Flowers

This is the first time I have ever planted flowers that not only lived, but really flourished! These plants were tiny back in May. I fully expected them to shrivel up and die from excessive heat or get pounded by hail. It has been hot and we have had hail yet they have persevered. I would like to think my family is the same way. Our roots here are strong!

Two Birthdays

Today we celebrated Tea's 10th Birthday!  It is unbelievable how fast the last 10 years really have flown by but at the same time, I can't remember much of my life without her either.

 She was thrilled with all of her presents.  She now has $50 burning a hole in her pocket and a dwarf hamster name Rue.

 Both Tea and Boo chose to celebrate as a family at Build-A-Bear Workshop.  We went once before, but it was a long time ago.  What a cool place.

 All of the kids enjoyed making bears and other creations, and it was really cute to watch too.

 Tea doesn't like cake or many traditional desserts for that matter so she chose banana bread muffins instead.  They were really good and I made quite a few extras to have for breakfasts as well.

A few days prior, we celebrated cute little Boo's 7th birthday.  She is so sweet and tiny too. 

 It wouldn't be a birthday without balloons now would it?

After dinner and a dessert of s'mores she and the other kids enjoyed playing games in the backyard with her new dart gun.  Here she is practicing.  Adorable!  I love these kids and feel so blessed to have such good times together!

Build-A-Bear Birthday Fun

I cannot believe sweet Tea is 10!

Birthday Ice Cream

Yum, Dairy Delite!

Birthday Lunch

Late Nights

It's late and I really should be in bed. Instead, I am up, enjoying the quiet and thinking about how tomorrow a very special girl turns 7! I am also thinking about the fact that we have several dentist appointments first thing in the morning, which is never fun. But I am thankful that we are able to go and that the kids have healthy teeth! Afterwards we will take the birthday girl to lunch and wherever else her sweet heart desires! My dear baby will be up early for sure, he is training to become a Ninja Turtle and an early breakfast is a must!

Working Out

It seems like no matter what kind of diet plan I try to follow, I always experience short term weight loss followed by gaining all of the weight and then some, back. It is a frustrating process than I am very tired of. One mistake I have made was quitting exercising. As a family yet have now been regularly exercising for 3 months. It feels great. We have variety in what we do from walks, the gym, swimming, and work out dvd's.  Our diet is better but certainly not perfect. The weightloss results have been slower, but I am happy to be making changes that will last!

Starting to Harvest

Yeah, I know harvest is quite the stretch, but we are actually growing things. It has been a long time since we have been able to have a garden, so this is pretty exciting stuff!

Summer Nights

Softball is winding down. The girls have three more games left. It has been such a joy to spend a couple of summer evenings a week at the ball park. Even the little ones sit so patiently on the bleachers watching the games. The weather tonight was cool and beautiful. Both girls got to try out a few new positions which was fun for them. I think we all agree this has been an enjoyable season!

Garden Update

The good news about all the rain, is the garden is exploding. We have more tomatoes than I can count and pumpkin, peppers, and squash are coming along nicely. I haven't been able to weed because the rain just won't stop long enough!

It's Raining, It's Pouring!

This has not been a nice weather week. It has rained, or more accurately poured every day. We have managed to stay busy despite not really spending time outdoors. I got the oldest two girls' homeschool evaluations completed and that has been a huge relief. I always feel like I can't really move on to the next year before that's done. 

Chiggie stayed the night at a friend's house tonight so I took the little kids to lunch. We had fun and it was nice to chat with Tea while the younger kids played. Their game was rained out tonight so we got ice cream instead. Tomorrow I need to mow the backyard (I mowed the front before the rain started back up) and maybe even weed the garden.

One Step Closer

I just submitted my final paper for my 2nd summer session course. One more summer course and I am on to the Fall, which is my last semester as an undergraduate student! I will be done on November 30th which promises a nice and relaxing Christmas, well at least academically! 

A Typical Summer Day

While summer does tend to be more relaxing than the rest of the year, sometimes it amazes me how busy we still are! For example today I:

Grocery shopped for the next week

Cleaned the house up

Made 3 meals

Took the kids swimming

Took the kids out for frozen yogurt

Mowed the front and back lawn

Went to the gym and did 50 minutes of cardio

Prepared a 15 slide PowerPoint presentation for my class

Whew, I am tired just thinking about it! Everyday doesn't look exactly like this, but we are fairly busy most of the time! I enjoy this time though as a busy mom to young kids!

Hot Hot Hot!

There is no better place to be than the pool on a hot hot hot day!

Yikes!

Seriously, I think we are done with sports you play with a bat. The last accident involved poor little Buster. He was spared a visit to the ER and instead we steri-stripped his cut. His eye is black and blue but he says it really doesn't bother him. Needless to say there are no bats left in the house!

Nature Study!

The Sweetest Season

 The King had one more day of vacation left, so we packed a picnic and headed to the beach for the day.  It was much hotter than normal and the water was actually warm.  The kids spent almost the entire afternoon actually in the water.

 Buster loves to build in the sand.  Somehow, we forgot our buckets and shovels this time, but he was creative and used a water bottle and his hands to dig and make tunnels of water.

 This view never gets old and no matter how many times I see it, I cannot believe it's right in our neighborhood!

When the little kids got tired of swimming we spent some time at the playground.  I was surprised it was just us today, but it was really hot. Later in the afternoon Tea and Midge had softball practice which is also at the lake.  Afterwards it rained really hard and cooled off, making for a very pleasant evening.

Estes Park

Yesterday we headed up to Estes Park for some food and shopping! It was a beautiful day and nice and cool too. We ate at Smokin Daves and it was delicious BBQ! I think the kids enjoyed the sweet shoppe the most, yum!

4th of July!

 What a wonderful 4th of July we had!  I was nervous about the weather nearly all day, but other than that we had so much fun. 

 Buster enjoyed riding the train even more this year.  I think he likes the predictability!

 We brought some fun games to the park and the kids really moved around all day long.  Now that they are all older we are able to stay out all day without having to worry about naps and overtired kids.

This summer is flying by and I am not altogether pleased with that, but we really are having so much fun outside and enjoying the time together!