Let’s Go Racin’

We’ve mentioned on the blog before what a big fan of cars Lyla is, however she had never seen a real race until last night.  We met up with Mark, Jill, Jonathan, and Kate for dinner at their house then went over to the Old Dominion Speedway for a series of races called the YFT 150 to benefit Youth For Tomorrow.  How could we resist cars, races, people watching, supporting YFT, and hanging out, all while at such a fine Manassas establishment!

This picture cracked me up because I didn’t realize until I loaded my pictures onto the computer that the guys in the background were posing for the picture too.  Too funny!

I am no fan of car racing by any stretch, but I have to say it was actually fun to watch the races.  There were several different types of cars that raced, and the kids especially enjoyed shouting and cheering for the cars they wanted to win.

 

 

 

Another exciting part of the races was seeing the crashes.  Every time there was a wreck, we got to see Tow Mater, a favorite of all the kids. 

 

 

 

After all the preliminary races, the real race attraction was the late model cars racing in the 150 race, but by halfway through the race Lyla was asleep on the bleacher with her head on my lap.  She must have been exhausted to sleep through all the noise of the race, so we packed it up a bit early.  She never woke up as we carried her all the way out of the speedway and the whole way to the car and home.  The girl was tired, but we all had a really fun time!

Nina and Lyla’s Fun Day

Yesterday was a great day for the girls. They were invited over to Mousey and Poppy’s house to spend the day and night, so I dropped them off after breakfast, then they headed off for their first adventure.  They met up with Miss Connie, my mom’s really good friend, and took a tour of the Shenandoah Caverns.  I asked my mom to take some pictures for me of their day, and here are a few of the girls and Connie inside the cavern, and the girls and Mousey on a train ride after the cavern tour. 

 

After the caverns, they went to Connie’s house to swim in her pool!  Nina and Lyla were very excited to go to Connie’s private pool, and from what I heard, they had a great time swimming their little hearts out. 

After staying at Connie’s for most of the afternoon and evening, they managed to make it back to Mousey and Poppy’s house for some food and a couple games of Uno before bed.  While they were having fun, Mark and I were getting a bunch of our respective work done, then we met up at home in the evening and went out for our first post-surgery date night to our neighborhood Mexican restaurant and a movie.  It was a great day for the girls, and it was great for us too!

M.I.A.

Well, we’ve been M.I.A. on the blog for most of the month.  I think I’ve picked up my camera once to take these two pictures…

 

It’s not like taking pictures is a chore at all. I love it actually, but it just seems like every time we’ve been doing something, I don’t have my camera with me.  We’ve been swimming a lot on hot days, we spent a week with Shen and the girls after Hartfield, we’ve had date night with the girls, and Mark has been healing from his surgery.  

The surgery is four weeks behind him (almost), and while he’s still not back to his old self, he is much much better and able to do so many more things now than he could even two weeks ago.  He’s able to rough house some with the girls now which makes Nina, in particular, very happy.  He asked her the other day how she felt loved from him and her answer was “playing Tickle Tackle.”  It’s a dad thing.  Speaking of Nina, she is still wearing the dog ears every day.  I’m not exaggerating when I say every day.  They’re just a regular part of her deal every day, so we almost don’t even notice them anymore.

We hope everyone is enjoying their summer – we are, and it’s hard to believe it’s half-way over. Boo. I’ll be back with more pictures soon!

Hartfield in July

Last week over the 4th, I took the girls down to Hartfield to meet up with the family for a couple days.  Mark had been rehabing well from his surgery, and despite my not feeling completely comfortable with leaving, Mark assured me that he wanted us to go to Hartfield.  His physical therapist and nurse would be coming to the house, friends would check in on him, he could get around enough to do what he needed, and it seemed like a good idea to everyone.  So, we packed up for a few days and spent some time having fun on the river with family while he spent some time here doing rehab and getting some work done. 

Here are a few pictures of our visit, but to read the captions and see all the photos, click to View the Slideshow at the bottom of the post. We really had a fun couple days, and I remember as a kid having so many great memories of all the time we spent at my grandfather’s house on the river in Maryland. It makes me really happy to see our girls having such a great time now at their grandparents’ house on the river. They are special memories.

 

   

  

 

 

 

P.S. If you click on the link and it asks you to sign up for an account, try this link so you don’t have to sign up for an account: https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=E630443B28FA289A!271&authkey=!AEU2dDkT_qv0wdk

It shouldn’t be doing that, as that is not one of the preferences I have set, but if it does do that, let me know and I’ll move the album to another photo share program.

		Hartfield in July VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL