Tickle Time!

Having some serious tickle time.  Natalie kept saying, "Get me, Mommy! Get me, Mommy!".

Love this laugh!

Fun with Family

Anthony's family all came to Oregon for his parent's 50th wedding anniversary.  (Anniversary pictures to come later.  There's about 400+ pictures to sort through, and I really haven't had the time.)  Anyhoo...

We had a great time getting together and visiting.

We finally got to meet little miss Callie Dawn, Walt and Rachel's youngest, who is almost a year old now.  Glad they made the trek all the way from Minnesota, because we all had so much fun with their family here!

Jessica and Callie (photo bombed by dollie, pink elephant, and pony)

Walt and his little clone

Seth, sleeping with his bread. Oh, the fun we had with this!

Church on Sunday

Church in Salem with Shade and Beth.  Loved getting to hear Emily and Seth sing!

It was so much fun watching all of the cousins interact.

And here we have one tired little munchkin.  It was a long day!

Sunday night, I brought Natalie in from the car, and sat her in the recliner while I got the older kids ready for bed. I love how she fell back to sleep!

Jared stayed with us.  We all really enjoyed his company, and of course, he was the human jungle gym

Teasing Talon about being his 'tiny little baby'

We had dinner and game night at our house on Monday. Time for Rook!

Daddy and his girl

Tomato harvesting

The kids and I went tomato picking at a local farm on Tuesday.  It was very hot, but we had fun. They've never picked tomatoes before, so we had to have a little education about what was okay to pick, and what wasn't.  When we started, if they saw anything on the vine, it went in their bucket.  So I told them, "Only the red ones.". Then, anything red went into their bucket... even the really mushy ones.  It didn't take too long, and they got the hang of it.  Pretty soon, they were tomato picking machines!

My tomato pickin' partners

Kaitlyn and Talon both wanted to take a picture, too.  So, here you go!

About 33 pounds of tomatoes, fresh off the vine.  It's salsa time!

The water bath.  Almost there!

And..... done!  42 pints of salsa, headed to the pantry!

All I want for Christmas...

Talon lost yet another tooth.  He has pulled the last two out all by himself.  I hope he realizes, after he pulls out all of his baby teeth, he's gonna have to find another way to make money!  

Nolan is pretty excited about the whole thing.  He keeps telling me, "Mommy, I think my tooth is loose!", as he has his fingers buried in his mouth, and is vigorously trying to pry his teeth out.  Oh, boy!  I shutter to think what his active little mind might consider, as a way to get those baby teeth out, so he can get some money, too!

Girls' Day

Jessica stayed with us for a couple of days.  The kids had a blast!  She even read them their bedtime stories.

One of the days that she stayed, we picked up Delani, dropped the boys off at Grandpa and Grandma Bauer's for the night, and had a girls' day.

We went for ice cream at Mike's Drive In...

 I got Natalie a cone.  She ate part of it, then decided she would rather have my dish of ice cream with the spoon, so I got stuck with the soggy cone.

 Is it possible to enjoy ice cream without getting it all over your face?  

Survey says.... nope!

 Next we went down to the river to feed the ducks.

 Natalie decided she would rather eat her bread than throw it to the ducks.

 Then we headed to the park

The girls convinced me to get on the twirly swing with them.  I am not a fan. 

Next up was the merry-go-round.  That was a huge mistake.  I was pretty sure I was going to forcefully lose whatever I had eaten that day.  I didn't, I just had a really good case of vertigo for a while! Man, I am getting O-L-D!

 Natalie was a bit unsure about the slide, but Jessica helped her get on it to slide down.  Unfortunately, half way down, her Crocs caught traction, and her feet stopped, but her body kept going.  While it was quite funny to watch, she didn't share in the humor.  She was quite mad about it. After I rescued her from the evil contraption, she refused to get near it again.

...until, of course, Mommy said she would go on it with her.  Then she didn't want to get off of it!

 On our way home, we stopped at the store and bought paint, paper, and Play Doh.

 Even Natalie got to participate.  Clearly, going on the spinning toys at the park, knocked the screws in my head loose.  Let's just say, I should have bought washable paint, or put her in appropriate painting attire!

But did she ever have a ball! 

The girls made sure to save enough time to play dolls and 'house' before bed.  I was sure they would fall asleep immediately after their long day, but I could hear giggling and talking coming from the upstairs room for quite some time.  They did sleep in for a while in the morning, though.

What a fun day!