Sweet Sweet Jane

She's here, she's healthy, and she's beautiful.

Jane Nicholson Hamm

Congratulations to our Bro and Molly B. You are so very blessed, and so is she.

Uncle Jon's here

We're just hanging out coloring, eating Bacino's and awaiting baby Stacey (I mean Jane Nicholson Hamm's) arrival...

Bathing beauty

After bath fun

Torch Lake, Traverse City and Sleeping Bear Dunes

Who needs sunshine when you have good friends, well behaved children, wine, the most beautiful lake, magazines, local brews, and friends who can talk fashion for hours. Another fun and memorable Torch Lake weekend. Eloise loved running around with the boys and being a very independent almost 4 year old.

Eloise driving the boat

nautical boys

s'mores!

all 3 kids won a stuffed animal from the claw machine (mostly thanks to andrew).

can you even believe it? if only i'd gotten a video of the mommies jumping and cheering.

On Sunday we left Torch and lunched/strolled Traverse City then continued our tour of Northern Michigan by exploring Sleeping Bear Dunes. So majestic and beautiful. George lost a croc at the top of one dune, or so we realized when we got all the way to the bottom. Daddy to the rescue!

on our way up

a gorgeous view of Glen Lake

our lake michigan in the background

way at the top with the rolling dunes stretching to the lake

rolling in the deep

now run!

To round out our Michigan travels we played with cousins (although only for too short of a sec), we Woodland malled, Blimpied on the boat and swam in Reed's Lake. Thank you Nonna and GW for babysitting our Maizer for us. She had a great time and didn't even run away...success!

Reed's Lake

Weekend Up North

Eloise taking in the majesty that is Sleeping Bear Dunes (a/k/a the most beautiful place in America).

Georgie "Pavel" Hamm

This boy LOVES balls. Loves. Kicking them, throwing them, walking around holding them, batting at them with sticks, and now playing hockey. Now keep in mind, he has only been walking for 2 weeks...

Recent haps

Eloise spent the week at Emerald City Theatre Camp for their Fancy Nancy theme. She LOVED it so very much. On Friday they had a special performance where the girls showed us how they warm up, acted out different animals, performed a haiku with motions and everyone received an award and t-shirt. Adorable! We took a video of the show too, don't you worry.

best friends alert

performing with her friends

a very dramatic bow

Andrew ran the Terrapin 5k on Thursday near Soldier Field. This is a race that he has missed every other year, and now finally he has the fabulous tie-dyed steal your face dry fit t-shirt. The kids and I cheered him on and enjoyed the after show with Mr. Blotto and Magic Hat beers (my new fav!).

Daddy crossing the finish line (official time just under 20 minutes)

jamming to Mr. Blotto

My friend Stella, who I haven't seen in way too long, called me this weekend to offer me free tickets to see Peter Pan. I took Eloise to the show on Saturday and we had a really fun and special girls afternoon together. The show was amazing (with a 360 degree video screen along the ceiling and actors flying all around the round stage). She was hooked (get it?) and loved the show...at least until she got really antsy after intermission.

flying with Peter, Tink, Wendy, Michael and John

On Friday evening we went to a charity event with good friends. Too bad we didn't get a photo because we were all dolled up and dripping sweat from our hot moves on the dance floor. A really fun night.

Oh, and Andrew bought George his first NHL hockey stick. It works much better for whacking balls than the little green shovel he's been using.

Hamm out.

Summer weekend in Chicago

Saturday evening - a bucket of KFC and PBR tallboys on Montrose beach
a really memorable summer night

George couldn't get enough of the original recipe

"Yeah. I feed my baby fried chicken. I feed my baby what he wants". So gross.

Plus we've been officially street-fested

Other weekend activities included dinner at our favorite Mexican joint - Mayan Palace, lunch at our favorite Irish pub - Cullen's, a free pedicure that I won, the farmer's market, plus Andrew squeezed in (lots of) work. Ahhh, summer in the city.