Friends, Sonoma and Ben F.

My childhood friend, Grace and her husband and 2 adorable kids came to visit last weekend. Grace and I figured out that we have been friends for 25 years!!! Wow--that makes me feel old...and blessed! I can actually say I have several GREAT friends I have known for 25 years ++!!

In a nutshell, the weekend consisted of amazing food and wine. All of the food cooked at home, which was most of the fun! On Saturday, we went to Sonoma to visit Benziger Winery, which is known for being a very "family friendly" place.

Now I am a huge Bachelor/Bachelorette fan, so I knew a certain runner up from last season's Bachelorette was connected to Benziger, however I did not in any way, go there expecting to see him! Well, Scott, with his celeb-spotting-eye (it's truly amazing) spotted Ben F. walk into the tasting room (and he IS the next Bachelor, for anyone who wants to be in the know) :). I am shameless when it comes to food or reality TV celebs (meeting Morimoto was a thrill for me), so I grabbed my camera and forced Grace to join me in a picture, along with 5 month old Ava!! She is now forever connected to Ben, too!! It was quite the highlight of the weekend!!!

The rest of the weekend was a blast, too....so much wonderful food was consumed. Definitely lacing up the running shoes....tomorrow :)

Ava enjoyed wine tasting :)


Bella looks like she's up to no good....

Kids in a vineyard

Pretty girls

Two boys in the vineyard

The kids had their own wine country picnic

The kiddie table

Matt, Scott and the rascals at Benziger

1st Grade!

Brookey started 1st grade today and I just keep asking myself, "Where did the time go??!" This year was different than the first day of school last year. Last year, I was fighting back tears as my big girl pranced off with her Kindergarten class. This year, I was not emotional whatsoever...but I enjoyed seeing my friends with Kindergartners get all teary eyed!! It's a very sweet, milestone-moment....somehow 1st grade just isn't as nostalgic.

It just amazes me all the things that Brookey can suddenly do that she couldn't last year...ride her 2 wheeler, swim like a champion, tie shoes...read!!! It's amazing what just a few months can do.

She has the same teacher as she did last year, due to her teacher wanting to move up a grade. We love her teacher and I know she's going to have a great year!!



The 1st Graders with Fr. Michael :)


The Posse is back together

Brooke & BFF Maddie who started Kindergarten

Will didn't start anything new, but I couldn't leave him out!!!!

Silly & Serious

More Fun!

We had a great couple of days visiting some friends in Tahoe! The kids and I road-tripped while Daddy stayed home and worked :( We're trying to take advantage of the last few weeks of summer.

All the BFF's :)


Check out his big stick!

Swimming in the snow-melt lake--brrrr!!

Brookey took this pic :)

Indiana 2011

The Rooneys have had quite a busy few weeks. Our first **big** stop was our annual Indiana trip! It went by in a heartbeat and given the sweltering weather, thunderstorms, some bad planning and a trip to the urgent care, I can't say it was one of the best trips we've had.

I was talking to one of my friends who has 3 kids and we were laughing about the fact that every time we come home from a "vacation" with our kids we are utterly exhausted, buried in laundry and feel like we need another vacation to recover! But then we start looking through the pictures and hearing our kids talk about things that happened on the trip and all of the hassles seem to dissipate and we're left with beautiful images of kids having a great time....it makes all of hassle and stress of traveling with kids worth it.

Let's list out the hassles and stress....

1. Waking the kids up at 3:30 am for a 6:00am flight....actually that was kinda fun...they loved it :)

2. Barely walking onto our 6:00am flight after I silently swore we were going to miss it.

3. Arrived right after a tornado in Indiana which left everyone with no power...did I mention it was about 110 degrees and 100% humidity. Yuck.

4. A mean woman on the plane who yelled at my perfectly behaving kids for coloring too hard on their tray tables. Traveling with a 2 year old, she was lucky he wasn't yelling in her ear and peeing on her seat.

5. Too hot to hang out by the lake over the weekend which is usually the highlight of our trip. I was cooped up inside pretty much all weekend. Ugh.

6. Will broke out in an awful rash one day that got so bad we took him to urgent care. It could have been strep, reaction to sunscreen or heat rash. Who knows but it cleared up completely within hours of landing in SF.

7. Driving 6 hours one day to visit my relatives in Illinois, 5 hours the next day, then immediately hopping on a 6pm flight back to SFO...like I said POOR PLANNING!

And now...here are some of the "beautiful images"....yes, it's always worth it!

Quality time with Pops

Brookey, Kate & Will (who is being nice at the moment)
Bathtime for Brookey & Kate

Chasing fireflies
Fun with cousins!


Craft time with Grandma Taylor

Roasting marshmallows with Pops

Backyard races

What's more fun than rolling down a hill?! (or running around without a shirt?!)

Will playing nicely with Kate...for once :)

Brother and sister love at urgent care

Brookey & Livy

Turning some wheels at the shop with Pops

First Camping Trip

After 4 months of planning, we finally packed up the truck and set out for a Rooney Adventure--Our First Camping Trip!! This was Scott's first camping trip EVER, so he got a chance to try being a "Suburban Dad in the Rough" for 2 nights :)

Some of my fondest memories of childhood were camping and I expected it to be no different for our kids. They really had a blast. For a kid, what's not to love about sleeping in a tent, swimming, S'mores, hot dogs and getting dirty running around with their friends?! We went with another family from our neighborhood. Their oldest kid is in Brookey's class at school. The also have a 4 year old and a 1 year old. So we had 5 kids 5 & under running around! Not everything was easy...hmmm....where do I start...

1) Reading the directions wrong, then having our GPS lead us to a "Bridge Out" sign, making a 2 hour drive a 4 hour trip all the while having a kid in the backseat who can hold his pee for all of 7 minutes...just enough time to pull over and pop the potty seat behind a tree a some vacant lot.

2) 4 sleeping bags, one gynormous tent, 2 air mattresses, 4 pillows, 1 potty, 2 ice chests, 4 chairs, 3 bags of clothes, 1 box of supplies, 3 flashlights, 1 lantern, 1 pop up sun shade, 4 towels...2 bottles of wine :)

3) 90 degrees in the afternoon...perfect for swimming but it felt icky coming back to camp in the heat. Luckily it cooled down to perfection as soon as the sun went behind the trees around 7pm.

4) Band-Aids: The campsite was a little rocky and Buddy feels the need to RUN EVERYWHERE. We must have gone through 15 Bandaids and a tube of Neosporin.

5) Buddy eating 2 S'mores with chocolate (AKA: caffeine) and being wired until midnight on Friday!! Hilarious. Note to self: NO CHOCOLATE within 5 hours of bedtime!!!

And of course there were just the regular hassles of taking kids places....someone has to pee, someone isn't sharing, someone wants to go swimming, someone doesn't, someone doesn't like hot dogs, someone needs another cup of water, someone spilled their juice, someone fell and needs a Bandaid, someone needs a nap...on and on. But honestly, overall, I would consider our first camping trip a GREAT success!!! I would do it all again next weekend!!! I know all the kids on the trip had a great time since they were all asking when we were going to go again. And we did actually get some "adult time"after the kids went to bed (Buddy joined us on Friday!!), and it was nice to catch up with friends.

All in all a great time. I am already looking for a next great place to go. The problem is there are about 5,000 AWESOME places within 3 hours from us.....where to go next??!!

They were amazingly upbeat on the 4 hour nightmare trip!!!!


First night roasting marshmallows!!!!
S'mores!!!!


Buddy ate S'mores and was up until midnight wired on chocolate!!!

Brookey and Adam :)

She spent hours on the "beach" collecting rocks and shells

He's the Number One boat rider! "Blue boat again, please?" He's a boater!!!

What's not to love about a nap on the beach?!

The Rooneys brave the Great Outdoors!

Chillin at camp

Camping doesn't stop potty training! The potty was our most-used item!! I wasn't going to submit him to camp toilets just yet :) (He's definitely going to kill me for this pic someday!)

He's a man of leisure!!!

Like a good Boy Scout, he leaves camp cleaner than he left it :) Helping me haul out the trash

Swimming Fools on the 4th

We spent the 4th of July in Fresno where I expected to completely ROAST in 100+++ degree temps. Luckily, I prepared for the worst so I was pleasantly surprised. 105 isn't all that bad as long as you're in the pool!! Which is exactly what we did all weekend!

Brooke hit a huge milestone of jumping off the diving board which I didn't expect her to do for at least another 5 years...just knowing the type of kid she is! She shocked us! I suggested she give it a try and told her to go stand on the board to see how it felt. When she was up there she asked me, "Mommy, will I drown?" Of course I assured her she wouldn't, and 3 seconds later she jumped right in! After a few more times, she got brave and swam the length of the pool, too. So proud of her!!!

Buddy on the other hand is fearless and he would jump off a 10 meter board right now if we let him!! He spent his pool time jumping off the side at least 125 times. HAPPY 4th!!!!!!