A very special week

I've mentioned our visit from our dear friends, J and S, and their twin daughters, A and E, but now I'd like to take the chance to fill you in on some of the highlights.

We've known S since high school and J since college, so we go way back.  There's something very sweet about being with people who've known you for long enough that you don't have to make small talk.  We definitely had catching up to do, but all of our stories had the full context of long time friends.  That's always great.   And if you'll remember, J and S adopted A and E in January, so we were thrilled to finally be able to meet these precious girls.

Let me take a quick second to officially introduce them to you.   Please meet...

A.  

Happy girl.

Wiggle worm.

Very close to crawling.

E. 

Sweet girl.

Good eater.

Known to pull A's hair.

I was very happy to finally, finally, finally have these girls in my arms!!

(Please excuse my crazy hair in this picture.)

We spent the first couple days mostly letting S, J, and the girls settle in to being in a new place and figuring out just how we were going to do something with all seven of us...in a time that one of the kids wasn't normally sleeping.  See, A and E take two or three naps a day still (they're seven months this week!), and Busy Bee takes one...during the time that A&E are awake in between their first and second naps.  So...that's a huge chunk of the day!

But eventually, we got our act together and finally made it out to the beach for a whole afternoon/evening. It was bliss!

Family portrait of our guests.  

S with E and J with A. 

Happy family.

My Sweets and Busy Bee explore the surf.  

Unfortunately, thanks to jellyfish season here, 

we had to do most of our swimming in the pool.

Sweets' sister, M,  and brother-in-law, P,  also joined the party on Friday.   M and S were roommates in college, so it was only fitting for them to join the celebration, too. 

We had several other sweet times and exciting and fun adventures, including...

a baseball game...

a trip to the park...

some Mexican Train Dominoes...

 more pool/beach time...

 

lots of Wii time for the boys...

and lots of smiles and hugs!