Happy August! It's been awhile and a lot has happened, so I'm just going to get straight to work here. Prepare for photo overload as I recap the last month and a half!
First, the rest of the Fourth of July! My last post was after the parade and before fireworks. One never can guess how fireworks will go with young children. But, we are happy to say they all survived. Joanna didn't even notice anything was happening, so the main challenge was getting her to sit still and stop running around and playing. She didn't start crying at fireworks until I finally forced her to sit in my lap.
That weekend, the Steffens made their annual visit to Southeast Iowa. The came to our place for lunch and spent the afternoon here, then we all moved over to my mom and dad's for supper, then went to Sperry fireworks. I got the privilege to keep all of the girls (those that stayed) overnight! Sunday evening we went to Jon and Julie's for supper, which is another traditional event when the Steffens come. We were SO excited to see Olivia, who finally made it in time for supper after some complications with flying home from Dallas!
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| It was a beautiful afternoon to spend outdoors! |
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| The kids even got in some swimming in the pond! |
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| Here are the "children" who make up the crew, minus three. Sandi didn't make it for the picture as she wasn't feeling well. Jonathan was in Oregon and Olivia was on her way home from Dallas. |
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| Waiting for Sperry fireworks! |
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| The boys got their faces painted. |
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| Joanna thinking she is big stuff sitting in a chair with the girls at Jon & Julie's. |
My second order of business today is our family vacation in July. We stayed in a big VRBO house with the rest of my family near a small town called Belle, Missouri. It was kind of in the middle of nowhere, but there was plenty to do at the house with a pool, hot tub, pond, and a huge yard with walking trails. We took a couple day trips - one to church in St. Louis and the Gateway Arch, another day a few of us went biking near Jefferson City, on Wednesday the siblings went to Six Flags, and then we visited the St. Louis Zoo on our way home on Saturday. Overall, it was a very low-key, relaxing week. The children enjoyed doing lots of swimming!
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| This is the first person that was ready to leave on Saturday morning. Not sure where Joanna was planning to sit. |
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| Our picnic lunch at a cemetery on our way down. We were having trouble finding a good place to stop and eat. The cemetery ended up providing a beautiful setting. |
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| We rode the metro into downtown St. Louis on our way to the Arch. The boys were absolutely fascinated about riding on the train! |
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| On the train! |
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| This girl loves glasses! |
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| The Arch day was our matching shirt day! :) |
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| Looking out the top of the Arch! |
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| On the train again! |
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| Checkers at Cracker Barrel on the way back to our house. |
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| Mom, Dad, Jesse, and I went biking on Katy Trail Tuesday morning. There had been lots of flooding in the area earlier in the summer and the sights and smells reminded me of Oakville in 2008! |
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| The rest of the crew had a fishing tournament while we were gone. Micah and Matt caught five and won. |
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| Wednesday, the six siblings and Matt went to Six Flags and the children stayed home with Mom and V. When they climbed into their carseats after we left, Mom was starting to think it was going to be a pretty easy day! |
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| Mom found the perfect shirt to bring home to Billy when they were in Austria... :) |
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| I was quite happy to be the "bag holder" for the rides that they weren't allowed to bring bags on. I quickly learned that my body is no longer made for thrill rides. My head felt like it was going to explode after the first couple rides they took us on. But it was all worth it because I got to be with Matt all day without any kids. :) |
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| On our way home, we ended up getting stopped because of the Belle parade! |
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| Micah never got tired of the water! |
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| All the kiddos. |
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| Looking the other way...beautiful sunset and pond in the background! |
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| "When you wake up in the morning and it's a quarter to nine...you brush your teeth!" |
Joanna's first birthday is another topic of discussion today...but it's still kind of a part of vacation because we celebrated Friday evening before we left, since her birthday was Saturday.
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| The boys helped me make cupcakes! |
The moments between these two photos involved tragic bawling as she grabbed the candle and burned her finger while we were singing to her. She received some consoling, and then...
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| ...she was able to go back to fully enjoying her cupcake! Happy birthday, sweet girl! |
Joanna got to spend her birthday at the St. Louis Zoo. What a spoiled little girl! :)
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| A nice woman with a membership gave us tickets for the children's zoo, so that was a treat! The boys enjoyed the indoor and outdoor children's exhibits and petting the goats! |
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| It was a hot day, but they had so much fun! It was a really nice zoo. |
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| The hippo was HUGE! |
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| When we got home, Joanna opened her birthday present from Grandma and Grandpa Schulz, who were spending the month of July at the church house in Washington, D.C. The boys were probably even more excited than Joanna to open her gift! :) |
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| Aunt Shelby embroidered a shirt for Joanna! |
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| One last birthday gift from the Massners! |
My final topic for today (before I unleash a bunch of miscellaneous pictures) is Joanna's one year pictures.
Now I would like to discuss the things the boys are learning from their uncles. The often come up to me and tell me that they are "being like _____." So, take heed. Everything you do in front of their eyes will come to light.
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| Uncle Jake... |
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| Uncle Jesse... |
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| Uncle Johnny... (this one raises the most questions) |
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| I had four flower pots this year, and they all suffered raccoon attacks several times before I finally gave up the fight and threw all my flowers out for good. On the bright side, Matt has killed several raccoons since then. |
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| The children spent a day at Brenda's while I went to Cantril to get peaches. They had fun dressing up! |
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| There they are! I think we ended up eating over half of them fresh! Matt is a peach fanatic...and I don't mind them either. :) |
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| One day, Hannah came over with her sisters to help with peaches. Another day, I did them on my own. I found it worked best to have the children "help" me because then I didn't have to spend the day checking on the mischief they were getting into. It went better than expected. The boys used the apple corer to cut up the peaches (thanks for the idea, Hannah!). I got 14 quarts canned both days without having any major meltdowns (me, that is)! |
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| Grandpa and Grandma Schulz came for supper one night while Matt was gone. |
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| Micah won "Button Art" from the library reading program! Levi was having a tough time accepting that Micah was the "boss" of the button art. Levi's personality is not the submissive type. |
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| Matt decided to tear apart some old speakers and the boys were so thrilled to help! They LOVE finding excuses to use real tools. |
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| We attended Kenzy and Casey's wedding last weekend. It was a beautiful evening and it was SO good to catch up with some of my good friends from school! |
Then, for the good ole' days of summer.
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| "Mommy! I'm stuck!" |
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| Painting! |
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| This girl could be entertained in the sandbox for hours (if her brothers didn't come in and start dumping sand on her head). |
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| We enjoyed an afternoon at the pool yesterday! |
Matt is still working on the landscaping during most of his free days. With Jesse's help, they are making visible progress, but it looks like the project will be continuing on into the next summer or two.
The past six weeks have been kind of crazy. After the fourth of July weekend came to a close, we got ready for vacation, then after a week of vacation, Matt was gone for work for a week. The next week I did peaches, served lunch at church, and hosted the Myron Schulz family. I was kind of starting to pull my hair out, and the children were out of control because I hadn't been consistently teaching or disciplining for about four weeks. This past week I've finally gotten the house, the children, my diet, and my sanity all relatively under control. So we're doing well again.
And in my spare moments...I'm still plugging away at Stephanie's Decluttering 101 course as I continue to read the inspiring writings of Marie Kondo and Joshua Becker and apply their methods and principles to our home. I've made a lot of progress on decluttering our house and feel like I am getting close to "done". I have begun to experience the benefits of not being consumed by all of our "stuff".
Other than the three thousand flies buzzing around this house, I can't think of anything else to report on. Hope you are all having a nice summer!
Joanna is giving me that cheesy smile right now...and those blinking puppy dog eyes...and pointing at the snack cupboard. Gotta go so I can give her another kiss...
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