Whippoorwill

Whippoorwill was a lot of pictures to go through, especially when I let 4 kids play with the camera! But here we are and should be on a roll so that we can start posting more current happenings around here.....like Josh getting home this past weekend, on our anniversary no less! YAY! We realized he'd been gone from home since mid-May so practically 3 months. He was here for one night before we left for MN and has been in Australia and the Philippines since then. SO good to have him home!!!

The Fearsome Foursome

Tate (Josh's cousins Dan and Jill's son)

Evan (Tate's older brother) and Gretta

Cousin Matthias and soon to be big brother to a little sister!!!

Maggie's first fish, she LOVED touching it!

The kids were hardly out of the water or sandbox. Maybe they slept a little, but other than that they were living outside!

Can't get enough of the loons of course.

Crossing the Mississippi Headwaters

Half the Mississippi ended up here.

Little longboarding

With....

And without help! Hehe!

And the pride and joy moment of making Evan SMILE and not do the fish hook face!

Until next year Whippoorwill!

Golden

The light...oh beautiful light! Had forgotten that I took these at my parents cabin before we went on our annual Whippoorwill adventure. So had to do a little post with just them. Guess it may take longer than I thought to catch up to real time, but we're not doing too much yet, so don't worry! Ha!

Right when I saw these I was in that moment all over again. That sunlight was so warm and golden and the girls were running and rolling and playing with Josh. I can just hear all the laughter again! That the pictures bring back that memory for me is more than enough! I remember last year in June was when we were just finding out about Josh's diagnosis and we didn't know what lay ahead. What a difference a year makes! He is healthy and happier than ever and so are we! 

First things first!

Well, we better start from before we actually left.....when a big first happened at our house. Gretta got a big bike! A "real" bike, and she couldn't be more excited about it!

Especially since its green like Daddy's!

Then, first on our agenda in MN was this lovely couple's wedding day! Congrats Kirk and Mel!

Well now ain't they a good lookin' group?!

We got a day and night away from the girls and we enjoyed ourselves a lot, but were quite happy to see them in the morning!

Preview

Sneak peak alert! I'm back in the land of fast internet and BOY do we have some catching up to do. I will not admit to how many pictures were taken in the last month #1 because I actually don't know the final tally because I'm still uploading some to my computer as I type this and #2 I'm pretty sure its possibly a borderline astronomical amount. In my defense there is a lot of editing to do so maybe I'll end up with not quite as many. Anyway, here is a little taste....

Whippoorwill, unforgettable memories.

And even more memories from Grandma Peg and Grandpa Steve's cabin

Surprise visit with cousin Petra...or Chepra as Maggie likes to say!

More to come!

Dresses

Well this summer is flying by already! Sorry for the lack of posting! Unlike the fast moving summer, the internet connection is SLOW since we're visiting MN, so not sure how many posts are going to happen this month! Anyway, here are some pictures from before we left...meant to post them sooner, but then packing and traveling happened! So many more pictures have been taken in the last few weeks, but these were already ready to go so we're going to pretend summer hasn't quite started yet! Ha! Hopefully we haven't lost all our readers.....all 4 of you....but we promise to catch up soon!

 

Our friend Sarah sent these super cute dresses and flip flops out before we left and it reminded me of the other 2 matching dresses the girls have and we had to have a few days of picture taking ridiculousness.

 

Do you see those adorable flower floppies?!

 

The "twirl test" yep....its a hit!

 

Grandma Peggy made these adorable dresses and here is Gretta teaching Maggie Ram-Sam-Sam.

 

Last, but not least, Grandma Rachel picked these out before we even moved from MN! Absolutely gorgeous!

 

SO much fun taking these pictures and I actually got quite a few good shots, mostly of them just being themselves! Thanks for the wonderful dresses everyone!!

 

And then just some more examples of high-heeled cuteness. These are a couple pics I'd been saving for a rainy day when I didn't have anything to blog about, but now I finally remembered them so I'm sticking them in here!

Hopefully catch up soon! Until then, hope this will tide you over and you can be patient with us! We've been enjoying our visit and have spent quite a bit of time at the lake and have lots of fun pictures to show!

Homing it up

So you may or may not remember I mentioned "house projects" in a post a while ago....well, we haven't really shown a lot of pictures of our new house but there is a serious lack of color on the walls and we all know I can't live with that. I've also been trying to be good about getting some before and after shots....so here we go!

Entryway before.....

And AFTER! Paint and some crafty projects for the walls!

I stitched the little h, wrapped some yarn around an embroidery hoop, put some fabric in the other hoops, printed out "What I love most about my home is who I share it with" quote and a little scrapbook paper in the square white frame. 

As exciting as I find house projects I figured we couldn't do a post without the girls!

Another view of her Barbie battle scars. Yikes, they look worse now!

And some pool time, it was 96 here yesterday!