My Bathtime Favorites

These are some of my favorite bathtime pictures of my girls. I finally put these three pictures in frames in their bathroom and they're just too cute not share.

Giddy Up!

Who needs a real horse when you've got Daddy?? An awesome Daddy nonetheless...

Camping @ Pokagon State Park

We went camping this past weekend at Pokagon State Park with our friends, Tara and Nate Routsong and their two boys, Jaxton and Cooper. It was so much fun and both girls did GREAT! They slept fine and were not cranky despite the fact that they didn't get naps. For some weird reason, as soon as we do anything outdoors, our girls are always happy campers...literally! (They don't get that from me!)



We kept busy swimming, riding horses, hiking, cooking and eating. Hallie loved making fires because it meant it was time for s'more s'mores!

She and Cam caught some fireflies in a water bottle one night and Hallie let them go after she realized she was killing them since their bums weren't lighting up anymore. The first night, Jaxton slept in the tent with Hallie. We caught them walking around and talking a couple times, but when they finally crashed, they slept like rocks.

We also had some adventures along the way...The first night we were there we saw an owl catch a mouse and after that Hallie was terrified of the owls. One of the owls even attacked Nate and Tara's tent! Come to find out, there was this big cicada bug (pictured above) under it which is why the owl attacked. A couple hours after dark, raccoons attacked our campsite. They got to the graham crackers before we had a chance to put them away. And the trip ending a few hours earlier than we expected the second night. The weather was beautiful and not too hot... at least for the first night and day. Then the second night, thunderstorms and lightning was so bad that our tent could only take so many hours of pouring rain and it started to leak. That was the end of camping for me, so my sweet husband let us pack up the girls and the tent at 5:00 am and headed home. We planned on going home that morning anyhow, just not quite that early! Luckily the girls had slept through most of the rain and went right back to sleep when we got home.

Camping wore the parents out more than the kids and we all decided that camping with kids that little is just intense babysitting, but overall it was a lot of fun!

Fresh Rhubarb Cobbler

My little red hens decided to make rhubarb cobbler using the rhubarb that's growing (uncontrollably I might add) in our garden. First we picked it and took the leaves off. Then we chopped it up and boiled the chopped stalk. Then, we added the cobbler ingredients, baked it, and waalaa: rhubarb cobbler. I should have taken an "after" picture after Hallie tried it for the first time. She gave a sour face and said it was disgusting. I guess she was thinking rhubarb is sweeter!? This little red hen was not impressed with her hard work. Oh well, at least we can say we've used the rhubarb in our garden!

Video: Sydnee Crawls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There is a reason for all the exclamation points in my title because... Sydnee finally crawled two weeks ago at 13 months old (hence the reason for all the exclamation points, I deserve to use them)!!!! This day has been a long time coming (as you can imagine since she's 13 months old), and the thing that got her to crawl was my friend, Marci's brilliant idea... we put marshmallows in a line and once she tasted one, she kept crawling to the next one and so on. After about a week of practice here and there she finally ventures into other rooms and crawls all the time! We are so proud of you Syd!

Discovering the Fourth of July

This year was the first year that Hallie really understood how cool the Fourth of July is. We were invited to our neighbor's, Shannon & Michelle's party. Hallie discovered what silly string was when the kids broke that out but she didn't understand that it's more fun to spray it at other people. Hallie kept bugging Daddy to spray her again and again!?

Then, our neighbor, Michelle, brought out the pop-it's and Hallie thought she had died and gone to heaven. That's all she played with until it got dark. Then she got smart and realized the pop-it's popped faster if she stepped on them instead of throwing them one by one. Another girl saw how much fun Hallie was having doing that, so she joined her, but as you can tell by Hallie's face she did not think that was cool at all (her face is too funny)! Then everything was right again when Michelle brought more out... phew! Later that night Shannon and Michelle put on an AMAZING fireworks show, it was such a fun night!

When Life Gives You Lemons... PAINT!

It's been a long and tearful month for my side of the family, to say the least, and bad news just kept coming to beloved family members of mine... so what do you do when you just can't cry anymore? I paint! I decided at the last minute to paint my china hutch which is beautiful but is dark wood so I painted it black to match my decor in our living room and it was the best stress relief mistake ever! At one point I asked Cam to bring a lamp in the garage so I could see what I was doing and instead of providing a lamp, he provided a head lamp which I always make fun of him for wearing when he works on his car... come to find out, it actually helped! I will post pictures of the finished product when I'm done...

What You Get When Three Girls Play Together...

Our neighbors, Rose and Lana, have become quite good friends with Hallie this summer and since they have a swingset, Hallie enjoys going over there to play. The other day, I let Hallie go over to play and they were awfully quiet out there. I went outside to see if they had gone inside Rose and Lana's house to play when they greeted me on our patio wearing their dress up clothes! It was too cute! Hallie informed me she was the pink princess, Lana said she was the purple princess and Rose corrected me when I asked what princess she was, by telling me "I'm the witch."