the unlikely orange

last week we had the opportunity to visit the turkey hill experience near Lancaster, pa, and part of the fun of that experience is designing your own imaginary ice cream flavor, packaging, and commercial.  they boys and I worked together to come up with a  brand new flavor called "MILINO-NUT," and it is a coconut ice cream with coconut chips, pretzel bits, and fudge swirl.  I know, right?  you want some in your belly right now.  well, perhaps you could call or write to turkey hill and demand that they start production of MILINO-NUT right away.  look for it on the shelves of your local grocery store soon.  here is the commercial we made...we were trying to hypnotize you into buying our ice cream.  let us know if it worked....

  this little ninja turned 5 years old today, and it marks an anniversary of five years of exuberance, vibrancy, and belly laughs.  this kid has a galaxy-sized imagination, and the heart of an entertainer.  he is constantly singing and dancing, telling jokes and doing impressions and making us double over with laughter.  he loves an audience, and since we are his primary one, he seems to enjoy us, at least as long as we give him attention.  he likes us less when we talk to one another, or look in a different direction, but he gets over it.  to be sure, it is a five years that we can't imagine any other way, than loving and laughing and living so abundantly because of him.  we love you, Quinton.  happy 5th birthday!   his lego ninjago cake i think he likes it. 

okay, okay, so its been nearly three weeks since i last posted, but i've been kind of busy and i have a bonafide, legitimate excuse:  WE MOVED!!! we are now residents of happy valley, in the state college area, and we are loving our new home, neighborhood, and church and community, but all these changes take some time for adjustment!  so we are getting there, and really just enjoying the process and all the new-ness. however, in the meantime, summer marches on, and i realized that i never got to share our annual summer bucket list, so here it is.  it is a bit smaller than usual this year, because we knew we wouldn't be able to do as much with a major move and all the packing/unpacking involved.  still, we want to make sure we live as fully and vibrantly as possible as a family this summer, taking advantage of the extra time with the kids, and enjoying the adventure together. as you can see, we went with a "constitution" theme for our list this year, since w...

this was our final day of vacation, and really a travel day home, but we weren't in any hurry, so we decided to make one final stop, since we were so close.  but before we went there , we had to go somewhere else.  everyday as we traveled to the metro station, we passed krispy kreme donuts, and since the boys had never been there, dad just had to make a stop to get some fresh warm donuts.  the kids loved watching them come down the "assembly line" and "get saucy" as quinton called it (the icing is poured all over them to glaze them).  a delicious start to the day! then we went to mount vernon, since we were staying literally a few miles from it.  and boy were we so glad we did!  it was a little bit of a shock to the system to pay for entry after doing so much free stuff through the week, but you can tell that they put the admission price to good use, as the home and grounds and museum were in incredible condition, and truly made for a great exp...

for our last day in the city, we had some time to kill before our appointment in the national archives, so we began in the east building of the national gallery of art.  while the boys thought this might be boring at first, they ended up loving the art museum, and were amazed at the size of some of the paintings, the realism in others, and the incredible color, creativity, and diversity throughout.  the museum really captivated their attention.  we didn't see the whole museum, by any means, but the impressionist rooms won my heart, as always.  i am always stopped in my tracks by van gogh, and i just can't stop gawking.  we were very glad we took the time to go to the art museum. when the time for our appointment arrived, we headed over to the national archives so that we could get a look at several important documents. first, we saw an original copy of the magna carta (700 years old!) in beautiful latin script.  then we made it to the rotund...

after so much walking the day before (14 miles!) we slept in a bit on day 4, and got off to a late start. we began the day with a trip to the white house. we didn't have tickets to go inside, but we were able to stand at the front and wave at the first family.  it is an impressive looking edifice, with even more impressive security.  Shannon and the boys went in the white house visitor center, to learn more about the white house and see some old presidential ephemera and pieces, while i stayed outside with the stroller. while waiting, i made plans to head over to the old post office pavilion, where you used to be able to go up into the clock tower for a great view of washington.  however, when we got there we found out that good ol' donald trump has bought it, and is turning into a hotel, so no more clock tower for the public.  thanks for making our nation's capital not quite as great, donald. after that we went to lunch at the ronald reagan internation...

welcome to day 3 of our vacation (for those just joining in....this was last week, i'm only just blogging about it now).  strap on your seat belts because today was a whirlwind of walking and seeing the sites. we got up and took the metro to arlington national cemetery, where we walked to jfk's tomb, and then the tomb of the unknown soldier where the boys were impressed by the changing of the guard. we also got to witness a wreath ceremony, and the playing of taps. the day was gorgeous, and it was pretty amazing to take in all this color - the bright crayon-blue sky, and the gorgeous green grass punctuated by so many rows of little white stones, so symmetrical, so linear, so stunning. from arlington we walked to the iwo jima memorial, which took our breath away.  we have seen pictures of it several times, but we never expected it to be that big! once again, we felt full of awe, just as we did at arlington, at the scope of war, the f...