Beautiful

I love orchids so when we went to the botanical gardens I made sure to go and see them again (I took a bunch of pictures of them last year too).

This was one of my favorites this year. I love the orange-red of them.

Picnic in the Park

Since the weather was so beautiful in Richmond, Mom (Mimi) decided that we needed to have a picnic. It was a wonderful idea. They had found this wonderful park that had playgrounds, walking trails, a lake, and of course – pavilions with picnic tables. When I told Emma that we were going to have a picnic, she got REALLY excited. She got even more excited when she saw the playground. Actually, at that point, she really didn’t care so much about the picnic part of it. All she wanted to do was play :-)

Emmaline even managed to get her Mimi and Papa in on some playground action! There is something about eating a sandwich at the park – YUM!

Here is my beautiful Aunt Elaine along with her husband Ross. They came from Australia to help celebrate my Dad’s birthday.

This little guy was hanging out around the lake and let me capture this picture before he took off. He was beautiful in motion!

It was a beautiful day spent with my family. I was so incredibly happy that I decided to take Emma and make the drive.

She wanted a party

so she got a party!!

Emmaline and I went to see my parents in Richmond, Virginia to celebrate my Dad's birthday. The day before we were to drive out there, she asked me what kind of party her Papa was going to have. I tried to explain to her that Papa was a grown up and grownups don't have parties like that. She then calmly informed me that Papa was going to have a Spiderman party because he was a boy. Since she was so adamant about it, I took her to the store and we got the necessary supplies for her Papa's Spiderman Party!!

My dad was a really good sport about all of it. I know that he would NEVER have chosen to have a themed party, but since Emma wanted it......Emma got it.

The "special" tie that Emma got for her Papa. It says "60 and SUPER"!

Check out the fabulous cake!!

I love you Dad and I hope you enjoyed your "special" party!!! Thanks for being such a good sport about it!!!!!

On our way...

Emma and I went on our first long road trip alone. I packed a ton of stuff for her to do in the car, but the best thing I brought was the DVD player and ALL of her movies. She watched them almost the entire way there. We only stopped three times and got to my parents in time for a steak dinner......YUMMY!!!

Emmaline was already all relaxed before we even got on the interstate. Of course we had to stop at Sonic on our way out of town to get our last fix in for a week!

This was Emma just about 10 minutes before we got there. Something was really amazing to her.....I just don't remember what it was :-)

Family

While my parents were visiting we took the opportunity to snap a few photos of us. I really wanted some pictures of just them and me with them, but of course Emmaline had to get herself in on the action.

I love this picture of me and my mom.

I love you Mom & Dad!!!!