Coincidences

Funny story today...

Sunday night when HAP was at our place, H came up to me at bedtime with the book Animalia, a big alphabet book with great animal illustrations. She's had it at our house since we moved in, I don't know when she got it.

She asks me: "Why did someone write in my book?"

Me, confused: "What do you mean someone wrote in your book?"

And she shows me that on the inside cover of her book there is an inscription.

So I explain that a child owned this book before she got it, and the person who bought the book for that child wrote them a special message in the book.

"Let's see what they wrote to the child!" I said.

The inscription went something like this:

Dear Max,
I think you will grow to appreciate this book more and more as you get older. And someday I hope Wynne will enjoy it too.
Love, Uncle Bob and Janet

And I think:
Max and Wynne...the woman I share an office with has 2 kids named Max and Wynne...and those aren't the most common names!

So I check with my office mate and YES! Her kids have an Uncle Bob and she remembered them getting Animalia from him - over 17 years ago!! She had no idea when or where she donated the book, but it was a long time ago (her kids are in college now) and it found its way onto my stepdaughter's bookshelf! We thought that was pretty funny! Small world!







-The Good Stepwitch

Home again!

Boy, I leave the country for one week, and what happens? The entire banking system collapses! That was quite interesting news to come home to. Also, Texas got slamed by Ike, and there were 2 bomb threats down the street from our studio. Good grief! On the brighter side - my fighting Phillies went on a tear and are in first place right now! Way to go boys!! Knew you could do it!!

C and I got back from Paris on Saturday. What an amazing week. We had such a great time, and I will blog all about it in the next few days, but it just seems too daunting to tackle right now. We spent Sunday lounging around and catching up on sleep. HAP came over for dinner and we ended up having my parents and C's mom over as well for the Eagles game and pizza. It was a very American night - pizza, beer and football - and it was great to see everyone.

Now it's back to the work grind. I am having a tough time getting back into the swing of things (hence the blogging...) but I will buckle down now and get some work done. Here's a picture of C and I in Paris:





–The Good Stepwitch

730 days

Today is C and my second wedding anniversary.
2 years married to a wonderful, loving man who makes me laugh and makes me feel so special.
24 months of being a step-parent to HAP, and growing in patience and love for them.
730 days of ups and downs, but mostly ups, with my wonderful family.
I love you so much C!

xxoo
your wife



-The Good Stepwitch

Mushroom Fest 2008!

It's the beginning of September and that means it's Mushroom Fest Time around here! We live in Kennett Square, the actual mushroom capital of the world, and what better way to celebrate that fact that by having a huge street festival every September? We always look forward to this weekend, and since we live right in town and can walk to all the festivities, it's even better because we don't have to deal with the headache of parking...

This year though, Tropical Storm Hanna cut the festival down to one day. Saturday was a complete washout. But Sunday was so perfect! We only made it to the festival for about an hour and a half, because of soccer games and a longer morning at church, but we got to sample the FOOD which is the most important thing anyway!

Here is the street festival with tons of people and vendors. Sometimes it's almost TOO crowded!! The kids all saw friends from school walking around, and it was neat to see them interact with their buddies.



H and A sampling some festival treats!



HAP with their dessert - Ice Cream from the Woodside Farm Creamery - The BEST in the land... They all got boring flavors like chocolate and peppermint. I celebrated Mushroom Fest correctly by getting Pumpkin Mushroom ice cream, yes it had mushroom slices in it, and it was GOOOOOD!



A nice time at the Festival!




-The Good Stepwitch

Great Finish to Summer

Our family had a great Labor Day weekend - what a nice unoffical finish to the summer. We got to spend lots of time with C's brother and his girlfriend who came up from Louisville for the long weekend. We spent lots of time outside, playing tennis and swimming, did some yard work, watched some baseball and relaxed. HAP is always so excited to see their uncle. Each night when we tucked them in bed, they would ask "When are we seeing Uncle A tomorrow??"

Today was the first day of school for HAP. P started high school, A started middle school and H started 3rd grade. We got to see P off to school because he is going to staying with us most days of the week now that he has started high school. The high school is right across from our house, and that way he can sleep in a little more in the mornings instead of catching the bus from his mom's house at 6:50am. C is very happy with the arrangement, and I think it will be good as well.


-The Good Stepwitch

Dynamo Diva!

H tried out for and made a traveling soccer team for the fall season. She is a very good soccer player - a good athlete in general - and this weekend was her first soccer tournament. It was about an hour away in NJ and she played in 3 games. It was hot, but thankfully not as humid as it could have been. What a long day for her though! Her first game was at 8, her second at 12:30 and the last one was at 4:00. The games lasted about an hour, so there was a lot of down time. Note to self: bring more to do next time. I didn't even have a book! H had her teammates to play with, but C and I got very bored.

Her team is named the Dynamos, and I'm being modest when I say they CRUSHED the teams they played. It was a great start to the season, and C and I are so pleased that she is on a good team with some really nice girls. H played defensive wing and goalie, and no one scored on her when she was in goal which was great. ( and a big relief! It stressful watching your player in goal!) C is so funny watching her play (really, watching ANY of his kids play a sport). He is definitely a sideline coach, and gets very into the game. I kept telling him to relax because this was the first day of the entire season, and we have a long way to go. The team was awarded trophies for tying for 1st place. They also get a patch from each of the teams they play, which was kind of cool. As H showed me her 3 patches from the day she said proudly: "These are the teams I dominated!" Too funny! Way to go Dynamos!

You're not getting by this Dynamo...



Look at the focus...



Proud Dad with his Dynamo...

Marching Band Debut

Friday night was P's first marching band show! It was at a high school about 30 minutes away, so he rode the band bus to the game and the plan was that we would arrive at the game at half time to see the show, watch the second half of the game and take P home with us after the game. It was a good plan. But then it rained.

We got to the game right as the marching band was getting ready to perform - perfect! But even though the game was half over, we still had to pay $20 to get in, ouch. So we go in and watch the show, which was about 15 minutes long. P did great! The whole show was very impressive and looked very polished for being the 1st time performed. P plays the melaphone - here he is in the center:



He was a good marcher:



Next week, the band will wear their uniforms for the first time, so it will harder to pick P out in the crowd! Anyway, the show was great, and afterwards C, the girls and I headed into the stands to watch the rest of the game. And the heavens opened, and it POURED! The only place we could find a seat was in the student section, and when it started raining, the students went a little crazy! C left to go try and find P to set up a meeting place for after the game, so the girls and I were huddled under 2 little umbrellas with a couple of other band parents in the middle of a bunch of crazy screaming teenagers. it was pretty funny. After about 10 minutes, C returned to say the band was leaving early because of the rain, and did we want to stay for the rest of the game?? Ummmm, no honey, that's OK, seeing as we were already down 19 to nothing, and it was um, pouring!! ;-)

So we left, and drove home – sort of a waste of 20 bucks, but we did get to see the show, and P was great and at least it didn't rain on the marching band! Here is HAP waiting under the stands for C to get the car - still a lot of smiles even though they were wet and cold...




-The Good Stepwitch