First Day of School

 Can't believe the summer is over!  Welcome back school!  The girls were super excited to start back up again, they really missed it.  They are growing up-Bailey is in 4th grade and Erin is in 2nd!  My beautiful girls!!

Washington Trip

My mom, the girls and I went to see my brother and his family in Seattle.  We had a great time!  This picture above  was taken at a fun park that we went to.  Bumper Boats!!  It was pretty funny, Bailey was always going after Melissa, never anyone else.  Erin went with me once and Dave once-she was great at the water gun!  Then we also did some miniature golf, the girls first time.

While we were downtown Seattle, we spent time at Pike's Place Market and new this year there was a large ferris wheel put in just off the water. 

We went to a Minor League Baseball game--Boise Hawks vs Everett Aquasocks!  After the game, the kids got to run around the bases and got a certificate.  They had never been to a baseball game before.  It was great because when they played the song "Take me out to the ball game", the girls both sang "Root, root, root for the Cubbies" instead of 'home team'.  Josh's mom sings it that way to them and they didn't even know that Cubbies wasn't the real word until that night!  It was pretty funny to listen to them sing it. 

Webby and the kids!

On our way, we made a nice stop at Snoqualmie Falls.  A nice view, lunch and break from the car!

Erin's Birthday!

Cannot believe that my little girl is 7 years old in just a couple hours!  She is such a fun loving energetic girl.  We love her so much.  Before our company came we went bowling and out to dinner at Chuck-A-Rama.  Both of which she picked.  She had a great time at her birthday party on Saturday with some of her friends.  She was so happy that Ben and Hannah Crocker were here to celebrate with her!  She wanted a Gummi Worm cake so I made cups of chocolate pudding and cookies as if it was dirt and put in gummi worms.  She wanted to play musical chairs and pin the tail on the donkey so those came next.  Then they played water balloon volleyball and then we made a big slip n' slide down our little hill.  Fun was had by all. 

Conversation with Erin today:
Christine: Erin, tomorrow is Monday-what does that mean?
pause...
Erin:  School starts!!
Christine: Nope
pause....
Erin:  Our Washington trip!!
Christine: Nope
huge pause....the wheels are turning in her head so I showed her the calendar and asked her what is said.
Erin: MY BIRTHDAY! 

Even though we had been counting down the days to her birthday for the last several weeks she had forgotten since we had her party the day before.  Super cute. 

 Bailey, Erin, Ben, and Hannah had a great time decorating the backyard before the party.  Josh made the comment that they are learning how to toilet paper trees at an early age.  :)

The Crockers!

      

Our good friends, the Crockers came to stay with us for a couple of days which was just amazing. The kids all had a great time playing together in the backyard, at the pool, at Erin's birthday party, at Bear Lake, at the park ice-blocking and much more. We had such a great time with them. So good to see them again. Hope it won't be too long until we see them again. Sure do love them!

 

Alcova Lake Wyoming

 Some neighbors invited us to spend a long weekend at their trailer house on Lake Alcova.  It was such a nice break.  We went hiking, jetskiing, and played on the beach.  The girls had a blast playing in the lake with our neighbors two large labs.  It was hot but it was great!  The girls especially loved being pulled behind the jetski in a tub.  They are little daredevils!

 On our way back home, we stopped by Independence Rock and Martins Cove-both great pioneer locations.  It was wonderful to go there with Bailey and Erin and talk about pioneers.  It went right along with Pioneer Day that was a couple days after. 

We got a Kitty!

Josh surprised us girls a couple weeks ago by bringing home a little kitten.  We were all so excited.  The girls have been loving it to death!  He's pretty tolerant of them though-except for the occasional bite that especially Erin will get when he is done being held.  It's so fun to have a kitty again, even if it is sometimes a pain and a bit of work.  His name is Smokey and he is very playful and very social-he loves being around us and if he cannot find anyone to be with he will meow.  Even Josh can't deny that he loves having the little guy around.  We love our new addition to the family!

Girls stuff

Thankfully we were back from our trip to be around for all the end of year things at school.  Bailey's class put together a play and I was so impressed at all the hard work that was done to pull it off.  It was such an amazing play.  Bailey was Snow White and Gretal.   She had all her lines memorized plus everyone else's lines too.  She got a lot of compliments on her singing voice as well.  She has such talent!

 After the play we came home and pulled out Erin's other front tooth!  She has been working on that tooth for months now and was excited to finally lose it.  You wouldn't tell that she is so toothless in the front by looking at how she eats.  She'll still eat an apple just fine...I wonder how she would handle corn on the cob though... :)