Roar To The Shore 2008

This past weekend we headed down to Wildwood, NJ for Joseph's first bike rally (well, as a participant anyway!). James and Sandy went too, and we were all kid-free for the weekend. I think the last time that happened was when we went to Villa Roma for vacation before Juli was born. It's been a while!

Joseph and James rode their bikes down on Friday afternoon and Sandy & I met them down there that night... at just about the same time as Hurricane Hanna arrived! Luckily, it wasn't a wash-out though. It did rain pretty hard for a bit on Friday night and then off and on on Saturday until a downpour for a few hours in the afternoon/early evening. After that, the skies cleared up and Saturday night and Sunday were beautiful!

Joseph entertaining himself with his "Crain-com" while we waited out the rain

Me, looking overly excited to be sitting on the bike, LOL

James & Sandy

My curly Wildwood hair...

Gotta love the humidity there!

Rubber Duck Boardwalk Ride
James in front, Joseph behind him
Joseph
The Boardwalk ride went out onto the streets too.
Joseph is in front now and James behind him.

Excuse me sir, I think you have something on your head!

Gearing up for the ride home

Eyes on the road

Checkin' out some hot chicks in the car next to them!

Happy Birthday to Denise...again!

We had our usual Thursday night dinner with Poppy and celebrated my birthday. We had yummy beef stew for dinner and Ruthanne made her specialty dessert "Texas Fling" for us to try. It was so good!

Happy 32nd Birthday to Denise!

My day started off with a donut and bagel breakfast at work and a Coach wristlet bag from my bosses. I'm pretty sure this is the one... (I didn't take any pics and it's upstairs so I don't feel like going to get it right now, lol)
I had to run out to do something for my boss and when I got back, I had these from Joseph:


I was so surprised because flowers for special occasions are not the norm for me and Joseph. They are so beautiful! :-) Even the guys in my office were commenting on how pretty they are!

To finish off my "work birthday" we had ice cream cake from Coldstone Creamery in the afternoon. Yummy!!!

Then I went to my Mom & Kevin's for my favorite dinner - cream of chicken - with them, Two Mom-Mom and Katie. Then we had Happy Cake, another one of my favs! All in all, it was good day! :-) It only would've been better if Joseph was home!

Setting up the candles

Ready to sing

I'll huff and I'll puff, and I'll BLOW the candles out! LOL
(I made my cheeks real big as a joke and Kevin happened to snap at just the right moment.)

Katie's take on the night:

Two Mom-Mom

Me, The Blazing Cake, and Pop

Someone call the fire department, LOL

Happy 3rd Birthday, Katie!

Tonight Aunt Sandy, Juli and Livi came over for Katie's birthday dinner with me, Joseph, Katie, and Maddie. Then Grandma came over to sing Happy Birthday and Katie got even more presents!
(Disclaimer: Our dining room is being remodeled, hence the open walls and unfinished floor!)

Singing to Katie

Juli's happy to have a piece of Katie's birthday cake

The cake

Grandma snuggling with Livi

Our Lil' Party

Opening Grandma's gift, a really pretty winter coat! :-)

I think this is her look of shock because she got a "cambra"

Now she's excited!

Checking in out and ready to take some pictures!

Chugga Chugga Choo Choo

We took a trip out to Strasburg Railroad to ride the train because Katie has been asking every day if she can go on a train since she went on the West Chester Railroad a couple of weeks ago. When we decided we'd go, the weather was beautiful and the forecast called for possible thunderstorms in the late afternoon. Well, here's my tip: Don't rely on the weather man! We got about 1/2 way there (around 11:30am, far off from "late afternoon") and this happened:

It seemed like the storm was lightening up and in the direction we were headed the sky looked clear, so...

The rain finally stopped but after seeing this we should have known more was on the horizon. They say cows lay down when rain is coming.
We finally got to the station and the weather looked like it was going to hold out and we'd get to enjoy a nice ride on the train.
We got our tickets and were ready to board our coach car.
But then the sky opened up again...
We made a dash for it and we finally got on the train. Here's Katie looking pretty wet and frazzled!
As they say though, the train must go on. Oh wait, that's the show, but you get my point! The conductor gave us the low-down on the history of the train before we took off.

Some of the beautiful scenery of the Amish landscape

Katie checking out the corn growing next to the tracks

Me taking a picture of...

Joseph taking a picture of me!

The locomotive had to switch to the back of the train so that it could become the front and we could head back to the station.

Katie relaxing with her milk AND water while we waited for the train to get going again.

Joseph calls this picture "Mini-Maddie"

These are my two favorite pictures from the trip.