Last Week of Summer

Doing our best to keep busy in our last week or two of summer.  

We start back to school the day after Labor Day.  

Marshmallow Tower Tips:

Elizabeth -- Toothpicks are a great way to get marshmallows to your mouth.

Joshua -- Triangles shapes work better than squares!  

Nathan -- Freeze your tower for more sturdy results.  

Got Our Game Faces On

Another favorite Sunday activity.  (As long as no one loses.)  =)  

Greg has been teaching Nathan and Joshua to play.  

(Interest has been heightened due to watching the Harry Potter seen with the "live" chess board!)

Perfect Sunday Evening

After a lesson on keeping the Sabbath day holy in Relief Society today, I feel slightly guilty this picture isn't us reading the scriptures at home.  But, in it's own way, this is totally soul-filling for me.

Just a 5-minute walk from our home is a trail around this small lake/pond.  We love to take a Sunday evening "stroll" over to "skip" rocks and chase the ducks.  

Can you tell that Elizabeth has definitely caught the vision of rock throwing?! 

Raspberry Picking!

One of my very favorite traditions!  Raspberry Picking!  This year we went with my dear friend Deborah and her four great boys!  (If you thought Elizabeth was outnumbered before....)  =)

 

 Nathan, Isaac, Dallin, and Joshua

 Deborah

 My raspberry patch girl!

I was amazed at what hard workers all of the children were!  It's good Deborah wanted to make a serious amount of jam!  I think in the end she made almost 20 jars and I made about 15 half-pints myself.  

A small petting farm on the same property.  Elizabeth's first time seeing real pigs!  She was snorting up a storm!

The unexpected "attraction" was the toad Nathan found in the grass.  "Mr. Grumpy Pants"

We just had to try a few of our raspberries in what we had left of homemade ice cream fixins' from last week!  Good stuff!

Sunday Fun -- Homemade Ice Cream

Last Sunday's after-dinner treat.  We love the process at least as much as the product!  

And, to the questions, YES!  We're expecting and I just hadn't realized I hadn't blog "announced" it.  I'm 6 months along.  Due the Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend.  It's a boy!

End of Summer "Staycation" -- Part 2

This morning we headed to a great park...just 5 or so minutes from where we live.

We played at a fun playground.

Then "the boys" got ready to go fishing.

 They rented a row boat and headed out on the water.

While the boys were out on the water, Elizabeth and I snacked and played and tried to take some fun pictures. 

Some turned out...better than others.

Love this girl!

The guys came back and livened things up.

Nathan built a great castle.

Greg built a sand castle with Elizabeth.  Love Elizabeth's trying-to-be-patient stance.  Reminds me of Greg!

Joshua spent most of his time underwater. I tried to get a good picture of him...but they all turned out splashy and blurry. I guess that's a good problem on a day like today.

Had to get a picture to remember I was there too! 

Mostly I just want to remember how much our family loves days like this!  Especially time away to have fun with a great husband and dad!

End of Summer "Staycation" -- Part 1

School here starts in two weeks...and it's given me a bit of a jolt!  We've still got a list of "memories to make" before school starts!  So, on this rare weekend of nothing scheduled, we decided to declare a little "camping staycation". 

Camping is in quotes because between an "expectant" me and a Scoutmaster Greg, pulling out all the camping gear and actually taking it somewhere to spend a night without sleep just was more than we could bear.  So, we decided we'd do all of our favorite parts of camping without actually "spending the night away".  We were worried we'd be letting the boys down, but actually it's turned out to be a great way to have the fun without feeling the exhaustion (at least quite so much).  =)

So...last night we...

 Ate a hot dog dinner on the deck.

 Make "Slushees" for dessert.  A fun trick we got from my sister.  You put a can of soda into a quart-size Ziploc bag, then put that bag into a gallon-size Ziploc with ice and rock salt. 

Then you SHAKE!

And enjoy!

We worked hard...

 to set up the tent in the backyard...

Elizabeth had to bring out her long, blond haired baby doll ... named Jeffrey.  She would rock the baby and assign me to sing.  Then would tuck her in and repeat.    

After dark, we went outside to look at the stars.

Waking up this morning.  (You may notice the tent is in a different setting this morning.  Actually this is a different tent!  We realized that we'd wake up more cheerful this morning if three of us got to sleep in our own beds.  We took down the big tent outside and set up the smaller tent inside.  Nathan and Joshua slept in the tent in the family room after watching a bit of football with Dad.)   

Shiner

The night we went on our date to Harry Potter, the kids were in bed before we got home.  When we woke up the next morning, Joshua had a serious shiner!  You'll see more of it in the pictures to come.  Apparently Joshua's eye connected with the baby sitter's elbow while playing Frisbee outside.  Between that and a bug bite on top of it...we doubt (at least we hope) that this is the "truest" shiner that will ever grace his face!

Harry Potter -- The Next Generation

Ten years ago this fall, Greg and I got engaged.  One of my favorite memories of when Greg and I were dating, was Greg reading Harry Potter to me.  He'd read some of them before, but I never had.  He was so great at doing all the voices and really making it "come alive" to me.  The books, and the movies, have been an ongoing piece of our little family's identity.  

This summer, we suggested to Nathan (going into second grade this fall) that he might just like to try reading the first Harry Potter book.  He has surprised us and amazed us!  He's now quite a ways into book 5!  We decided that to celebrate his reading we'd have a Harry Potter night.  Greg had pizza delivered (a real novelty around here...can't remember if we've ever done it as a family before)...and we had a picnic dinner while we watched the first movie.  It was just so fun to watch Nathan watch the show!  Some things were an adjustment.  He'd been pronouncing some names, etc. differently than the movie does.  But, for the most part we were amazed how much he remembers and understands the characters and the plot and the details!  

Thursday, Greg got us a babysitter so we could go see the last Harry Potter movie just the two of us.  What a great "full circle" kind of week to see the happy ending 10 years after we read it!  And, to be living our own kind of happy ending...sharing this great story with our own boy!

Cute Summer Kids