Brian's Parents.

Brian's parents just left a few days ago after a great 2.5 week visit with them.  They had a little jet lag, but adjusted pretty well : )  The boys LOVED having them here, as did we.  

The first thing we did with them was go to Oktoberfest at Brian's base.  We actually did this with them last year too!  JJ got his face painted for the first time and as you can see, it was a huge success.

I'll be adding lots of posts about their visit in the next few days.

Cantina Del Vesuvio.

Last weekend we took a USO tour to a local winery and had a great time.  We got to help harvest the grapes, stomp the grapes, and then had an amazing lunch and drink some wine!  JJ had a great time collecting the grapes and kept running all over the vineyard.  The winery is fully organic and they do all the grape harvesting by hand.  I'm hoping they don't use the grapes that we stomped for next year's wine though!

The man in the white coat is the owner.  He was kind enough to come talk to us even though he is extremely busy right now during harvest.  This is a family owned business that's been making amazing wine and olive oil since 1951.

Here is their cellar.  They only sell wine from their store, not at stores or restaurants.  The wine was amazing and we got a lot to take home : )

Gaeta.

We went up to Gaeta a few weeks ago for a nice relaxing Sunday afternoon.  We just walked around Old Town, went to Split Mountain, and had a very long traditional Italian lunch.  Going out to lunch reminded us why it's not very enjoyable to go to an hour and a half lunch with 2 opinionated and walking young children.

Owen was excited to go : )

JJ had a great time looking for fish in the ocean.  If you can see it, that's a US Navy ship off in the background.

I had to carry Owen down into Split Mountain.  He was a little leery about being back in the Ergo.

In case you've never heard of it, here's the legend of the mountain.

Chief Brian Harris!

After 6 extremely hard weeks of training/initiation for Brian, he was finally pinned yesterday.  He's been waiting 14 years for this day and yesterday was just perfect!  The ceremony was very nice and JJ did a great job putting Brian's anchor on.  We're so proud of Brian and are very happy we all made it through the training process.

First Day of School.

Last Tuesday was JJ's first day of school and he was really excited.  His teacher moved up with the class, which was great because he kept talking about how much he missed her all summer.  When I took him into class, he immediately went over and started talking with his friends.  I lingered a bit in the classroom thinking he might want to at least say goodbye, but I had to force him to even acknowledge me!  He had a great day and when I picked him up from school his teacher said that he did great being back.  She noticed that he had a growth spurt over the summer and said that he was so excited to see his friends and talked to them a lot all day long.  So basically, JJ grows a lot and talks a lot!  I'm sure the talking a lot will continue for years to come : )

Poor little Owen.  Now with JJ off at school all day he has to start doing chores around the house.  His first chore is helping with the dishes.

Luckily he seems to enjoy it.

Another Birthday Boy!

Today is JJ's birthday!  I really can't believe that he's 4-years-old already!  Time really does fly.  We had a great relaxing day at home today.  Owen had a horrible night last night, so we stayed home from church today to allow for naps.  JJ opened presents, snacked all day long, and ended the night with cupcakes and apple juice.  He had a great day.

JJ waited patiently watching videos on the iPad to open presents.

First present, Batman shirt from mom, including cape : )

Thanks to Oma for the Spiderman "hand"!

Brian taught JJ how to be a professional web slinger.

Owen was super excited for JJ's birthday.

He did enjoy JJ's new car track.

After a relaxing morning at home, our friends came over to play, eat dinner, and enjoy cupcakes.

Owen enjoyed his third cupcake in 2 weeks.

Don't mind Brian's face . . . isn't Owen cute though : )

It was a great birthday.  JJ's already excited to turn 5 though!