Parks Family Reunion

Quin's entire extended family lives in Reno, NV and every year they hitch up their trailers and camp out at the lake for a week together.  This year we decided to buck-up and make it happen (with a two-month old in tow).  It was nuts, but it was so much fun!  Seriously, my kids could play in dirt, sand and water everyday for the rest of their lives, so they were in heaven.

Ryland and Great Grandma Bertie

 Sweet babies Rylie and Cate

Miller got to celebrate his birthday at the lake too, which was a bonus!

Birthday cake for Miller and Aunt Jocie

The long-awaited fishing pole from Nanny!

Another bonus!

Miller, Ryland, Cooper, Cate, Jackson, Amelia and Emerson

 These girls played in the sand all day!

Everyday

 Emerson generally likes to be sure to get some in her hair

"water skiing" 

 knee boarding

surfing with dad 

 Emi surfing

Jordan wakeboarding

Quin water skiing

4.5 hour drive to Dallas + 3 hour flight to Reno + 1.5 drive to Lake Lahontan + 1 week in a trailer on the beach with a DOZEN other trailers full of Parks' = worth it!

(factor in the 1.5 hour drive back to Reno + the 3 hour (plus) flight back to Dallas + the 4.5 hour drive back to Houston = still worth it)

Sharkboy Turns Four!

We celebrated Miller's 4th birthday at Oma's house with most of his favorite people in the world - his cousins!  Have you seen the movie The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl (starring Taylor Lautner pre-Twilight)?  I thought it was the weirdest movie I had ever seen, but Miller loved Sharkboy.  He has all of his lines and choreography memorized, it's hilarious!  Anyway, we haven't watched that movie in ages but Miller still has a love for all things shark or should I say "Sharkboy".  So when he requested a pool party at Oma's house, a Sharkboy theme was only appropriate.

We didn't even leave the pool for cupcakes or presents...

Sugar much?

Sharkboys

Emerson, Opa and Grayer

Rocket launch, courtesy of Uncle Scott

Roman, mid-launch rotation.

Photo Op fun:

Ryland's Blessing

My grandpa and grandma Verna, parents, brothers (and their families) and Quin's parents were all able to make it to Houston for Ryland's blessing over the Memorial Day weekend.  Ryland's blessing was beautiful and nothing could have made us happier than to be surrounded by family!

(blessing pics from Stacy go here)

Preschool Field Trip: Fire Station

Our final preschool field trip before the summer break was to the Pearland Fire Station.  Miller asked me to snap a picture at every turn; he was so excited to be there.  When the firefighters suite up in their gear for us, Miller wished he had his own fireman costume on.  Why didn't I think of that sooner?!

ENGINE 5 

Miller checks the back of each fire engine now to see if it's number 5.

In the fire engine...

He had to try out every seat in the house.

Pip squeak

Pretty sure this is his dream job.

Does anyone else think he looks like a pirate in this picture?  Argh!

Future volunteer firefighter

Future princess

Camille, Mitchell, Summer and Miller

Preschool Field Trip: Zoo

Miller really enjoyed our preschool group this year.  Before the summer break we took a field trip to the Houston Zoo with our preschool buddies.

Summer, Mitchell, Miller and Emerson

 We even got to watch the bathing of the elephants!

Ryland and I were ready to get out of the house, so Oma accompanied us to the zoo as well!

monkeying around :)

Ryland Guy Parks

Baby Ryland is here!  He arrived 2 weeks and 1 day before his due date, which turned out to be a big blessing because he weighed in at 8 lbs 10 oz and 21 inches.  Can you imagine how big he would have been in another 2 weeks?!  

Ryland has been such a blessing.  Miller especially adores his little brother and is very tender and loving, it melts my heart.  If you ask him, however, what the baby's name is, he'll tell you he hasn't decided yet.  In fact, that is exactly what he told his Sunday School teacher today after hearing Quin tell everyone his name is Ryland.  I think he feels a lot of responsibility for the name because Quin used to ask him his opinion on names all the time and we never really talked about this one, so he's not sure what to think of it.  We've tried to allure him with cool nicknames like Ry, Rylie and Ry Guy but he's still "undecided".  In the meantime, Miller says we can just call him Buddy Boy.  :)

So here's the story :).  My contractions started around 10:30pm on Tuesday night.  They were pretty short and mild so I convinced myself that they would stop if I went to bed.  About 3 hours later we resigned ourselves to the fact that it was time to get ready to go to the hospital.  We are so blessed to be surrounded by people that are willing and happy to help us, even at 3:00 in the morning!  There were actually three shifts of people in our home to watch the kiddos until my mom got in Wednesday evening.  Thank you thank you!  Anyway, my OB's office is on the same street as the hospital where they deliver, so I never bothered going there for a tour or anything.  I just told Quin to drive to Texas Woman's Hospital and the GPS took us there.  But the sign said Texas Children's University/Women's Pavilion.  That didn't seem right so we asked every person from the valet to the security guards at the Labor and Delivery unit if we were in the right place and they all ushered us on until they couldn't find us in the system.  Everyone was taking their time trying to figure out why we weren't registered at the hospital while I'm in serious pain about to have a baby.  Finally I asked these same people for the third time if there was actually a different hospital nearby called TWH because I thought we were in the wrong place.  They finally conceded that there was a TWH down the street.  What?!  So we rushed to the hospital down the street, slightly flustered and in real danger of having a baby in the car - just kidding.  We checked in at 4am, got the epidural at 5am and then my contractions slowed and we basically waited until my doctor was on call at 7am to start the Pitocin.  She came back at 8:30 to break my water and then Quin went downstairs to get breakfast.  Of course, just as he's riding the elevator down the nurse is calling the operator to page him back to my room because it's time to push.  Luckily, he made it back in time for 15 minutes of pushing and voila - giant baby boy #2!