This and That

Well, Marky wrapped up his trip in Rome and came home last Tuesday.  He truly had the time of his life- he LOVED everything he saw and did.  We were thrilled he got to have Mass several times with our former parish priest who lives in Rome now-

He did wonderful tours.  One of the last days they did a counter-reformation tour of all the Baroque churches, which he really enjoyed.   They also went to Ostia Antica, which is a Roman ruin that is very well preserved by the sea.  It's reminiscent of Pompeii.

Ostia Antica-

This theater was built in the 1st or 2nd century and is still beautiful-

There is a medieval castle there as well-

Ostia is where St. Monica (holy mother of St. Augustine) died and was buried.  They put her in this church- Basilica of St. Aurea-

Of course they saw the Trevi Fountain-

One day they did the "Tiber River Race," where they did a grueling run up and down the Tiber River- they covered 17 miles!  They also had a very tricky scholar's bowl on one of the last days of class, and I was told Marc did very well in that.   They would ask questions like, "significant event in 1929".  And the boys would have to go up and do presentations on people and events.  They had a Rome scavenger hunt the last day that took them all over the city in an Amazing Race kind of way.  It sounds like just a wonderful time.

Circus Maximus-

St. Clare's Church in Assisi-

Pantheon-

We were thrilled to greet him at the airport Tuesday night and introduce him to his sister.  He had to fly from New York to Atlanta to home as an unaccompanied minor where you have an airline escort.  He said the flight staff were always shocked because I guess they don't usually have 6 foot 2 14-year-olds in the program.  :)  They still let him visit the cockpit-

Waiting to meet brother- you know Tucker made a sign-

He was so exhausted- he'd been awake 19 hours, but he was thrilled to meet little sister!

And he even came home and gave her a bottle-

The next day we took it easy and he played with her all day.  :)  She has no idea how much she's going to love having this sweet boy as a big brother-

We immediately put him to work building Sissy's play gym- he is our house handyman-

She loves it!  Thanks brother!

Speaking of baby girl, she is doing great.   Here she is on her one-week-old birthday-

Here are the pictures from her first Sunday at church two Sundays ago-

Sweet BB!  She stayed with us for 2 weeks- she has done that for all the babies.  She cooks, cleans, folds laundry and even kept the baby in her room every other night to help us get sleep.  Everybody needs a BB-

And as for baby girl, we are probably spoiling her- we all love holding her!

She does sleep well in her cradle though-

And Anastasia had her 2 week check up on Thursday.  She was 9 lbs, 11 oz and doing great.  :)

And I have taken her out and about now, and she is sweet as pie.  :)

The boys have been busy bees.  They went to a 1/2 day swim camp a few weeks ago.  This past week they went to a day camp at a Baptist church and had a ball.  Daddy took them every morning on his way to work and it was super cute.  They did rope courses, swings, swimming, BB guns, archery, crafts, and games- traditional camp activities-

And we still are crafting and doing science experiments every day.  Like the pencil through the bag of water trick!

The water doesn't come out!

And lastly, a couple pictures from when they dropped Julia off from camp-