Troy and Melanie (dot com)

Just to wrap up our Lancaster trip, Friday held more family time, including a Bujung-Schneider dinner at Friendly’s.  Yum!  Saturday held surprises…for me, at least.  The mommas, B and S, threw me a surprise baby shower, with the help of Troy (successfully confusing me and keeping me off track) and Aunt Jo (offering up her house for the shower).  I thought we were just going down to Aunt Jo’s for lunch with the Schneider clan, but once I walked into the house, I was greeted with a “surprise” as I entered the dining area and a room full of family and friends…and mini Winnie the Pooh and friends goodies.    It was one of those “wait, wha?” moments and I’m pretty sure I hugged 40+ people in the span of seven minutes.  It was such a nice surprise.  Furthermore, I was surprised to see some in attendance.  My Aunt Georgia was to the best of my knowledge in NY, but she had delayed leaving for that trip to come to the shower.  And, speaking of NY, my friend Fran made the trip down to l’il ole Lancaster to be at the shower.  So, that was a lovely surprise too.  The whole afternoon was full of smiles, conversation, catching up, and being wowed by the adorable and useful presents coming our way for the Peanut.  How blessed are we to have such great family and friends!  Thanks to everyone!

That evening, we had dinner at the Schneider abode and worked to pack up all of our stuff.  Then, we hung out at the Bujung abode for a few hours, finally saying goodbye…always bittersweet.  We left the Schneider house Sunday morning and drove to the Philly airport.  Luckily, we didn’t have delays on the way back to Austin like we did on the way up to PA.  We picked up our happy pup and headed home to see to unpacking, laundry, and some general vegging and reflection on the week.  It was a great week. 

So, Troy promises Lancaster posts and then doesn’t do any…tsk tsk!    Just kidding…I’m not much better.  We have been having a good week here so far, keeping busy and visiting with family and friends.  We have today and tomorrow and then we’ll be flying back to the heat (100s, 100s, 100s) of TX on Sunday.  Let’s see…here’s what we’ve done so far (some highlights):

>  Lunch down at Aunt Georgia’s last Sunday

>  Rita’s Italian Ice for a short visit with Hien Sunday afternoon

>  Father’s Day dinner out at Chili’s with both families Sunday evening

>  The Science Factory with Mom and Dad S. Monday afternoon

>  Oregon Dairy dinner with Ang Monday evening

>  Mel going to Central Market with Mom B. on Tuesday for lunch

>  Ang’s tennis match in Harrisburg on Tuesday evening

>  Mel having lunch with Alison at S. Clyde Weaver Wednesday at noon

>  Early dinner with Mom and Dad B. at Ruby Tuesday on Wednesday late afternoon

>  Troy playing tennis at McCaskey with Ang, Leigh, Brandon, and Kevin (Dad S. and I watched) on Wednesday evening

>  Photo session with The Wiebners Thursday morning (with us actually the “subjects”).  Thanks guys…looking forward to seeing them!

>  Mel seeing “The Proposal” with Mom B. and Aunt G. Thursday afternoon

>  Dinner and catching up with Ommie, Jodie, Ollie, JJ, Chrissy, Brett, Derek, Annie, and Ivy (at Ommie and Jodie’s house) Thursday evening

…which brings us to today.  Troy and Kevin went out riding Kev’s bike.  Beyond that, the day is just getting going, so not sure what it holds.  We’ll try to do a wrap up post once we’re back in TX Sunday.  On some general notes, the weather here in Lancaster has been beautiful…sunny and highs in the low 80s for the most part.  We have definitely been enjoying that!  Also, Peanut seems to be enjoying hearing the sounds of family and friends’ voices.  He’s building up a bit of a fan club already.    Okay…that’s all for now.  Toodles!

This is going to be a very short post. I just wanted to get something up before we travel to PA. This past weekend Kevin and Kelsey visited us and we had a really good time. We got to show Kelsey downtown, saw a ton of motorcycles at the ROT Rally, saw a sunset at the Oasis, and did some things around the house (moved furniture and painted). The time went by too quickly. The next time they come to visit Kevin will have a nephew (I know… that still sounds weird). Anyway, here are a few photos. Look for some upcoming blog entries from our trip to PA.

Melanie and I seem to have luck with yard sales. The last one we had we recouped a few hundred dollars and this morning we had another one (making room for Peanut) and we sold nearly $500 worth of things. If you had looked at some of the prices items were sold at you would have been amazed (32″ TV for $22, receiver and speakers for $50, PS2 for $40). The most important thing for us was getting rid of items that we no longer use… mission accomplished.

I ran the sale from 8am until 11am (Mel got to sleep today) and sold nearly everything that was put up for sale. The last item to go was the TV so that should explain the crazy low price. I just wanted to get the dang thing out of the house. Stopping at 11 was perfect… the traffic was thinning out, I was running out of things to sell, and it was beginning to get hot.

Very quick random post here just to share that my boy seems to enjoy a variety of music so far.  Here are a few he seems to get excited to hear (measured by the amount of “inner dancing” I feel going on):

Lady Gaga – Poker Face

Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major

The Boys Are Back and Walk Away from the HSM 3 Soundtrack

Shinedown – Second Chance

Keith Urban – Kiss a Girl

Black Eyed Peas – Boom, Boom, Pow

Kiss – Rock ‘n Roll All Night

So, there you have it…our little music lover. 

Anyone who’s seen the movie Superbad will recognize the name McLovin. We weren’t, however, expecting to find it as a suggested boy’s name on babynames.com.

What do you think? McLovin Schneider?

This looks pretty cool, but we’ll see if it turns out to be as revolutionary as Microsoft hopes.