Birthday parties and first communions - oh my!

First - let me warn you! This is a long post. Hope you are ready to read!

Last weekend, we took a road trip back to Evansville. Ashton (Andrea's youngest) was having a birthday party on Saturday and Kiersten (Jennifer's youngest) was having her first communion on Sunday. And boy - there are some stories to tell!

First of all - the birthday party. It was at a park in Evansville. The weather was great - perfect temperature and a nice little breeze. We were all able to sit around a visit. We could play with the kids (it's amazing how much fun they can have with a swing and a tennis ball). We got to pass around Kylie (she is so TINY!). Lot's of hamburgers and hot dogs. It was one of those spring days that you dream about...

And while we were all sitting underneath a huge tree - two squirrels decided to get a little "frisky" and chase each other up and down the tree. They started barking and pieces of bark were flying everywhere. Then they ran down the trunk of the tree. When they got about 10 feet from the ground (bark still landing in everybody's hair), Darlene and Tracey - who were sitting closest to the tree - screamed and jumped up and got out of the way.

It all sounds like a normal reaction - except for the one detail that I've left out. Sitting next to Tracey (before she ran away) was the baby carrier - and it still had Kylie in it! Needless to say, we teased Tracey the rest of the day (and probably for many more days to come) about her new "motherly instincts"!

Of course, Kylie (and everyone else for that matter) was perfectly safe the entire time. And in Tracey's defense, Kylie had been passed around all day - it was more likely that someone was holding her than it was for her to be in the carrier. That doesn't make the "motherly instinct" jokes any less fun (or funny!).

As for the squirrels - I'm sure they "kissed and made up" just a few minutes later!

It really was a fantastic day and it's so rare that we are all together at the same time like that. Hopefully we'll get to do it again soon!

The next day was Kiersten's first communion. The mass was really pretty (there's something pretty about old Catholic churches anyway). Kiersten was in the traditional white dress with a pretty veil. She got to carry the candle into the church - and even had to stand up at the lectern for a speaking part! She looked like a little angel...

...of course - we all no better! Just ask her brother...

The really cool part about her first communion was that the weekend before had been Darlene's first communion. She got a kick out of her first communion being on the same day as Aunt Darlene's second communion!

So now comes that part about the pictures. We took our camera to Evansville with us. We even left it by the front door so we wouldn't forget it when we went out. But as we were arriving at the park - we realized we forgot it. I know that Andrea took a bunch of pictures. Hopefully she'll send me some!

Then the next day - as we were pulling in to the church parking lot - we realized that we had left the camera right by the front door AGAIN! And I know that a bunch of people were taking pictures at the church (consider this an open solicitation - you can email me whatever you might have!).

And the funniest part about the camera fiasco... Monday night, we were sitting at home watching TV. I looked over at the end table and saw the memory chip for the camera laying there. So even if we would have carried it to our "events", we wouldn't have been able to take pictures anyway!

So my apologies to Kiersten (who has told us that we need more pictures on the blog) - especially if she's read this long post and now realizes that there are no pictures for her to see (tell your mom and nan and pap to send me some!)