Is Daddy chicken to surf?

Two weeks ago the girls headed back to school and Arnie & I took a quick trip to Grand Cayman. He was busy with meetings part of the time and I truly did nothing! The weather was beautiful and it was a nice few days of relaxation. The girls were super excited to have Grandma come stay with them. Other then Gracie locking them all out of the house, I think it was pretty uneventful. (Thank goodness Grandma knows how to use a drill! We found out the hard way that the town locksmith went out of business.)

I've always wanted to learn to stand up paddle board and I had my chance while we were in Grand Cayman. We sent the girls these pictures and Gracie was surprised I knew how to surf :) and she asked if Daddy was to chicken to try it! It was really fun, I'll do it again....though I might wait until my belly is a little smaller, I only fell off once, but pulling yourself back up with a baby on board is hard (and definitely not graceful)!

Daddy's safer mode of transportation :)

You can take the boy out of the office......I suppose the view was better then from his desk!

After a sprint through customs and the Charlotte airport we arrived home to -9 temperatures.....I think maybe we should move to Grand Cayman!

Gracie is all of the sudden very dedicated to learning to tie her shoes. She's getting close. She really wants to go to Kindergarten and I think she thinks if she masters this she can go now.

We've been fighting germs around here. Last week Maggie was down a couple of days....then we thought we'd kicked it so we went to Omaha to meet baby Reid! Yah, we're so glad he's here and that everyone is healthy.

Gracie is a baby hog! She thinks she should get to hold and snuggle him all the time! She slept all the way back to Norfolk and
several times, in her sleep she said "but I want to hold the baby!" :)

Maggie got to help him get dressed, she'll be such a big helper when Baby Chip arrives.

And then there were 4....but not for long!

Uncle Mark was trying to keep the baby hog occupied so someone else could have a turn....it worked for a few seconds :)

Unfortunately, Saturday the germs reappeared and poor Gracie had a miserable weekend. It takes ALOT to get this little lady to sit still but she spent most of the weekend alternating between the couch and her bed. After a trip to the doctor and some medicine things are definitely getting better.

Gracie and I had to miss Maggie's basketball game on Saturday. She played great. She's improved a lot this season and says she LOVES basketball. We hated to miss it.

Thursday I head to Omaha for another look at Baby Chip, he/she sure feels like its growing. The girls are both excited to start getting things ready around here. Gracie's pretty sure she can get the crib ready by herself (but she thinks we should put it in her room) and Maggie says she's ready to take care of the baby, except for diapers, she doesn't want to do that :)

Yesterday when I picked Gracie up at school her teachers pulled me aside to tell me she'd had a fight with her best friend Lily. Apparently Gracie and Lily were fighting about who get to play with Hudson and Lily got mad and choked Gracie. Obviously my first concern was Gracie (she's fine, her neck was a little red, but there are no bruises and she seems to be over it). My second thought was, this kids teenage years are going to kill us......Hudson should probably save himself and go back to playing with the boys!