Cape Cod

For the 4th of July we decided to take a trip up North to visit Jack's best friend, Mike in Cape Cod. Well actually his best friend, Mike's wife, Lauren's parents' beach home. Phew, see why I didn't lead with that? 

Anyways, Cape Cod was the agenda on this family vacation and we made it a good one. Once we got there...

Cape Cod is actually a bit of a drive from Boston, and Boston is a ways from Austin, so after 2 connecting flights, a rental car, lost luggage and a 4 hour drive to the Cape (because of 4th traffic) we FINALLY made it to our lovely hotel...

The boys (and Jack and I) were thrilled to be off our butts for the first time in 12 hours! Once there, we unpacked what little we had and decided to get a delicious lobster pot to celebrate our crazy travel day. Unfortunately my camera was part of the lost luggage so you'll have to bear with me with the boys' outfits and my lack of pictures :(....

After sleeping off the travel day, we woke up bright-eyed and bushy tailed and made our way to a ferry to catch it to Martha's Vineyard. 

The boys were really excited to get on a boat. James was SO excited in fact, he tried to jump off the boat on multiple occasions. Gotta love him, he's a daredevil this one :). 

Jackson of course made friends on the ferry and they adopted him for the remainder of the ferry ride. No really, the mom told me to leave him and walk away. So I did as I was told and sat a few chairs down to keep an eye on him...

Once in Martha's Vineyard we went to a small town named Edgartown and had a delicious seafood lunch and wandered around while the boys slept...

 

 It was all so lovely. Jack and I have never seen architecture quite like this, or flowers, or food. It was all good.

On our way back to the ferry home we drove by 'Jaws Beach' where the movie, Jaws was filmed and there were kids jumping off a bridge that clearly read, 'DO NOT JUMP OFF BRIDGE'. Jackson asked to go back and jump off the bridge when he was bigger and had eaten all of his vegetables. Fat chance...

 That night we invaded the Roda house and pretty much stayed there the remainder of our trip (also our luggage was returned so the following pictures are taken on a camera and the boy's outfits are back to their 'normal' attire)...

They were so sweet and fed us all sorts of yummy breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Lauren and Mike just had a baby girl named, Juliet and she is pretty perfect. 

The following day was the 4th of July and we were decked out in our red/white/blue best for a day full of parades, food and rainy day fun! 

 Look at all these people doting on sweet Juliet! No joke, even her diaper changes were this eventful! Lauren and Mike are the most perfect parents (so that's where Juliet gets it) and her grandparents are awesome.

 The boys loved her too, Jackson was so sweet with her and James tried to pull out her hair, (that's how he shows love).

 After breakfast was the neighborhood parade...

 Best friends and babies :)

 ...and then it started to rain. And rain. And rain. So apparently there was a little tropical storm that hit the east coast by the name of Arthur (you might have heard). It wasn't terrible, but it did put a damper on some beach plans. The boys were so good all day long so when Jackson asked to dance and play in the rain we obviously said, yes.

These boys are the best. Even when they are soaked to the bone and wearing life jackets in backyards. This is what life is all about. Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Roda, Mike, Lauren and baby Juliet. Your generosity and patience were everything and we had the best 4th of July we could have ever hoped for!

Row Your Boat

We like to be outside, A LOT, so naturally we thought it'd be fun to rent a canoe one sunny afternoon for the boys to enjoy. What a great idea--let me tell you! 

Often times we take the boys to walk/run around Lady Bird hike/bike trail, but our James has never been ON the lake before. Since his older brother is such a pro at all things water related, Jackson took the ropes this time around and showed James all about a canoe (or what little he knows).

He made sure to tell James and I to, "not touch" the 'peddles' (paddles) because only him and Dada were going to row our boat.  

James and I didn't mind. We were too busy taking pictures anyways...

 It was a successful trip in my books. I mean, I did have to keep James from jumping over the boat the ENTIRE time, but he thoroughly enjoyed the ride. So did Jackson, he managed to stick to the 'peddling' for the entire canoe trip without getting tired!

We decided to celebrate the successful boat ride with oysters, champagne and a banana pancake for the boys. WIN! 

Dinosaur Zoo

I know what you are thinking. Why haven't we talked about dinosaurs in a minute? It's been too long! Well chill a second because this past Saturday we attended 'Dinosaur Zoo' at the Long Center in Austin.  

 We honestly didn't have a clue what this was going to be like, only that Jackson would obviously like it and that James obviously didn't have a choice.

 These puppets were pretty cool, I must say. The puppeteers were also pretty entertaining. They engaged the audience during the entire performance and picked kids at random to join them on stage. Jackson and I tried desperately to get him selected, (at one point he was half way on stage before we called him back) but alas, they picked other kids besides our cub :(

No matter though, he was soooo happy to just be there. Jackson's eyes were GLUED to the stage and James loved it too. He was dancing like a crazy guy, (which is typical James fashion, it had nothing to do with the show. The kid just dances. A LOT. ALL the time). 

 During the second half of the performance the puppeteers told us that "THE T REX HAD ESCAPED!" and they were looking for him up and down the audience. I thought Jackson and James were going to be scared about this (I kind of was) but they didn't flinch. James was kind of disturbed by the triceratops on stage, but other than that he braved the performance like a champ.

After the show the boys had the opportunity to meet and greet the dinosaurs out in the front of the auditorium and we asked Jackson if he wanted to meet them but he told us "No, I just want to eat my sandwich outside and have a picnic". So we did just that....