this week

Yup...gave in to the summer buzz. Said I'd never, but we did it. His hair grows so fast, it's so thick and it's been so hot. He loves it.

Yesterday we played in the rain.

We had planned to go creek stomping and swimming w/ Den's mom and a couple cousins and we kept those plans despite the rain.

Notice V has no pants. They kept falling off so we ditched. He don't need no stinkin' pants.

They kept running back...

...and forth.

Then a quick plunge in the pool.

Praying that there would be no thunder and lightning. (there wasn't)

Some of us were plumb tuckered out.

Last Sunday I made great great aunt hank's (Henrietta) camp pancake for the kids. I had been describing it to E, my lover of questions, and decided that it would be easier to show her. YUM. (I know these pics are blurry...my hands shake like a drunken sailor when I try to take pics w/ no flash)

Today during J's cello lesson I took the others plus cousin Ethan to a park to feed geese & ducks. Those buggers are aggressive! The one white goose was hissing at us. So ungrateful, in my opinion. We quickly finished off our few pieces of bread and got out of there.

courage and love

E had a baby tooth pulled today. It had an adult tooth growing behind it for a year and it didn't want to budge. She was so brave!!


BEFORE

AFTER

People keep asking how V is doing w/ B.

You can see that he likes to share. He loves him.

So far so good.

So...B is pretty much the best baby ever. This is him right before bed. He was smiling and cooing away, and he fell asleep while I was brushing my teeth. Every night is about as easy as that one was. Though he does like to stay up LATE.

mts '10

Year 9 of our annual trip w/ Den's fam has come and gone. Twas a good one, and we spent our time....


in the pool,

(this is how he got in the pool, every time. no steps for this man)

(whose toes match the pool perfectly? that's right, my toes)

...picking berries,

modeling,

soaking up baby-ness,

enjoying the "beeg boat", (thanks uncle dwayne!)

the lake,

(he kept saying, "swimming, swimming, swimming" as he walked out to his neck)

(this is a rare sighting of a 3 torso mermaid. notice which girl did not run into the water on the count of three...yep, my girl)

launching water balloons at small children,

s'mores,

and the last morning we went just us to a state park where it was all about throwing rocks

(Den was the master and could skip his rocks all the way under the bridge)

and sleeping for some.

Not mentioned, were....family, late night Rook and Catch phrase, movies, and food.

We've been there before...

and we're going back. It's that time of year. The time when we pack up and head to a lake/mountainous area w/ Den's fam. The kids LOVE it and ask about it all year. We've been going since J was an infant. These pics are from 2005 and I can't believe how small they are! We'll be back in 5 days.

To: Daddy.... Love, Me

Cooling Off

Den took the kids to the big pool today so V decided he'd like to give a demo on how to cool off when you have to stay home with mommy so you can get your nap instead of going to the big pool.




so simple! It's more fun when you get others involved, see below.

When all else fails, strip and run (aka streaking).

Gross Love

A dear dear cousin sent me a gift. I opened it during lunch thinking it must be something to do with the baby. I was wrong.



Can you believe it? Quick back story...we are both pickers. I'll leave it at that. But even my normally iron stomach could not handle sampling one of these bad boys. But my oh so brave soon to be 10 yr old nephew was willing to try some. Verdict...he liked it! They smelled sweet and are probably yum...but I still don't know if I'll do it!

But thanks abs, I feel loved!

The girl is there....

but this post only features photos of the boys.


For breakfast we made this...


from J's Star Wars cookbook. (though it was really a single sun toast as we have giant farm fresh eggs)


And this is what was left on J's plate. He did end up eating it w/ more toast.




It was our first library day of the summer! I love how V saw everyone reading and after many attempts of trying to get his siblings to wrestle, he decided that he would join in w/ Goodnight Gorilla.




Den took this last night....so glad he did!



Baby B fix.

For those of you that are wondering we have survived a whole day and a half w/o my mom and I think we are going to make it! I really think the summer is going to fly by and for the time being I'm loving having the kids home all together until school starts.