Both Marina and Stella REALLY like spending a day at our home and just hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa. So this year we had many fun, lazy days with them.
Since both Marina and Stella have winter birthdays, we are often on a road trip and miss celebrating with them. This year when we arrived home we took them shopping. Marina and Stella tried on several outfits and I spent at least an hour in the dressing room with them as they decided on their favorite, changed their minds, tried on more clothes, and then finally found the Perfect Outfit. Dan waited patiently, drinking coffee outside.
Then we went out to eat. When we arrived home, Stella and Marina put on a fashion show for Grandpa. He oohed and aahed, as any good Grandpa should do. Here they are on the fashion runway in our front yard:
Every spring Marina and Stella help us pick out flowers and plant them in our hanging baskets and flower pots:
Marina and Stella picked out over 100 different plants for our yard. Then they chose which flowers to put on each basket. This took a whole afternoon because there were so many flowers and so many different ways to arrange them. They discussed each basket arrangement at length with us and kept rearranging them. It was great fun and they made Grandma and Grandpa’s home so very beautiful!
Mother’s day was extra special this year! Dan and I met up with Jules, Jessica, Ian, and Adam at Horn Rapids Benton County Campground in eastern Washington for Mother’s Day weekend. Dan and I brought our truck/camper and the rest of the Graybills tent camped.
Saturday Jules, Dan, and I did the Inland Empire Century, one of our very favorite organized bike rides.
Early Sunday morning Dan gave me my gift and a loving Mother’s Day card. Then we all had a Mother’s Day pancake breakfast:
Jules, Jessica, Ian, and Adam left for home and shortly thereafter, Owen arrived from Spokane on his Harley with flowers and a big hug for me:
Owen’s “sunhat:”
He spent the afternoon with us, but had to leave since he had a 41/2 hour drive home, he was already tired from his long drive to celebrate Mother’s Day with us, and didn’t want to be driving at nighttime. It was hard to say goodbye:
Mother’s Day was not over. Marina and Stella arrived with Candice!
They spent the afternoon on their scooters, racing through the sprinklers:
That evening we all played “Go Fish” for hours in the camper. Most of the time we were laughing hysterically. It was great fun!
Marina and Stella slept in their very own tent. Dan and I were quite surprised and impressed as they are only 10 and 7 years old. Ian and Adam, who are older, have always slept in the camper with us. Although when Ian and Adam heard about this, they also insisted on sleeping in their own tent too (which we set up VERY close to the camper).
This was a very special Mother’s Day!
This summer, Marina and Stella spent many afternoons making pot holders and several pairs of earrings, bracelets, and necklaces.
They both were very generous giving family and friends many of their masterpieces:
Dan and I spent a wonderful day with Marina and Stella at the Island County Fair. The fairgrounds are only a mile from our home so we walked there. They had several entries in the fair and we got to see them all. They made scenes and animals with vegetables, were awarded with blue ribbons! Their vegetable entry is above their heads on the right side of this picture:
We spent all day at the fair, seeing the exhibits, eating greasy fair food, and being good grandparents by buying massively overpriced tickets so our granddaughters could screech and yell as they twirled around on all the rides.
I have lived on Whidbey Island for 33 years and have gone to the fair every one of those years with children and/or grandchildren. But I have never seen ALL the exhibits. This year I did! As we entered the fairgrounds Marina and Stella noticed that they would get a prize if they visited all the fair exhibits, and of course they wanted to get the undisclosed “prize.”
So we picked up our fair cards that had all 40-50 exhibits listed and off we went to fill out our cards. At each exhibit we had to admire all the 4-H children’s entries and then find the ONE person that had a stamp to mark our card and verify that we had seen their exhibit. It was actually kind of fun, but tiring as it took us all day, traipsing from one end of the fair to the other.
Here we are, the three girls proudly getting Grandpa to take our picture, with our “prize.”
Drum roll.......a metal button with a blue ribbon attached, that read “I Saw It All In 2015, Whidbey Island Fair!”
As summer draws to an end and fall approaches Dan and I start to feel the
pull of our beloved deserts. We will be soon leaving on Road Trip 5, and
leaving our lovely Whidbey Island home and our Pacific Northwest
family. So it is a happy time and a sad time. One thing that Dan and I
particularly miss is our big family Thanksgiving celebrations.
So
this year we decided to have Thanksgiving in September! We invited all
our local family. Everyone joined our celebration and each family
brought a dinner entree. I cooked two turkeys and set all our tables together so we could have a big formal family dinner. It was a beautiful fall day and such a fun
day!
Of
particular fun was watching Ian, Marina, Adam, Stella, and Guri chasing
each other and wrestling for hours, each trying to gain possession of
the only tennis ball found on our property. Our grandchildren are still
children this year, but we fear that by next year they may have
outgrown this kind of game:
No comments:
Post a Comment