Road Trip(s)!

Over the course of the last two weeks, we have clocked a whole lotta hours in the good old Family Truckster.  Although I was super-nervous about driving for hours with a newborn and a 3-year-old, I'm happy to report that both trips went remarkably well.  I've got three words for you: DVD player and pacifier.  Our saving graces.  Didn't hear a peep from either kid for most of the trip except when we needed to pop in a new movie (Fionn) or pop a pacifier back into a pie hole (Dex).  I guess you could say that both kids had their pacifiers.

But enough about the driving.  What about the actual destinations?  Patience, people.  I'm getting to it.  

The first trip involved a drive down to Portsmouth, Virginia where we spent a weekend with the PDWC.  Always a good time.  Always filled with wonderful conversations and great moments with the kiddos.  And, as always, it went by way too quickly.  It felt like we had just arrived when it was time to pack up the car and hit the road again.  

So I have to preface the rest of this post by saying that we have indeed succumbed to the Photographic Drought that appears to impact most families once they welcome their second baby.  It's so typical.  First baby, you photograph every single thing.  Every cute outfit, every smile, every...everything.  I literally have ten minutes of video of Fionn doing Tummy Time at 2 weeks old.  In other words, I have ten minutes of video of Fionn doing absolutely nothing (and crying about it).  Talk about action-packed entertainment.

Second baby?  Poor Dex probably barely has ten pictures to his name, and he is nearly 3 months old.  Sigh.  Ah well.  It makes sense, right?  We now need all four of our arms to hold children, chase after children, cut up food for children, etc.  Picking up the camera and documenting the many amazing moments of our life right now just sort of...falls by the wayside.  As a result, our overflowing well of photos has gone a little bit dry.  We'll strive to do better.  We will do better.  But that doesn't help us out much for the purposes of this blog post.

Even with that said, we were still able to capture some great moments from the weekend. 

Adorable Henry Van Orman -- such a little charmer!

Fionn and Quinn using a hammer to break into the pretend cash register.  As Conor said, "Should we be worried or proud?"

Of course, it was so much fun to introduce Deaglan to the PDWC.  He basically got passed around from person to person.  Notably the Miller family.

Nola Miller and Dex

Joe Miller and Dex

Caroline Miller and Dex

 And, fresh from a day at the beach, here are the PDWC ladies in all our glory.

As you can perhaps tell, we are indeed expecting a new member of the PDWC!  Sarah and Danny Van Orman have a new addition coming in September.  Hooray!  We are so excited to meet him or her.  That said, this new addition is a big game-changer.  He or she will officially tip the balance of our group.  That's right.  We the adults will finally be outnumbered by the children.  Decorum will crumble!  Chaos will reign!  Ah, who are we kidding?  It already reigns.  In fact, those pesky kids are already invading our group photos.  See for yourself!

As you can see, the "little ladies" of our group did not appreciate being left out of the "girls' picture."  And they made it known.  Oh, is nothing sacred?  Haha. 

All in all, it was a wonderful trip.  We appreciate Danny and Sarah so much for hosting our family at their house.

Following our Portsmouth trip, we were home for a mere five days before we packed the car up again for road trip #2.  This time we were traveling a bit further away -- to Ohio where we attended the wedding of our friends, Josh and Mai.  They celebrated their marriage (they had a first wedding in Laos where Mai was born) in Oberlin, Ohio which is an adorable little college town.  We had a wonderful time exploring before the actual wedding festivities began.  But did we take any pictures of our experiences?  No, siree, we did not.  Sorry, folks.  All I got is this measly picture from the wedding. I call this one "Tuxedo Dex."

It's been nice to reprise some of Fionn's onesies from the wedding bonanza that followed his birth in 2010.  Speaking of 2010, check out this blast from the past.  It was taken when Fionn was 7.5 weeks old at Jon and Emily's wedding.  Let's compare and contrast brothers, shall we?

What do you think?  Who wore the tuxedo onesie best?  I gotta say that Dex's head full of hair makes for a more debonaire presentation, but you have to love Fionn's Dr. Evil impression.  Oh, what the heck.  We'll call it a tie (no pun intended -- hehe)!

I will leave you with a picture of our proud Farmer Fionn following our first cucumber harvest of the summer.  Oh, these boys.  How they have my heart.  And the cucumber was pretty tasty too.