Last Friday my Mommy Group pals came alllll the way up to my house! Yeah! I was so excited and happy to have them come over. Most of them live in/around/close to Gig Harbor. So, in the summer they meet at a park and in the dead of winter they take turns inside each others houses. I'm always going to their homes, eating their goodies, letting my kids mess up their toys : ) So, I couldn't wait to have it be my turn to play hostess. Unfortunately, two of the gals had to cancel that very morning because their children started vomiting (yucky for them). We were quite sad to be missing them, but still managed to have fun. Our meetings are called "Mommy Group" and not "play group" which means it's more for the moms than the kids : ) We plan a brunch type snack for the moms and make the kids go play in another room. It's amazing that with 26 kids total--and sometimes all 26 are present at the same time--we've never had to call 911 for life threatening injuries. The kids are pretty good at working out problems on their own. Occasionally we have to pry ourselves away from the food and gabbing and go help them out.

Here's the table. All of the moms were non-coffee drinker prior to children--now they are all respectable addicts. Some of us still use tea instead. We enjoyed orange-blueberry scones, double dutch chocolate scones, strawberries with cream, coffee and tea for our morning graze-session.

Here are the kids having a kitchen floor picnic lunch of pb&j, cheese sticks and fruit cups with chocolate pudding for dessert. The moms went straight from enjoying our snack to eating a blackberry-pork salad with rosemary-apple bread (THANK YOU HEATHER!) lunch. We had mocha truffles for lunch. Yes, we are all foodies.

Cousins eyeing each others plates.

Poor little H had to be stuck in the high chair. It was for his own safety. Caroline, who is hardly any younger than him, decided to be his mom that day. She terrorized him with hugs and kisses and kept bringing him things. At one point she shoved him into an infant carrier car seat (not his), covered him with a blanket (not his) and said "nigh, night baby!".

We had so much fun with Mommy Group, that one unnamed member decided to lock her keys in her car while her vehicle blocked the driveway where the other vehicle was parked and prolong the good times : ) Eventually the other driver was convinced to back out over the grass and curb and get the 8 kids already strapped into car seats howling their lungs out back to their own homes. The locked-out mama was stuck waiting at my house until the police arrived to free her keys. I sure enjoyed a little extra chat with her!

I thank and praise the Lord often for my Mommy Group. A lovely bunch of women who love the Lord and want to raise their children to His honor and glory. It's so fun to share our experiences and get advice from one another. The common bonds of sisterhood and motherhood keep us close. I so wanted to get more pictures, but I was too busy with other things.

Now, on to the rest of the weekend. Saturday was a restful day and Sunday our favorite J family (just kidding other J's--we love you all equally) agreed to come over for Sunday dinner and the afternoon.

Mr. J has always been rejected by Caroline in the past, but after much coaxing he totally won her over Sunday afternoon. She was taking him by the finger and leading him around.

The kid table. The older two J kids sat at their own table--the "in-betweeners" and us adults got the big table to ourselves since Caroline napped all through lunch--ahhhh.

Caroline and the only "Miss J" (JMJ3) had fun playing outside with the boys. We had snow in the morning, but the sun came out for the afternoon and set the mountains glittering like crystal. It warmed up all the way to 50 also, making it truly a beautiful day. The kids knew how to make the most of it!

Look at that follow through : ) His sports teacher in his toddler class is always patiently reminding them to have an "ice cream scoop" follow through when they make a shot.

JMJ 1 was tall enough and then some to dunk.

JMJ 4 makes a shot while JMJ 3 shows off some dribble and pass skills in the background

The kids all did some water color painting real quick before we hopped back into the cars and made the trek into Kirkland for gospel meeting.

Look at the concentration!

JMJ 1 offers some advice from the wisdom of his advanced years.

We sure enjoyed our weekend. Now it's into another week--Mondays are hard after all the weekend fun, so both kids are happily napping.

Also, thanks Mrs. J for sharing some of your photos.