Summer Happenings

It's been a very busy 7 days since I last wrote. Our family was supposed to have gone on a 5 day camping trip to Hanging Rock State Park with some of the other Dream & Discover cabin families. It sure would have been a nice way to celebrate the summer solstice. 24 hours before we were to depart, Paul and I concluded that a jaunt in the woods just wasn't in the cards for our family. I had sent out a sitewide sale notice for MoonDance last week and the customer response was a bit overwhelming. Add to that some large wholesale orders and it leaves me working out in the shop every spare moment of the day. I just had way too much of a backlog of work to allow me to go off and play. The thought of returning to Raleigh to face an even larger mountain of work to climb was just too much. So, home we stayed, but we promised ourselves we would at least take a day off to play.
So, on Friday, the Roth family invited us to join them for a day of swimming and play at their fitness club in Cary. It's a pretty impressive place. Huge outdoor swimming pool with two 2-story water slides, snack bar, shady cabana umbrellas, .... Maddie made her swimming debut, sporting the latest in absolutely adorable infant swim gear. Here she is in one of her favorite poses with Daddy.

Not to be outdone by her younger sister's ravishing beauty, Emily struck some lovely poses for the camera as well. Can you see those lips? That's a plum she's munching on ever so daintily.... I'm pretty sure that these are the kind of photos we're supposed to save to share with her beaus.

We're currently scheduled for one day a week at the cabin in addition to a weekly field trip outing. Our day is Tuesdays and we share the cabin with the Olinger, Levinson, Brodie and Harper families on that day. Just 5 weeks prior to Maddie-Lu's birth, Jennifer Olinger gave birth to their 3rd child, Lucas. We've been friends with the Olingers for several years now (since Emily and Natalie were infants) and Jennifer has worked for me at MoonDance for 3 or 4 of those years with various breaks for maternity leave here and there. In all likelihood, Lucas is going to be a pal of Maddie-Lu's for many years to come. Jennifer and I thought it would be fun to track these two and their various exploits and adventures over the years. Lucas may look a lot older and bigger than Maddie, but it's really only a 5 week difference in age. Lucas is just an exceptionally juicy baby :-) (Moments before this picture was taken, Maddie-Lu rolled over from back to front for the first time!) Here's to many, many more years of friendship!