The Wallisers

We had a pretty busy long weekend… but I really can’t complain a bit! Saturday, we went to the family reunion on my Mom’s side of the family… saw a bunch of people that I couldn’t remember… and a few that I did. Nora had a blast dancing while Papa and Uncle Jerry played music with a few others. This kid is a real big fan of music! I LOVE IT!

Sunday, we got up and went to the cemetery where Jeremy’s Mom’s side of the family meets up each July 4th to remember his Grandmother. Then a big family breakfast at Cracker Barrel. We dropped the girls off at Grandma & Grandpa’s house for naps and some swimming while Jeremy and I came back here to get the yard mowed and the house cleaned up. Everyone was coming over to our house for fireworks so we wanted to make sure it was all ready. When we were done we headed back over to Jeremy’s parents house and cooked some steaks and went swimming until it was time to head over here and get everything set up for fireworks.

We ended up with a pretty decent crowd… in addition to Jeremy’s parents, sister & her husband, and his Aunt and cousin… my parents made it over too, with a cameo appearance by Aunt Whit and her new boyfriend… who soon left for bigger and better fireworks (apparently).

Nora LOVED the fireworks! We were afraid that she’d be scared… but she really seemed to enjoy them. We started off with some sparklers and she thought those were pretty cool. She really liked the little snap pop things but couldn’t throw them hard enough… so she’d stomp on them on the ground (which was pretty awesome). Sarah hung out with us for a little bit but she was getting pretty tired so Grandma Kathy gave her a bath and put her to bed for us (Thanks!!).

Oh, and we can’t forget my super awesome cherry chocolate ice cream that I made! – see previous post.

We started in on the fireworks in the backyard and had a blast. Nora kept hopping from one lap to another to watch the show… which was pretty cool because everyone got to enjoy them with her. Surprisingly, the kid stayed up till almost 10!! Before Grandma Judy (& Grandpa Mark) left, she read her a story and Nora was pointing towards her bed wanting to be laid down – what a sleepy girl!

Unfortunately, the late night didn’t make her want to sleep in any longer – both the girls were up at 6:00 am!! Oh well.

Today, we decided we’d make a trip to the bookstore to get a few new story books. Mom & Dad are really tired of the same old selection of stories at bedtime so it was kind of a treat for us all. Grandma Judy met us up there and hung out with us while we looked for books, browsed another store or so, and had lunch at Red Robin. By the time we got these girls back in the car it didn’t take long and they were both asleep!

Anyway, it was nice having an extra day off and getting to spend the day with the whole family. Back to work tomorrow…

Trying something new today… finally attempting to make homemade ice cream again in my fancy ice cream maker that my Mother-in-Law bought me. OK, technically it’s the 2nd batch… but the first (mint chocolate chip) didn’t turn out very good.

I asked Jeremy what flavor he wanted and he mentioned cherry… so I found this Cherry-Chocolate ice cream recipe and decided to try it… It’s the Batch Family Mountain Cherry Choconut Ice Cream recipe that’s listed… minus the almonds cause I wanted to make it baby-friendly. It’s mixing in the ice cream maker now… fingers crossed.

…more later…

OK, I’m back with a little teaser… (hehe)… yeah, I’m mean like that…

That, my friend, is some really yummy ice cream!
I should have paid a little more attention to how far up I was filling the freezer container on the ice cream maker, because I think I put a little too much in… it expands as it freezes (of course) and so it kind of expanded out of the container and made a big mess in the kitchen. But then again… I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t make a mess of some sort when cooking/making something.

Anyway, after about 30 minutes of freezing the ice cream it was looking pretty good – about soft serve consistency – and that’s when you are supposed to take it out. You can either eat it just like that or you can transfer it to an air tight container and freeze it to a harder consistency. Well, this batch is for tonight so it’s going to be a bit harder… and that’s a good thing.

Of course, I did have to try a bite… and I must say that it’s pretty awesome!! There’s not really as much chocolate in it as I’d like usually, but the cherries are perfect and it is just right for tonight!! I might try to compensate for the not so much chocolate in it by shaving a few extra pieces on top!! I’ll get a better photo tonight when it’s all dished out to make you drool even more!!

Sorry… it’s been forever since I’ve updated anything here.  I kinda feel like this is the case most often though… I’m always coming back about a month or so between posts.  My internet time is limited though, and well… I’ve gotta rest when I get the chance.  Oh well

I do have TONS of photos to share though!   Stay tuned!!

A few weeks ago, we had our first encounter with drawing/coloring! I bought a large pad of paper and some of those toddler markers that Crayola makes… turns out, Nora seems to think they are toys. I think that we’ll be better off with real crayons rather than these toy-like things… we’ll see how that goes.

April 3rd.  We had a good day, just hanging out… Grandma Kathy brought over an Easter basket for the girls and Nora had a blast checking it all out!

She even brought me a planter with some beautiful flowers… I’m trying not to kill them this time!!

Later we went to dinner at Mellow Mushroom… it was kinda crazy. The girls were both in a bit of a mood and so it wasn’t as relaxing a dinner as it could have been.

So, we came home… and Aunt Whitney came by to play, so we hung out outside for a bit and played with BUBBLES!!

a few photos from Easter   I had really wanted to get some good photos of the girls in their Easter dresses… it didn’t quite work out so well though.  Here are a few, and a few egg hunt photos too!

The girls’ Easter baskets… Yeah, Sarah’s wasn’t big enough… I’ll do better next year!

Nora had fun playing with her Easter goodies…

Me & Sarah

Easter was also Grandpa Mark’s 55th Birthday!!

After lunch and a few naps… we got to enjoy the outdoors and help Nora with her first ever Egg hunt!!

Sarah got in on the fun a little bit too

Then we hung out in the front yard for a little bit





and snoozed a bit more…

Then Aunt Whit got home from work (yep, she had to work all day) and wanted a pic of her and her beautiful Nieces

So yeah, Easter dresses… I decided that the green gingham dress from Gymboree had too big of a skirt for Sarah (since she doesn’t exactly even sit up yet), it’d be hard to get her in her carseat with it and just wouldn’t be quite as cute. So I thought I’d just exchange the sizes and get Sarah the tulip dress and Nora the green gingham… of course, they didn’t have the right sizes though. So I just returned them all. Figured I’d save some $$ and just use something else that I had already bought.

That was until we were walking through the other end of Bridge Street and walked by Strausburg. I remembered that Nana had bought Nora a beautiful dress last year… and that really, this was the only chance for it to be worn by Sarah before she outgrows it. So… the next deal was to find a new dress for Nora. And so we did…

Here is what the girls will be wearing for Easter… I’m not changing my mind anymore   Sarah will be in the green and Nora in the White/Ivory (obviously, these photos aren’t my children… simply the stock photos from the website)

Done!!

Even though Saturday ended up being a wet, cloudy, windy, cold day… we headed out to Tate Farms to the pumpkin patch anyway. I really didn’t realize how cold it was until we got out of the car there… oops. I guess next time I better check a little better. It was our last chance weekend to be able to go though (too much stuff going on this weekend and the next), so it was then or not at all. I’m glad we went!

We bundled Nora all up in her stroller and luckily she didn’t fight it. Lately she’s had this thing about not wanting to sit in her stroller for too long… I guess because of the cold and wind she decided that it wasn’t too bad after all.

We invited both sets of grandparents to come with us but because of the timing Grandma Kathy wasn’t able to make it. It was nice that Grandma Judy could be there though. A great help having an extra set of hands around to help push a stroller while I was taking pictures and Jeremy was pushing around the pumpkin cart. Next year hopefully we’ll be able to have everyone come and enjoy the day.

There were so many different kinds of pumpkins and gourds that I had never even heard of. It was really cool to go around and see all the different varieties.

These are the ones we went home with…

It was really nice to have an extra person there… allowed us to take some family photo ops

We had such a great time… despite the nasty weather. I really hope to plan much better next year so that we can get the girls out of the stroller and allow them to play. There were lots of cool fun things for kids to do that we’ll try out next time!