Summer Fun!

We have done alot of fun things this summer. Since this blog is a way for me to communicate to family and friends what is going on in our life, I want to back track a bit from now and fill you in on some of the fun things we have done. First up is the picture above. This was taken on our first ever family vacation. We traveled with our friends, the Hanks family, to Branson, MO. We had a wonderful time. This picture was of all the kids at the Butterfly Palace. It was absolutely beautiful to see all those butterflies. Stephanie and I actually had one to land on us, well Stephanie had two. We spent an entire day at Silver Dollar City. Drew was not scared of anything! He rode all the rides that he could. Many of the "kiddie" rides go around in circles so that left me out! I love a good thrill ride or roller coaster, but spinning in circles leaves me rather ill. We spent two days at the water park, White Water. The kids absolutely loved being in the water park. Again he was quite the daredevil, riding all the slides that he could. He still has a great fear of being in deep water but he really enjoyed the water park in a way I never expected that he would. We are going to get him enrolled in swimming lessons to help with his fear. Jim and I got to enjoy a "date night". The Hanks were left to babysit all the kids one night and we went to The Dixie Stampede dinner show. It was so much fun. I am glad that we were able to experience that together. It was a fun filled week that went by quickly. We are so appreciative to our friends for sharing this trip with us and for using their timeshare points to provide us with a place to stay. I hope we will all be able to do it again in a couple of years.

Our next summer adventure was the First Annual Poppy and Nana Fishing Rodeo. My parents decided to start a new tradition this year in honor of Father's Day. We had a fishing rodeo at their house! The kids had a blast. Drew is not quite the devoted fisherman that his daddy is, but I am sure he will develop this desire with a few more years of age on him. He did catch one fish. Jim caught a few too. We ended the day with a fish fry. It was good fun and good eating!



Fouth of July! We enjoyed the fourth back over at mom's. As you can see Drew and Jim did some more fishing. We all had matching patriotic shirts, so mom took our picture. After the morning fishing we all went over to Aunt Bev's and Uncle Johnny's to enjoy their new pool. It was so nice and Drew really enjoyed the pool, again to our amazement. We cooked out that afternoon and later we enjoyed fireworks thanks to Jim and my brother-in-law, Todd. They did a good job on them. We really enjoyed the day and the weather was perfect!

A few weeks ago we had the pleasure of keeping all of my nephews for the evening while Elizabeth and Todd went out for dinner. This is always a joy to me. They are all growing up so quickly. Daniel will soon be 11, Nathan is 6 1/2, Ben is 3 1/2, and now little Matthew is here and about 7 weeks old. Drew and Ben actually sat still long enough for me to take a picture of them holding him. The other picture is of Drew pretending to be Batman. The fingers on top of his head are supposed to be the horns on Batman's helmet! It was too cute, I just had to get a pic of him!

That brings us up to date in our life! It has been a busy summer but a good one. This has actually been the most relaxing summer I can remember since Jim and I married. We have enjoyed many quiet evenings at home. Jim has been a real help in getting some of the "housework" done during the week when he has been home so I have had to do very little on the weekends. This has been so nice. Now school is just a few more weeks away and he will not be able to do that anymore. It has been a real treat. The fall will be a busy time for us as Drew will be starting to Pre-K. I am so thankful to God for the quiet and restful summer. I am trying so hard to enjoy each and every minute we have together as a family and to cherish all the memories we have made this summer. I plan to do my best to be a good "blogger" and to use this as a resource for expressing my thoughts and sharing what our family is doing and to take many pictures to share with you, all my friends and family!!