Memorial Day Weekend

How's that for a clever post title?  Oh dear, my brain is just so frazzled right now I can't even think of something witty to say about this weekend.  But that's not to say it wasn't a great few days.  It all started with Nonnie and Poppie's arrival on Friday night.  Jack was allowed to stay up extra late so he could "give kisses and hugs."  The kid knows his role! 

On Saturday morning the men of the family washed cars.  Nonnie got some super-cute pictures of Jack washing his bike right along with them, but alas I forgot to nab them off her camera before she left.  So insert mental image of my sweet little son wiping the sweat off his brow with one arm and the dirt off his tricycle with the sponge-clutching other hand.

We're a little anxious to wrap up this move and settle into our new area, so we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather and scope things out.  We pulled into Sandy Point State Park to grill some lunch and let the kids splash in the bay.  It was so good to be back at the beach, and my boys heartily agreed!  It's like my little water babies have never left the seaside!

We forgot sand toys.  I take full responsibility for that.  I meant to grab them and then my preggo-brain tricked me (it's been happening a lot lately).  So Jack and Jude had a tupperware container, plastic cup and plastic spoon.  And within a few minutes the plastic spoon was only half a plastic spoon.  Jude didn't seem to mind.  He entertained himself the whole afternoon with sand in a cup.  Then again, maybe he thought it was some new Rita's flavor...

Sand in your teeth?  No big deal, just wash it down with a cup of salty sea water...

And then there's our other water boy.  He thought it was cool to throw himself in the "waves" and practically lose his balance.  I thought we were going to have to rescue him  a few times but he managed to swim back out again.

Jon and I are thinking of entering this in the Chesapeake Baywatch Calendar... :)

After we beached ourselves out we gave our parents a tour of the new neighborhood and drove them by the new house a few times until the neighbors started giving us weird looks.  By then the kids were maxed out and ready for home.  After a quick dinner and bath, the boys zonked out for the night, the big boys went to the theater and mom and I watched a real tear jerker at home - "A Shine of Rainbows" if you're interested.  But make sure you have a box of tissues nearby.

On Sunday we went back up to the Annapolis area to visit a church.  I've been researching churches online for months now, since way before we knew where we were going to be living.  There's a lot out there and we didn't want to spend our entire summer church hopping so I've been trying to narrow things down by exploring webpages, listening to online sermons, scouring Facebook pages ... This church has a nautical theme so I knew we needed to try it out.  And it appears we may have nailed it on the first try.  We REALLY liked the place.  Everyone was super friendly, the congegration wasn't too big or too small, the pastor had a great sermon and our kids had a successful rendezvous in Sunday School.  Oh, and Jon felt right at home amongst all the men wearing polo shirts tucked into khakis.  We may have found our new church family!

Per a recommendation from another blog, we decided to have lunch at Cantler's.  I think the rest of the county had the same idea.  We got there before the rush and had an hour wait, I can't imagine what the line of 12 cars behind us had!  It was a little tough, waiting out in the hot sun with two hungry kiddos.  But thankfully there were crabs to entertain us.  The restaurant is along the water and crabs from fresh off the boat are kept in pools under the restaurant.  Every once in a while the workers will empty out a pool, load the crabs in some crates, and send them up the elevator to the restaurant where they are cooked and dumped onto brown paper covered tables for the "all you can eat" crab special.  Which is what the guys ordered.  They managed to get through about 3 dozen by the time we left the restaurant.  And now I realize why the place has such a long wait - it takes a little more time to eat when you have to do most of the work yourself.

After spending an hour watching crabs in the pool, Jack felt really bold when they brought out our lunch.  He even shared his french fry with this guy.

Needless to say, the boys had a wonderful time with their grandparents.  They got lots of time in on the swing, splashed around in the little pool, went on bike rides, and got lots of snuggles.  Jude even did a little showing off, walking a record-setting 4 steps from Nonnie to Mom!  He hasn't done it since, but I'm sure it won't be long!  Just last week he started pulling himself up on furniture and within a few days he mastered the step from the kitchen to dining room, not without a few mishaps though.  For some reason he likes to sit on the edge of it and kick his feet. 

He's faceplanted more than once, and even fell off backward another time.  But it appears he's learned his lesson and the full extent of his skills.  Oh, and in addition to pulling himself up on furniture and stairs, he's also keen on climbing up his mama.  I remember this stage well with Jack:  maternity pants + child attempting to climb up leg = embarassing mishaps.  But it's okay, I gotta give my lil' lover boy all the cuddles he needs because he's in for the shock of his life in about 4.5 months.

We waved goodbye to Nonnie and Poppie on Memorial Day afternoon and blew kisses.  Jack was a little sad after they left.  He wasn't quite ready to accept their absence.  Instead he hung around the front tree for a little while longer just in case they decided to turn around and come back. 

We're now recovering from our memory-making weekend.  The boys spent Monday catching up on sleep and Tuesday driving their parents batty!!  Then, Jack woke up this morning and barfed all over me so he's been relaxing on the couch all day watching Disney movies, except when he asked to go "nigh nigh" at 10:30am. 

We close on our new house in 10 days and Jon has been working extra hard to finish up a rough draft of his thesis before we sign the papers.  And then my grandma had us all a bit worried when she suffered a heart attack yesterday.  She's doing remarkably better today, and we're praying for a full recovery, but you can just imagine the little bit of chaos we're in right now.  I promise to finish the house hunting series and do another "Our Story" installment as soon as I can carve out a bit of me-time in between packing and cleaning up barf.  Life is so full and exciting and downright difficult right now, but I can't wait to share it all with my blog readers!