Sophia said the cutest thing today...

She loves mandarin oranges, or cuties. We get a bag of them from Costco. She likes them so much that for her b-day she wanted a bag of "cuties". Anyhow, she came up to me and asked if she could have a "peel" I reluctantly said "yes", and thought "what is a peel?". Then I busted out laughing when I found her peeling a "cutie" and then she proudly exclaimed, as she showed me her peeled orange, "see, a peel!" We just love her!! She is stinken' cute!!

Latest on the Hens and roosters...

These chickens are growing so fast. They are so cute. We just love them. They are a bunch of smarties too. Rob has taught them to free-range around our yard and then return to their coop when it is bedtime. They are so good at that. They get all excited when we come near the coop to let them lose and to give them our left overs. The roosters crow at two different times. One does it about 6am and the other around 1 or 2pm. One is getting good at it, and the other sounds more like a Turkey. It is so funny! I need to catch them on video and post the videos. Then you all can hear what we mean...

What is James up to these days...

These pictures will tell you that James is ready for school to start: Strapped in Sophia's carseat on our computer chair Having breakfast with little sisters Pink Glasses Got bored and went up to the Attic, and found this Wig P.S. the pictures with him wearing a tie are telling his three favorite things in life, in this order... 1. Church 2. Soccer 3. Running

Last day of Track N' Field...

Summer must really be coming to an end. I cannot believe how fast this one went and how we are already getting busier with activities that involve school and sports. School starts next week for us (Sept. 2nd). We start and end late in the year in comparison to other states. Juliette actually doesn't start until the 5th, she has an assessment first for Kindergarten and then she will be placed in a class. She is so excited. Sophia starts Preschool in about 2 weeks, she tells everyone she sees about it. It is such a big girl thing for her. Anyhow, we had our last Track N' Field this week. The kids tried to participate in almost everything as well as hang-out with friends. They had a great time, regardless of the cold weather. We can't wait until next summer again. We look forward to this every summer. Just hope we have a much warmer and sunnier summer next year. I feel like we didn't have much of a hot summer. It just went by too fast...

Day 1~ Our First Camping trip to North Cascade Mountains...

Rob had to go to work today, so we couldn't leave any earlier than 4pm. We headed out knowing that rain was ahead of us and that we would have a rainy night. I couldn't believe how much packing was required and that it all fit in the van. I forgot a few things to pack, but did pretty well overall. The drive to Colonial Creek campground was amazing. I had asked Rob to make sure there were flushable toilets in the campground, it was my only request. So, he did his homework and found this awesome place by Diablo Lake in the North Cascade Mountains...I haven't seen such extraordinary beauty and colors in nature, all around, as we approach our campground. For $12.00 a night we got to camp right next to the Lake. It was better than a resort near the beach and so much cheaper. Although, The Oregon Coast vacation was an exception. We got there just in time to set up our tent, as soon as that was done, it just rained hard!!! We were very repetitive to the children about not touching the tent. We just didn't want to get wet thru the night. Our tent is over 13 years old, we didn't know what to expect. The kids all wanted to sleep together and so we managed to fit all of us in one tent, that is only meant to fit 3 people. We were so excited. The kids had the giggles so badly!! But, we managed to settle down and fall asleep quick after a story. We just couldn't wait for tomorrow and we prayed hard for better weather. P.S...Sophia had several falls in less than 20 minutes of being there. She just cried about it every time. She couldn't keep her balance on the muddy ground, and she tripped over several rocks around the camp. Poor thing, she was so tired!

Day 2~ Winthrop, Blue Lake and Rob's 35th B-day!

Wow, what a night?!! What a way to wake up to celebrate your 35th b-day? Rob was such a good sport. We had non-stop rain for over 12 hours. We knew that we would have a rainy day to deal with, but I didn't think that it would be this bad. All night Juliette struggled to get warm. We managed to get all of us in one tent, which only holds 3. But, the problem we began to have is the "don't touch the tent, kids". If we touched the tent then we would definitely wake up in a puddle of water. Of course the tent got touched, lightly in a few places and water and moisture did get in, but it was not too bad. The funny part was waking up and seeing that our tent was holding about 4 ounces of water at the very tip of the roof. It was about to just spill right on top of us and our sleeping bags. I managed to get it out without getting any in. We didn't bother making breakfast, it was raining too hard. So, we headed into a Cowboy Town called Winthrop. We had a fun time there. We stopped at this little bakery called the "Rocking Horse" and enjoyed some delicious pastries of all kinds and quiches. Rob also got some local cinnamon rolls near by and we had a feast. After walking the little town a bit and seeing the Shaffer Museum(which was so much fun, it was filled with so much history and antiques from gold mining to the life-style of the old cowboy days), we enjoyed some local homemade ice cream. We all tried different kinds. James and Eliza had the Cotton Candy flavor, I had a Black Cherry flavor, Rob had some multi-chocolate peanut butter chunk, Juliette just plain Chocolate (she is more conservative and simple), and Sophia had the Bubble Gum flavor with real chunks of bubble gum. She didn't realize there was gum in it until after about 10 licks and then she turned to us and said "There's real candy in it" with the biggest smile and surprised gesture on her face. It was so cute! We played around in the local park for a bit, and saw some gorgeous parts of the lake there and found some snakes. Then we headed towards our first hike of our trip. We got all geared up in our raincoats and packed up some snacks and water. We hiked up to 1,000ft and 2.2 miles to see "Blue Lake". It was absolutely gorgeous there. The colors of the lake were phenomenal. We were actually amazed that the kids had made such an incline. We took our time and ate some snacks. Right around us we started seeing some wildlife. There were these birds "gray-jays"~I am not sure that is what they are called, but they looked like Blue Jays, they would fly right by us and land on our feet. It was so neat. We also saw chipmunks who were a bit frightened of us, but were still daring enough to swiftly run by us.

On our way down we saw some amazing plants and flowers. Another 2.2 miles down hill, it seemed to go by faster. We managed to hike it all in less than an hour and 30 minutes. These kids were amazing, the person we worried the most about was Juliette and she didn't complain one bit. Rob carried Sophia on a back-pack and she did get a bit uncomfortable and was crying some of the way. She was just tired. Eventually she calmed down and dozed off for a bit. Rob was so amazing to have put up with a screaming child on his back and the extra 30lbs. What a way to spend a b-day!?

Rob started a fire that night and we roasted marshmallows after dinner. I successfully cooked my first camping dinner on our propane grill. I was pretty proud of myself. For the marshmallows, the kids got to pick their own stick and sharpened the ends with dad's supervision. They thought it was neat to eat roasted marshmallows. We had a few burnt, and fall into the fire. It was fun. We forgot the candles to sing to Rob with, so we made a stick and lit it in the fire and then we sang to him. He got to blow it out and then restart it, the kids thought it was a neat trick. Overall we had a wonderful, busy day! We were blessed to have enjoyed some nice weather and little rain on and off.

By bedtime it was not raining, we felt that we had to sleep all in one tent again because the one-man-tent was soaked, we figured we would survive another night. So, we read some stories and attempted to have another night snugged and tried to stay dry. Rob had mentioned going on another hike the next day but I wasn't sure about the kids being able to handle another hike after hiking to "Blue Lake".