A FUN weekend!

Friday night was family game night at our church, complete with a huge spread of food and lots of fellowship.

Saturday evening was a post-school party with Kevin's coworkers.

And Sunday was an air show at Oufitt air force base. Actually I have aunt and uncle that live just a few minutes from base so we were able to go hang out with them for the afternoon and watch the show from their balcony. Kevin and I went to one of their air shows when we were first dating 10 years ago so it was fun to go back! I love these things! My favorite pics of the day as we did a little play and a little watching...

while we were waiting for Blue Angels to start the kids and Linda had fun running down this little hillwell, if you're gonna watch airplanes all afternoon then of course you have to fly like one!

I assure you, no one was hurt in all of this

my sweet children

Fun with a furry friend

No words necessary for this post.

Connections.

This morning Eli sees address labels with a small hummingbird on it. "It's like nochio [Pinnochio)!" he exclaims seeing the pointy beak of the bird.
haha, Yes, Eli, I suppose it is...


Later this morning when we were outside picking up sticks in the yard so I can mow Eli found a bunch of mushrooms and asked what they were. I explained that they were mushrooms and not to touch them. A couple minutes later he was asking about them again, "Why are those pepperoni's there?" Haha, I guess he hears all too often when we typically order mushroom and pepperoni pizza and he'd connected the two!

Life is good.

I love these beautiful babes!

Hot off the press!

My aunt Linda, uncle Ward, and cousin Kara just recently moved with the air force from England back to the midwest where Ward is stationed again. They're just over an hour away from us now and this morning they came to visit! We haven't seen them at all since our wedding 5 years ago and before that probably my high school graduation, so it was great to get caught up again! It was such a nice visit, and we certainly look forward to seeing more of them now that they're so close!

Caught ya!

This is coon #3 that we have caught (and by "we" I really mean "Kevin"). We used to the keep the cats down in the barn in their own little corn crib room, but we started getting raccoon invasions in the night and every morning Kevin would find the cat terrified and way up in the rafters of the shed, so he got a trap and we started catching coons. Kevin would then put it in the back of his truck and let it free again somewhere on his way to work. This one got trapped while we were gone this weekend and before it got freed we took some pics of the little guy.


Once we got two new kittens we moved all the cats up to the white shed by the house. It was good motivation to really clean out the whole thing and now it's a pretty nice set up!

Jumping hurdles!

A week ago I took Eli's little potty away and put the potty seat part on top of the toilet, and after a big fit the first time he was fine with it and the transition wasn't too bad. Well as of yesterday Eli officially sits on the toilet now without a potty seat on top of it! Woohoo!! This is HUGE! because it means that now he can go in public places too instead of just at home, and that's exactly how it started. We went to Omaha shopping with my mom yesterday and in our first store Eli urgently needed to go poop. But he HATES pooping in his pull-up so we dashed through the store and straight to the bathroom to give it a try. At first he didn't want to sit on the big toilet but I made him anyway because there was no other option, unless he wanted to poop in his pull-up. And after a little bit of sitting there, HE WENT! Then later after lunch I took him to the bathroom to "try", especially since his pull-up was still dry and he went again! And then in Target before we left for home, we tried there, and he went, this time right away and without coaxing! He was still dry when we got home several hours later, so we tried at home without the extra seat, and he went! I am sooo proud of him! Now that we're back at home we've got his stool set up so he can get on the toilet by himself and unless we're getting ready to go somewhere I don't need to tell him when to go. It's been several days since any accidents and we're well on our way to an ice cream treat after 10 dry days!

Pretty girl.

These look so much nicer in the computer before I upload them online, but here's my sweetie anyway..

Storm damage.

When we returned from our weekend home, we came back to lots of storm damage with another storm rolling in behind us. I mentioned it here. And now here are some of the pics. It's really nothing compared to all the damage done in town. I sure am thankful!

We drove the truck around the yard piling all the big branches in the back. Then I spent the next two days picking up a MILLION twigs in preparation for mowing. Seriously, it was a handful of twigs every square foot! Now today I think I can finally mow! Oh yay...

branches

more branches

some large branches blew out into the field

my sunflowers

I planted sunflowers all along the side and front of the barn. Only a few sprouted and none on the front side, and just as they were starting to open, the storm came through and smashed 'em.

beauty in this midst of it. (thought I'd better a take a photo of my lone sunflower before it too wilts or gets destroyed!)