Property in Aberdeen

Tonight we went out and took another look @ the land we are bidding on.

The girls decided to take their horses for a ride.
It looks just like a flat piece of farmland from the front.

View to the East.
View to the South View to the North

My husband and girls standing where we would possibly build our house.

View from the back of where we'd build a house.

The two posts in the middle is where the driveway would come in.

My husband is standing in the middle of where the driveway would be. We'd build to the left and the other family to the right.

Aspen Trees

No Man's Land- Not farmable due to lava rock, but a great place for kids to play.

Field behind the house.

The Girls were busy "building a house".

The view to the northeast. We'll put a tree there.

Birthday Party!

Someone special turns 4 on Wednesday. But since we have soccer and youth group Wednesday night, we had a little party with a few of her best friends on Sunday evening. This was not quite the masterpiece I was imaging, but Birthday Girl said "Mommy, this is the best cake ever. It's got spots all over it. How did you ever know?" I felt like I had made a masterpiece. We put the top "tier" of the cake in the freezer

to celebrate with our family Wednesday night.

Look @ those two beautiful girls!

"Cheese"! We had hotdogs with our friends before we had cake!

I don't think the birthday girl got to blow out her own candle.... She had lots of help. (She will on Wednesday.)

This was the calm before the storm. We (all of the parents) tried to keep the kids sitting on the couches as Birthday Girl opened her gifts. It started out organized, but then all chaos broke out, and everybody helped B.G. open her presents too. It was comical. I was trying to take pictures and lil' sis of course was the worst. (I was really proud of B.G. because she didn't seem to mind all of the help.)
This was a puppy from Grandma for her dollhouse.

I think her exact words were "Oh how wonderful! It's cool. I like it!"

The Poser

Two weeks of staying in a hotel with a water park and eating out every night... equals two spoiled little girls.

This is not the hotel we stayed at for two weeks,

this was a different water park on the way home.

Big Sister really wanted to pose for every picture.

You can barely see lil' sister's hand behind her in this picture.

Lil' sister started watching Big sister.

Lil' Sister is starting to pose now too.

Big sis never new she had a copy cat.

Here is a video of Big sis posing for that perfect look after her slide.

More Posing....

Big sis loved going down the waterslides for 2 weeks, but never by herself. At the end of the 2 weeks going down slides, big sis very confidently went down the big slide by herself. In fact she had never gone down the big slide yet by herself, we were at this brand new pool and we were walking from the kiddie pool to the big pool. Myself leading followed by big sis, lil' sis, then dad. I went around the corner, put my stuff down and then looked at the big pool as a tiny girl came down the slide and went under and then doggie paddled to the side. I first thought. "That little girl is going to drown." Then, "Oh she has on floaties." Then, "hey that's ______!" My husband then came around the corner and I looked at him and he looked at me. We both thought the other had let her go down. We both thought that she was with the other one. So as she passed the stairs she had just run up them and had gone down this 4-story slide all by herself. If anybody asked me if she would have done that, I would have said "no way". "She is too scared. She will never go by herself". Well, she proved us wrong, and got in trouble for going off by herself.

Here is a short video of her going down with Dad!

We survived Survivor....

"There can only be one..."

That was the theme for Survivor this year. There can only be one God.

Exodus 20:3

12 Adults. 43 Survivors. 3 tribes. 1 God.

Nobody was seriously injured, nobody drowned, we didn't get eaten by bears, we didn't burn down the forest...To me it was succesful . But really, Andy McCune did a great job speaking. The challenges, tribal councils, tribe devotions all went well. I'll try to get more pics from our photographer to post.

Dad and Mom were a tremendous help, watching kids, cooking meals, and helping set up challenges. The RV that my parents rented with their own money became the Survivor headquarters for all meals and first aid. We had more than one patient in the RV late @ night. All the other adults kept commenting about how my parents were awesome and such servants to all these people they didn't even know. Thanks Mom & Dad!

We were home one day from Survivor, and then off to Fargo, ND for 2 weeks.

And then we got busy......really busy!

From Minnesota we drove 10 hours to Missouri for a 4th of July Family Reunion.

The girls with my mom eating s'mores.

Holding (strangling?) a kitty from my Granpa's farm.


Blowing Bubbles in the Gasconade River.

Jumping in Granpa's River...Oh to be a 1 year old.

Eric & I left the girls there and drove for 2 days back to Idaho and then went Immediately to Old Faithful Christian Ranch where Eric was the speaker for a week. I didn't take any pics @ OFCR because we were too busy. I flew home to get the girls on Friday, was back home 24 hours later with the girls.

We were home for 4 days before off to another very small church camp where Eric spoke again.

We took the girls this time.

Palisades Mennonite Church Camp

Dipping in the freezing cold waters of the Palisade Resevoir.

Enjoying the sunshine on the Dock.

Mom got to float the snake river.

That's me waving in the middle.

Here is a picture of our little A-frame cabin we stayed in.

We will be home for a week and a half and then we have our SURVIVOR camp with our own youth group. A day later we will be road tripping out to Fargo, ND for a week and a half. Crazy two months. I think we will only have been home at our house 14 days out of 55 days.

So what does life look like at home?

As I was working on the computer today the girls came in and said, "We're ready for the snow." (It's 88 degrees outside). So I took their picture and as they walked out the door the oldest said, "What a beautiful snowy day it is today."

Good Times with Grandma

Grandma's house is hard to beat....

First there is her vegetable garden.

I helped Grandma pick vegetables for dinner and then gave the leftovers to two little rabbits that live in Grandma & Grandpa's yard.

Grandma also has a cool picnic table & pool just for us!

Here we are in action in the pool!

Grandma's house is near the Mall of America.

Nickelodean Rides @ the Mall of America!

Hattie & Grandma on Blue Skidoo!

Grandma took us all to get our nails done!

Hailey's tiny toes!

Hattie's toes!

Grandma's House has Princess Cakes!

Sparklers!

And a fireworks show! (Thanks Grandpa!)

All this fun made one little girl a bit tired!

Thank You Grandma!