Bond Falls

 My smiley girl. :)

 Jenna and me.

 The falls themselves. They were so pretty this time of the year, but I can imagine they are even better in the spring. :)

 The fall colors there were awesome! :) The drive down there was spectacular too. :)

 I figured out how to slow the water down, the focus isn't the greatest, but I liked how it turned out anyways.

Here is a picture of Travis at his party. Check out the cake! Thanks Alanna! :)

An Update on Life

Hello readers! Have you missed me? I think this is the longest time I have ever gone without updating this blog. Sorry, but it'll be like this for a while. We don't have the Internet at home anymore, so I will just have to sneak into town every once in a while to update. I'll try to make it more frequent than once a month. I promise.

Here is a little update as to what we've been up to in the past month. I am still working full time, my insurance started now! yay! We are pretty excited about that factor. Aaron especially since he needed to start his clinical in the OR at the end of August. He LOVES it!! :) He came home after his first day in surgery saying he wished he knew how much fun it was going to be when he was going to class. It would've made it much more bearable he says. But I am glad he's enjoying it. Only two and a half more months until he's done! It's looking like we are going to be down here until December or January, as he didn't get his externship at P. Hospital. Oh well. Everything works out for a reason. I'm ok with it. Just bummed that it means at least two more months longer of working full time than we'd originally planned. But it's working out well, and why change what works.

Travis just turned three, and he is fired up. :) Saturday was his birthday. He was my baby in a hurry to be born. My total active labor for him was about an hour, maybe less. :) Two hours before he was born, I was in a corn field, picking corn planning for Aaron's grandparent's to come over for dinner. :) Needless to say, we had to take a rain check. My Travis was born weighing in at 7lb 1 oz. Now he weighs 31 lbs. :) He's getting to be so big. I see alot of my traits in him. He's got such a happy personality, but unfortunately he's inherited my clumsiness. Aaron says he'll trip over the next color in the carpet. It's not that far of a stretch saying that either. ;) Trav wanted a dinosaur cake for his birthday ( he's been real into them lately) so his awesome ( you really are!) Auntie Alanna made him a cool dino cake. He loved it. We got it on Friday and the party wasn't til Sat. Every time he walked by the cake, he had to hop up on a stool to check out that cake one more time. :) It was cute.

School started today for Jenna and Travis. They are both going to afternoon pre-school four days a week. Today was the first day. I was wondering how Travis would do, as he was nervous of the buses last year, but he did great! They have the cute little pre-school bus that they ride, and when it pulled up, he hopped right on like he's been doing it for years! I was a little sad when they waved goodbye through the window, but then decided I am going to enjoy the quiet during the day with just Logan at home. He took a three hour nap today with nobody around to make lots of noise to wake him up! At best he used to get about an hour long nap. I got almost a whole book read, and lots of laundry done. :) It'll just be him and I from eleven to four thirty, or two on the days that I work. Just think! I can go do my grocery shopping with just a baby in the front! No more burying kids in the back of the cart. :)  They came home with big smiles today, but now are showing signs of getting pretty tired. I doubt they got a nap today, so we should probably go home and put them to bed, as they have school again tomorrow. I will try to get pictures of their first day of school and Travis's birthday party up ( mostly for you Jen!) this week.

Oh on one more note, we went to Bo*d Falls this weekend and got lots of nice pictures there. I'll save that for another post however. See you next time!

At the Camp

All of the L**s*n grandkids were there!!!

We went to the camp for the weekend, and a great time was had by all! All of the L grandkids were there, so we got an updated picture. :)

It was a hot cocoa day

I have mixed feelings about our summer dwindling down. I love summer, and always try to enjoy it to it's max, and we did that the best we could on our hot days by heading to the beach. But now I can smell fall in the air, and it gets me a little bit excited for several reasons. One, being that we're on the last step to Aaron being done with school. He started Monday, and has his schedule all figured out through November. Two, because I can have hot chocolate for breakfast. I had it this morning with Cinnamon toast. YUM. My favorite. So for those of you moaning and groaning that summer is almost over, I hear you. But I'm still excited for this final chapter of Aaron's schooling! :)

A little bit of everything!

I can't seem to keep up on my blog this month! Sorry, but we've been enjoying the weather immensly!

Logan was sick all day today, and all last night. He wasn't running a temp, just puking. Jenna and Travis had it too, and today Aaron came down with it. I'm hoping since I was at work the majority of the time everyone was sick, that I won't get it. I was told that Logan was starting to perk up later this evening.  A good sign for my tomorrow. :)Levi just turned 7! And on Saturday, I think Zacharty turned 19! :) Maybe 2o... I can't remember. :)

Jennie and Ricky are back in Kiana now, I miss the diggens out of her! Next time I see her, hopefully it'll be up north back in my house! It'd mean I would see alot more of her and her hubby next summer than I did this one! It was a busy summer though, with working and Aars going to school. Hope your having fun up there again! The kids miss you bunches!


And last but not least, Aaron started school today, yay!!!!! The last step to being down with school! We are pretty excited about it!

Garage Sale Finds

   A few of my garage sale finds tonight. :) I  went garage saleing tonight, and hit up one really good sale. Made me fired up to go tomorrow. And I will have a garage sale buddy to come with, hopefully without my kids. :) Aaron will be back home from MN again tonight so he can watch the kids in the A.M. while I go. :) I'm hoping for lots of good deals! I still need a few things for Jenna and Travis for this winter. :)

National Night Out (picture heavy post)

I guess every year our local fire department hosts a community event for National Night Out.  This year I found out about it at work, and marked it on the calendar so we wouldn't forget.  I'm glad we went! The kids had a blast. They were able to get their blood pressure checked in an ambulance, ride in a fire truck and honk it's horn ( Jenna did it twice. :) ), and spray the water hose.  They also jumped in a bounce house twice. All this while wearing their little red plastic fire hats. I got lots of fun pictures, and am glad we went. I almost didn't, but it was worth it to see the smiles on the kids faces.

 The dad of this house has been gone for a week, and is coming home tomorrow. We can't wait! We sure have missed him!

15 months

I brought Logan in for a checkup on his hand today, and his 15 month well baby checkup. His hand looks great, we're told that it's past the risk of infection, and we don't need to keep it wrapped with gauze anymore. Just keeping it moisturized is all we have to do now.

He is 32 inches long, an 25 pounds. A big boy! :)

Jenna and June

This was taken a while ago, but I stumbled across it and decided to share. :)
  We went up north this past weekend and spent a few great days at the camp. I'll try and get a post up and some pictures tomorrow.

Scary Guy

He can growl at sea gulls now. Isn't he so scary? :)

Photography Class

I'm having so much fun with my class, and it's only week one. Already some of my questions I've wondered have been answered through our lesson, and I've figured a few things out. Alot of my pictures are far from sharable quality, but everyonce and a while I get the settings right, and a good picture comes from it. That is so satisfying!

Tomorrow is my sixth wedding anniversary. I married Aaron on Saturday, July 24th, 2004. I can't believe six years have gone  by already. Time flies. :) It'll also be my 27th birthday. That seems crazy to me too. I feel more like I'm in my early twenties instead of late twenties.  Jennie and I have this conversation often.

It was a beach day

I was playing with the camera trying to get a picture for my class I'm taking, and I got a few that I liked.... I don't know that I'd say any of them are really what I am turning in for class, but I figured a few things out, and discovered my camera takes pictures in black and white.  The colors at the beach are so fun to work with. I love the water in the picture of Jenna standing in front of the rocks. I'm considering the picture of Logan looking at the camera to possibly be one I turn in for class. We're going to go and try take more pictures somewhere today, so we'll see how those turn out before I decide. The lighting is completely different, so I'll just have to experiment and see what works. It'll be fun. I may have to stock up on fruit snacks for bribes however. :)

Class and Camping

I start my online photography class today that I signed up for a couple weeks ago. I'm excited to see what I'll learn, and just to be able to learn! I have had the itch to take a class for a while, and when Sharyn  suggested a class on her facebook page, I didn't take long to think about, and decided to sign up! It's a class on how to capture your kids through the lens, so it should be fun. :) It's a small six session class, perfect
 of time for how busy we are right now. I'll let you know how it goes!!!

Camping- to totally switch topics- was so much fun. :) Heather   and her family were there, along with a few other friends of ours. Even saw a bunch of the Ka**g*s clan there and sat and visited around their campfire for a while. It was a very enjoyable time. We were supposed to stay Saturday and Sunday night, but Sunday night, after she went swimming, Jenna started burning up. She got to a point where she was so hot we got a bit nervous. So we packed up camp at about ten o'clock at night ( we only live a half an hour away from where we camped), and were home by eleven. Her fever was 102.6. Pretty high. Still not sure what caused it, but we gave her some ibuprofen and she went to bed and woke up feeling normal in the morning. It was kind of a strange little fever. Aaron pointed out that it could've been anything when I was wondering what had caused it. She could've picked it up from the drinking fountain, the bathroom, walking barefoot on the ground, petting every other dog that walked  by our site, the water from the lake.... who knows.

Travis was just in his glory. As soon as we pulled into the campground, he went "TENTS!, there's tents!" And a few sites later, "CAMPERS! There are campers here! Can we sleep here?" He was pretty fired up to be there. :) 

Logan, well, I didn't have any expectations of keeping him clean. Good thing, cause I would have drove myself mad. He crawled through the dirt the whole weekend. But he had a good time too. Jenna was fired up to be there. Our neighbors were probably sick of her after the first five minutes they were there. :) Oh well. That's my Jenna. Miss Social. 

Now we are still unloading the van, and doing laundry from the weekend. I expect to be caught up on that tomorrow... hopefully. My old neighbor always said it takes twice as long to get caught up on laundry for however long you were gone. I still think she's right. And with that, my loads are ready to switch and go out on the line. Later!

We're Going Camping!!!!!

I woke up this morning all fired up to have a day off. Then the nursing home called around noon and asked if I'd go in today as they'd had a call in. I wasn't so pumped off the idea being as it's my only day off all weekend.  But then Christy (she has always been SO good with working with me when I want a day off, and because of this, I always try and work with her so she keeps being nice to me! :D) said I could have tomorrow or Sunday off instead of today. The idea suddenly sounded like a good one, so I said yes, I'd work today if I can have tomorrow off. We wanted to go visit some friends who are camping over at V. Riper Campground for the weekend. Then she said I could have Sunday off as well if I wanted. At first I said no, not really wanting to loose out on many hours, but then Aaron came up with the great idea of taking it off anyways, and go camp with them. I LOVED the idea. I have been craving a good camping trip all summer. I don't think we really camped a real camping trip all last summer, and it wasn't looking so hot for this summer either. SO....

I called Christy back, and asked if it was too late to change my mind, as I now wanted both Sat. and Sun. off. It wasn't too late! Hooray! Now..... to figure out if there were open sites. There are! Hooray! We're going for two nights. It's going to be so much fun! Our site is mostly dirt, and some grass, but what the heck. Who said that camping is supposed to be clean? I pretty much know that that's impossible when I've still got a crawling baby. I've resigned myself to the fact that he probably will crawl his way through summer, and then start walking in the fall sometime. That's just the way my babies operate.

 The only slight hitch in the plan... our tent. Remember the pictures from this POST? Our snowstorm that we had the first weekend of May? Right. It's ruined. But I remembered my wonderful neighbor who offered us to borrow their big dome tent sometime this summer if we'd wanted too. I called her up and the offer still stood.. :) Thank you Lisa! Now.... I need to assemble a list, and pack and go grocery shopping for two days and two nights of camping. I'm So So So excited! I better get cracking. Have a good weekend! I know we will! :D

One More Day

This one is at Muumu's house for one more night. She's been gone since Tuesday. Probably the longest time ever spent away from home for her. She's been doing great. From what I heard last night, she gets a bit lonely around bedtime. I'd found her  a ride home today with Rick and Jennie, but she decided she wasn't quite lonely enough and would stay two more days. :) It's been kind of nice to have a mini break with just the boys, but I'm ready for her to come home now. I miss her smiley little face and personality. :)

It's a Monday

This daisy is for you Leanne. :)

These are from our hike up Sugar Loaf yesterday. :)

Sunday Happenings

My Jenna was my model for the day today. We went to church this morning, to find nobody there. So we went to the park for a half an hour where I played with the settings on my camera. It was alot of fun!

We have Annie and Levi staying with us until Tuesday, when I'll bring them home. We have been having fun with them around. Yesterday we went to a parade in the morning, then fireworks after I was done working last night. This morning, we went to a local park, then hiked up Sugar Loaf. What a gorgeous view! In the two years that we've been here, we never hiked it before. We will def. be doing it again. :) Pictures on that tomorrow. :)

Still a Band Geek

I'm still a sucker for marching bands. I think I always will be. I was in band in school for seven years, so I still find myself marching in place, or swaying to the beat when ever the band goes by. :) I just can't help it! I know, I know, I'm still a band geek. But I for real LOVED marching band. Minus our uniforms, but besides that I loved it. I even kind of miss it some days, and I have been out of high school for eight years. :) These are taken of the Blue Notes, and drum and bugle corps that march in all of the parades down here. They're pretty good. :)