• Sharp Family Blog

    Sharp Family Blog

Over the 4th the Coughlins and Rainers had their traditional summer vacation in Ocean City. Sophie stayed with them for the entire week and enjoyed being the most spoiled little grandkid there was. Lauren and I came down for a few days at the end of the week. While the weather the first part of the week wasn’t great, the weather at the end was perfect! Lots of beach sitting, cocktail drinking, book reading, bike riding, treasure burying and just relaxing…. ahhhh. I have about a million pictures, and here are just a few of the highlights.

Lauren’s first real beach day. She wasn’t a fan of the water, but didn’t mind hanging out in her chair or on the lap of her relatives. 
 Sophie is a true beach bum. She could be down there for 8 hours straight, and still not be ready to leave. She had a blast playing by herself, making friends, and running in and out of the water. 
And what’s a trip to Ocean City without renting a surrey?

The whole crew (sans James, who is taking the picture)
 After the week was over, Becky, James, Mom & Dad and all of us visited with Kathy & Dave at their new house in Rock Hall, MD. Here’s Sophie helping Dave and Uncle Ed to clean a fish. She’s quite the little helper. 

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On June 28th Zoe turned 18! Her grandparents threw her a surprise party – and she was really surprised. It was at the Ocean City Yacht Club, and a whole slew of friends and family turned up to celebrate. 

Here’s the birthday girl with Dave
 Zoe, Sophie & Me
Cousin embrace! 
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Over the last month Sophie’s class has been reading and listening to Peter and the Wolf and learning about the various instruments that are played, in part by trying to play them themselves. Here she is trying each of them out: 

Clarinet

Flute (after mom’s own heart here)

Oboe. I’m not sure what is better here, the extension of her tips to reach the reed, or the unique way she has chosen to wear her headband. She has her own style – what can I say? 

Violin
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Today marks Sophie’s last day at the Toddler House at Greene Towne School. It seems like only yesterday she started there, and now she’ll be among the “big kids” at the Primary School. She’s turned into such an amazing, smart and vivacious little kid over the last two years, and I know GTS had a big part in that. Here she is this morning getting ready for her last day (with trusty Benson by her side)!

Here are a few shots of her and the class from this year: 

 The dynamic duo: Sophie & Claire

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We just got home from a weeks vacation down south. Our good friends Carl & Amanda moved to Winston Salem, NC last year and we finally got down to visit them. Sophie had a fabulous time with their daughter Gianna, who is older and therefore much more fun than any of us to hang out with.

The very first thing they did when we arrived was to pull out the fancy dress clothes. Perfect for swinging… white gloves and all.

 We went for a “walk in the woods” (not quite a hike with the little ones), and Gianna was sure to show Sophie the way. Of course, she couldn’t do everything that big kids can do – like stream jumping. One day…

Before and after NC we stopped into Charlottesville to break up the ride. My dad hung the swing that was his, mine & Becky’s and now Sophie & Lauren’s in the backyard. Sophie enjoyed it very much. 
This was a week of many firsts for Sophie. Here she is tasting her first honeysuckle. 

Group shot with Grandma. 

After the second swing through of Charlottesville we headed to Shenandoah, Va. where we rented a cabin for a few days with my parents. They had a canoe at the house that Dave and Sophie went out in it a few times…. her first canoe ride. 
Dad, Mom & Lauren

Another first… Sophie’s first fish! And the only fish caught the whole weekend. With a stick, fishing hook and dental floss no less! 

And the last – and probably most enjoyable first – Sophie’s first s’mores experience (which was actually on the deck at Carl & Amanda’s house). Here’s a shot of Pap Pap giving her some instruction at the cabin. 

Me and the girls… 
What a great vacation! Relaxing and adventurous all in one week. 

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This weekend we headed down to Maryland. We spent Friday night at the Sharp’s new house in Rock Hall, and then Dave had a regatta with the ULYC on Saturday in Oxford, and then we headed back to Rock Hall on Sunday for Mother’s Day. It was an absolutely beautiful weekend weather-wise and so nice to just relax with family.

Dave’s boat came in 2nd at the regatta and he also presented the awards that evening at a party and awards ceremony. This year Sophie was also his helper.

Clapping for an award winner

An attentive listener to an acceptance speech 
The fam
And the very best part of the weekend was my Mother’s Day present – a beach cruiser bike with an attachment for Sophie! We’ll keep it down at the house in MD. We rode around for a while this afternoon and it was so much fun. So looking forward to this summer! 

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It’s hard to believe, but Lauren is four months! She had her check-up last week and she’s doing great.

She’s 24.13″ long, which puts her in the 57th percentile; 13 lbs 14 oz, which puts her in the 47th percentile; and head circumference is 16.5″ which puts her in the 75th percentile.

She’s also big enough for the bumbo seat! She can’t quite reach the toys yet, but likes to sit in it and look around. We also started to give her some rice cereal. She’ll take a bite or two from the spoon, but can’t really keep much of it in her mouth at this point. But she has started to sleep a solid 10-11 hours at night. I’m not sure if we can attribute that to the cereal or not, but I’ll take it, whatever the reason!

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About two weeks ago Sophie went back to CHOP to get her lip corrected. As you’ll recall, back in August Sophie was jumping on the bed, fell off, landed on the bedside table, and knocked her two front teeth back up into her gums, and split her lip. They stitched the lip in the emergency room, but didn’t do the best job, so we had it corrected by the plastic surgery department.

She was pretty nervous about the procedure because we had a lot of time to talk and think about it – as opposed to the last time when it was a mad dash to the ER. But she did great! She was put under and the surgery took about 30 minutes. When she woke up she had about a dozen stitches in her upper lip and it was pretty swollen.

She was a pretty sad girl when she first woke up…

But Dave took her for some ice cream right away! 

And now it’s almost back to normal. You can see that one of her front teeth came back all the way, but the other one has only partly emerged. Now that her lip isn’t so fat you can see the teeth better. But we have a few years before they both fall out and are replaced by (hopefully very straight) grown up teeth. 

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