A Productive Day

What a Saturday. I managed to cook & freeze my pumpkins, toast the pumpkin seeds, make a final batch of tomato sauce, a batch of chicken broth, 4 dozen cookies for convention & a boatload of bran muffins. Craig managed to single-handedly tear down our little shed. The kids were in & out all day "helping" wherever they were.

Here's the shed site at the beginning of the day.

Here's the shed site after Craig flexed a few muscles!

Pretending something fun on the 4-wheeler.

Words of Wisdom

"This was not a good idea, Mom"! That's what Ayla said to me a little bit ago & I have to agree. We did something I hate to do, but occasionally we HAVE to do it. We just got back from Wal-Mart!! I didn't like to, but I HAD to go today. I've had an extreme urge for snickerdoodle cookies & we were down to our last 3/4 cup of flour, so you see, we had no choice but to go. We braved the rain with our "sunbrella" purchased on a previous trip to Wal-Mart. We made it in just fine, but a very slight gust of wind on our way out turned our "sunbrella" inside out. At that moment our keyless entry decided not to work. To make things worse, it took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out how to unlock the door with a regular old key! Needless to say we were sopping wet when Ayla delivered her words of wisdom. Maybe one day I'll learn to just stay home when I get the urge to go to Wal-Mart. One can only hope.

Funny Shots

I think people aren't noticing what's funny in the sunflower shots. Look very closely at Ayla's pants. She was just posing in front of the sunflowers & I caught a true Kodak moment.

Enjoying candy from Grandpa Mike.

Going...going...

Gone

Anniversary

Six years ago today, we heard Micah's heartbeat for the first time. We started off the day excited about our appointment with the midwife. Then the terrorist attacks happened. We began to feel scared & then sad. We thought about canceling our appointment with the midwife, but decided to go in the end. That day we heard evidence of the little life within, but had to wonder about the kind of world we were bringing our child into. I'm glad to say that soon after these events we felt peace. I'm sure every expectant parent feels excitement & terror, joy & sorrow when they think of becoming parents & of what the future might hold for their little ones. I'm writing this mostly for my dear friend Michelle who will soon bring new life into this world. Good luck Michelle & Don, may you have peace & joy in this new beginning.

New Favorite

Not much new to report around here. Micah still loves school & Ayla loves being numero uno all day long! It's super-duper hot again, but that shouldn't last too much longer. We are dealing with all our laundry after a long weekend in Iowa. We also have many ripe tomatoes to take care of soon. If we hadn't had hail damage to our garden we'd have more tomatoes than we could possibly deal with. I love this photo of Ayla & Lexie in the hammock. It just feels like summer.