We joined a volunteer-led tour of the farm with one other family and literally we were the only ones there. Felicia, the volunteer farmer, told us that Mother’s Day is always packed and Father’s Day is always deserted at Howell. Weird. Although we are regulars at the farm, we’ve never actually gone on a tour before. The tour was amazing! I think the volunteer was happy to have some company and took Natalie around to do all sorts of cool farm chores that we don’t normally have access to. The girls were troopers at the farm, despite the 90 degree heat and being hungry. Unfortunately, when we got home they were both pretty worn out and cranky. I wonder how old they will be when they are able to accomplish not giving Chris any grief on Father’s Day?
Natalie and Daddy model their crowns Natalie decorated a crown for Chris for Father’s Day. Off course then she wanted one, too!
Natalie with her crown
Miranda jumping Our friend Joanne was kind enough to hand down this jumper to Miranda!
Visiting the horses
Pigs in mud
Natalie with Felicia the farmer
Collecting farm fresh eggs
Volunteer farmer shows Natalie how it’s done
Natalie and Daddy scrape feed corn off the cob
Natalie helps grind corn
Natalie turns the crank
Natalie looks at the ground corn
Natalie feeds her corn to the chicks
Pumping water
Natalie gives water to Blaze the 30 year old horse And he spits it right back at her!
Funny faces Most times this is the only way that Natalie will "pose" for pictures these days.
Miranda’s First Father’s Day III
Family Portrait Kids not smiling, of course!
Smily baby Miranda getting her diaper AND outfit changed outside yet again.
Lamb Grazing
Miranda’s First Father’s Day II
Miranda’s First Father’s Day I

A lot of friends have season passes to Six Flags Great Adventure and I wanted to go with them once before I return to work next week. Since I get motion sick, other moms (and dad) were gracious enough to take Natalie on the rides that she couldn’t go on by herself. Although amusement parks are not my favorite, Natalie and I had such a great time with our friends that I’m sad that my work schedule will prevent us from joining in on the weekly great adventure outings!
Natalie and Mama Ready for fun!
Amy & Jen Jen was nice enough to give me her "bring a friend free" coupons so I didn’t have to pay admission!!
Natalie and MacKenzie
Miranda and Mama Luckily, Chad had this extra hat in his diaper bag to lend us….I pulled Miranda’s hat out of our diaper bag and it was covered in mysterious brown spots.
Big Red Car Maya, Robert, Nick, and Natalie
Bouncy ride
Balloon Ride
Chad, Laurel, and Natalie ride the airplanes
Peyton, Maya, Heather, Jill, and Cameron
Caryn and Gabe
Brenda and Liam
Jenn & Ben
Jill and Natlie Getting their groove on the wiggles show
Joanne, Alex, Jill, and Cameron
Amy & Jenn
With the wiggles guys Natalie, Robert, Olivia, Ryan, and MacKenzie
Natalie and Olivia
Friends Nick, Natalie, Olivia, Laurel
Andrea rockin’ out! She says, "how can anyone not dance to the shimmy-shake??"
Cooling off
Charlie
Natalie and Olivia

* We’ve named the group Marvelous Moms, and a Dad named Chad. Cause we’re cheesy like that!

Before we left we debated about whether or not to go. I took Natalie to the pediatrician to make sure she didn’t have any infections as she’d been running a fever for two days. But she was eating, drinking, and sleeping fine, and pretty much acting normal. The doctor said it was just a virus, so we decided to chance it. Of course in retrospect, that was a big mistake. Almost as soon as we got to the campsite, Natalie became fragile, clingy, and cranky. Any little problem set her off. She wanted to be held all the time. She had trouble sleeping*. A few times, twice at 4:30 am, she had complete, utter meltdowns that took her a very long time to recover from. She started picking at her chapped lips so much that they cracked and bled, which incited more meltdowns. Whenever she cried, her nose ran, which made her cry even harder, which made her nose run more—you see the problem. She often melted down upon waking up, which we realized was because she had to pee, but felt too tired to walk to the bathrooms. We bought a potty for her to use in the tent, but she didn’t always want to do that.

At one point, after a particularly bad meltdown, Natalie wanted mommy-and-only-mommy, and Miranda needed to nurse. Since Miranda is very easy to soothe and hasn’t yet gotten into a bad cycle of continuing-to-be-upset-as-a-result-of-being-upset, Chris held Miranda off while I tried to calm Natalie down. At a certain point, I had to feed Miranda, and it broke my heart that I couldn’t meet both of their needs at once. Natalie was still upset when I got to Miranda, and at that point, Miranda was as upset as she’s ever gotten. She nursed, but stopped every minute or so to scream at me for making her wait so long. When both girls were finally calm I felt like sobbing. I felt like I could *almost* imagine what my friend Lindsay, who has a girl Natalie’s age and triplet 10-month-old boys, must face multiple times a day. At this age, and even in that situation, the girls’ needs are pretty simple. And yet at that moment mothering them felt like an overwhelming responsibility.

Another thing we learned (although we already knew!) is that we have amazing friends. If Jodi and Jay hadn’t been there to support us, we never would have attempted, or made it through the trip. And the girls are so comfortable with them that when they were having good moments, they were just as happy to sit on their laps, be carried by them, or fall asleep laying against them.

Finally, Chris and I affirmed that we are a good parenting team. Monday marked our 7th wedding anniversary, which was fitting since it was one of the more challenging experiences we’ve had since getting married. Even though the weekend was extremely stressful, we stuck together. Our parenting styles are complementary, which is a good thing since this weekend, we needed all our tricks to survive.

Here are the pictures, which as I said, reflect an entirely different experience than the one I just described.
Natalie’s funny face
Look who’s old enough for back carries!
All the comforts of home
Funny faces
Ducklings on the lake
Mad faces
Chubby legs I guess Miranda’s socks are too tight!
The burn on Miranda’s arm Apparently our kids are destined to be scarred by the time they are 4 months. A flaming piece of wood popped out of the campfire and landed on Miranda’s arm. She didn’t cry even though it blistered almost immediately. Chris and I have both camped our entire lives and never had anything like that happen before.
Natalie in the coal mine On a rainy day we went on a tour of the Lakawanna coal mine. A lot of the details went over Natalie’s head of course, but it was fun to go so far underground.
Natalie shows off her rocks She sorted them in order of sparkliness.
Miranda and Natalie bundled up Finally calm after they both had complete meltdowns. Thank goodness for episodes of Yo Gabba Gabba on my iPhone.
Miranda with Auntie Jodi in the hammock
Natalie smiling Funny that we got lots of pictures of Natalie smiling on the trip, even though she was pretty miserable overall!
Eating pancakes in the screen tent
Hikers
The hiking trail was surrounded by these pretty flowers
Jodi and Jay
Miranda asleep on my back
Tree on the trail
Natalie with Auntie Jodi
Chris wearing a tired Natalie
Hiking while wearing the kids On our 7th wedding anniversary!
Happy after a nursing break
Stopping for a snack
Miranda with Auntie Jodi
Miranda and Mama
Ganoga Falls
On the edge In more ways than one….Natalie started melting down right after this photo was taken.
Overlooking a 90-foot waterfall The map said the trail to these falls was 3 miles, but according to my Nike+, it was 5.5!!
The lake on our campsite One last photo before we headed home. We chose to start a 4-hour drive at 10 pm rather that suffer through another horrendous night and morning. Hopefully our next camping trip will be better!

*The first night we all had trouble sleeping since the couple camping in the site across from ours stayed up until 3 am arguing. Loudly. Every other word out of the woman’s mouth was f—ing. That combined with Natalie waking up crying, Miranda waking up to nurse and both girls wanting to be held by mommy at the same time made for very little sleep for all of us. Then Natalie started the day at 4:30 am with a long, terrible meltdown.

U-Pick at Terhunes

In the strawberry fields

Flower picker with her dad

Jodi and the girl in the yellow hat

Natalie and Jay

Showing off her loot

Yummy

Meema helped us make strawberry jam with our harvest. I would highly recommend freezer jam. Since the berries aren’t cooked, the flavor of the strawberry is preserved. Like summer in a jar.
Making jam with Meema
Crushed strawberries
Freezer Jam!

Luckily, we had enough strawberries left over to make my other summer favorite: strawberry shortcake!
Berry Shortcake Nothing else says summer better!

Group shot It is chaos trying to get all these kids to stay in one place to take a photo–forget trying to get them all to smile at once!
Nick, Nathan, Grace, Robert, Ethan, Olivia, Maya, Natalie (and Alex in the front)

Bug eyes!
Happy Miranda What a tropper she was today! No crying in the car, napped well in the mei tai, happy to ride in the stroller! This photo captures her latest thing–chewing on her hands constantly!

Babywearing My failed attempt of a picture of me and Liz wearing our babies.
Happy girl on the train There was a model railroad running next to the train….Natalie was so excited, she kept saying, "look, mommy, I see a little train next to our train!!"
Jill and Cameron
Maya on the train
Olivia on the cat
Grace on the bunny Nathan on the dragon
Bunny ride
All by herself! Natalie very proudly yelled, "hi mommy!!" every time she passed me.
Little pigs, little pigs, let me in! Natalie, Olivia, Nick
In the giant’s chair Natalie and Olivia
Natalie and Maya Natalie had just fallen off this giant chair and wasn’t too happy about me taking her picture.
Natalie the butterfly
Natalie and Iris

Mother of Two

On Sunday, Chris made delicious waffles and Natalie was excited to give me her “project” that she made at Melissa’s: a glittery gold handprint and homemade card. We had a relaxing day, half lounging around and half working in the garden. It was brisk at 55 degrees and windy—Natalie was a little scared of the wind, even asking if our house would blow down. We assured her it wouldn’t!
That’s not a dandelion, silly!
Miranda’s First Mother’s Day

Showing off Chris and Mark Natalie and Josie made corn cob sheep!

Lambs Much bigger than the last time we saw them!

Reeeeeach!!! Josie petting a freshly shorn lamb.

Sheep shearing No electric shears at Howell Living History Farm!

Good arm
Happy The thrill of throwing rocks into the stream apparently never gets old.
Josie-jo
Testing the waters
Oopsies! Miranda did NOT like having her feet dipped in cold water, despite the fact that it was 90 degrees and she was literally dripping with sweat.
Flying high
Goose Eggs
Balancing girls
Jump!
Jumping Josie
Oy, it’s so hot!