Friday, July 30, 2010

::fishes::

We finished up a couple of sessions of swimming lessons yesterday...

The first session, the kids got to go with some friends...

(Cooper-20 mos., Porter-4, Chloe-6 1/2, Laney-6 1/2, Dillon-3)

Port got off to a rough start in the first session. He didn't want any part of getting his face wet, so we put him in a private lesson. Turns out, all he really needed was some goggles! After we discovered that, he did awesome!


Chloe LOVES the water! She was always the first one in and the last one out of the pool.
She did a great job, too!

What would summer be without swimming lessons? They got to swim every day for a few weeks, learned a lot, and had FUN!

Bubby, on the other hand didn't love swimming lessons. He wanted to get in too (and he did during Port's private lesson). We spent a lot of time eating snacks, crying, running away, trying to get in the pool, throwing toys in the pool, trying to run out into the parking lot, and REALLY wishing we could swim too!

He and I aren't too sad it's over :)
Now, if we only had our OWN pool........

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

::garden update::

I thought I'd do a quick update on our garden.
(mostly for my Dad :) )
It's grown!

A few close-ups of the produce...

Green Peppers...

Radishes...
...and they're HOT!! We pick these pretty often for salads. We give some away too.

Green Beans...
We had to replant a few because the first batch didn't give us many sprouts.


Tomatoes...
They're monsters! They've each got a million tomatoes on 'em (not really a million, but you know, a LOT). The middle bush (cherry tomatoes) grew so big it lifted the wire support off the ground and then tipped over. All the tomatoes are green still, but they'll start turnin' any day now, I'm sure.

Yellow Squash "Crook Neck"...
It's coming along. It had a broken stem on it, so I just cut it off, and ever since then, it's gone nuts! The plant itself is huge. There are a couple of teeeeeeny little squashes on there.

Cucumbers...
We had to replant these because they didn't sprout the first time (same as the green beans). We'll see how they do this time.


Corn...
Our corn's doin' pretty good. No ears yet, and it's not as big as the neighbors', but it'll get there (we hope).


Carrots & Lettuce...
We cut the lettuce pretty often for salad. The carrots are doing well.


Watermelon...
We only have 2 watermelon plants (out of the 9 we planted). I think maybe we washed the seeds away when we watered. The 2 little plants are doing well though.


Peas...
We're FINALLY getting pea-pods! We lost a whole row of peas. A friend told us it was because we had too much compost in our soil, and it burned up the plant. But our other row is doing well.


Onions...
Our onions are lookin' good. The plant part came out of the rough look they had at the beginning, and seem to be doing well.

And that's about it! It's been fun. We go out every day to weed and water and check on things. It's always fun to see new growth or a change in the vegetable itself. The kids get excited too. They've helped a lot with the watering, weeding a little, showing us new stuff, and planting-Coopie always says "oh howp." We can tell the kids helped us plant because we have random carrot plants popping up all over the place-some in the watermelon mounds, in the middle of all the lettuce, along the brick edge, etc.

It's definitely a learning experience! It took us a while (and probably cost us a few plants) to learn to best way to water, and we already know a few things we want to do differently next year.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

::"wuhdeeluh"::

Saturday. 7ish pm.
A 4-wheeler ride with Matt :)
and J & Sae-glad she took her camera!
I'm not much of an outdoorsman (I saw lots of campsites and people camping, and I just kept saying "why??? Why would you DO that???"), but I do kind of enjoy riding the 4-wheeler with Matt. He likes to scare me a bit (it doesn't take much), he knows just about every trail and road in the mountains up there, and it's just fun.
PS "wuhdeeluh" is the way Coop says 4-wheeler :)

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

::limited edition...::


...and I just couldn't resist.
(Cooper 20 months)

How cute are these things?? What a great idea! Sometimes I wish I was more creative.

In other news...
We went out to dinner tonight (Chili's-which I don't think is as good as it used to be), and on the way, I asked Chloe what she was going to have. She kind of sighed and said "I don't know, I'll have to look at the menu." I thought it was funny-so grown up!

AND...
Cooper says the kids' names. He's been saying Porter for a while, but didn't dare attempt "Chloe."
( I don't blame him, it doesn't exactly roll off the tongue of such a little boy. Chloe called herself Gogie, Portie said Giggoo.)
So now he does, and he pronounces it "kiss." And I think that's sweet.

AND...
Porter's swim teacher calls him Buzz, and he loves it. He sticks his wings out when he does backfloats. Chloe's teacher gave him a Buzz bracelet (you know those rubberband type of ones that all the kids are into), and now he thinks she's the nicest person in the whole world. She gave Chloe one too-it was a rocket.

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

::lvd::


Another Little Valley Days celebration...

The Dam Race
Amberlee & I ran the race in the ugliest dam shirts
(they upped it to an even 5 miles this year).

This is about the grossest picture ever.
This is me handing the lady my ticket from my number.
I was a little tired :)

It took us about 54 minutes to run 5 miles. Not too bad.

The parade...

It rained on us, but we still had fun and got lots of candy
(which is always a bonus).


A cookout @ Grandma & Papa's...

(all the little cousins)



(Amberlee & George)

(the rest of the group)

Sparklers...
The kids did a few sparklers. They LOOOVE sparklers! Coop kind of kept trying to touch the "sparkle" part, but he didn't get burned. He thought they were pretty neat.

Fireworks...


They were pretty awesome. I love how close we get to sit, and it's way fun to hear them echo off the mountians...