Jazz Fest

AKA our third festival this summer.  This was a very small event in downtown Blaine.  Which was fine by me.  It was just my speed.  I was able to let this little man wonder the streets(with my eye on him) and not worry about the crowd size.

The kids all got balloon creations.  Motorcycles for the boys.

And animals for the girls. 

Which lasted about as long as you would expect outdoors with toddlers.  The girls did keep theirs for almost two days.

Hot dogs were consumed.

And it just wouldn't be a festival with out kettle corn. 

I really did enjoy this small festival.  I got to walk and side walk shop with my girls so it was awesome!!

Ice cream party!

A friend and I decided that an ice cream party would be a rather nice thing to do.  Especially since July is national ice cream month.  Thank you Mr. Ronald Reagan.

So a party we had.  Since pictures are worth a thousand word, this post will be loaded!
We started with balloons decorated to look like the star.  Ice cream cones!!

Saying goodbye to the first balloon lost to the sky.

We had home made moon dough for our kids to use in their ice cream shops.

We shook our own ice cream.

We made ice cream cone hats.

We played pin the scoop on the cone.

 And of course we enjoyed eating ice cream.

We had coffee with cookie dough.

Strawberry and lemon(sorry no picture).

We had full bowls.

And empty ones.

Most important we had moments of bonding(or stealing)

and memory making(like when a boy tells you he tooted).

A blessing from the Lord....

and some cute photos of the girls!

Background first.  Jeff recently became a member at the Custer Shooting Range(or Club I wasn't really listening).  He has been going every Saturday to shooting competitions.

This last Saturday the Lord used Jeff's competition to bless the family.

All the peoples names who competed were put into a drawing.  Jeff's name got pulled.

Next Jeff had to pick a card from a deck of cards.  He had to pick the ace of spades to win the jack pot.

Guess what people, HE DID!!!  He won over 400 dollars and no one has won since 2010!

A crazy day for the rookie at the gun club and a huge blessing to the Doyle family!  

Everson Days

A.K.A. our second festival.

Every year the little town of Everson holds a festival.  Well, that's what I am calling it.  It starts Friday with music and vendors.  It continues Saturday with a parade and more fun in the park.  And it all wraps up on Sunday with a 5k that I think I will need to do next year!  It is funny that to me that this is a major highlight in my year.  Everson is the town I grew up in and I remember well the thought of leaving it and never coming back.  Now it is a place I enjoy to visit!  Saturday morning we piled in the wagon and headed from my mom's house to the parade(she happens to live a block away from the parade).

We all waited for the fun to begin.

 Some waited better

than others.

But in the end we all found ways to have fun till the candy started flying.  Oh, did I not mention they are one of the only towns around that still throw candy.

The boys lit up when they saw these cars.

The yelled like mad men that Lightning McQueen was in the parade.
I fell for this little man and his horse!  Don't know what he was representing, but my heart melted.

When ended up with quite the haul of candy that I am still trying to get rid of,

but I managed to miss all the fun in the park.  My kids slept through it this year!

In the end it was an amazing time and a great second festival of the year!!

First Day

Today is the girls first day at girl scout camp. 

It is one of those bittersweet moments for me.  So wonderful to see them growing and yet so sad to say goodbye to the little ones they use to be.

They were sweet hand in hand headed to the great unknown. 

It is a first for Samantha also.  She is going to be a Program Aide.

I can't believe she is getting so old on me!! 
Kellina started the day telling me how she didn't want to go.  And this was the girl I left behind..... 

I think she will be okay. 
Melia was her normal outgoing self.  I have no worries about her.

Other than she is getting to big to fast!!  Lucky for me it isn't an overnight camp, so I will get these girls back tonight to snuggle because I know all to soon they won't enjoy even that......

yesterday

Yesterday I went to the zoo.  Yesterday Caleb decided that pulling down his pants and peeing in the middle of the zoo was a good idea.  Yesterday I was thankful for the other moms who just laughed when they saw my son with his shorts around his ankles relieving himself in the beauty bark.  Yesterday I thought this will make a great story to tell his future wife!

Boys will be Boys

I have often said that boys are yucky.  I thought I should go on the record to say I now know that they are much more than just yucky.  The other morning I was trying to get my quiet time in after my boys had woken up.  For those of you who don't know my boys are not quiet!  Luckily for me they are very creative.  On our deck we store water bottles for our water dispenser.  It turns out if you give a boy(or boys) a water jug he can do many things.  First he can sit on them.

He can kick them.

He can roll them all over.

One of the funnest things that mom had to stop was rolling them down the stairs.

He can lay on them while they roll.

And the thing I enjoyed most was lining them up, using them as drums, and singing a tune. 

Yep my boys are much more than just plain old yucky.  See all the fun stuff they came up with!  These photos were taken after I finished my semi-quiet time.