Summer Magic: Sail Club

One of Greg's dreams has always been a sail boat.  He researched when the "sail club" at the local Metropark meets, and took us down for a fun evening.  We got to watch the boats get in the water, sail around, and by the end Greg, Nathan, and Joshua (while I was with Elizabeth and Aaron in the van because of rain) watched several boats race.  Nathan even got to blow the air horn.  There were only 4 boats this time, but apparently by mid-summer they get 10-20 out racing.  We'll be back!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finishing Up School: Nathan's End of Year Party

Posting this picture because when Nathan became friends with Kerry earlier this year...everything changed.  He went from having a hard day most days, to liking school because he had someone "to be goofy with".  It's amazing what a difference a good friend can make!

Playing "Minute to Win It" games.

Finishing Up School: Field Day

 

Aaron -- 6 Months

Our sweet boy turned 6 months this week!  I was telling Greg I think that the first three of those six months were some of the very hardest of my life!  And, the next three have been some of the happiest I've ever had.    What a difference a little baby Zantac and some sleep can make!  Aaron is such a pleasant little guy!  There couldn't be a more loved baby by all of us!

He found the plants...and was so pleased with himself.

Mister Innocent.
(Reminds me of his father's attempt at innocence in the midst of mischief.)  =)  We just love how expressive his eyebrows are.  He doesn't actually have eyebrow hair much, but those little eyebrow muscles can say so much.  =)

 

Toes in the Tub

Can't remember our other babies so thoroughly loving their toes as much as Aaron does!

The Man

 

Love This Boy

 

What's not to love?!  He's got the moves...may they transfer on to the field!  =)

Swing Set and Water Guns

 

A swing set from Craigslist and some water guns have turned our backyard into the happening place this week.  It's a little dream come true for me to have all the neighbor kids out in our yard playing their latest favorite game "Medieval" .... involving various ranks of archers and "calvary" ... great scheming and too much weaponry.  =)  Mostly a whole lot of great imagining and fun.  My favorite is the boy in the upper left picture who's shield is from the inside of a tool box.  =)  Brings back so many great memories of playing with friends in our neighborhood growing up.  There's nothing I'd rather be providing for our kids than this kind of simple, carefree fun. 

Die! - orama

 

The project that would not die!

We were excited and ambitious as we started off on Nathan's diorama of a scorpion.  We even kept up momentum pretty well through the sculpting with clay and painting of the cactus and almost 20 separate parts of the scorpion Nathan created to glue together (including 7 sections of the main body).  Determined to help it get safely to school (we have a bad track record of dropping special projects on the sidewalk on the way to school -- shattering two things so far this year) we dropped Nathan carefully off right in front of his classroom. 

Somehow by the time he made it inside a few legs had broken off and trying to get it safely back home to fix it...it only got worse!  I was so frustrated that we'd almost gotten rid of the thing and it arrive back home severely damaged by afternoon.  Nathan spent the evening glue-gunning again, and I thought we were done. 

The next morning I woke up at 6:30 a.m. to banging...and dashed down to find Nathan adding a "finishing touch".  His friend had crushed graham crackers to put as sand in the bottom of hers, and he thought he'd do the same.  Only after he'd crushed and spread them all over the bottom did he realize that gluing each crumb on might be tricky.  

Needless to say, I carried the diorama in the classroom that morning, handed it straight to the teacher, and told her I never wanted to see it again!  The teacher assured me these are the things that create such fond memories later.  All I can say is it's going to take an awful lot of forgetting before then! 

Little Gardener

Squirting and talking to the flowers...to help them grow.