plums for daaaaays

im sure anyone in my immediate circle is sick of hearing about our plums but here is one last ode to our pride and joy. so last year was our first summer in this house and after we got back from a week in san diego in late july we noticed thousands of little red plums on the ground. we had a japanese plum tree and didnt even know it! and we had missed the opportunity to pick them! so this year we were on top of it. craig would check on them every day to see when they were ready and last week they were ripe and delicious.

we started with an eight foot ladder, then a ten foot ladder and finally cut the crap and had my dad bring home a twelve footer. i was nervous when craig was up that high. but not nervous enough to make him come down.

once we had boooooooowls filled with juicy little plums we got to work at cutting the flesh off the pit. brooke was in town and she was the pitting queen!

jam time! megan graciously offered up her kitchen to the sticky process of making real (not just the freezer kind) jam.

divvying up the jars.

i cannot even begin to explain how good this jam tastes. we also bottled filling so we can have plum crisps throughout the year.

for the last week, tagg, sully and tess have had a waffle with plum jam on it for breakfast. we cant get enough.

and while im here, i thought i would post this picture of our big girl. talk about 'cant get enough'.

happy 4th of july!

we started out the weekend right by making flag cupcakes for craig's office.

aaaaaand tess and i decided we needed patriotic manicures.

on the morning of the fourth we drove over to bothell for the parade.

this year, rod got us seats near the top of the parade because they were in the shade. which was amazing except that every year, tagg and sully stop walking in the parade when they walk by me. so yeah. they lasted all of about 3 minutes.

grandpa rod and grandma cheri!

tess and her grandmas.

the smiths and wells fargo. ha

when we got home from the parade (and chick fil a) sully lined up our fireworks for later that night.

and craig let him set off a few. apparently those grenades are hard to get going.

that evening we met our friends at a local county club to watch their fantastic fireworks show. dang cute kids.

sully loooooooved the fireworks.

i dont blame him. its always such a wonderful show.

when those fireworks were over we went back home and got ready for our own show.

casey, craig and  tagg. the fireworks masters.

like always, it was a wonderful fourth. i love that holiday.

san diego with just moms and kids

last week i flew down to san diego to meet up with jocelyn and stay at my aunt brooke's house.

but lest you think it was a girls trip... think again! we took all our kids with us. this was first time i had flown with all three of my children by myself (i dont think i even flew with tagg and sully by myself) and i was pretty nervous. but everything went great! i mean, if i had time to play around on photobooth it couldnt have been too bad. 

our first day there we drove over to coronado to play on the beach and meet up with jocelyn's sisters. it was a perfect day. 

tess was loving life and even took a nap in her stroller while the fighter jets flew over. 

it was a long walk from our car to the surf. but worth it! 

after the beach we went back to brooke's house to swim, swim, swim.

rough life!

the following morning was fathers day so we facetimed craig to wish him a 'happy fathers day' aaaaaand to check in with our girls. 

tucker had come down from his internship in orange county to play with us while we were in san diego. we sure do love this guy.

then it was lunchtime at in-n-out.

tess loved their salty fries. :)

after lunch we drove down to balboa park. it was another gorgeous day. 

jocelyn and i are such mean moms. that water kinda grossed us out so we only let our kids look at it. :)

dont feel too sorry for them though. they got to pick a toy out at the science museum gift shop.

while we were waiting for the tram to take us back to our cars three tourists walked right up and (without asking) started taking pictures of/with tess. they were freaking out over her and couldnt get enough. kissing her feet even! the funniest part? tess was hamming it up for them. she loved every second of it.

still on her little cloud nine after all that attention. (you know, because she hardly ever gets any)

later that night we enjoyed smores by the pool. doesnt get better than that. 

the next day we met up with hanna and her boys for lunch and ice cream. it reminded me of how much i miss her!

then it was back to the pool for more shenanigans. 

last night of hot tubbing for these hot tubbing fools. 

i cant even begin to explain how lucky we are to have brooke in our family. she is not only generous and thoughtful but she is also such a good time. we love her.

these brothers.

the flight home. i cant say it was the most relaxing five days of my life but it sure was fun.