Saturday June 30

Okay....we kinda miss the pool on these hot days.

But we came up with something that works for now.

Madi went to her friends house today.

A really good friend, that I was excited about her starting middle school with....her only good friend going to her middle school.

Well, just found out today that they are moving to McCall!

Dang-it!

I need to be on the lookout for girls her age going to her middle school.

Anyway...while she was gone, and Porter was sleeping, Cassi and Elsie played in their own little pool and sprinklers.

It kept them happy for hours, which was really nice :)

Yep...that little feed trough thing....that's their pool :)

Worked great.

Cassi decided they needed a little snack so she popped some popcorn and hauled out the table and juice jug.

They sure had a lot of fun.

I think we need to invest in a little blow up swimming pool soon :)

Friday June 29

All this week Cassi has been paticipating in a Musical Theatre program for Meridian City.

They have been working on scenes from 'Suessical the Musical'.

Cassi was cast as 'blue bird'.

She had per performance today, and she had so much fun.

She did such a great job.

Cassi has such a knack for remembering lines and lyrics to songs.

She had all the parts memorized and all the songs, including the ones she didn't sing.

She has so much fun doing this kind of stuff and we look forward to all the musicals/plays in her future!

You like her tail and head feather :)

Pretty cute.

Full cast

Old and new friends to hang out with.

Daddy picked out these tulips for Cassi to give toher after the show.

She loves her Daddy and loves when she makes him proud :)

Musical Theatre teacher Mary.

She does such a great job in such little time.

Tonight we went to a Dutch oven dinner at the Youngs house and Mary and her family joined us.

We have known Mary for a while....her hubby, Eric, and Drew have been best friends forever.....and lets not forget that Eric is our awesome realtor who found our little peice of heaven for us :)

Anyway, while I was talking with Mary tonight she told me that Cassi is just so great.

She said that Cassi has an amazing ability to mesh with any age or personality that she is working with.

She said kids flock to her and want to ber her friend.

I knew Cassi was like that....but it is always nice to hear it from someone on the outside :)

*****

After the play we took Aubree home with us, while Madi went to the Youngs house.

Cassi and Aubree wanted to make some peanut butter cookies.

I went out to help Dad, cause we are putting a roof of sorts over the deck now....

Anyway, when it came time to taste the cookies.....the were horrible!!!

Luckily the girls agreed that they were very bad....and I told them they could give it another try.

But I did ask them what exactly they put in.

They seemed quite salty, so I asked what they put in for the salt and baking soda.

The recipe called for 3/4 tsp salt and 3/4 tsp. baking soda.

They told me that they put a full teaspoon of salt in and then they put a full teaspoon of baking soda in......AND another 1/4 CUP baking soda!

AHHHH!!!

I couldn't help but laugh....the girls thought it was funny too when I showed them the actual amount!
I also have to add that Cassi did come and ask me how much 11/4 cup was  :)
It was 1 1/4 cup.
Baking is so great for math lessons.

They are good girl and had a lot of fun making cookies....even if they had to do it twice :)

The second batch turned out perfectly!

Good job girls.

*****

So, like I said, later tonight we went to the Youngs house for some ducth oven cooking and swimming.

It was so much fun and such yummy food!

Thanks guys for having us over.

We love hangin out with you :)

Thursday June 28

More hard work today.

We dug up the gravel and leveled up the ground behind the garage.

This is the area that the stairs off the deck lead onto.

It was all gravel and very unlevel.

Brent hauled some dirt in and we leveled it out.

I should really stop saying 'we'.....I did what I could to help, but he did all the real work :)

I am excited for this to be green and smooth.

It feels like our yard got even bigger.....with more usable running space.

We haven't yet decided if we will sod or not.

It is kinda a high traffic area, so seeding it will be kinda a hassle.

But, sod is just so expensive!

The seed we planted up front is coming in really nice.

But like I said....it is high traffic and with the seed, it needs to be kept wet.

We will see.

We also got some more gravel so finish up the road behind the retaining wall.

The kids love it when we have these little mountains for them to climb on :)

Here's a shot of after we spread the dirt out.....and Brent took out the big stump we had in the middle of it.

Just imagine how nice it will look green.



Private update

I still plan to go private....I am just waiting for a spare second to type in emails......

Just so ya know :)

Wednesday June 27

The other day, Porter was playing with the fitting to fit into the 2 inch pvc pipes we are using for our irrigation sprinklers.

He was so entertained....and I got an idea.

Today I decided to stock up on some 1 inch pvc pipe fittings....cause we have a bunch of 1 inch pvc pipe just laying around.

Most of it has holes poked in them when we tried to use them for the garden drip system...so I just cut chunks up and the kids had a lot of fun.

I helped them a little with the playhouse.....

But there are a bunch of smaller peices that Porter likes to put together and connect them all.

That is exactly what I hoped for :)

The kids had fun with the playhouse.....

They thought it looked like a circus tent, so they made it into a circus petting zoo of sorts :)

My kids love all my old toys.

Anyone remember Tippy and Zippy?

Not even sure if that was their real names.......

But I sure did love those guys and I love seeing my kids play with them :)

*****

We had a free Redbox rental, so the kids wanted to watch it in their tent/playhouse.

So I put the movie in my laptop and it was movie night.

They all thought it was pretty cool.

Now I won't lie, and tell you that the night ended perfectly.

Cause it didn't.

There was fighting, pushing......and they didn't get to finish the movie.

That's what we get for having such sleep deprived kids around here!

But, I hope when they look back, my kids will remember the fun stuff they got to do together, and not how much they fight!!!!

Tuesday June 26

Madi did a little babysitting for us tonight.

We are trying to give her more chances to do that so she can learn the ropes of real babysitting.

You know....learning to not only take care of kids, but leave a clean house.

Well, I came home to a pretty dang clean house, and these two snuggled up together watching a movie.

I think Bell did a good job :)

Monday June 25

I will add pictures later....

But we had a fun time hanging out with Uncle Andy today.

He is here for some research conference thing and we got to spend a little time with him.

It was a late night....and we talked him into staying the night here and not in a hotel.

Pictures to come :)

Sunday June 24

It was a nice day today.

After church we went over to some friends house for dinner and hang out.

The kids had a fun time.

We got home and we had two little goats sitting on our front porch just waiting for us to get home :)

They must have gotten out of their pen somehow.

It was pretty cute of them to be sitting there waiting for us.



They are starting to head butt each other and rough house a little bit....and dad thought he would get in on the play.

It was pretty cute.

Dad likes these little guys a lot more than he thought he would :)

Port tried to do some head butting too...

These little guys sure are fun.

They are a great addition to our farm-ily :)



Saturday June 23

Ah.....

This is the life.

For real.

It is hard for me to understand why a life like ours isn't wanted by everyone :)

But I guess that is what makes the world go round....all the different people in it.

We had some visitors this morning.

The Young girls came over to see our baby goats.

They got to feed them a little snack.

The kids had fun running all around and chasing the other 'kids' :)

Then Heather took Madi and Cassi with her to her house and the girls got to swim with the Young girls.

So they were very excited about that.

Dad and I got a lot of stuff done.

He did more....as usual.

The guy doesn't stop.

Not even to eat, unless I make him.

We waited to long to burn our burn pile....so Brent loaded it all and he took it to a place that makes it into wood chips.

It looks great to have that space cleared :)

There was a lot of wood there.

Now we will work on watering all that area and make it green.

We did a lot of watering today.

I am loving the sprinkler system Brent came up with.

It is gonna be perfect for what we need to do to make everything green :)

We had a little picnic dinner tonight in the backyard.

Yep...that's the deck...still with no railing.

Soon.

But it sure is awesome!!!

Dad shared his special Fathers Day root beer with Port...

That boy loves his pop.

*****

After dinner, the heat had started to cool off.

As I weeded my garden, and Dad mowed down the field....the kiddos played and ran around the backyard coming up with fun games to play.

Not many games you can play with just 4 kids, let alone ones that will entertain the 10-3 age range :)

The played duck-duck goose, red rover, piggy back rides and their own version of capture the flag....

They had fun, with minimal fighting.

It made me happy to look over at them, and at dad on his tractor, and all around our place and how far things have come.

It makes me excited and happy.

Then when I talked to Brent, he told me that he was thinking the same thing.

How great this all is :)

Friday June 22

It was a hot busy day.

Brent rigged up some above ground sprinklers to hook up our pump to when we irrigate.

It is gonna work awesome!!!

I can't wait until there is more green around here :)

*****

We had dinner outside and let the goats run around with Mater while we were out there.

They aren't scared of him at all....and Mater is so curious of them.

I think they could all be good friends.

Mater might end up thinking he is a goat.

They like to jump up on anything above the ground....and Mater watches and tries to follow.

They jumped up on an adirondack chair and Mater tried to squeeze in under the arm rest.

So funny :)

*****

We couldn't eat dinner on the lawn....cause it was wet from irrigation.

Brent made a larger cage for the goats and we hauled it up in the trailer.....so that is where the kiddos ate their dinner.

Porter and Elsie played 'telephone' with each other.

After dinner the girls went inside....

And Port and I helped Dad move the sprinklers.

Porter thought it was just the greatest.

Thursday June 21

Jenni invited us to go swimming with her today.

Elsie had a dentist appointment at 2:00, so we made plans to go after that.

One of Elsie's silver caps is wiggly.

I wanted to take her in to see what our options were.

She had to be put under general anesthesia when we had it done.

So I wanted to find out what we had to do about it being wiggly.

The dentist told me that they did a pulpectomy on it, and sometimes the roots deteriorate.....so the tooth falls out.

He thinks that is what is happening to Elsie.

So for now, we wait for it to fall out, and then watch for her 6 year molars to push through, then we will worry about putting spacers in then.

We will still probably have to do general anesthesia again.......no fun.

But Elsie was a good girl.

She tried to be so brave.

I told her that they are her friends there...and they just want to make sure nothing bad was happening in her mouth.

She cried, but allowed them to look in her mouth.

She wasn't scared.....she wasn't worried.....I think she was just overwhelmed with all the emotions she was feelings and all she could do was cry.

Cause she willingly did all they asked, just cried while she did it :)

Dr Whitt is so great with her too.

You can tell she really likes him.....She just couldn't help but cry....

*****

Then we went with the Terry girls and headed to the pool.

It was fun to see a lot of friends who I haven't seen for a long time.

Fun to sit and talk and relax.

Afterwards, we had a little pizza/watermelon picnic with the kids at Jenni's house.

The kids played and had a good time.

It was a fun relaxing day.

Wednesday June 20

Madi got invited to go to Roaring Springs today with a friend.

Which worked out great, cause Cassi got a pass that expires next week and she won't be going by then, so Madi was able to use the ticket.

Cassi was more than happy to share with Madi.

Madi has earned a nice fun day off.

She has worked harder than I think any 10 year old could!!!

She is a great kid.

She had a lot of fun....too bad I don't have any pictures of her.....that would be fun :)

*****

Cassi made some cookies while Porter napped and Elsie played.

She thought these looked like fun cookies, cause you get to use a jello package.

Sugar free too :)

They weren't too bad, considering.

She had a lot of fun making them.

I think maybe I will have her tie her hair back next time she cooks :)

Later on tonight, our friends invited us over to their house for a swim in their pool.

Madi was still gone, and the other kids thought it would be fun to go swimming.

I mean it is the first day of summer!!!!

So that was a fun time.

We finished up the same time as Madi and all 4 kiddos were exhausted.

Madi more than the others :)

I am glad she had such a fun time!

Tuesday June 19

We took it kinda easy today.

We have been going non-stop and I think we may have pushed it too hard.

But we still got a lot done today.

We seeded the front yard.

It will be so nice to have some grass there finally.

I started to thin out the garden, and will hopefully finish it up tomorrow.

Madi and I also did a little weeding....again, hope to finish more of that tomorrow.

Brent put up a fence in the agrden so that I could attach my tomatoes to it.

I am really excited about my garden.

Things seem to be growing really good!

Except my strawberries...I would have liked for them to take off better.

Oh well, maybe they will do better next year.

Anyway....

So we did get stuff done today.

We did think about starting the railing, but decided to take it easy.

After dinner we had some of Dads Fathers Day cheesecake and root beer floats.

We also got a movie to watch together.

Hard work is fun together and so it taking it easy :)

Monday June 18

Porter carries around his Summer Reading log chart from the library, everywhere he goes.

It is pretty funny.

Poor paper may not last til the end of the summer!

I have taped and re-taped.

We will see.

But I do think it is so cute.

He is very excited about the prizes he will get for reading.

Porter loves books.

He will sit and listen to book after book.

I love it.

I took the kids to the library today.

Our first trip since the Summer began.

We are closer now to the Silverstone Library....which I did not know existed until we moved.

We love it.

It is small, but really nice.

Both Madi and Cassi got their very own library cards today.

I can't even tell you how cool they think it is :)

It is great when the little things can seem so big.

We stayed for a bit and picked out books.

The little ones also got to play the computer for a while.

Port was so funny.

He had earphones on...so when he wanted my attention he would yell really loud, even though I was sitting right there.

Goofy kid.

Port had a variety or books and he picked a couple movies as well.

Elsie found about 6 buffalo books.

So she is thrilled, of course :)

The big girls picked some good ones too.

I hope we can make a trip at least once a week.

It was a fun time with the kids.

Then I went grocery shopping with all 4.......and that's when the fun time stopped.

I promise I will NEVER do that again!

(.....seems like I have said that before......)



Sunday June 17

Happy fathers Day to one amazing man.

I am so grateful to have him as the father of our children.

He is always eager to teach them new things.

He loves to spend time and do fun things with them.

They love to work with him.

He is a great example of hard work and dedication.

He has a special bond with each one of the kids and they each KNOW just how special he thinks they are.

I am so thankful for a day that we get to celebrate all that he does for us and try to give back the way he gives to us.

We had a fun day.

Before church I got all the kids bathed and showered so that we could still do our fun stuff and still be ready for church in time.

We made him breakfast in bed.

We made bacon and eggs and we were planning to make a breakfats wrap....but didn't have tortillas.

So I decided to make my own.

It was a big failure.

Well, I guess not a big failure as long as you weren't expecting tortillas.

They still tasted good....just couldn't be used in a tortilla way.

Oh well.

He is used to me not getting things quite perfect :)

At least I try....

We took it down to him and told him there was a clue under his his plate and to come up and open it when we are all with him.

Then there was  a clue to lead him to each kids room where they had a gift for him.

Each envelope also had one of those questionairs that kids fill out about their dad.

It was pretty dang funny.

Porter's gift was a new seat cushion for dads tractor.

And a couple bags of Daddy's favorite treats.

Elsie had a basket full of more of dads favorite treats.

Then we headed to Cassi's room.

Cassi wrote a lilttle song for Dad.

It is so cute and I sure love to hear that girl sing.

(I will try and upload it...cause I did record it)

Madi's gift was two movie tickets so that dad can take me out on a date.

And I was boring and just gave him some new pictures of the kids to hang in his locker.

He also keeps a picture of the kids inside his helmet.

I just love that.

They are always close to him :)

So he got a few prints for those reasons.

*****

After church we were invited to go out to Pat and Steve's for a steak dinner.

A way better dinner than I could have made for Brent!!!

It was a perfect evening.

Lots of fun with great people.

Thanks so much guys!!!

*****

Here are some of the pictures of the kids that I took for Dad

Saturday June 16

I think my one of my most favorite things that has happened since we moved here has been the drastic change in the relationship between Madi and I.

We were at a not so great place less than a year ago.

Fighting all the time about dumb things.

Not a horrible place, just not the Mother/daughter relationship I longed to have with her.

But things changed when we moved here.

She has blossomed....and I have too.

She is a hard little worker, and she really enjoys being out there with Mom and Dad.

I am proud of her and the kind, honest, loving, beautiful young woman she is turning out to be.

We have been running together at least 3-4 times a week.

We have so much fun.

She runs 2 and a half miles with me, then she goes back home and Cassi rides her bike with me for the rest of the run.

It works out nicely.

It is fun to go with Cassi too, but I don't get to talk with her much, cause I am busy trying to keep up with her.

She helps me work on speed :)

But with Madi, we have a fun time.

It is a good opportunity for her to tell me about things she is feeling and worries in her life.

Or the exciting things in her life that we are just too busy to sit down and talk about.

I am so thankful she asked if we could be running partners.

I think it has helped us build a foundation that will hold us together and strong forever.

*****

We did irrigation stuff pretty much all day today.

Trying to figure out how to get mater to all the places that desperately NEED it!

I think we, well, Dad, came up with a good system.

Now we need a few more weeks of irrigation under our belt and things might get a little more green around here :)

We also cleared the front yard area to get ready to seed.

We debated whether or not to sod or seed.

Sod is just too expensive.

So seeding it is.

It will be nice to have that patch of dirt turned into some nice green grass :)

Friday June 15

We went to the Dairy Days parade tonight.

Lot and lots of pictures to share......

But it's too late.

And I am too tired!

So just one cute shot of Elsie Rose, enjoying the parade.....with her ears plugged :)

Thursday June 14

Today wasn't a very busy day.

Well, I guess it kinda was....just more of a run-around kind of busy.

So, here are more pictures of the goats :)

They are fun little guys.

Mater is very curious about them.

We are careful when he is around.....but he seems to be soft with them and excited to have friends to play with :)

Port and Hulk had fun playing around.

Hulk jumps up on stuff more then Thor does.....

Thor likes to sit and cuddle, and watch what is going on around him.

Hulk likes to run and jump and run some more....I think he would do a flip if he could.

Maybe we can teach him :)