The Brown Brick Road

Capturing our adventures one photo at a time...

I ❤️ NY!

As I mentioned, Maxwell read 100 Books this summer and earned a fun surprise. I decided to combine that surprise with an early birthday present and took him on a trip – just the two of us – to New York City! We left on Friday and I didn’t tell him we were going until that morning. His reaction was very reserved – not surprising at all! ha! I could tell he was super excited though!

At the airport, ready to go!

airport

Maxwell learned a lot of things this trip starting with the joys of flying Delta through the Atlanta airport! Our flight was delayed 1 hour because of air traffic issues then delayed another 2 because of a mechanical issue! Arrgh! After getting a new plane and a complete terminal change, we finally took off to NYC! While we waited Maxwell spent the time with his new favorite hobby – putting emojis on pictures on my phone! ha!

friday

We landed at LGA around 8pm. Welcome to New York! 🍎

new york

Maxwell then got to take his first taxi ride!

taxi

We got to our hotel (which was right in Times Square), threw our stuff down, and headed out to see the sights! I forgot just how insanely crowded and overwhelming Times Square is!

times square

times square

We had planned to go eat at Ellen’s Stardust Diner but, since it was so late, the wait was way too long. We decided to just walk through Times Square and grab a piece of NY pizza instead. Perfect!

pizza

We also stopped into the M&M store (crazy crowded) and then got Maxwell a giant pretzel!

pretzel

We made it back to our hotel just before 10pm to finally eat our pizza. It had been a LONG day but Maxwell was so hyped up and excited (as was I!) I wasn’t sure we were ever going to be able to go to sleep. But, we had to get some rest because we had a FULL day planned for Saturday! Details tomorrow!

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Show me your smile

Happy Monday! We went to the dentist last week and all 3 kids got great checkups!

dentist

dentist

dentist

dentist

dentist

I was super proud of all of them. There was no fussing, no complaining, no issues at all!

dentist

The movies on the ceiling help!

dentist

The dentist said Spencer’s injured tooth is still looking good and not loose at all. Yay! He said Samantha really should think about getting rid of her paci soon. Eek! He also said Maxwell probably won’t lose his first tooth for another 6 months or so (much to Maxwell’s dismay!).

dentist

Overall a great report! We love good dentist reports!

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100 books

In an effort to keep Maxwell reading this summer, I challenged him to read 100 books. Considering how competitive he is, I knew this would be right up his alley! I really had no idea how long it would take him but it turned out to be the perfect amount of books to try and read in 3 months. There were some days he read a few, some days he read none, but it mostly kept him reading at least one book out loud to us before bed every night. Some of the books were easy for him, some of the books were really hard for him, but he read all 100 himself! I am SO PROUD of him! and I think he’s pretty darn proud of himself too!

100 books

He asked if he could take his list of 100 books to show his new teacher on the first day of school! 🙂

Of course, the challenge also included a big prize at the end. At first he wanted an iPod, but then I hooked him up with Amazon Music on his iPad and he thinks that’s pretty cool. I also gave him some new wristbands (he’s obsessed) which he also thinks are pretty cool.

wristbands

He’s thinking he also wants a new Alabama jersey but I have something else up my sleeve…something I know he will think is beyond pretty cool! Tune in next week to find out what I’m going to surprise him with. It’s a BIG, fun surprise and he deserves every bit of it. This kid is the best – smart, kind, responsible, funny, outgoing. Yep, he’s pretty cool!

mbb

mbb

mbb

I sure do love him and can’t wait to see his face this morning when I tell him the big surprise! 🙂 HAPPY FRIDAY!

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Summer nights

Just soaking up the last bit of summer…

summer

summer

summer

Nothing better than ice cream on a summer night!

Summer camps

We’re in the home stretch of summer! Only two weeks left until school starts. While I think we’ll all benefit from a little more routine, it’s really been a great summer – just the right mix free time and activities. I signed the kids up for a few camps and I think all of them were hits. At the beginning of the summer, Maxwell did basketball camp at Samford and Spencer and Samantha did Apple at their school…

camps

camp

Maxwell liked basketball camp fine. I think it was a little overwhelming for him so we’ll see if we do it again. The others had fun at Apple and Samantha got to do carpool for the first time! 🙂

carpool

The boys then did VBS. I can’t say they loved it…but they were with all of their friends and had plenty of fun.

vbs

Watching their end of the week performance was funny…Spence was up in front doing his thing while Maxwell was almost completely behind the podium by the time it was over! ha!

vbs

vbs

Maxwell then did flag football camp which he thought was awesome! I was afraid he was going to melt out there on that field every day but, thanks to some inside gym time and Gatorade, he did just fine.

flag football

Spencer and Samantha did another week at Apple and it was water week so that made it extra fun. Maxwell also got to take a water gun to flag football.

water week

Finally, just last week, Maxwell did baseball camp at Samford. By far and away his favorite camp this summer! Being out on that hot field didn’t bother him one bit! He LOVED it!

camp

I loved seeing him all geared up each day. He’s growing up so fast and I just love the kid he’s becoming. I mean, how cool does he look?!

baseball

Mix all of these camps with a few fun trips and the adventures with Mrs. Susan and it adds up to one fantastic summer! Let’s see what all we can pack into these last two weeks!

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