Marjorie Visits.....Sayen Gardens~

We really need to find a new place to hang out but it is so pretty and so close and so free!~

Having a juice break as temps were in the mid 90's!

Madge and her little man. I love how he is looking up at her!

YAY for the fountain. It was so hot we all crawled in.

I can do it all by myself!

Seeeeee!

Down too!

Daddy and his kiddos looking at the ENORMOUS KOI!

An hour at the fair!

No, really we lasted about an hour at the St. Gregs Annual Carnival. My friend Marjorie came to visit for a few days and so we thought we would check it out. As if she has never been to a fair?!??!!? Sorry Madge! Hopefully on your next visit it won't be 100 degrees and we won't have to wait till dark like vampires to be able to leave the house!
All trips to the carnival should start with Fried Dough! Frankly all trips anywhere should start with fried dough.



Gritty carny ferris wheel.....made grittier thanks to photoshop.

Jacob and Marjorie having a BLAST on the tea cups. :-O

Brian having a blast waiting in line to ride the gritty carny ferris wheel.


Stella having a blast waiting with Daddy to ride the gritty carny ferris wheel.



Madge and the little man!

Me, sweating (and gritty) hiding behind the little man!

Looks like they had fun on the gritty carny ferris wheel....sigh.

OH!!!!!! Wait!!!!!! A smile!!!! YAY!!!!!!!

I guess they had fun after all. TeeHee.

Happy Father's Day!

Today is Father's Day and Brian is truly to be celebrated today. He is a wonderful Father who adores his beautiful children and though he has been up since 6am with one blessing we call Jacob is still happily building a fort with the other one....Stella, as I type this.

I enjoyed looking at all the pics from my past mother's days so thought I would do the same for him today.

Technically I was only pregnant for this Father's day but I still consider it his first because he was so excited about becoming a daddy!

Now a Father's day tradition.....breakfast out....here he is when Stella was small enough to keep on the table. Now....we try to keep her off the table!

This Father's day was extra special, we spent it with my own Father and I was preg with Jacob AND Stella started walking a teeeney bit on her own that day as we waited for our table at breakfast.

Last year's Father's day was great because we knew our family was complete (phew) and even though Stella wouldn't go near Jacob and he squealed all through dinner at Red Robin we had a lot to celebrate.

Here are the McGann scamps today in their matching My dad Rocks t-shirts

We almost got Stella to get sorta close to Jacob. Love those smiles!

One of many reasons Stella is such a Daddy's girl! Again, she kept saying!

Here is Jacob saying my dad is mad dope. Tru Dat little man!

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Stella helped me come up with the top 20 reasons (in no particular order) to love and appreciate daddy!

1. Tubby time-Daddy comes up with the best tubby games....mommy is all about getting clean.

2. Trips to the pet store!

3. He handles LOTS of 5:30am Jacob-wake up calls! Thanks hon!

4. He lets me play with his cell phone even though I know it drives him bonkers.

5. You read me books, tell me stories and sing me songs at bedtime.....even songs you make up!

6. I want to go downstairs!

7. The swings and slides!

8. You wave bye bye to me in my window from goldie (our nickname for his car)in the morning when you leave for work.

9. Sometimes you let me 'help' you get ready for work in the morning.

10. You change Jacob's diapers when he stinks.

11. You endure Noggin!

12. You love me and mommy and even Jacob and tell us every day!

13. Pretzel picnics, Peddie Lake picnics, and surprise picnics!

14. Chutes and Ladders, Candy land, the Ladybug Game and Animal Scramble all in the same hour....or even half hour....or even 15 minutes!

15. You go to work every day so I can have a pretty room and Jacob and I can have cool clothes and Mommy can buy black shirts.

16. You pretend going to Barnes and Noble to watch me play with the train table is really fun.

17. Tag, lots of tag! Again!

18. You aren't ashamed to have tea parties with me.

19. You are patient and I have proof.....these 2 photos and the blog entry on the circus!

And Finally.....

20. You couldn't have been happier to make whatever this is.........

We love you Brian!!!!! Thanks for all you do to be an amazing daddy!

Father's Day gifts

So I had this great idea that the kids would paint bird houses for Father's day gifts. I was smart enough to have Jacob be naked and Stella in a shirt that didn't really fit right so when paint ended up everywhere....which it did...it wouldn't matter. I also knew we had planned to replace that rather crappy looking deck box so it would make for the perfect spot to create a paint mess. I did it in 2 installments....there were 4 to be done total so we did 2 one day and 2 another. WOW! It was so much fun but geeesh what a mess. I think they came out great and hopefully will be appreciated.

Jacob was having the most fun of all and this shot will be a favorite of my forever I am sure!

The master at work.

Stella grew weary of the close contact with Jacob and opted for some time at the sand table.

A paint covered Jacob making his way to the sand table....little did he know I planned to hose him down and ended up having to take him direclty to the tub. What is cuter that a little guy in his diaper?

Here are the finished products! Brian got the deluxe one on the left, the two in the middle were for Grandpa Kitchen and Grandpa McGann and then the last one was for Jacob's Godfather Jon.

Happy Father's day!!!!!

Click on the pics to see them bigger.

Picking BLUEberries

Last Wednesday I took the kids BLUEberry picking. I emphasize the word blue because it was quite a discussion....repeated many times that the goal was to obtain BLUE ones and not green or any other color for that matter. We had a great time though and managed to get it all in before a brief shower and crazy sun so I was happy for that. Terhune Orchards is a wonderful place to visit and do u-pick. Although I am glad we opted for blueberries instead of cherries as the bag I got was $3.75 and the same size bundle of cherries for the gent ahead of me was $17.00 and change!

Stella trying to decide what was too green for keeping.

Both Mcgann-ettes picking away!

Jacob mostly wanted to run free. Thankfully there was a netting around the entire crop so I knew he could only get so far before being totally tangled.

I ADORE this shot I snapped of one scamp being kind to the other totally on her own! Her secret is out......she loves that little brother of hers...she just can't admit it!!!

Jacob learning the hard way that dirt is not yummy!!!! Click on this to see large for full humor effect!

Donut time! I am proud to say.....I didn't have one! It wasn't easy but I held out!

Jacob squealing and giggling over these insanely docile pups.

He dove right in to petting them and pulling on their feet but Stella kept her distance!

Don't even think about it buddy! ;-)

What a great day with my bugs!

Memorial Day weekend.

I missed a lot of photo ops this weekend. Not sure why I just wasn't feeling it to bring out the camera. I did snag these 2 shots of the kids with my cell phone. We were driving home from a picnic with our friends Jon and Kat and Melissa and Paul......they have a 2 year old and the kids moslty ran in circles and played with the sand/water table....hence a naked Jacob!

You know how much fun your kids had by how fast they fall asleep or by the sourpuss look on their face on the ride home. I think you can see we had a blast!