Oh Boy Has It Been A LONG Time Since I Posted! Even longer than I realised. So I will try to give a condensed version of the past few months.

• Our vacation to Pittsburgh went smoothly despite my fears of pre-term labor because of contractions I had a few days before we left. We stayed at a hotel just out of the city Monday - Friday that had an indoor swimming pool. We played at a very nice local park twice during the week and both times had the playground to ourselves, visited The Natural History Museum with it's famous Dinosaur Hall, The Children's Museum (which I would describe as a huge hands-on learning/play center), and The Science Center. Breakfast was provided at the hotel every morning, we got lunch at each of our destinations and ate out most evenings on our way back to the hotel. Ending up each day with a swim in the pool which, we also almost never had to share with anyone else. Our last day was a first time and much anticipated (by Emma and Rachel) trip to a Chucky Cheese's. When asked what their favorite part of vacation was the top two answers were swimming and Chucky Cheese. Although, Uncle Kendall would have been proud of Emma's work at the Children's museum. Their favorite part there was the waterworks floor where Emma worked quite a LONG time in the plumbing department contemplating and connecting various pipes that squirted water. Rachel like the waterworks floor too but spent most of her time making new friends and playing with them at the water tables.
• Our summer feels like it has come to a close within the last two weeks. We had our 2nd annual cookout Labor Day weekend this year instead of the 4th of July weekend. Last weekend was our 20th high school reunion. It was a small group but we were able to catch up with some people we hadn't seen in years. Last weekend was also Ken's company picnic. his company booked the local "fun zone". From 11:00am -4:00pm they provided food, go-cart rides, bumper boat rides, mini-golf games, and tokens to the arcade games for all the employees and their families. Emma and Rachel had a grand time!
• School is going well for Emma. Most days she looks forward to our school time despite her frustrations over handwriting and her little sister trying to chime in with the answers. She is already well over half way through her Math book and has read her first reader in English. Rachel had her first day back at nursery school yesterday which she enjoyed very much.
• "Junior" still doesn't have a name but we should still have a little while to work on that. I am at 30 weeks and had a Dr. visit Tuesday. The placenta is now in a good location and I have not had any spotting in the last 4 weeks. The doctor wasn't too concerned about the fact that I am 1/2 a centimeter dilated and have had some contractions. I just need to keep track of them and make sure I am not having too many. If they need to they can send me to the hospital for a test to indicate if I am likely to deliver within the next two weeks and give me steroid shots to develop the baby's lungs a little quicker. He said "there won't be another ultrasound as long as everyone behaves themselves". I am trying to behave, hopefully "Junior" will too.
• Some recent quotes from Emma regarding Aunt Julia. "Aunt Julie sure is lucky to have such a fun kid like Asa! Asa's lucky too to have Aunt Julie for his Mom." She saw the actress Keira Knightly on TV and said "She looks like Aunt Julie!" shortly followed by the comment " But, she (Kiera Knightly) has a pretty voice."
• I'd better sign off for know. Just checked on the girls and they decided to fix themselves a snack...bread topped with cream cheese and brown sugar! At least it was whole grain bread :-)