Sunday, June 26, 2011

Hello....Good-bye

We said hello to summer this week......finally some warm weather!






The best pool toys proved to be this potato salad bucket and an empty Dr. Pepper bottle. I believe that makes us hillbillies.



She's wincing at the flying water....


from her brother doing this.....

He was jumping to see how big of splashes he could make. I do believe that if the ghetto pool toys didn't confirm our hillbilly status, our swimming attire (or lack thereof) surely did. In my defense, it was an impromptu swim. We hadn't planned on swimming when we stepped outside. The kids just stripped and hopped in.

Max was there, and he took a few dips in the pool, courtesy of Ava.






We said Goodbye to our butterflies this week.





Max was there too.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Stink-Eye

Ava can deliver an impressive stink-eye.....


Luckily, it's often followed by a smile....
(pardon the crusty milk face and mouthful of pretzels)


One more time......
Stink eye....


Smile.....




And a few more pictures just because she's the baby and we think she is soooo cute.....


Wednesday, June 15, 2011

On a roll....

Three posts in three days, I am really on a roll....
Last night, while Chris slaved away shoveling rocks in the backyard, we played.
Someone had to keep an eye on the littles.....important job right?
Actually, if I were him, I would have been a little crabby that no one was helping me, but that doesn't bother him. He's more patient than I am.

There are a lot of pictures. Pictures that probably only the grandmas will appreciate, but since the grandmas account for roughly 50% of this old blog's four person readership, we cater to the grandmas.

Owen, atop the giant dirt hill in our backyard that he calls "Woodsman Mountain." There is a creepy woodsman in the "Scooby Doo Camp Scare" movie. He pretends he's that creepy woodsman. I have to say it makes me a little uncomfortable, and I do hope he isn't destined to be a sociopath.









Before we even began building our house, we moved this play equipment onto our property. It's old, and indestructible and has provided hundreds of hours of fun. We scored it from a church that used to run a private school. There is a huge sturdy swing set, and the climbing gym in the picture below. It is tall, and it gives me a near heart attack watching my kids stand on the tippy top of it, but they love it so I just hold my breath and hope they don't fall. There is also a tether ball pole as well as a merry-go-round that really needs restored.
I've mentioned before that we live on the top of a steep ridge with the town below us. When the kids haven't known I was watching, I've seen them stand at the top of the jungle gym, arms outstretched and yell "I'm on top of the world." When they're standing up there, they are taller than everything as far as the eye can see. I suppose the feeling of being on top of the world is worth the risk of fractured limbs?





Jumping....


 



This was going to be a super cute picture, but Emma bounced over at just the right second to give it blur. Even blurry, I still think it's pretty sweet. 

Dead man, dead man. 














A whole slew of pictures of Ava playing around what the kids call "the tree house," which is actually the playhouse my dad built when I was little. It sits on an old deck, but there is no tree involved, so I'm not sure why it's been dubbed "the tree house."









Lastly, a few pictures of Ava gathering weeds for Owen's "fire." He piles sticks and weeds to build pretend fires outside. It's been a relief for him to play outside because before the weather was nice, he'd empty the toy closet into a giant heap in the middle of the floor to build his "fires." He knows just how to elevate my blood pressure, giant heaps of toys.