killing time

Here is a bit of what the kiddos have been up to lately...

The other day, Grace was REALLY into her painting

 Such concentration!

Then on Saturday, Jake decided that Grace needed to under go some surgery.

 Her recovery was a smooth one.

She is always such a sport to go along with all his silly ideas.

hard at work

Saturday afternoon i looked out the back window and saw this....

Dad's helpers

Saturday Brooke got a stand at Lowes that needed to be assembled.  He had 2 volunteers that were more than ready to help him put it together.

Brooke would ask them for the number of bolts, washers and nuts that he needed, then Grace would hand them to Jake and Jake would pass them on to Brooke.  Grace started getting creative and would put them down her shirt and Jakes shirt.  It is a miracle we didn't loose any parts!

This was good training for the next time we get something at IKEA!

weekend update

This last weekend was a fun one for us.  Sunday was Brooke's birthday, but since we weren't going to be home, we had cake on Friday night....

Saturday morning, we headed out to Roswell to do some camping for the rest of the weekend.  When we got there and got our campsite, we headed to the local McDonalds.  It was Alien themed!  The kids had fun playing there.  When we got back to our campsite, we got our Kayaks out and went out on the lake.

Grace decided to practice getting george buckled in her seat.

The next day was Brooke's birthday and we had a great day exploring the town.  The kids LOVED spotting all the aliens that were in front of different stores and shops.  We hit the local Alien museum and a few gift shops.  There was some sort of festival going on in front of the court house, so we got lunch there and relaxed for a bit.  The kids saw the big inflatable slide and were begging to go on it.

They both had a fun going down it as many times as they could in the 3 minute time limit. 

Then we had to take pictures with some aliens to make the trip complete.  These were their favorites...

Jake spotted this and struck a pose

Then Gracie had to do the same thing.

It was a great weekend!

and so it begins

Jake started Kindergarten today.  The house seems very quiet and empty with him at school, but i guess it is something we will have to get used to.  Last night he was very excited to be starting school.  This morning he was a little bit nervous, but that wore off quickly.  There are 2 kids in his class that he knows from church, and they happen to be sitting all in a row, so i think that helped calm his nerves.  We are excited to hear all about his day.  He has some great teachers, so i think this will be a good year for him.

This is his locker

and here is his desk.  He is growing up WAY too fast!

beatin' the heat

The last couple of days, the kids have enjoyed playing in the sprinkler in the back yard.  It isn't super hot here, but it is hotter than they are used to.  It is amazing how far a little water will go in keeping them entertained.

It looks like Grace will be a sun worshiper.  Too bad all she will do is burn and peel, burn and peel, then burn and peel some more.

where to begin...

We have had a great summer.  The one downer is that Brooke was deployed for about 3 1/2 months.  He is back now, and we are very happy about that.  The kids and I spent a couple months in Vancouver where we got to spend lots of time with grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles.   Now we are back home in Clovis with lots of yard work and house work to catchup on.

Sunday was Jake's 5th birthday.....wow, how time flies!

Grace was a little disappointed that she didn't have a present to open.

ok, she was ALOT disappointed.

In other news, we will have a new addition to our family at the end of November.  We had an ultrasound yesterday and were able to find out what we will be having.

Any guesses?  not that you can tell from this picture, but the tech was pretty quick to tell us that it is a girl.  So, it looks like more pink for us!  We are very excited and feel very blessed that she is looking healthy and that things are going good.

That is our summer in a nut shell.