Cider Mill Road Race 2013

For the 2nd year in a row, this family participated in the Cider Mill Road Race.  Actually, we all participated this year and it was a lot of fun.

Talk about a great community event.  The elementary school gym teachers lead the kids in warm ups, the principal ran the mile and the 5K, lots of familiar faces and friends to see.  Beautiful weather too.


Annie did the fun run and ran against other kindergarteners

 

Whit did the fun run in the 1st grade division.  She was the 2nd place girl.

 

Mary enjoyed seeing her great friends Emma and Julia

Matt, Mary and Andrew ran the mile.  Andrew finished in 10:30 and Mary in 10:34.  Both of them beat last years times; Mary beat hers by over 3 minutes.  Go kids!!!

 

 

The milers

I ran the 5K this year--my first 5K since college.  The nice thing about this course is that it loops right around our neighborhood--if we weren't racing we would have been trapped b/c the roads were closed.  I'm used to the race loop including the monster nasty hill at the start.

 

Finished in 28:53--my personal best run  (and I'm not just saying that b/c I haven't run a race in like 15 years--I do run and time myself regularly) :)

Lots of fun.  It feels good to be an exercising family.

Happy Birthday Annie

Annie turned 5!  My baby is 5, it's hard to believe.  She's been waiting for this birthday for so long.  We had a lot of fun.

She wanted a gumball cake, again.  This girl has a thing with gumballs.

 

What a reader.  She amazes all of us.  It was fun watching her read all of her cards.

A Flutterbye Fairy--the only thing she really asked for except gumballs.

A cute cheerleader

 

This is the non-party birthday year.  On our 'off', we try to make a point of having a special playdate.  Annie's friend Emmie and her family joined us for a cake and ice cream celebration.  Talk about adding to the birthday fun!

Annie got to choose a restaurant for her birthday--she chose Chuck E. Cheese.  We opted for Wendy's first and then Chuck E Cheese for games minus the pizza.  Happy night.

We love our 5 year old.  Annie is funny (and knows it), gets along with kids of all ages, is creative, smart, happy, happy, happy and very opinionated.  She fits in perfectly to our family and, as much as she acts older b/c of older siblings (like knowing too many One Direction songs and staying up late more often than any of the others ever did at age 5), Annie gives us plenty of reasons to remember she is still only 5...like gumballs.  

Spa Night

Matt took Mary and Andrew to a UConn soccer game so Whit, Annie and I had a spa night.  These two are so unbelievably girly, it's unreal.  They were in heaven.

They wore robes, got facials, listened to spa music and got their nails done.  It was a night of lots of giggling and huge smiles
 

 

I loved that they hated how it felt with cucumbers on their eyes so they just took them off and ate them.  Silly!

First Day of School 2013

School started back oh so quickly this year.  It was like one blink and the summer was over.  But kids were happy to get back and it is a big deal this year because EVERYONE is in school.  Our one and only year with everyone getting home at the same time.

Here are the happy kiddos:

1st Grade Whitney

3rd Grade Andrew

5th Grade Mary

 

The bus stop gang

Annie has afternoon kindergarten and actually slept in through the morning bus.  Thanks to our cross country travels ending right before school started, Annie didn't see the other kids off to school for over a week.  It's been nice that Annie can sleep in this year...I think she gets a little less than a normal 5 year old thanks to older siblings.

SO excited!  Kindergartener Annie.

And, since the first day of school was like 1 1/2 months ago, I can report that all is going well. :)

Oregon (part 5)--the rest

This will really wrap up Oregon.  It's nice to have today to remember it all all over again.  I miss it, I miss being with everyone.   Looking forward to another Singer fam reunion in a few years.  Why do we all have to live so darn spread out?!?

Heading back to Roseburg from the coast we stopped at Honeyman State Park and did some paddle boating.  Talk about a killer leg work out!
Can you tell these kids are excited?!
 

 

There were huge sand dunes. We pedaled over to some big ones and the kids had fun running up and then crazy running down.  Some kids were even sledding and snow boarding down the dunes.

Brittney took family pictures of everyone on Saturday.  Here are Dan and Whitney making someone smile!  

Andrew and Miss Nora.  He would rock her and sing 'baby girl, baby girl' over and over.  It was really sweet.

Clem celebrated his 70th birthday just a week before the reunion so we had a surprise birthday celebration luau for him.  We had fun dressing up Hawaiian, eating Hawaiian haystacks (obviously authentic food), and celebrating his day!

 

 

We went to Wildlife Safari and got up close and personal with some awesome wildlife.  This freaky bird was a little too upclose and got a little too personal.  He reminded me of some birdy dinosaurs in Jurassic Park

Stewart Park in Roseburg.  Roseburg has great parks

 

 

There is just something about dead bodies on a bench pictures that make me smile.

Awesome train!

Singer boys!

Our last day in Oregon we went on a Hell's Gate Jet Boat Tour down in Grants Pass.  It was incredible.  Our boat held like 70 people and we did a 35 mile round trip on the Rogue River.  We did 360 degree spins, sudden stops, big splashes.  I've never done anything like it before--talk about fun.
The way down, Annie felt like it was TOO windy.

 

 

Seriously, Oregon is beautiful

Halfway through, we stopped at a lodge and were served a big lunch.  The lodge was beautiful and the food was delish

 

A really awesome way to spend our last day.  Thanks to Rita and Clem for such a wonderful vacation and for all the Singer brothers, sisters-in-law and cousins for coming.  It was perfect!
And then it was getting back just in time for school to start!