Independence Day!

Well, I am hoping to get all of July blogged about before August 1.  There is a good chance I am not going to make it, just in case you are on pins and needles to hear about it!

July 4 we started out with company, but sadly they had to head home since they had things to do bright and early Monday morning.  Since we hadn’t really checked into what to do in this area for the fourth, we decided we would just stay home and see what we could see.  Best decision EVER!  Have I mentioned that we live kind of in the middle of no where?  Well, that is not exactly true.  There are cities and neighborhoods all around us, we just happen to be in a little patch of land with not a whole lot around us.  Have I mentioned that we have some new neighbors?  Yay!  Since the first of the year five houses have been completed and four more are almost done.  No one is right by us, which is nice.  (Or should I be paranoid?  Do all the trashcans and outdoor kids stuff scare people away?  I don’t care, I like a little space!)  Well, we could seriously have sat on our roof and had a 360 degree fireworks extravaganza.  The other nice thing about being out of city limits is that you can pop your own fireworks.   At least that was nice for those of  us that wanted to just watch our neighbors fireworks! The boys couldn’t understand why we wouldn’t do this!  Umm,  safety maybe?  Thirteen year old that thinks he knows how to do everything and fireworks was not a battle I wanted to face this year!  One of our new neighbors had a party and had fireworks galore.  We decided to elect him chairman of fireworks for our neighborhood from here on out!  It was a fabulous time.  Perfect weather, lots of fireworks, our family all together.  Loved it!

Gannon, Kellen, Callie, Garrett, and Daddy enjoying the shows.

This girl was the LOVING the fireworks!  She clapped and cheered the whole time!

This is just a good picture of her curls.  :)

Yay!!

Garrett and Callie deciding to stand and watch.  It was better this way since we could turn around in all directions to view the shows!  

Just to show how close we were to our neighbors show.  Perfect!  Just like having your own but we didn’t spend any money on fireworks or ER visits!  (They didn’t go to the ER thank goodness, but it just takes on crazy firework you know!)

Family Visit

The end of July we had a great visit from Todd’s brother Glenn and his family, Kerry, Taryn, and Jack.  They came and enjoyed Branson a couple of days as a family then came and joined in our madness!

The first day we got together we met them at Silver Dollar City and had a great time!  It’s nice to have cousins all about the same age so they have someone to ride rides with.  Aunt Kerry was a good sport about riding stuff with them.  I have yet to ride anything at SDC except the bouncy frogs.  That was enough for me!  I would enjoy the water rides, like the log ride and such, but I do not enjoy walking around wet all day.  One of these days I will ride at the end when we are heading straight home!

The next best thing to having cousins your own age is having cousins older than you to take you around and do fun things!  Callie was loving having Taryn help her!

I don’t remember the official name of this area, but it is filled with soft balls that you can shoot, pick up, dump, they fall on your head, the possibilities are endless.  It is several stories high, fun for all ages!

It is hard to get a picture of someone jumping, at least it is when they don’t jump very far off the ground, but can you see that her feet are leaving the ground?  Taryn would fill up the balls for her and she could push the button to shoot them out into the middle.  She was soooo excited about this!  She would shoot and then just jump up and down, it was so cute!

Here Callie is putting the balls in the vacuum tubes that take balls up to the top of the structure.  This was sooo up her alley!  She loves to clean and pick up.  The girl was seriously determined to clean up all these balls!  I wish I would have gotten a picture of the look on her face when they would come dumping from the ceiling.  Pure frustration that she would never get this place clean.  Welcome to womanhood sister!

Meanwhile, Glenn was our official “stuff” watcher.  Thanks Glenn!

Here Jack, Garrett, Callie and Gannon are getting in on the action.

Here is a guy that apparently has a summer job of scooping up foam balls and tormenting children with them.  He’s probably a homeschooler :).  (I kid, I kid!)

Of course, instead of saying “Hey kids, let’s go over here and play”, I documented the whole thing with my camera.  I love the look on Callie’s face as the ball guy is heading for them.  Soon after this, she ran to me.  I don’t blame her!

Watch out Garrett, he’s going to get you!!!

Glenn finally gets in on the action!  He graciously offered to take Gannon on the little roller coaster.  Can you spot him?  He could not have been comfortable in the that little thing!

Kids still smiling after a long day at Silver Dollar City.  We had a GREAT time!

They spent the night with us Friday and Saturday night.  It was supposed to rain Saturday so got up early and went to the go-cart track.  Taryn volunteered to drive Gannon.  Kellen has not ever gotten to drive a single car since Gannon is not tall enough to drive by himself, so Taryn said she would take him.  Thanks!

 

Kellen with Jack right behind him!

The rest of Saturday we just hung around the house.  I think the kids got a little bored, but this mama was worn out and the adults were just enjoying having time to visit.  We enjoyed some Arris’ pizza for dinner, a family favorite!

 

The next day we went to church and then made the obligatory visit to Lambert’s.  Everyone that comes to this neck of the woods wants to go there.  It has been featured on the Food Network as the number one pig out place in the country.  Actually, I don’t think Glenn and Kerry really had that on their list of must-sees, but Todd had been wanting to go there for a couple of weeks so this was a good excuse!

Jack, Kellen, and Taryn waiting for their rolls.  Yes, they throw their rolls.  Lovely. (Except they are really good!)

Garrett waiting for his roll.

Glenn and Kerry enjoying their lunch.  Notice there is food everywhere.  This is not all theirs :)!  They just keep bringing more and more food until there is no where to put it all!

We had a great time!  Looking forward to them coming again!

More Summer Fun!

Gannon and his friend Josiah hanging out in the whale pool!  I thought Callie might like this while the boys were sliding.  But, the have confiscated it to use at the bottom of the slide since the fall out over the edge half the time!

Garrett going down the water slide.  Yes, a water slide in our backyard.  Quite possibly the silliest thing I have ever bought :)!  But,  our yard leaves something to be desired for little boys.  No trees.  No neighbors.  No shade.  No nothing.  Until now!  They have had a lot of fun.  Luckily they are the kind of kids that can make anything fun.  How many times can you go down a slide and still have fun?  So, they have all kinds of games made to keep it fun.

Gannon on the slide.

Kellen sliding.

Callie just watching.  She has come around and gone down the slide with a brother from time to time.  She likes the slide, just not getting drenched at the bottom of the slide!  This day she ended up going in and falling asleep on the couch.  Fun times!

Just Hanging Out

Ok, not really.  On paper, our summer looked so easy and carefree.  No baseball games, time to hang out at home, hang out with friends and family.  Let’s just say there has not been much hanging around doing nothing!  We have had a lot of fun though.  The boys have tried some new things, we’ve spent time with new friends, and had lots of company, which I love!

After my surgery we went home with my mom.  It worked out great since Todd was going to be working in Oklahoma, he could just come pick us up.  And, it gave me more time to lay around!  Ha!  This is what you do at Grandma’s house.  Shoot things.  She has managed to amass quite a collections of little guns and hats so the kids march around inside and like they are in some sort of battle.  Too funny!

The kid on the right is Garrett, I promise.  I didn’t want to get to close and embarrass him and I hadn’t updated my phone with the zoom for the camera.  This is the first time any of the kids have taken tennis lessons.  He loves it! 

Gannon pushing Callie on the swing while we wait for tennis to be over.  The girl is obsessed with swings!

Garrett and his friend Christian joining in the fun after their lesson.  Seeing if they can fly!

Kellen is officially in the youth group at church now.  So, we celebrated his first youth outing by eating at his favorite Mexican restaurant without him!

Who knows?  But too cute to not include!

  All three boys are taking golf lessons.  Kellen and Garrett have started playing in some tournaments.  This is Gannon’s first time to really play much.  I’m not sure he has figured out what all the fuss is about, but he seems to like it ok :).

 

 
Callie at the golf store.  It was all I could do to not buy the pink clubs.  Especially since they also had a pink polka dot bag! 
Callie reading the Bible to her baby.  Love it!

So this sums up some of our summer!  (Lots of sums!)  Everyone seems to be enjoying things.  Even though it seems like a lot, it is at a slower pace than the school year.  We are all loving that!  More to come!