4th of July Eve

Sophie & Greg, Owen & Cousin Jared

Sophie wanted to use her carnival ticket on this climbing structure. We warned her that if she got scared at the top we wouldn't be able to help her. We pointed to the lovely carousel and tried to lure her away, but she would have none of it. So, up the climby thing she went. Owen wanted to go too, but we knew he'd wimp out for sure.

She made it to the first bridge with no trouble.
Though there was a little wobble about half way.

About 5 minutes and a lot of cajoling and tears later, the slightly creepy carnival worker had to help her get across the final bridge.

Here she is after sliding down the giant slide at the end, yelling, "I want to do that again!" I'm not kidding. And she ended up doing it at least two more times that weekend. Oh well. Grandma bought the tickets.

The lovely carousel turned out to be my scariest (and only) ride. That thing was a death trap, man!

Owen's first solo ride. He was very stoic.

But he was ready to do more rides.

Cousin Jared used some of his tickets to do rides with the kids (what a good sport!). Here they are on the Dizzy Dragon. About 30 seconds later, Owen was in Jared's lap for the rest of the ride.

Greg offered to go on a "big kid ride" with Jared since he'd been so good about riding with our kids (what a good sport!). Too bad Jared picked "The Scrambler."

We're getting too old for this kind of thing.

Grandpa getting ready to set off his "Circle Works" fireworks extravaganza in their street.

Fun at the Park

When Sophie saw this park, she said, "We've never gone here in a long time." She's mostly right. We've haven't been here since last summer, and we've never gone with the W's!

Lydia

Sophie
By the way, do those things ever work? Greg's theory is "NO!" and therefore, why do they even bother?

Owen & Drew

Drew & Lydia

Picnic lunch

Laura, you will thank me for not posting the one I took of you and Drew!!

Balla-nina Class

Sophie is taking a dance class this summer. She is beyond excited about it. Although, she may be nearly as excited about wearing her hair in a ponytail for class (she's growing it out, you know) as she is for the class itself. Her friend Lydia is in the class too, along with church-friend Cora and her sister Eva.

Waiting for the first class to begin.

Drew, Owen, Lydia & Sophie. The little brothers were very supportive.

One of these things is not like the others...Sophie was wearing a hand-me-down leotard because Daddy said she had a few already so why buy one for a 6-week class. That discrepancy was quickly remedied by Mommy after class #1. She now has a pink, skirted leotard...I just didn't get pictures of it yet. But I will.

Sophie was very attentive and did just what she was asked to do.

She didn't even notice that her leotard was different from the others because she was just so excited to be in dance class and wearing a ponytail. She's still super cute in that wacky leotard.

So is Owen.

Father's Day

I forgot to add these pictures to yesterday's post, but I suppose it works out really since they are mostly about Father's Day weekend. We were all set to head out to Black Grandma & Grandpa's for Father's Day weekend to visit with everyone, including the Florida family. But, Owen was still coughing his lungs out on a regular basis, so he and I stayed home and sent Sophie and Greg without us.

Prior to that though, the kids worked on Father's Day projects for Daddy. The kids decorated paper picture frames with buttons. Owen was very particular about which buttons and where to put them. He even did a bit of the gluing himself.

Sophie did her whole project on her own. She's such a type "A." All her buttons were in perfectly straight lines with no crowding whatsoever.

While the kids were doing projects for Daddy, I was making dessert for the family. Hamburgers!! They were made out of yellow cupcakes with brownie hamburgers. More on that in a minute.

Checking out Grandpa's bread machine.

Greg and new nephew, Logan

Hanging out at Cardinal Kingdom, I think (remember, I wasn't there!)

Russ' much-anticipated fish fry (Cousin Megan monitoring his progress)

Brother-in-law Brad, Aunt Mary, Cousin Tracy, Uncle Bill

Nephew Jared, Cousin Megan, Sister Janelle

Russ & Greg

Here's my dessert being served in my absence (Thanks, Tracy!). Those are "french fry" sugar cookies, too.

Sophie opted to have a sucker instead of the dessert that took me three days and many hours to hide and construct. But I'm not offended.

Megan & Logan

Family Time

It's been a busy summer here in our household! Most recently we got to spend some time with Greg's side of the family. His sister's family was visiting from Florida (we hadn't seen them in ages) with new baby, Logan, making his first Midwestern appearance!

Picnic at the beach

How cute is Owen?

How about now?? (Can you see all the cookie shrapnel in his teeth?)

Janelle, Brad & Logan (can't really see Logan!)

There...that's better!
Grandpa with a pie that he's particularly proud of (he's proud of them all, really!)

Owen got to sit up at the counter on the big stools. I was afraid he'd fall to his death from there, but he'd been doing it all week and nobody else seemed too worried about it.

Cousin Jared

We went to a concert in the park. We listened to a kooky folk band who sang about garlic and birds eggs and Mary (had a little lamb) Had a Little Itch. It was weird, but it was good for a laugh!

Owen came for the music but stayed for the juice boxes.

Logan was so darn cute!

We had a great time with family, though some of us (Me!) didn't really get to be there much. I'll be sharing some more family photos from the 4th soon!