The last sprinkler day of the year...

On Thursday, September 1, we had our last sprinkler day of the year. Jay and I blew up about 250 water balloons the night before. How long do you think 250 water balloons would last 12 children? At bet they lasted no more than five minutes. :)

There are a lot of pics, but I like how pics come alive when there are a lot of them. Here are the pics of the day...

Just look at all those little toes lined up. They are just dying to dive in!

All right everyone get a balloon and stand still...don't pop it...get together for a picture.
Seriously, I must be pretty talented! You have no idea how hard it is to get 12 children to stand still with a water balloon for a pic. They wanted so badly to run and have fun. There was already an uproar of giggles! :)

Silly faces...

Nate was scared of the balloons the night before (while Jay and I were blowing them up). With some time, and influence from the other kids, he started to have a great time!


New friend M, "cheese!"

New friend C!







Girlfriends! New friend A, is pictured here.

Four out of the five girls that left for school this year. :(

The kids put most of the balloons in the pool. They loved seeing them float.

D and ET definitely knew how to throw a water balloon. The two of them had a good old fashioned water balloon fight...and they loved it!







Poor little M, the water balloon popped in her face.

She was not very happy about that.

C came alive! He loved throwing and popping the balloons! Each time he would giggle and get more and more excited!


If it were left up to some of the girls, they would have just held on to them all day...like pet rocks. :)

Unlike the boys...who just wanted to see how many they could pop in the shortest amount of time.



I had a wonderful time with all the kids this summer! I loved doing a sprinkler/picnic day each week. Though as much as I enjoyed it, I am also excited for fall and some of the new changes that have begun. We said good-bye to five kindergarteners and two school-agers this summer. Five new children have started. Needless, to say we have a lot of changes to adapt to. We are so sad to say good-bye to so many good families and kids, but excited to welcome so many new and wonderful faces! We are so blessed!

Melissa's 15th Birthday Celebration

We headed over to WI to celebrate Melissa's birthday on Sunday, August 28. The weather was perfect, the food was great, and time with family is as always, time well spent! :)


Beautiful!


Auntie Tammy always makes us feel so welcome...the boys love it there!












After a lot of playing with his cousins, Nate was pretty tuckered out. He is not sleeping, just throwing a tantrum. He was ready for a good nap. :)

Nate's 18 month pictures!

These were taken at the beginning of August (just after Nate turned 18 months on July 19). Unfortunately, it has taken us a while to scan them for the blog, so I am terribly behind schedule on posting these.

I always schedule our pictures with the same woman from Sears (Jennifer). She is the manager and she definitely knows what she is doing. Nate has proven to be a lot more difficult for these situations than ET ever was, and so getting a good picture has always been quite a challenge. Each time we go in, I think there is no way I will be buying anything, but Jennifer some how manages to pull it all together for me. You really have no idea how big of a saint she is!

This time I totally caved and brought along toys from home, Nate's favorite book, his stuffed kitty, and... a bag full of M&M's. (Yes, I know, if you're one of 'those' moms, just gasp and turn away.) I hoped the M&M's would warm him up a bit and get him to separate from me so that we could play and catch some smiles. Unfortunately, my plan did not exactly work. He sat and ate all the M&M's without a single smile, then threw a HUGE temper tantrum. After a LOT of patience and creativity, we were able to crack a few giggles and catch a few pictures....whew! These photo shoots are so nerve wracking, and unbelievably exhausting!

Here he is with his M&M's...

Here is a funny one... Nate was actually on his tummy because he was throwing a temper tantrum. He stopped to look up a second and smiled! Boy, isn't it amazing how fast they can turn it on and off? Jenny and I laughed because he literally posed himself! :)

This is Nate's favorite book at the time, I Love You Through and Through. Most recently though his favorite book has become, The Truck Book. (This brings me back because The Truck Book was also one of ET's favorite at this age.) :)

What a cutie pie! I am so glad that thumb is not in his mouth anymore, unlike his 12 month shots.

Love those toes, and the summer sandal lines! :)

One of his favorite toys are matchbox sized cars.

Lundberg Chicken BBQ!

Since my sister and her family were in town this last week, I volunteered to host the chicken BBQ this year. My parents originally said they wanted to do it, but having all six of them stay at their house and also be in charge of preparing for a such a large get together would have been too much. Jay and I were happy to do it!
We rented a bounce house, and also set up the bounce house that Addison and her family had borrowed to us. With both bounce houses the babies (Nate and Sierra) had a safe zone all to themselves.
Twyla, her family, and my parents arrived about noon. We ate a light lunch together while we all just sat outside and enjoyed the weather. The chicken was on about 4:00 and everyone was here and eating by 6:00. Everyone made it except Jay, Stacia, Tyler, Alex, Becky, Mark, Matt and Grandma (sadly, Grandma was in the hospital).
It was a GREAT time spent with family! Everyone stayed a bit past dark, and ET thought it was so cool that he was outside "in the middle of the night." :)

Playing outside during the day before everyone arrived. Sam opened a few belated birthday gifts.

The traditional chicken BBQ!!! You could have smelled it a mile away. It was such a sight! I am not sure how many halves there were, but this was a rented five foot grill and there wasn't an inch to spare. :) You can see in the pics that the kids LOVED helping Papa Jim and Uncle Doug by shooting out the flames with the squirt bottles.




Grandpa Jim and Great Aunt Grace...I know Grandpa Jim loves watching his family prepare the tradition that he started years ago! :)

Grandpa Jim insisted that I take a picture of the sun rays shining through the smoke. :)

I forgot to take a picture of the kids again once Logan had arrived. It was hard to get them all to sit still for a moment to catch this pic. They definitely put the bounce house to good use. It was a HOT day, and so Grandma Terri told the kids they could run through the sprinkler a bit. WARNING...wet kids and a bounce house do not pair well with each other. We were lucky no one got their eye poked out! :)


Nate and Sierra enjoying the little bounce house. As much as I would have liked them to bounce in this one and stay safe, they just wanted to be with the big kids in the big bounce house.


This year instead of worrying about tables and seating arrangements, we just had everyone bring their own lawn chairs. It worked great!