Dancing with Daffodils

 Monday morning Emma and I went to her open house and it was crazy. I don't understand why people wait in super long lines just to say hi to a teacher. It is the most awkward conversation anyway so Emma and I just walked through her schedule, at least saw what every teacher looked like and mostly she compared her schedule to any friend we might run into so that she could figure out if they had classes together. She was disappointed that after 5th period she is kind of on her own but hopefully she'll make new friends. She has two of the same teachers Lily had and liked so I am hopeful it is going to be a good year for her. Then we went and got her hair cut.  Later I left to go up to Tyson's Corner to meet my mission companion, Michelle, from CA. She was doing an event for work at this hotel in TC and invited me to come hang out with her. The kids were all so busy but Lily really jumped in and drove Emma to and from dance and Curtis to and from cross country and helped Josh g...

 We had a couple of days home with mom and dad here. We didn't do much; we were all a bit tired from all the traveling and fun and we had more coming so we just hung out and played games and went to the grocery store and Nicolletti's for dinner one night. I also took Lily to the dermatologist and Emma to an ortho consultation. She is going to start braces soon so giddy up! I happen to love Dr. Schneider's office though so besides the cost and Emma's moaning, it won't be a big deal.  Then we left Thursday morning and headed to Harmony, PA. I have been wanting to take my kids to the Priesthood Restoration site but it is not really on the way to Rochester. When my parents mentioned wanting to go too I decided to make it happen this trip so we got there about 3pm and spent about three hours and it was lovely. My parents have a good friend from the temple that lives near there and was a big part of the development of the area so he came on our tour and told us some prett...

 The rest of July was good. The girls did a dance intensive and Curtis went on a bike trip so it was just me and Brandon hanging out for a few days again. We spent time with the Wiests and did piano lessons after we got Curtis off on his trip and then Thursday we went to the wharf and Brandon kayaked around for two hours while I sat on the dock and watched. I didn't feel like getting our big kayak out and his is so easy to just throw in the van so I sat and enjoyed the beautiful day while he went all around the wharf. Friday we went out to breakfast with a gift card he had from Nana.  We spent time packing and grocery shopping for our trip and Thursday night I helped Josh with all of the beach stuff. Friday Joel came over to play and I took him and Brandon to the pool and we were there for hours. It was relaxing and fun. We also packed up the car and got ready to leave. Josh had to go pick up Curtis early from the bike trip so he did a fun three hour drive up to the campsite w...