Yay Emme!!!

My beautiful god sister Emme came to visit earlier this month. This was a highly anticipated visit first off because we haven't see her in 2 whole years AND it was her first time to California! We had a fantastic time, enjoying her company, exploring LA and trying our best not to persuade her to move to CA as we promised her mom Jenny we would do. Here's how we kept busy:

We picked up Emme on a Friday afternoon and then had her buddies over to our place for a sushi dinner. Meet the Lash brothers! Both originally from FL like Emme but Jesse is out here for a summer internship and older bro Jon was out for a visit. Serendipitous timing! We had heard much about these boys and we glad for the chance to meet them.

Here we are at our place:


Out for some fro yo...there was much discussion about where to find the best fro yo in LA:


At the Beverly Hills sign (we went on a driving tour):


And Rodeo Drive:


The next day we rented bikes and explored Venice beach. Tandem bicyles take MUCH more coordination that you would think. Thankfully Emme was better at leading that I was;)








We also saw some street performers:


Hit the Santa Monica Pier for some Ferris Wheel action:






And introduced Emme to In N Out. A guy named Zander served us, how fitting. (Emme's brother's name is Zander!)



The next day, we took Emme around Hollywood to take a look at things:





Monday was fourth of July and we went to Dani and Greg's just like last year. Only this year we had Emme and Ivy June was healthy(!) and could join in the fun. Ivy June and Emme were fast friends.


We had some bocce action...





On Tuesday I took Emmme for a tour at WB. All the pics were on her camera but here she is with Emmy Awards! Get it!? Emme with Emmys?


And here I am a sad girl, leaving her at the airport. I almost didn't let her go but figured that wouldn't end well with her parents.....just a hunch.


Thanks for coming Em! We love you!

Our first trip to Disneyland!

Can you believe we've never been to Disneyland? We've been in Los Angeles for 2+ years and we're only just now getting around to it. It's crazy. I mean, look, we were there for about five minutes and Rhianwen already felt right at home.


Seriously, Disneyland is mega-awesome. We've been missing out. Where else do you get to see an elephant showering on a jungle cruise?


Nowhere, that's where! And look, Bert and Mary! It's a jolly holiday alright!


I crashed a cartoon car into a mailbox!


Sorry dear! Maybe I can get the spare parts we need at the ol' five and dime!


Oh crap! It's Sweetums! Run!


I think seeing some of the Muppets just about blew my mind. Apparently they have a "experience the Muppets Show" type thing at California Adventure, the park we didn't go to that day. Oh well, guess we have to go back! Here's a shot of Kermit and Piggy, we almost missed them.


Thanks to our friend John who used his super cool VIP powers to get us into Disney for free! Rhianwen and I had a pair of perma-grins on our faces for just about the whole day, thanks to him. You're a great man, John!

Rhi and Benner's summer 2010 trip to Philly!

Philly! Has it been that long?

I guess it has been that long. A couple weeks ago, Rhi and I made our pilgrimage to the city of brotherly love. We visited with friends and family, ran in the Gary Papa Run 4 Your Life prostate cancer run and sweated our butts off for 9 days. (Someone has to do something about that humidity. Sheesh!) Here's a slideshow of our visit, followed by some notes:




- As I mentioned above, we ran in the Gary Papa Run 4 Your Life race, which was wh that at prompted this trip. This race marks the one year anniversary of Gary's death, and we miss him so much. It was a blessing to see Kathy and the boys, and we were honored to cross the finish line with Tucker who completed the whole race! We were very proud and enjoyed that time with him and of course Nathaniel as well who finished on his own. Thanks to everyone who participated and/or donated to the cause. You will be glad to know that the money we raised for the run was matched the morning of the run by Jim Dougherty, and the event raised over $250K for Prostate Cancer research for around 3,000 runners. Gary would be amazed.

Here are some additional highlights:

- We got to see both Chuck and Ray for father's day, which was great. Chuck came over to Jen and Rob's for dinner on Saturday night, and we met up with my dad (and my grandpop and most of the Benner clan for that matter) after the race on Sunday.

- We also got to eat and drink at McShea's a couple times. Man do we miss that place.

- Thanks to Jen, Rob and their incredibly cute boy Aiden for being such excellent hosts! We spent our first few nights in their guest room and it was like staying in quaint B&B with a cute kid and goofy dog running around.

- Joe and Meryl went out to dinner with us, which of course was a wonderful treat. We miss Joe and Meryl, a lot, all the time. They should move to LA. So should you!

- Matt and Jenn Lozano, of the Naylor's Run Lozanos, happened to be out of town while we were in town. Which was a bummer as we didn't get to see them much - but we made lemonade with those lemons when they said we could stay in their house while they were gone. Yay! Free house all to ourselves! It was actually a really nice blessing and we are so thankful for it, and were even more thankful when they came back on our last night and hung out with us. (Which also happened to be the night that USA lost to Ghana, but whatever.)

- We got to see Gwenyth, Rhianwen's mom who brought us some toys made by children in Liberia that had been given to her 30 some years ago. Gwenyth is working on a massive cleaning/clear out project in their house and rediscovered these treasures. The children that Gwenyth met in Liberia didn't have toys so they made their own - an old ovaltine can and wooden spools of thread were repurposed to create a car - see the photos to see what we mean. We got to bring one of the toys home with us and have it proudly displayed in our living room. What an interesting story!

- We got to see Miss Abigail, Greg and Trish's beautiful baby girl --- and of course we saw Greg and Trish! It was nice to just hang out at their place and marvel at all the new things Abigail is doing. She enjoyed putting things in Rhianwen's purse and we may have made it back to the left coast with a puzzle piece or two. She is a doll!

- The Lozano kids are getting bigger and bigger - and more and more grown up! Jamie was going through Vacation Bible School that week and he and the cousins performed a couple of the songs they had recently learned - with much excitement and vigor! Lots of jumping and song all for Jesus. Fun to see!

- We got to see the lovely Chandler and Maureen as well! They are quite the happy and handsome married couple. Maureen made a most scrumptious monkey bread and joined us for a dinner filled with laughter and stories. I always enjoy watching Maureen interact with kids - she is just so good! You'll see her holding a content Abigail. You'll see the moments I captured with just me were pre bed time and I wasn't as lucky:)

- We had a great visit with the Benners and walked through Grandpop and Grandmom's house for the final time since it is up for sale. One cool piece of history includes a servant call box personalized for Mrs. Strawbridge! There is a photo in the slideshow above. Grandmom's garden is thriving and beautiful thanks to her faithful hands and hard work. A nice gift to the new people who will live there.

- We always enjoy seeing our family, our parents (and Benner's brothers) of course but also aunts, uncles, cousins and hearing anecdotes about daily life. Everyone is keeping busy and its great to be able to catch up in person! Aunt Marge, Lia, Dave and the kids, big boy Matthew, Babe and Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet, Steve, Maddie, Regs and Stephen, Uncles Richard, Robert and John....family is a gift!

- As always, it was an extremely busy trip in which we crammed in as much as possible, and we were so thankful to get to see all the people that we did. We certainly love all our Philly peeps!

Sarah's baby shower!

That's right! That baby is comin', which means we gotta shower it! So Rhi, Gwenyth and I headed up north to San Francisco to give that baby the ol' what for!

Rhianwen managed to pack our entire kitchen into the back of the Versa and made the trek 8 hours north with her Mama (for work reasons, I was to follow the next day via aero-plane.) We had a big task ahead of us: shopping, cooking, decorating, baby showering, puppetry... Rhi had a vision for Sarah and Steve's baby, and I think we achieved it:
















Of course, it was a labor of love. (Get it? Eh?) But we are so excited to welcome little Benneretta Wilson (still trying to win them over to this name) that we were glad to do it. Here's Sarah and Steve (and us too) enjoying all the super cool loot they got! Er, I mean the baby got.





The above quilt was made by my amazingingly talented Great Aunt Jean -- isn't impressive?

And a super special thanks to Mama/Gwenyth, Carrie and Nicole who helped out with much-needed details for Sarah's shower. Also, thanks to Rhi's cousin Tegwyn and her partner Carmen, who we were blessed to hang out with and who were also suckered into helping us prep some food at the last minute.

Also we had a great time hanging out with them. Can't you tell I love my cousin?


Thanks guys! Only 3 weeks to go until Baby Wilson!