Moo-sic Class

Love spending my days with this silly guy....he wanted his hair "spiked for moosic class." We started Songs and Signs this week and he just LOVES it. Night and day from when we started last year!

Harvest Time!

Thanks to my neighbor and sister I have made two batches of TASTY salsa. If I do say so myself best tasting I have ever made! Found the secret was to add a little green onion, fresh lime and to use vidallia onions to make it a tad sweeter....so good! Gave some away to the neighbors who are most appreciative, and I have pretty much had chips and salsa for dinner for the last three nights!

In other news, the only thing that really grew well this year were my berries and our ridiculous zucchinis! This one is half as tall as Grayson, I can hardly keep up!

Sweet Lily is here!

Almost two weeks ago Ms. Lily was born. Chelsey discovered that she was breech a few days prior and had an appointment monday to try and flip her. Well, Lily didn't like that idea because Chelsey's water broke early Monday morning and around 9am Lily was delivered via c-section! Chelsey and baby were both healthy and happy and Lily is thriving! She is a cutie for sure, and Chels is an awesome mom!

Fun to watch both she and spencer as they turned into parents! In other news they also bought their first house!! They close in a few weeks and I couldn't be happier! Its in ankeny and they are sure going to be busy with a newborn AND moving! So exciting!

Kennas Tree

We were sorry to say goodbye to Kenna's tree this weekend. When she was born we planted two baby willow trees, well saying they thrived in our backyard is an understatement! The one Josh cut down was over 30 feet tall! We will miss the awesome shade and listening to it rustle outside our window at night! Darn borrers got into it and we couldn't kill them in time.

Happy Birthday Gracie!

So fun catching up with our daycare families, Eski, Kohls, Easters, Volmers!! I cannot believe how big all the kids got!!!

Dojos Picnic

Its no secret that we love Dojos. Just an amazing place for McKenna to meet friends, and grown both physically and mentally. Their 7th annual picnic was Saturday and I took the older kids and mom, Chels and Spencer. It was so laid back and just nice to see all the families that are impacted by karate.

Master Wilber was at the grill, and aside for a minor water balloon on the grill incident the entire party went pretty much smoothly. I will say that next year they should have a signup for potluck dishes....pretty sure about 1/2 of the people brought cookies....holy cookies batman!

These snow cone people have it figured out! Drive up truck, serve ice for $2-$4 a pop and let the kids get their own sugar flavored delishness.....I need to rethink this business opportunity :)

State Fair

We sure missed dadd this year with our annual state fair visit! He got tickets from work, so we decided we HAD to go! But with the craziness of our schedule and daddy leaving for San Francisco today, we just couldn't find a time that worked for all of us to go!! So Wednesday I packed kids and stroller up and drove to the fair. In hindsight I should have left the darn stroller home because between having the three kids fighting over who got to sit and trying to push 70-100 lbs of kids around on some dirt paths, needless to say next year it is staying home. Kenna was still worked up over her injuries...so she insisted that she needed a chariot versus walking, Zachey was hot with his sensitivity to sun and Grayson was happy to walk but would get distracted with every bug, pile of horse poop or shiny object...was quite comical actually :)

After driving around looking for inexpensive parking I finally said screw it and parked across the street for $10...totally worth it with three excited kids and aforementioned monster stroller. We walked in and immediately saw what I call the "death rides." One is a ball two people can climb into then get flung up and down on bungie cords....the next is a similar ride that two people can sit in either end of a long arm and get flung in circles. Kenna was excited to try them out until she got close enough to see what was involved...and her eyes grew twice their size :) The joke of the day was Zachey saying "Kenna...you sure you want to go on those?" and he would giggle. I swooped in as super mommy and told her that I am sure she would be brave enough to go, but that she wasn't tall enough, man was she relieved :)

First stop was the 4H barn where I made the children succumb to utter (hahaha) humiliation by wearing these cow hats. We looked at some thing that kids had made like dresses and woodworking projects and Kenna seemed really impressed. I snapped a picture of this chicken coop that I really like in my quest to have chickens in our backyard - much to the dismay of my wonderful husband.

We ditched the stroller to look at all the animal barns. What a fun time. The kids LOVED the animals, looking at the giant cows (and laughing hysterically when they pooped.) Kenna loved watching the horses in the equestrian barn, we sat in the air conditioning and had a snack while they showed off the horse tricks. We saw the goats and the pigs, but the best part were the sheep! Yes, I know...how exciting can a sheep be you ask....but the kids have never seen sheep sheering before. They were tied up and getting their "haircuts" and one especially ticked off sheep was letting his owner know how he felt. He was doing this sort of baaing while his tongue was sticking out and the kids thought it was the funniest thing ever. We watched for 5 minutes and the kids just laughed and laughed....so funny.

I forgot about the sheer insanity that is food at the state fair...just gluttony in its finest form. The kids were told that they got ONE treat at the fair as I had already snuck in many goodies of the healthy variety...and after much deliberation they all decided on milkshakes. I thought, perfect, cold - yummy...I'll go get them. Well they only came in size hugantic...so they were all extremely full when the day was done.

After overstuffing with milkshakes we continued on our quest to find the stroller....I knew I left it somewhere? Took us about 10 minutes then we found it and headed to the kids area. The petting zoo was so cute! Baby camels and zebras....adorable! Worth the $3 in animal food purchase. Grayson was extremely aware of his limited supply and would only feed the animals like one-piece-at-a-time. Zachary took a different approach and just held his cup out in which a giant cow ate it all in one bite. Sure there is a lesson there somewhere.

Not sure the kids were 100% worn out, but mommy was. So a little after one we called it a day. On the way out McKenna was animate about riding this mousetrap rollercoaster. She didn't even flinch when I told her she had to ride it on her own, as I couldn't take the boys. So she be-bopped right up and rode it. Brave little stinker! Sure it was her fathers insistence at exposing her to the tower of terror when she was only 4....made her fearless on rides!

Overall, successful fun day. I think next year when the kids all walk the whole time and we get to go with daddy we can take our time and really see everything.

Last week before school

The last week before school I tried to cram as much fun in as I could! I feel like the summer FLEW by and I wasn't prepared for the sort of sad knot in my throat that appeared as I thought about my little buddies going back to school :(

On Tuesday we had Keelin over and took Jill and Megan and my three (along with the two dogs) to one of the last new parks we hadn't hit over the summer. It was across the interstate (Hilltop Park.) I had a hard time figuring out where to park so we definitely parked on the road and snuck through a person's yard (sorry person.)

What an awesome park! I cannot believe how fortunate we are to live in a town with so many amazing parks! It had that recycled rubber flooring, a huge pond with water fountain and tons of brand new climbing toys. I tied the dogs up and ran around with the kids, we ate lunch and all had a good time!

In the picture below Kenna is sporting one of her two injuries that day. She wiped out playing with the dogs and the curb won. Both her knee and elbow are minus a significant amount of skin! There was definitely drama the following days as we had to change the dressing. Lots of anxious "work yourself up into a frenzy prior to pulling off the dressing" time. But, I am happy to report that they are now both bandage free and healing nicely :) Also pardon Grayson's finger up his nose...didn't realize this until after I took the picture...ha!

Zuchinni

We have had zuchinni growing like crazy! ! I've made zucchini bread,  muffins,  and tonight made stuffed zucchini for dinner. The kids josh and I ate it up. .. zachey threw a fit for 15 minutes while I made him sit and try one bite... he gagged but got it down. ...ahhhh my sensitive one :)

Grayson Cuteness

As Grayson becomes less baby and more little boy I relish in some of his last "babyness." One of the things I giggle at every time is his use of the word "something." The kids constantly play I Spy in the car and when it's his turn it never fails. .."I spy with my ittle yi....SOMMMMME-PPPPING..." is adorable.  Instead of someTHing... he changes it to somePing which the cuteness level is only multiplied when he draws it out looking for the perfect item to spy :)

The other babyism I have recently noticed is his use if pronouns.  Instead of saying "That is her dog" grayson instead uses she..."That is she's dog." Part of me wants to correct him. .. But part of me is holding on to this and loving the innocence of it all!

Fun New Park

In our "fun new park series" I give you - Urbandale Park. Actually I have no idea what the name is, but the park is awesome! I took Chels with the kids one day as it is right by where they go to swimming lessons. We went early, before the kids were scheduled and they had a ball climbing all over the place! Great for big kids and little kids! It even has a couple crazy big slides that go down the side of the hill. They have bumps to slow the kids down - but they just complained it hurt their bottoms!