Thursday, September 5, 2013

Some Important Dates

We have had some important dates over the last couple of months.  We celebrated our family day with Bella on August 10th.  Bella has been part of our family for 4 years.  Sometimes I can't believe it has been 4 years while other times it feels like yesterday that we were in China meeting our little Spicy Girl for the first time.  As always, we went and had some yummy Chinese (American) food and had a great afternoon out together.

Our 4 Silly Kiddos - almost impossible to get them all to look at the camera at the same time

 Our Sweet Bella
 
 
We snuck in one last trip before school started.  We went to Milwaukee for the first time to visit my sister who moved there a couple of years ago.  We had a great time visiting with Alyssa and Will and seeing the city, going to the beach, having fun at the waterpark and eating a lot of wonderful food.  The lake is so beautiful and the weather was perfect!  One of the highlights of the trip was going to Chicago's Chinatown on our way to Milwaukee.  It was a small glimpse of China for our kids.  We did some searching and went to a wonderful restaurant and it was like being back in China with the smells, the language, the people.  We love China because it is a huge part of our family, so this little pit-stop was so fun!



We also were able to meet up with sweet friends that we met on our first trip to China.  It was so neat to see Della and Bella together again, 4 years later.  We loved catching up with them and hope to do it again soon.
 

 
The boys giving a thumbs up at the beach

Aunt "Sissy" with her adoring niece and nephews

On the way out of town we stopped at the Jelly Belly factory and took a tour.  We also had to stock up on some beans, which didn't last long in this family.  Here is a pic of our goofy boys "acting" scared of the train ride through the factory.
 
The first day of school came quickly.  We had a wonderful summer, but the kids were ready to head back to school (I think).  Bella is in the 1st grade.  Keenan is in the 2nd grade.  And Aidan is in the 5th grade (how do I have a 5th grader??). 

 

 

Last but not least, we celebrated Aidan's 11th birthday and Keenan's 8th birthday over Labor Day weekend.  We had 2 parties ... one at Sky Zone with friends and another with family at our house.  Figured out a cheap and easy way to feed 9 hungry boys is to go to CiCi's pizza for all you can eat pizza.  :-)
 
Jack, Aidan, Matthew, Jason and Garrett
 
Colin, Keenan, Jacob and Matthew