Waking up Eight

I always ask the kids what they'd like for their special birthday breakfast and Shaun wanted cinnamon rolls. Well, I went to the grocery store to buy the ingredients late at night and walked past the bakery. They had a huge box of about 20 different day old pastries for $1.99. Besides donuts, bear claws, sticky buns, it also had several cinnamon rolls. SCORE!!! I forgot all about buying the ingredients and slaving in the kitchen and grabbed the box of day olds. I put them in a glass cake holder and Shaun thought it was the best breakfast ever :) Combine the day olds with the leftover balloons from a friends pump-it-up birthday party and Shaun was in birthday heaven. I love this boy! He's so easy to please.



The first thing Shaun got for his birthday was a big hug from his sister.


He perked up with an enthusiastic scream when Shane showed him where his birthday surprise was hiding. He looks great on his new "turtle green" bike. He looked like a giant on his old creekity one! Thanks grandma.

Shane be nimble, Shane be quick

Shane jump over the candlestick.

Shane's class had Nursery Rhyme games Friday afternoon. I got to help with the candlestick relay races. It was so cute and the kids had a lot of fun.

My Boy's become a Wolf

Shaun started cub scouts today which began a whole new adventure for our family. You should have seen me at the boy scout store trying to find everything he needed for his uniform. They have badges for EVERYTHING! Cha ching, cha ching. Notice that his uniform doesn't have any patches on it yet. Can you believe they're not iron on? I'm going to have to break out the needle and thread. Poor kid, it might take me a month per patch :) He has been looking forward to this day for such a long time and was beaming with excitement. He also got to build a boat tonight that he'll race at the Rain-gutter Regatta next week at pack meeting. YIKES, den meeting, pack meeting, wolves, bears, cubs, it's all foreign to me. Greg's wishing he had paid more attention all those years ago.



Shaun's boat.


Spencer, Derek, Shaun, and Parker

Early Release Play Date

Today was early release day from school and Shane's friend Connor came over for a play date. We decided to get crafty and make these cute soup can pumpkins filled with candy for the kids to take to their teachers and friends.

Connor and Shane showing off their finished projects.

A true fan!

I saw this shirt on a lady at QT and had to convince her to give me the shirt off of her back. No not really, but I did convince her to give me her source :} Hot Topic if anyone is interested.

Forty Funk!

So I'm on the other side of the BIG 40! I wish I could say that it wasn't so bad, but I'm really having a tough time with this one. It's been a little over week and I'm thinking it's time to snap out of my funk and move on, however I've had many friends tell me that there's nothing wrong with sulking for two or three more months :)

Greg surprised me and took the day off of work and we spent it together. He and the kids spoiled me with a yummy steak dinner on our new kitchen table. They also made a delicious chocolate cake. I'm not sure why there are so many holes poked on top. I'm thinking they might have tried to put on a lot of candles and either realized it was a fire hazard or ran out. All I know about the hammer candle is that the boys thought it was pretty cool.

A captive audience

Shane has started reading and loves to read to anyone who is willing to listen, Even Pebbles :)

Slithering Salami Snake Sandwich

This year in kindergarten we had an ABC picnic at the park. Each student was assigned a letter and Shane's was "S". He wanted to bring soup, salad, sandwichs, and salsa. This is what we came up with instead. He's been bugging me to "put it on our blog."

Ahhh, Labor Day

Well, they say Labor Day is the official end of summer. Since it's about 105 and humid here we're having a tough time believing that.

Shea came up with our Labor Day agenda: We started our day with cinnamon rolls, a morning hike (enduring the crazy flying ant things that wouldn't leave Greg alone), then came home and spent the rest of the day swimming, eating watermelon, munching on chips and dip, and Shaun wanted BBQ ribs. Shea really dug into the ribs.

It was an awesome end to a really great summer!

Dana and Steve's cabin

Our good friends Dana and Steve invited us to spend some time with them at their Cabin on Stoneman Lake. We had such a great time. The weather was beautiful (in the 60's when we left), we went exploring, apple picking, riding the quad, played games, saw lots of beautiful birds and critters, the kids made a fort in the woods and Shaun and Shane said they saw beavers and Elk. My personal favorite thing was taking a really, really, long bubble bath in their claw foot tub and reading about Edward and Bella's wedding. Yes, I finally started Breaking Dawn and you'd think I know better than to read around water.
It was a wonderful way to start our Labor Day weekend!



The clouds were so beautiful, I had to take a picture.


These shoes were made for hiking.

Stoneman Lake in the backround. It actually has a little water in it.

Steve relaxing by the lake.

Greg pushing Shea in the tree swing.

There were Lady Bugs everywhere.

Shea cought a Dragon Fly that had it's wings stuck together. We peeled them apart and set it free.

Shaun is on "look out" we saw a pretty big rattle snake slithering into the tall grass.

Digging through the muck in the lake looking for critters.

Dana to the rescue. It started raining so she gave the boys a ride back to the cabin.

Shea showing off her delicious apple.

Shane getting a lift to pick apples off of the tree.