best toy ever = a cardboard box!

every parent knows that kids would rather play with the box instead of the object inside...




Lilly showing off her new top teeth...she now has a total of 5 teeth.

our week

We have been having a rough week...Lilly started running a fever on Monday afternoon, and by Tuesday morning it was up to 103 so I took her to the doctor. Turns out she has an ear infection (the first one in our household...Maggie's never had one), and she's been fighting off a high fever, which has been making her miserable, all week. Tonight was the first night this week she's gone to bed without a fever, and she seems to be finally starting to feel a little better. We even got some smiles and giggles tonight.

Anyways, last weekend before Lilly got sick, we discovered something "new" (well, new to us) to do here in town. There is an observation deck at the Raleigh-Durham airport where you can watch planes land and take off, and we thought Maggie and Eli would enjoy it. We were right...it was a hit. The kids would wave to the airplanes and yell "bye airplane! bye airplane" everytime one would take off.

baby racing

Lilly vs. Jacob

annual beach trip

We spent most of last week down in Ponte Vedra, FL with Will's folks. Maggie enjoyed the beach much more than last year, but she still didn't like it during high tide. So we spent the mornings (when the tide was high) either in the kiddie pool or in the house, and then we'd head down to the beach during low tide in the afternoons. Both Lilly and Maggie really enjoyed playing in the tide pools during low tide, and Maggie would make up all kinds of games to play with the shells and sand. One morning we saw 5 or 6 dolphins playing in the surf, but unfortunately I wasn't fast enough getting my camera so I didn't get any pictures. (And as usual, I obsessively hunted for shark's teeth every moment I could...my final tooth count for this trip = 305!)







Will and I also took the girls to the Jacksonville Zoo one morning. Both girls really enjoyed it, but it seemed as if Lilly actually had more fun. She kept pointing and smiling at everything we saw, and she and Maggie especially liked the aviaries and birds. Maggie's favorite animals were the pink flamingos and the giraffes.








Maggie thought these were guinea pigs!



one of my favorites...roseate spoonbills!



sleepy kangaroos

Maggie and Daddy in the lorikeet exhibit

wagon ride!

dinner with the Jones'

We try to get together with our friends David & Susan on Thursdays for dinner, and this week their kids, Ariana and Jamie, were really interested in holding Lilly.

Maggie's first day of preschool!

Today was Maggie's first day of preschool! She will be going half-day, just for a couple of days a week, but it is a big deal for her because (aside from grandparents watching her or the occasional few hours w/ our close friend Leslie) she's never been away from me or Will. Today went more smoothly than the meet & greet w/ her teachers on Friday (when she cried and screamed for nearly 30 minutes!)...only a few minutes of crying and "I want my mommy" today. :-) Her friend Eli is in her class, which I'm hoping will help ease the anxiety for her. Here she is modeling her new backpack before we headed out the door this morning.