Weekend

The Sooy kids had FOUR late nights in a row, starting off with Thursday - a screening of "Big Hero 6" outdoors at a local farm:

Friday after camp, we spent some time playing Pokemon and baking before watching "Night at the Museum" 3 for our traditional Friday night movie night...

On Saturday, we took the kids to the Delsea Drive-In to see a double-feature: "The Minion Movie" and "Inside Out"!  Coloring in the trunk to pass the time before the first movie starts:

The kids even made a friend and threw a football and played games under the screen before the sun went down...

Finally, the movie started!  Both kids stayed awake for both movies and we got home super-late.  Sean slept in the next morning but Clare was up pretty early because she was very excited...

...to go to a birthday party for two of her best friends.  The party was at a tumbling party at a gym - Clare had a blast tumbling, balancing, jumping, and swinging!

 

The highlight of the party was when Elsa came for cake and cookies!

As Clare and I drove back to the boys, we kept spotting these signs (for a family reunion?) around town:

Which was a perfect segue to our next activity - watching the CONCACAF Gold Cup Final at the Linc in Philly:

"Boo Eagles!"

"Go Jamaica!"  "Go Mexico!"

 Even Miss Picklehead Bun-Bun was getting into the game:

Ending the night with Rita's before heading out to the car.

Picking

On Father's Day this year,we took Daddy to our favorite farm to pick cherries, strawberries, and BLUEBERRIES!

Waiting for the hayride:

First stop, cherries! It was the last week for cherries, so it was literally slim-pickings but we got enough cherries to satisfy Clare.

Next up was blueberries. Sean showed us that if you want blueberries in a hurry, then he's your man!  The kid is a natural.

And our last stop was strawberries.  Again, it was the last week for strawberries so we really had to look hard for "good" strawberries and Clare was up to the task...

After all that hard work, we stopped for ice cream of course!

July 4th

We started our July Fourth weekend with some fireworks.  Despite the drizzly weather, we went out to our "spot" to enjoy Medford's fireworks display:

The next morning, after we put our 10lbs of blueberries in the freezer for winter (minus enough to make a giant batch of pancakes), we packed up and went to the beach!

Dinner at Grummy and Pop Pop's:

Lunch at Grandmom Jackie and Pop Pop Pop's:

Beach time!!

Crash!

We did sparklers:

And we took a bike ride up to Barnegat Lighthouse!

The four of us climbed up Old Barney - Clare motored up the stairs like a case of Pirates Booty was waiting for her at the top.  Sean took his time coming up the stairs, being very careful on the 217 steps...

TJ got me a Birch Beer when we stopped for refreshments (can't visit Barnegat Lighthouse without a Birch Beer!)

Grummy, Thom John and the trailer

After the bike ride, it was back to the beach!

Thanks to the recent round of beach replenishment, the beach is full of neat shells, including lots and lots of sand dollars!

The kids are total water-babies this summer.  I hope to get pictures or video of them boogie boarding later this summer.  They waded into water together and we could see them trying to decide if they were going out to the sandbar or not - they didn't!

And another passed out baby after the beach: