Hannah has two Mommies

Introducing Joy and Sue. These are my super good friends that I've known for about 11 years now. Picture it, Harrisburg, 1998. A Beautiful young cocoa colored boy was walking along the Susquehanna river walking his puppy Golden Retriever. From out of nowhere, two women walking their Golden Retriever puppy started talking to the young boy who was in the prime of his life. That strapping young lad was me and those two women were Joy and Sue. Truth be told, I wasn't that young.

I totally stole that story telling line from Sophia from the Golden Girls. It works though, right?
Well anyway, as we were walking our puppies(I liked dogs at that time), they told me that they were trying to start a family. I told them that Fred and I were wanting to do the same thing too. From that point on, we started to hang out.
February of 2000, they gave birth to Hannah. Well, actually, only one of them gave birth. I am holding her in the picture above. Hannah, not the the Mother. Two months later, Johnny was born. They were the ones who trained us on how to change a diaper. I also give the girls credit for convincing Fred into buying our first home in mid-town. It was condemned with rats, crack whores and missing floors but I loved it and they made Fred see the potential.
Olivia and Joy in October of this past year. Olivia just had a sleep over with Claire the other night. Claire likes to tell her that she is no longer into Princesses. Olivia lives for Everything Princess.
Fast forward 11 years, and we are Fred, Mark, Joy & Sue plus 8. But like all of our City friends, they eventually came to the conclusion that they were too good for us and moved to the West Shore.
This is Johnny and Ethan playing above in front of their new house. Following is a brochure(2 pages) that a neighbor gave to them when they moved in. It is the original advertisement to their house. How cool is that?

Wouldn't you love to buy a house for $4990.00? Since the housing market is crap, that's about all that I can get for ours when we go to sell.
You know, having four kids is a lot of work and a full time job. And even the best parents sometimes need a break. Joy is above trying to get rid of her youngest, Charlie, to Hillary Clinton last year when she campaigned in Harrisburg. Just joking. But, this is actually Joy and Charlie in an AP photo that was everywhere in the news 10 minutes after it happened. Personally, I'd be afraid to hand over my baby to Hillary. I would really have to hate it.

But, as you can see, they made it to the White House to get Charlie back after Obama won. Poor Hillary, she couldn't even keep the baby.

Joy and Sue, thanks for being such good friends.

You Friends, m & f