messy baby

I love this baby and the way he inhales his food. Chocolate mustaches look good on him. Adorable. Plus he knows he's cute. :)

fruit

When I arrange the kids' fruit on a platter in a rainbow-ish way, it always gets eaten. When I separate it out for each plate, I get complaints. Of course. So we'll be eating rainbows around here. 

Pioneer Day

Dale set up a "Pioneer Day" activity for the people in his church ward up in Spring. Grandma Stacy was here visiting and brought pioneer outfits that she made for all the kids. Pioneer Day, by the way, is (according to Wikipedia) a state holiday on July 24th in Utah celebrating the entry of Brigham Young and the first group of Mormon pioneers into Utah's Salt Lake Valley in 1847.  Lullaby wanted a crown braid, very pioneer-ish, I think.

Pioneer Grandma and baby pioneer Kjerstin.

There were lots of cute pioneer games like the sack race. The pictures I got were AWESOME, if I do say so myself! :)

Check out Matix's winning leap! Woohoo!

Paul and Dale take sibling rivalry very seriously. You're going to be a lawyer? Well then I'm going to be a doctor! You're going to challenge me to a sack race, then I'm going to keep jumping even when I lose my sack! Ha ha ha!

The boys weren't feeling very photogenic that day… These are three of the BEST shots I got of them. Stinkers!

Sully didn't fit in his shirt. The neck hole was too small. But he looked adorable just in the pants. :) Paul and I make the cutest kids.

Linnaea, Matix and Hawken trying out the washing boards and the clothes line. I'm sure the actual children that did this didn't think it was this fun.

The stick pull is harder than you think. Matix did okay, Hawken was out fast. Gavin did really well for his age group. I beat all the women, but when I was matched up with the men, I lost FAST.

Grandma and three of her 4 granddaughters. So cute.

 Lullaby snuck in some baby holding time. She's obsessed with babies.

All the cousins, except Kjerstin who was sleeping in a friends arms, and Saras who was back home in Arizona.  Thanks for the fun day Dale! And thanks for the outfits Grandma Stacy!

flight back to Texas

Our flights home were great, as usual. I have 4 very happy seasoned travelers.  They played the iPad and had snack while we waited. The layovers were short and everyone stayed happy.

We played ducks in a row and they all followed each other pulling their suitcases. They got lots of compliments on their good behavior. When Paul picked us up he surprised us with a mustache he had grown. He looked SO silly. I wish I had a close up. He shaved it off right away.

And he got to work taking Solaces stitches out right away when we got back home. Thanks Dr. Daddy! It looks like this was for sure the right field for him to get into considering how many E.R. visits we have had with our not-so-graceful children.

family

Our trip to Wisconsin was fun and fast. I miss everyone already. Here are our last pictures from the trip. Love you guys!

Grandpa

The kids got to play at Grandpa Chuck's house for a bit too. This trip though, we didn't spend nearly enough time over there. The kids were very sad when we had to leave. Here there are picking raspberries in his backyard, and digging in his sand box.

Noah's Ark

The kids and I joined up with Jolie and her kids, Dad, Heather, Hunter, Kenzie and her kids and sister-in-law for a fun day at Noah's Ark. We stayed at a hotel right around the corner, but drove there anyway to preserve our walking potential for the park. It's a BIG park. And so much fun.  Thanks Jolie and Dad for the fun trip!

After the water park, everyone went back to the hotel. There was a room change from the night before, and the hotel moved our things for us. But we were surprised to see, no joke, a MAN passed out in bed of one of our rooms… ?! What?! It was quite the shock! They had to call the police to have him removed because no one could get him to wake up. Needless to say, my dad got a huge discount on the rooms after the incident.  Plus, all my kids started to get sick.  Hawken gave Jolie quite the diarrhea mess to clean up at the pool the night before and then Lullaby and Solace threw up at the hotel and on the way back to Racine. All that aside, it's SO nice having cousins around and family to be with. It was so nice.  Too much love for Rory, poor girl.

We played at one of the hotel pools for a while too and the kids couldn't get enough. I actually preferred that to Noah's Ark. We had it mostly to ourselves and it was a lot easier to keep an eye on the babes.  Hunter was the entertainment of the day. Thank heavens for him!

Lullaby and Ridge are only a few months apart, and are so cute together. Russell is super reserved, and Lullaby is super NOT. Sometimes I wish we lived closer.