New Jersey

So the Billy Joel song "Allentown" is what I always think of for some reason when I head up north to visit friends in PA or Jersey. So I was listening to the song as we made our trek up to Hackettstown, New Jersey to visit my big brother Christian and his sweet wife Jodi and their new home. Christian works in the regional corporate office for Mars Co. (the candy company-makers of M&M's) and we got LOTS of free candy. Perfect for Halloween time. Their home was beautiful, lots of land, and they're expecting their first baby boy in November!


We visited the shoreline and Austin and Ash loved putting their toes into the freezing cold water and running back up. Until they spotted a few jellyfish washed up on shore. Not so fun anymore. The weather was so perfect and so nice to be around the water again.


We walked up and down the boardwalk and ate fun boardwalk food. The next day we visited a pumpkin patch and had so much fun picking out pumpkins with them! Of course since it was my brother, I had many moldy pumpkins thrown at the back of my legs. So some got slung back to him too. My kids were watching and Austin was shocked. I reverted back to brother/sister times and rememberd I couldn't act that way around the kiddos. Austin was so excited to see mom cut loose that he started picking up pumpkins and anything else he could find and started throwing too. Ashley was just squealing in delight. Duane as just shaking his head. That' s the fun of having 3 brothers!!!!

We then made it home Sunday night. The trek takes about 5 hours. It was so great seeing them and where they live. I'm also so thankful for a wonderful tight family.

Quotes of the week:
Austin: "You're the best mom/dad I've ever had. Ever!"
Austin: "I'm not going to be your BFF (Best friend forever) anymore!" When he's upset at something...
Austin's started to tell some "stories". Sometimes he'll just make something up and I have to ask if that really happened, or he imagined that it would happen. Like, at the gym nursery Austin said that "a boy had a magic wand and he turned a toy into a frog!"
Austin: "I want to be a real pirate. Eat meat and sweets and no vegetables. They're lucky."

Ashley: "No way"
Ashley: "Ewwwww" when she spots a bug
Ashley: "Mommy" the word gets louder and louder now when she wants something-a change of radio, to get her up after a nap. Before she would just whine until I would do something. But now she's getting her point across!
Ashley: She's dancing more now than ever. She'll hear a song or see me and she'll boogie and shake her little toosh! It's so fun having a girl! I just went to a dancing store and got her a couple leotards for her class and it was so adorable!!!