"Molina" Dinners

[I will explain the quotations in the title later...so don't get hung up on them just yet :)]

For those who may not know, I was born in and lived until age 9, Tucson, AZ (where we currently live). In second grade, while attending St. Cyril's school, I was paired up with a new student to be her "buddy". This new student was Ms. Lynnea Molina.

As the story goes, Nea and I became inseparable. We would walk around the school grounds with our arms on each other's shoulders (thankfully she is just as vertically challenged as I!) and were referred to as the 'bobbsey twins'.

Then, I moved away.....for many many years. We stayed in touch over the years, but as tends to happen, less and less so. Then, I moved back =) And yes, as you can guess, we are once again great friends.

On top of that, she and her hubby Shiloh, have an adorable little girl named Brynn. I have posted about Nea and Brynn before, but wanted to throw out a refresher. We avidly try to do dinners with the families and these dinners (that are usually during the work week) are always the best part of the week!

Now for the quotes....

So, these dinners always include both my mom and Nea's mom, Susan. I always do, and probably always will, refer to them as "the Molinas". This is humorous to me because not only has Susan never been a Molina (she kept her maiden name when married), but now Nea is (and has been for many years) a Strunk. But alas, they are the Molinas to me and we just LOVE our "Molina Dinners"! Watching our children grow up together and having such dear old friends to share the day-to-day roller coaster of parenting with, is such a blessing.

 Here are some pics from some recent "Molina Dinners".

Here, the children are showing off Shiloh's handy work. Yes, he built this kitchen helper stool from scratch off a Pinterest post.

Here, the children are having dinner for the first time at the "children's table", which also happened to be Brynn's new table and at which Brynn was very keen on having the boys sit with her.  In fact, once the boys were done with dinner and decided to move to the playroom, Brynn proceeded to move the table chair by chair into the playroom saying "sit!". Does it get any cuter!?!?!