Fun times

Here's some fun, miscellaneous recent pictures.

Andrew insisting on buttering his own waffle

Zach & Andrew are really inseparable.
They have enjoyed floating the river numerous times this summer. We bought an inflatable kayak and they are both my kayak buddies. They sit so happily while we float down the river, usually singing "row, row, row, your boat". They like it because on the "merrily, merrily..." we rock back and forth in the kayak while they laugh delightedly.

This helmet is missing the top pads inside. When he runs back and forth in the family room, it slides down in front of his face completely.

Joe and Sara came to visit. It was so fun to see Bob, Joe, and Gumby all together again (Gumby & Kristi just moved back from Scotland, yeay!)

When it was time for our nightly "scripture, song, & prayer" time before the kids went to bed, we had to be serenaded by the Lamoreaux brothers instead. If only Lawrence Welk were still around, they could definitely be in the running for a spot on his show.
(I know Mom is rolling her eyes since whenever she visits us, she must endure these same kind of antics while trying to help get our kids to bed). Gotta love these entertaining boys!

Harvest Time

We really had a pathetic garden this year. I could use the excuse of having a baby this spring, but I know plenty of people who have new babies and still make time for the garden. Aliysa did do a wonderful small garden for herself, but I had really been wishing that we had planted more than just tomato plants for our family garden. So, I prayed that if anyone had any excess produce, they might think of us. Well, that prayer was certainly answered, I just didn't know it would all come within two days!

The picture above is produce from our friends, the Partridges. They brought it to our doorstep exclaiming "Partridge Produce!" They gave us a ton of produce, which we are enjoying so much. They also brought an entire box of apples which we are in the process of preserving.

Zucchini from our friends, the Calls. Bob also brought home an entire box of bananas that was on sale for $7 at the grocery store. Yesterday I made 11 loaves of zucchini-banana bread. Yum!

The kids and I picked raspberries at my friend, Jamie Bradley's home. We enjoyed them with fresh cream and a bit of sucanat. While many hands made light work of the picking (we picked these all so fast), it is also true that many mouths make the berries disappear even faster.

Aliysa and Jace are wet in the picture because they jumped in the river on the way home from berry picking.

A couple of days later Jamie called again to say that her freezer had stopped working the night before and all the raspberries she had picked had thawed. She didn't have time to make them into jam, so she was wondering if we could please come get them so they didn't go to waste. Wow! We all ate bowlfuls of vanilla yogurt mixed with berries, and still had bags of berries left.

Aliysa and I stayed up late and made honey-sweetened raspberry freezer syrup. I decided I didn't want the seeds in it, so we strained all the seeds out. That was a lot of work! But it is worth it, it is so yummy! We took some, along with zucchini-banana bread, to Jamie to thank her.

Our apples aren't ready yet, but our trees are loaded. I've told the little boys that they may not pick any off the tree yet, but if they find any on the ground, and bring them inside to ask me, they may eat them. They love running outside to check for apples on the ground.

The cornfield just around the corner is harvesting their corn, and selling it right as they pick it. Yum! Here are the boys shucking it for us. (Yes, I think they have lived in their swimsuits this summer!)

What a fun time of year!

Little Abby is 5 months old today!

Here's a clip from today, Spencer was making Abby laugh

Here's some pictures from yesterday. Bob is gone at WoodBadge, and we are having summer cleaning camp here at home. We call this yearly camp "Camp Shipshape", and we alternate big cleaning projects with fun activities, like playing in the river, having watermelon eating contests, playing games, having relay races, etc. Yesterday we went out to the big swing on the island, and then played in the river.

Andrew discovered a type of prickly seed.

Abby enjoyed sitting by the bank. She loves to be outside!

The little red owie on her nose is where she fell over while sitting, and face planted right in the dirt when I had turned away for a second. I felt so bad!

Jace just started football, and as you can see, he's already getting way stronger!

Monarch Butterflies

We raised two monarch butterflies this summer, from tiny caterpillars to beautiful butterflies. Here's some pictures. Sorry they aren't too close up, I'm using our old camera since our newer, nicer one broke. Here's the Chrysallis, when it was turning black. It starts out a light emerald green color, then slowly turns black. When it looks like this, you know it is about ready to emerge.

At first the wings are small, wet & shrivelled, then they fill with blood as the butterfly slowly opens and closes them.

After this, we put the butterfly in a tree where it stayed for quite a while before flying away. The next week, our second butterfly emerged from its chrysallis. It was neat. We were excited to find these caterpillars & observe this little miracle in nature.

The caterpillars were named Fredley and Charlie. It's funny how when they are caterpillars, they are always referred to as males, but when they are butterflies, you just naturally think of them as females.