Our Mini Vaction shots......

or how can you really pack that much fun into three days after driving 20 hours in a car with seven kids, a kid wrangler and your spouse! (or the short version.... how many states can each kid poop in one day!)

Here are a lot of photos from our really quick trip to Occoquan VA to celebrate Eric's Father's 70th Birthday with him at his surprise party! It was a whirlwind trip..... that included a broken van (after I had it tuned up and worked on before we left.....URGH!!!!!!!!!!!) A fun family evening of surprises, seven kids in two hotel rooms, Adrian puking in the pool and all over Kayla, The mandatory matching outfits (including mom, dad and the wrangler) a trip to a water park with Grammy and Grampy, a movie at the mall.....yeah space chimps!) and a ton of stops for mom to puke cause she managed to get the stomach flu !

Hope you enjoy them!

on the Potomac River!

Grandpa's Surprise Party!

The Splash Down Water Park with SEVEN KIDS!!!!!! Panic time for Mommy!

Inclusion at its best!!!!

Tonight after taking Melea & Adrian to cheer leading! Gosh I love that it is just so much fun to sit and watch Mlea about 15 seconds to a minute behind everyone else and Adrian trying to keep her going!

I have this philosophy for both of them.....they don't have to be the best, but they have to try their best...... not a best night for Adrian!

But we are in the drive thru at McDonald's and a little boy starts yelling at the car! I am perplexed and surprised....cause I do not recognize him or his car...... BUT HE IS ADAMANT HE KNOWS ME!!!!

Eventually cause McDonald's is moving so slow (I swear ours has its own time zone after 5 pm) this little guy gets out of the car and comes over to talk to me!

He wants to know how Colin is...... and if he is in the car....... and what he is doing....... I finally realize that he is a little boy from Colin's kindergarten class! I am actually amazed at how interested he is in Colin (in a good way)!

He shows me the sign for friend and tells me how nice Colin is and how he hopes he is in Colin's room next year and so on...... till his mom screams at him (I would have too) and makes him go back to his car!

I guess the fact that Colin never tells me about anything that happens at school or that I never hear about anything at all, he is still making an impact!

And I go back to my original thoughts about inclusion..... it is not to help my kids at all! It seems to help others more!

So Colin's little friend you made one tired old mom's day today by banging on my car and wanting to see your friend!

Hear is hoping you still care about him in 10 to 15 years...... but right now you made me smile and go home and get a huge hug from him and I told him all about his friend who had wanted to know what he was up to. He spent the rest of the evening signing "friend" and "school" so I am excited that he understood!

Thanks!

Daddy....Thank you for the toilet seats!!!!!!!!!!

Daddy - We just want to say thank you for the toilet seat! Or it is totally amazing what you did with PVC pipe and glue and a seat from Target!

Eric took the time this weekend to make five toilet surrounds for all of the bathrooms in the house and to install the new potty seats.....which I have to say are amazing!!!!) they flip down or up and you have a big kids and little kids seats, they are easy to clean and Colin no longer is petrified and gets on and off the toilet himself (all the time)

This is supposed to be the summer we manage to potty train Colin, Melea and start with Eliza & Big D! Well daddy made us these new seats cause we had a lot of little ones with fears of falling off and I saw some on EBay for almost $180 each.......

Well super dad says....we can do that...... so about 7 hours, and $80 of PVC/glue and elbow (and the requisite three trips to Lowe's) we have five potty chairs that are kid friendly and sturdy (also easily removable if you have a "huge butt" according to Adrian......I am sure she was taking about me!)

The kids love them and for the first time Colin is doing most of it himself...... if I could just get him to have some muscle control in his bladder...... then maybe we could beat this diaper thing!

Melea is doing great though!

Adrian turns Five today!

at 2:22 pm on July 4th! She was a firecracker baby and still is! I can not believe five years have gone by so fast!

She is one amazing young girl!!!! Though she still makes me laugh cause she thinks everyone has the day off to celebrate her birthday and that all the fireworks and BBQ's are for her! (possible a little self centered or a big ego! I am not sure..... but hey she needs it)

She has recently gotten a lot of understanding about where children come from and the concept of "Tummy Mummy" versus "Adoptive Mommy" and is really starting to be able to answer peoples questions about her siblings.

I watched her (nicely by the way) correct an older woman at the hair dresser who asked her which were here "real" brothers or sisters! She said all of them! "They were all real"

She then proceeded to tell her that "real" was not a nice term nor was natural because Colin and Melea got here to earth the same way she did...... they just had tummy families who needed us to help them and be their family! She told this lady how much we love Miranda's tummy family and how awesome that they come to visit us! How much everyone needs a family!

And then she looked at her and asked her if she needed a family..... we had lots of room!

Adrian is completely perplexed at the idea that there are so many children in the world that do not have families! She wanted me to bring them all home!

I guess this openness of her heart and the fact that she wanted to share us all with another is a good thing, and I am glad she is telling people that she loves our rather large and rather unique family!

She sure is a wonderful person and she makes me smile so much....... that I realize maybe she is right...... at least one of those fire works is for her! (course it is likely one of the screamer /whinny kinds...... )

Happy Birthday Princess Grumpy! I love you so much! Even after 12+ hours of natural childbirth I rember how happy we were to meet you!