Auntie Leesha's Visit

So, I've got a ton of updating to do! First off, my computer problem stemmed from insufficient memory. So I bought more; hopefully the computer won't crash before it arrives and I have a chance to install it!

I'll start with oldest events first, and keep the commentary to a minimum. I know all you really want to see is the pictures anyway!

My sister Alicia came to visit for a 4.5 day weekend in mid June. We had SO much fun, and did a ton of fun stuff.

We started off the visit by hiking to Portland's only waterfall, Jewell Falls. Who knew? It was a short hike, but well worth it.

We did a little finger painting too! Or was it face painting?

Saturday we visited Windham's annual Summerfest event. It was... well, interesting. We started off with the parade in the morning - highlight: monster truck-style fire truck. Oh well. No pictures from that, unfortunately.

But here's one of Payson, ready for Summerfest action!

We returned home to do some good, old fashioned puddle jumping! I think Auntie Leesha (as Payson ended up calling her - the Salsa nickname didn't stick) needs to do this more often!

Alicia and I headed to the Old Port for some sister shopping time for a few hours and returned to the Summerfest's live music! Who was on first but the Kora Shriners band! (I had no idea what the Kora Shriners was - they were actually decent, but NO ONE was there!)

At least they had free bubbles. We discovered Payson can now blow the bubbles herself!

Here we are amongst the unmanageable crowds!

Payson had a blast dancing around with me.

Sunday we went to Old Orchard Beach. It wasn't exactly beach weather, which explains our attire. We still managed to have an absolute blast - Payson just LOVED the beach experience. How could you beat it? It's big sandbox meets big bathtub, with birds!

She enjoyed playing with the different textures of sand...

... and being super silly and happy while enjoying a picnic.

Sunday afternoon my mom and Aunt Maryann made the trek up to Maine so they could spend time with all of us together, a rarity. Monday we went to Freeport and had lunch and checked out the fishies in LL Bean. What a great weekend!

We also checked out the hats! Alicia and Payson being silly & hanging loose.

I had to get in on the action, too!

I'm going to do my best to get up to date as soon as possible on here! Check back soon for more updates on the last month's adventures! We have been having a lot of fun this summer, and Payson is just an absolute riot and so much fun to be with. Although she's always been quite a little chatter box, this past week her language has really seemed to pick up concept and sentence structure wise. She also started pretending! What an amazing process to watch and be a part of.