some of the rest of the summer...

so there's been a lot going on this summer, and a lot of it wasn't documented with pictures so i tend to forget to blog those things... here's the best i can do:

--afton reading a book to malachi: these 2 are best book buds, they love reading together, and afton's a lot more confident with him than with me

--science experiments: mixing food coloring into a plain cup of water and into one with baking soda in it, the baking soda-water creates a tornado effect while the plain water just slowly mixes in

try it at home, it's kinda hard to see in the double layer santa cup

--visiting cousins: hooray for cousin marcie for coming to visit us (even if we were just a stop along her way) we loved having all those extra kids for a night! and we would love to have you come back through too!!!


we especially love giant chunky babies!!!

--grandma williamson: we got a surprise phone call from grandma williamson one afternoon, and she was in tx! so we dropped everything and raced out to the airport to see her for an hour or so before her layover ended! what an exciting day! oops, no camera :(

--dadfest: this is a 5K that's especially geared for families (the weekend of father's day), unfortunately paul had to work, but the kids and i rode the train up to richardson early in the morning and i ran while they played with some friends, then we all played a bit more, enjoying free samples (frozen greek yogurt was a favorite), playing in the water fountains, and afton climbed a tall rock wall, i wish i'd timed her, she was that fast! and the kids got little bead necklaces that they loved.

the kids had a 100 yd dash, both girls did great! and i love that they get bibs too

--lake visit: fun spur-of-the-moment trip one day, and i forgot my camera :) but it was fun!

--father's day: the kids made paul a shirt for father's day with roads and buildings, etc all over the back, the point is he can lay down and they can drive cars all over him like a little kid-massage. he laughed, but he wore it on our family walk that evening :)

this one's not technically from father's day, but i thought it fit!

--Juliana's garden: my friend juli lives a little out in the country here on a little farm, and she has a big garden that was getting a little out of control, so she invited us to come help weed in exchange for some produce! yum! we had a blast, she has chickens and donkeys, and just recently passed on her peacocks (they were waking the entire family before 5 am!) but she gave us a couple bags of eggplant, tomatoes, basil, and cucumbers. it was all amazing, and the kids had a blast
also, ms juli is an artist, here's a link to one of her works, i think you may recognize the subject!

the kids had a great time playing with some old peacock feathers though!

--i mentioned before that jacob and wendy came to visit, they were actually cisiting grandma, but we finagled our way in so we got to see and play with them a couple times too! rayna was delighted that she and sophie had the same swimming suits, and we loved taking them to the arboretum too. unfortunately i didn't ever take pics of the 2 cute curly-headed blondies in their matching swim suits :) go pink!

--malachi got this great new card-table tent for his birthday, it's technically a little too big for our kid-sized table, but the kids don't mind! it's so cute and they love pulling it out.

--and this is a picture i took that really has nothing to do with anything, but it makes me think of grandpa williamson, so i have to include it



malachi was pouring over the train calander one day, he'd get excited on each page and point and yell "train!"

now that i think about it, i should post one more picture:
we made this yesterday:

that's right! a count down chain til school starts!!! eek!

(ps, i don't usually let my children run around dressed like that, but it still seems to happen more often than i care to admit)

ps again, fourth of july and family reunion still WILL come! promise!