Willy Birthday 2008

Willy Turned 11 this week. He's very happy to go from cubbies to boy scouts. He got a bicycle to get him back and forth to school.

Here are a couple more shots from Oatlands

These are other images from Oatlands. The weather was perfect.

Oatland's invitational Race

Emily is running cross country this year and doing quite well. Yesterday she had her personal best. She ran 3.1 miles in 24 min and 40 seconds. Her personal goal for the end of the running season was to be under 25 min. She has had a wonderful time and likes to show off her "gun show" by flexing her biceps and her calf muscles.

We've only been able to attend one of her races but expect to go next weekend to her race at Albermarle invitational. The last two invitational meets she has run Varsity. She is a freshman so she has quite a bit time to continue to improve. She has made a lot of social growth as well.

While she was warming up for the race, we went on an outside tour of the Qatland's plantation. It is so beautify that they often hold weddings there. It was one of the plantations owned by the Carter King family. They were the wealthiest family in all of Virginia and owned most of the northern region. Many of the sites we visit have some connection to the Kings.

Here are some more

Here are some more shots from Sky Meadows State Park. It is located on land once owned by Lord Fairfax. It is a beautiful place.

Wow!! its been a long time...

It has been over 4 months since we've blogged. We have continued to do things but have not kept up on this blog. Bill just got a new camera so we'll want to showcase new pictures. Yesterday we went to a place called sky meadows state park. it was a beautiful day.

Lydia's Birthday

Lydia has been having a fun time getting ready to be three. Here is a quick video of her in different activities over the month of April.

Lauril's Birthday

Tuesday the 8th was Lauril's birthday and I'd been telling her for a couple of weeks not to schedule herself for anything and not to leave the house because she had a delivery coming. I left at my normal time in the morning but instead of going to work I returned just before the boys left for school. She seemed very surprised. We got the boys off to school and left. We drove to Leesburg and had a very nice visit. It was a peaceful day but humerously we kept stopping at stores a few minutes before they opened. We missed AC Moore (a craft store), an Antique store, and a Bead store all before they opened. Probably saved me a lot of money. We went to the visitors center and got some neat brochures. We found about Ball's Bluff battlefield. It was a very peaceful walk and Lydia handled it fine. We looked across the Potomac river into Maryland. We were about 40 miles from Harper's Ferry where John Brown had his famous rebellion for which he was hanged. In the evening we went to Bonefish restaurant.

We had a gift certificate. It is a very very nice restaurant in the area. We went to a movie afterward which was Leatherheads which is about professional football in 1925. It stars George Clooney and Renee Zellwiger. It was pretty good but mostly it was just good to be alone together.