Wordless Wednesday

Fay

Well Hurricane Fay never made it to a hurricane, but we were prepared for it anyway. Mark had been wanting to cut out plywood and use these new clamps he had bought for hurricane shutters and this storm allowed us time to do that.

Here you can see the girls having fun on our 'storm shutters.' Emily isn't really afraid, just being a ham. Katie finds this all to be new and exciting. She offered to help Daddy with the boards.
Mark was very happy with the new brackets he bought for the windows. He assures me that next hurricane the boards will go up very quickly. Something to look forward too.
Here is our little Hurricane documentation. Hopefully we won't need to fill in anymore pieces! Hope all of you Floridians had a safe day!

Ty dresses himself.

Ty is into the phase where he likes to try to dress himself and pick out his clothes.

Below you can see that he is sleeping in his Firetruck Man outfit. Please not this is not a fireman outfit. He is sure of that! Really it is a very, very warm raincoat that he has decided resembles a fireman's outfit. He insisted on wearing it to bed one night. I took it off before I went to bed and he was soaked in sweat.

(I really need to get him a different pillow case.)

He loves this headband and likes to wear my backpack. Ty is such a fun guy!

SunSplash

The Olympics are keeping me from updating my blog. Did you see the Phelps race last night? Amazing! We loved here.

Last Saturday we went to SunSplash. It was Family Fun Night, so everyone got in for $5 each. Good deal compared to their usual prices.

Emily loves all the big slides. In the picture below I was riding with her and we flipped out of our tube at the end. Do you see my arm holding up the tube?

She loved it!
Ty loved the kiddie area. There was hardly anyone there in the beginning, so we had the place to ourselves. Sarah is in between right now. A bit too big for this area, but not quite ready for the big slides. She did try the pink slides toward the end and loved them.

Mark enjoyed going down the slides with the girls. This looks almost painful to me.
Surrounded by 1000's of splashing, laughing people, Katie fell asleep. :)

Family Photos

I am a fan of the non-traditional family photos. One of my favorite photographers used to do a shot of the family in the front yard on a couch. I always wanted one like that. Now I know the quality is nothing compared to my favorite photographer, but I still like the pictures.

When I told Mark the picture I wanted he thought it was a good idea, but didn't want to drag our couch into the front yard. Lucky for me he likes perusing Craigslist. The other day there was a listing for a free couch in Villas. He picked it up for the picture, we took the picture, put the couch by the road and someone else snagged it. Thanks, Mark!

Olympics Time!

As you know I love the Olympics! Friday we got into the Spirit of things by having Chinese for dinner. We love Chinese, so this was perfect for us.



The kids all made their own torches to carry for our family Olympics. If you look closely you can see that Team Ty was so confident that he ate a granola bar during the opening ceremonies.


Team Emily-Gold Medal in Running
Team Sarah-Gold Medal in Hula Hoop
Team Ty-Goal Medal in Block Building
Team Katie- Gold Medal in Block Dismantling

We made up our own backyard (or in this case frontyard) games to play for the family Olympics.
---on a side note, doesn't our grass look great! We have had such a wet summer that it has done wonders for our lawn.
This was the hula hoop toss. I was a disappointing fourth place. We are laughing at something Mark said.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday-two days later-but that's ok- we have been busy enjoying the last few days before our friends go back to school- and it is more important that the pictures is there rather than the date it was posted-and I really like this picture because I can see 5-7 years down the road when they are teenagers taking the same picture-Chandler is holding the camera-I just like this pictures-no words from here on out.... :)

the red chair

I haven't got around to looking at these pictures I took while at the family reunion. This red chair was in the cabin that we staying in and it looked so nice with Katie's outfit. We went out to the driveway of the camp and had a little photosession.

I think she looks so cute! I love her little tiptoes!

Fun at the Waterpark

Today Emily, Sarah, Ty and I met Misha, Chandler and Holly at the waterpark. (Katie stayed home with Daddy and got a good nap.) We had a very good time. It is hard to believe the summer is nearly over. Chandler and Holly start back to school next week, so we want to get in as much fun time as we can before then.

Matching hairdo
Here are your pictures Holly. :) This was her pose idea.
And this was my pose idea for her.
Then Holly took over the camera and was able to get some...interesting... photos. :)

Countdown begins...

Has your family start making preparations for the big event? Around here we are all getting excited for 8/08/08 at 8:08pm--the official start to the Olympic Games.

We started school yesterday and we are working on an Olympic mini-unit before the games officially begin.

This is the first year that the girls wil enjoy watching the games (or at least I hope they will.)


I like all the Olympic events, but I am looking forward to: swimming, gymnastics, basketball, beach volleyball and the track and field events. I'm sure once the games start we will watch watcherver is on.

Go Team USA!

blogging mood

I just feel like sharing today. :)
Here are our 4 kids this morning. I love the diaper only baby and mismatched daughter. So is life! Why do we all hang out in 1 room so often?

Here is Katie at the watertable last night. This is her trademark smile. We had a good time hanging out in the backyard. This summer the weather is great. Not smothering muggy, just sweltering muggy. Gotta love that!
Katie has learned how to climb unto Ty's bed. She is very proud of this accomplishment. Mommy--not so much.
My beautiful Emily. Doesn't she look older than 9? You can't tell from the picture, but she is holding a frog and a lizard. They (Emily and Sarah) put them in the watertable and laughed at Katie trying to pick them up. Once Katie did grab the frog they weren't laughing so much. Luckily, Katie did not snack on frog legs.

Sarah's Blog

I told the kids we are going to start a homeschooling blog for them to 'publish' some of their work.

Sarah wants her own blog. I don't know how much she will update, but figured why not!

The link is on the left.

Quick trip to Michigan

On Saturday morning, Keela and I got word that Kami had decided to go the Family Reunion the next day. We didn't want to be left out, so we decided to fly up and join everyone. We brought Katie because lap babies are free.

It was a very quick trip, but we had lots of fun.

This is my cousing Shaun. In the future....Don't touch my camera! :)



This is my cousin's son Shane. He watered most of the yard. He reminds me of Ty. They would have a fun time together.
We brought Blokus to Michigan when we were there in June. Mary and Robin loved playing it. Now Robin has a game and so does Mary. Both sets got lots of use during the reunion. I have to admit there are a lot of really good Blokus players out there. I may not be the best, but I do have the Blokus Champion Lanyard. :)

Michigan 2

We had a good time arriving in Michigan. When Keela and I got to the airport we called Robin. We figured she would get us even if it was late at night. She didn't answer her phone! That put us in a panic. We never figured that into the plan. So, we called Mark and he rented us a car for $30. Good deal! Keela called at 1230am to ask about her day and then we started ringing the door bell. Mom and Kami were spending the night and they were all scared until they looked out the window. We stayed up until after 2am talking. Katie just crawled around smiling.
This is just a sampling of Mammaw's greatgrandchildren.
I think Mammaw looks great here! She does a wonderful job hosting 140+ people at her house each year. I actually honored her request and used the porta-john this year. (just one time)
Katie ha a great time and explored the yard with the gorgeous Michigan grass. She enjoyed the attention she got, but was excited to see the rest of her family when we got home.