"Flyer-flies"

Last night we had some good friends over for dinner. Their family is moving next week, and we are sure going to miss them. The kids had a blast eating hotdogs, shooting water guns, and catching fireflies!

The kids asked to go out again tonight to look for what Wade calls "flyer-flies". It's awesome to see the backyard lit up with these little lights just after the sun goes down. I don't remember seeing that as a kid, so it's been fun to experience it now! The mosquitoes scare me off, but it's great entertainment watching the kids. They'd stay outside forever if we let them!

These videos are so dark (it is night, after all), but hopefully you can still enjoy listening to Rhiannon and Wade! :) Happy Summer!

The Charters of Freedom

Jason took the day off today (Hurray!), and we took a day trip to the Archives in D.C. We stood in lines for a while, but it was worth it. I think I'd like to go back again in the "off-season" to get an even closer look at the Charters of Freedom. It was intentionally very, very dark in the Rotunda, which made taking pictures pretty ridiculous, but hopefully you can get a glimpse of what we saw...

THE Constitution of the United States

THE Bill of Rights

THE Declaration of Independence

Listening in on a family history story

We stopped by the Navy Memorial, too; they were having a retirement ceremony there for an officer, so we didn't look around too much. A great day, though, all the same!

HOOKED!

My sweet sister-in-law Chris sent me this wonderful link today. For anyone that's ever said, "I may not keep a journal, but..."well, now you can make a book out of your blog posts and call it done! :)

I've been playing all day and have done over 40 pages in our blogbook so far. Delirious, dizzy, happy fun!!!

Check it out!
http://www.blurb.com/create/book/blogbook

All caught up

So. If you've hung on for the ride and read ALL the posts for this month, you can see that we've been pretty busy having a TON of fun. Nothing could hold us back, not even a tornado! :)

Since school's been out and all our family has left, we've been soaking up the summer with LOTS of:

--sleeping in
--SWIMMING
--tennis lessons
--reading
--"dollar" movie watching
--a family work project here and there
--introducing the kids to Monopoly
--playing with friends here, there, and everywhere

In the coming weeks we'll do more of the same, I'm sure. Besides calm, peaceful, quiet days, we've also got bigger trips to look forward to, too. And come July 5th, we'll celebrate one whole year of living in Virginia and will begin counting down our final months! Stay tuned!

A Few Good Men

Father's Day has come and gone, but I still wanted to salute the terrific men--dads, grandpas, uncles, adopted uncles/grandpas, hometeachers, and church leaders in our family's lives! I am so grateful to each of them for all they do!

Love you, Dad/Grandpa Rich! Three things, out of many, that I love about my dad are that he can work and play equally hard, he LOVES my mom, and he is an amazing record keeper. Maybe keeping a blog/journal is one way I pay tribute to him for the good example he set growing up of writing in his journal on a regular basis.

We love you, Dad/Grandpa Rod! The first flowers I got in the hospital during the saga of Rhiannon's birth were from Grandpa Rod and Grandma Deb. He is a good observer and doesn't seem to get stressed out; he is also super-thoughtful and his laugh fills a room!

And then there's Jason, husband/dad/friend extraordinnaire. He works so hard for our family, and this little East Coast adventure we're on only makes that more clear. He's a rock star, an encyclopedia, a teacher, a sportsman, a good-time organizer, and everyone's best friend all rolled up into one man we love and appreciate and pray for every single day. LOVE YOU, Daddy/Hubby!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Before I forget...

Verity here, again. (Thanks to Rhiannon for typing something the other day. :))

I had to add a couple cute things that kids have said to me the last 24 hours:

Rhiannon: "Hey, Mom, did you know that you were actually serving Heavenly Father when you helped me and Wade out with our bikes?" (after reading an article from the Friend magazine)

Wade: "Aren't you going to have cuddle time with me?" (he says this every morning when he wakes up, after I've been awake for an hour or so already. 'Cuddle time' means we crawl into Mom and Dad's freshly-made bed and talk for a few minutes.)

A conversation I had with a new 4-year-old friend while swimming in the neighborhood pool...
Me: Hi.
Kid: Hi. I got new Lightning McQueen underwear today.
Me: Wow--that's awesome! Way to go, buddy!
Kid: I got TWO pairs of new underwear.
Me: Neat! My son is over there; he's 4 years old.
Kid: Hey, I'm four, too!!

Priceless stuff. Gotta love it when random cute kids tell you what's fresh on their mind. :) I'm just glad the kid was 4, and not, say, 14.

A vacation after the vacation

Rhiannon finished second grade on the 13th. We celebrated that and my mom and dad's last day here with a gigantic Chinese take-out dinner (we ate the leftovers for at least 3 days afterwards. :)). On the 14th we drove my mom and dad to the Baltimore Airport and took a sidetrip to the Baltimore Aquarium afterwards. Lots of fun!

We ate at Hard Rock Cafe afterwards. It was starting to get toasty outside, so we headed home after that!

Taking it easy with GPa Rich and GMa Donna

By Wednesday that week it was getting pretty quiet at our house. Derrick, Traci, and Max had left Monday, Brant and Chris had left on Tuesday after the Capitol tour, and Grandpa Rod and Grandma Deb had left on Wednesday. I was glad that my parents were sticking around a few more days to help us all ease back into our normal routine.

We didn't make it to the Atlantic Ocean for Mom, but we did get some good relaxing in, checked out the International Spy Museum, and got up to the Washington D.C. Temple! (Thanks for all the secret lawn mowing, too, Dad!)

It's okay; they're cooling off with water guns!

At the DC Temple

Hanging out with Rhiannon and Wade! :)

A big thank you to Grandpa Rich, too, for helping Wade learn how to swim underwater! Wade is loving the pool now, thanks to him. And thanks to Grandma Donna for the AWESOME family history work with pictures that she passed on to us!

Enjoying some perks on the US Capitol tour

On the 10th Jason set up yet another fabulous tour for us that he wasn't able to attend, through our California Congressman Kevin McCarthy, to see the US Capitol building.

Rhiannon poses in the Rotunda

Statuary Hall

Matt was a great tour guide and a super-nice guy. We ALL appreciated a couple of his "executive decisions" to get our little group past some huge, long lines and avoid some heat. The kids especially enjoyed riding this little underground train at the end of the tour.

I wonder what's behind the flag?

We had to stash our cameras and other things during a House of Rep. session. I thought it was interesting that they were trying to approve a special day to honor those who make mobile homes. (?!?!) I'm pretty sure I heard them correctly, too.

DC Memorials

On June 8 we all piled in cars and headed into DC to see the memorials and monuments at night. If you can believe it, this was our little family's first experience driving there, instead of taking the Metro. It was also amazingly hot and humid that night--we were READY for showers and/or popsicles when we got back. :) I'd say it was worth it, though, to say we'd done it and to see the sights we saw: Korean War Memorial, Vietnam War Memorial, World War II Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, and Washington Monument!

Brant and Chris at the WWII Memorial

Rhiannon says, "Thumbs up!"

Derrick, Traci, Mom and Dad Sheen at the WWII Memorial

Grandpa Rod specifically requested a picture with the Washington Monument and reflecting pool in the background. :)

Brant, Chris, Rhiannon, and Wade at the Vietnam War memorial. Thankfully MY kids didn't get yelled at for being disrespectful and too loud in this place.
Dad Sheen at the Korean War memorial. It was my first time to see this one--it was awesome.

Washington Monument at night

Lincoln at night

What else we did with family

Hi! This is rhiannon speaking. If you were wondering what else we did with the family, here it is! We went to that special mike`s place once for dinner. Wade, mom,grandma donna, and grandpa rich went to the spy museum. Once the sheens & the cushings went to austin grill. Most of the time we hung out at our house. The End

Rhiannon's special day

On June 7 at 4:00pm, we celebrated a very special event--Rhiannon's baptism and confirmation. Rhiannon glowed through the whole program. After she was baptized and came out of the water, she said, "That was so fun! Can I do it again?" We are so pleased with her decision to get baptized and officially become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She was ready for it! Having so many family members with us made it that much sweeter, too.

I love this picture!

And this one, too!

Grandpa Rich gave a wonderful talk on baptism, and Grandma Donna played the piano beautifully!!!

Grandma Deb spoke on the Holy Ghost and let Wade help with visual aids. :)

Bishop Baker welcomed Rhiannon into the ward.

After the baptism, Jason took all of us out to Mike's Grill for dinner. YUM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A sighting

That Saturday we had some hours to fill until Rhiannon's baptism at 4pm. We opted for the Udvar-Hazy Museum out by Dulles Airport. We did a few things there that we'd never done before:

a) got in truly for free (no $12 parking that day)

b) Rhiannon, Wade, and Jason tried out a simulator

c) got to see Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox and director Michael Bay filming Transformers 2! (too bad we couldn't "officially" take any pictures of that, but we did capture something from the observation tower...see last pic on this post...)

What a group! It was a fun mini-reunion!

Derrick, Traci, and Max are so cute!

Posing with Gpa Rod and Gma Deb

Coming out of the simulator...

We hope this was an Autobot and not a Decepticon! :)

So the free parking ended up being a result of the movie filming. Parts of the museum were shut off because of that, but I didn't mind! Would you? :)

A full house! (aka Lucky Number Thirteen)

Our final party drove in Saturday morning. With Derrick, Traci, and baby Max "in da house" with us, I think our fun meter was officially maxed out. It was so awesome to have them here and to meet Max for the first time. We'd kept up on baby Max through their blog, but it was so much better to be up close and personal with him and his sweet parents! :)

There were other chairs in the house, but we had fun setting camp in the kitchen, too! :)

Jason with his nephew Max!

Wade hangs out with Brant and Chris downstairs!

The grandparents visit over breakfast (those colossal donuts were a big hit again!)

"The second eagle has landed"

Our second group came that Friday afternoon. Grandpa Rich, Grandma Donna, Uncle Brant, and Aunt Chris flew into Baltimore together and then took a MARC train and Metros to get closer to us in Springfield. I REALLY appreciated them doing that. That night we celebrated my mom's birthday!!!!!! We also hung out, ate tacos, and played some Rock Band (a highlight for many! : )) I've got to get pictures off the computer downstairs that my dad took (over 500!), but I may just provide a link to his Picasa album if he manages to get all of them on there. :) He was really good about taking pictures of things that I may have missed while I was running around crazy everywhere. :)

The kids love Brant and Chris! This picture was taken at the Udvar-Hazy Museum.

Mom and me, at the WWII memorial (Sunday night)

Unwinding with some football

Grandpa Rich and Uncle Brant were good about getting outside with the kids. They played some baseball and got in the hot tub with Wade often, too. I credit those two with helping Wade overcome his fear of putting his head underwater. Wade is a regular Nemo, now! :)

Our first visitors of The Weekend arrive...

Back to "The Weekend":

The day after the tornado hit, Grandpa Rod and Grandma Deb arrived. It was SO GREAT to have them here with us! We ate at Friendly's for dinner that night after driving around a while. There were roads shut down because of debris/trees, etc, and the restaurant itself was very busy (people without power eating out, too?) On Friday we went to Mount Vernon. It was pretty crazy to see where the storm had hit those grounds, too. Luckily, the brand new baby pigs were okay! :)

Showing Grandpa our "home away from home;" Grandma had seen it before back in October.

Gotta love the big porch chairs!

Potomac River view

The mother pig was SOOO big, and the baby was SOOOO small!