Our Vacation to Missouri !

We started our vacation at Sara and Eric's it was a chilly day but we had a nice time lounging around. You see there are no pictures of Alex, he got sick that day. The next day we went to urgent care and he was diagnosed with strep, we got him on some medicine and he was good to go. The only bummer for me was Alex and I had to miss the wedding. But it maybe was for the best, as Henry, Oliver and Timothy missed the wedding, too. Sometimes toddlers and weddings don't mix well.



We swam a lot, (you see Henry hoarding the floaties, none of us except Henry are sure why. :)


played at the park,

and feed some ducks.


We checked out a near by cave, and afterward a very nice man working in the gift shop gave the kids a good sized bag of fish food. The kids enjoyed throwing the food to the huge carp down below that gobbled it up as expected.


Aunt Donna was nice enough to give Timmy his first haircut while we were on vacation. Timmy didn't really cooperate. He squirmed and screamed most of the time. I'm sure Aunt Donna was so glad we saved her the task of this first hair cut. :)


With the exception of Timmy and me everyone in our family had a good time fishing multiple times. Lots of fish were caught . . . and thrown back.


Sophia went fishing for the first time with her new fishing pole! She caught some fish and was very excited about as you can see. She gleefully threw the fish she caught right back in the water.


The biggest surprise on our vacation was parasailing! Alex and I had a lot of fun parasailing, together. Alex was a little nervous when we started out, but when our 15 minute ride came to an end, he was wishing our ride wasn't really ending. I felt the same it was pretty amazing.

By request

The boys finished school June 23, that very afternoon we went to Sara and Eric's. The next day we headed out to Missouri for a wedding and a week of vacation at Lake of the Ozarks. At the end of that vacation Max went back to Iowa with his Grandma Steffen and Uncle Bob and Aunt Wendy. And Kelli (Coco and Chris' youngest) came home with us. The following Thursday Kathy and I took all the kids plus Kelli back to Iowa where we got to be a part of the wedding shower for Amy (Coco and Chris' oldest) and a baby shower for our sister-in-law Renee. It was a lot of fun and I have lots of pictures to share but I thought I'd start with these that Kelli requested I take and post. We had a lot of fun having her with us that week.

Timmy turned 9 mo. old

Timmy tuned 9 months old, about a week ago (6/15). Although the post is late the pictures were taken on time. School is almost done, only one hour left tomorrow. The bus ride to and from school will be longer than the time they're in class. And here we are getting ready for vacation - we're all very excited for that!

We got a tire swing! and other stuff !

Today Randy hung a tire swing for all of us to play on! It has been so much fun! We all took a turn, except Timmy, it has been an inspiration for many smiles, laughs and some fighting, too. Now you'll all have to come visit so you can have a turn.








Max had his birthday party last Saturday (June 4). He wanted to play mini golf, so he, his siblings and some of his buddies golfed. It was kind of wild, but a lot of fun.



Tilt your head to the right and you can see what Timmy looks like crawling.


Sophia on the tire swing.

Signs of Summer

Although it's been cooler here the last few days. Last Sunday was really warm and it felt like summer. Here's our naked baby asleep in the swing.

Henry has lived in our sandbox since it's been warm enough to be outside. As you can see Alex still get out there once in a while. Today he happens to be burying his feet.



The swing set has already gotten a ton of use!


How could I post without posting this beautiful little picture Alex took ?


This picture is mostly for Donna and Steve (Randy's sister and brother-in-law), who were nice enough to give us a shoot from their rhubarb plant. I can't believe how quickly it's grown already.


Here's a video that's about a week old of Timmy crawling. I should take a new video though because he's much faster now. He's also figured out how to go from laying on his belly to sitting up by himself.

Blowing out his candles for his 7th Birthday !

I had wanted to post these pictures of Max blowing out his candles last night, but our internet went ka-put (not just ours but our town and the surrounding area), right in the middle of my post. So here they are! Happy Birthday Max!

Everyone getting ready to have cake together.

Sophia, Henry, Timothy and I took cupcakes into Max's class on Tuesday for his birthday. (I know Monday was his birthday but I'm lame and forgot to ask his teacher if I could bring cupcakes to class. So I asked Monday and we brought them Tuesday.) They are centipedes, ladybugs, spiders and ticks - yum, yum - dig in!:)