July Stuff

Here are a bunch more pictures of all the nothing we've been up to for the month of July:

Our neighbors, the Hawkins, moved to Florida!  It was all very sudden and my kids have been very sad to not have (the very aptly named) Scarlett to play with, in addition to her older sisters Abbi and Makenzie.  They're only renting out their house, so I still have hope that they'll come back some day...

Of course, their departure meant lots of block parties to wish them well:

l-r: Camille, Colton, Sydney, Beth (in the back), Scarlett

This picture is deceptive.  Everyone is TOTALLY six feet apart!

Kendra put together this awesome Eiffel Tower puzzle!

And she somehow had this magical-looking ringlet in her hair!  I'm so jealous!

Lots of card games going on in this house...

Oreo looks very festive with a scrunchy around her ears!

Craig made me amazing peanut butter brownies for my birthday!  (This is before they were frosted!)

Probably should have put on makeup for the big day.  But honestly, who cares???

Craig and I enjoyed the sunset at Carter Mountain!

Can you spot my house down there???

One day, Camille was very sad.  I no longer remember why, but I'm sure it was DEVASTATING, whatever it was...!

Another day, the kids re-discovered all their favorite costumes!  Ryder was especially excited for his wizard hat and wand!

Craig, Bentley, and Kendra participated in virtual camp and it went surprisingly well!

Kendra built this indoor shelter and slept under it one night!

And she also made a birdhouse!

And Bentley had fun playing minute-to-win-it games!

We're slowly figuring out how to have church again!  I really love that Camille's mask matched her dress so perfectly!  And, thanks to the movie Spies in Disguise, my boys LOVE putting on their church clothes and pretending to be spies!  WIN.

And sometimes we're just snuggly and goofy!

Craig wanted a 4-layer cake for his birthday!  (Clearly, we've been watching too much of The Great British Baking Show!)  Fortunately, he was happy to help out.  Once we put a whipped cream cheese layer on all of that, it looked quite good!

I climbed Humpback Rock with a bunch of my friends early on a Saturday morning.  (And TOTALLY had to suck in to look like that!  😬 )

Craig's parents offered to pay for us to all eat out one night, so we got Five Guys AND let the kids order milkshakes!  They were in heaven!

(No.  We can't fit at one table!)  Thanks, Tom and Donna!!!

Bentley finds ways to make a snuggie even MORE snuggly!

Apparently Camille and her friend Sydney decided they wanted to learn to sew, so Sydney's mom set them to work sewing on paper towels.  Brilliant!

More card games

Bentley found this little guy at the pool

And Craig got to help out with a baptism-- the work still goes forward, even with COVID!

And we're not done yet-- I've got more to tell you about soon!

My Son, the Youtuber...

With all his spare time, Bentley has been learning video editing.  And, actually, he's pretty good at it!  He's made a few episodes now, but here's his most recent if you want to check it out:




(Oh, wait-- we don't say "check it out" any more, we say "Like and Subscribe!")

Ohio Trip

We had all kinds of good reasons to visit Rachael and Ian in Ohio: a) They have a new baby that we needed to meet!!!  b) They're so fun to hang out with.  c) They have this great restaurant Cone'n'Shake that Craig keeps not getting to experience.  d) They also have Whit's Frozen Custard, which we love.  And e) Tracy and Adam (and Cora!) were all going to be there, too!

So, obviously, we needed to drive up to Ohio and take care of all these things.  We came at the end of Tracy and Adam's trip so we wouldn't take over all their time with Rachael and Ian.  And it was so great to see everyone!!!!  AND, I continued my streak of taking a lot of pictures!  So enjoy:


Since we were only going to see Tracy and Adam for about 24 hours, I wanted to actually arrive early and make the most of that time.  So we left the house at 7am and got there around noon.  I was so proud of us for making that happen, but it sort of backfired because I was SO TIRED all afternoon then...  Oh, well.  We try!

The FIRST thing we did was scoop up that new nephew and give him lots of snuggles!  Clayton was very good and stayed asleep for us!

Colton LOVES holding babies

And then Camille wants to do whatever Colton does!

These mag-snaps were a HUGE hit with kids and adults alike!

Craig was so tired he didn't notice the kids napping with him...

We stopped by this exercise park and had fun...

Nolan is THE HULK.  He's also a HUGE fan of Ryder!  He followed him everywhere he could!

I wish I could have seen this tree before it died-- that is a HUGE stump!

This is what our kids do when you tell them they can be cool...

Harrison liked to hug/tackle Colton

Cora is still very cute!

More baby holding!

We got Clayton to look at the camera for this one!

Bentley continues to enjoy taking creepy pictures with my phone...

Milk coma!

Snuggly Harrison!

Our second day there, Ian took us to the farm where one of his nurses lives.  It was so pretty and fun to see all the animals!

Colton also loves all dogs

So many piglets!!!

Harrison loves his daddy!

The cows actually let Camille pet them!  (This was only noteworthy because every time Bentley tried to pet them, they'd hustle away from him...)

Admiring the chickens

Kendra caught this chicken and then it immediately leaned against her-- who knew chickens could be snuggly?

And they had a very sweet bunny, too!

Their daughter took each of the kids racing around in this-- Camille was a BIG fan!

I spent a lot of time getting my baby fix!

Craig was very proud of this tower that used ALL the mag-snaps!

And we spent an evening at Ian's PA's pool!

I love getting pizza at the pool-- such a perfect combination!

Bentley managed to build a tower taller than himself!

On our last day, I showed Rachael how to make my favorite beef skewers, and we also had watermelon and chips-- yay for outdoorsy, 4th of July weekend foods!

And finally, before Tracy and Adam had left, we arranged this photo:

Everyone is wearing Bay Hay and Feed shirts!!!  Credit goes to Bentley for scouting out this perfect location!

So good to see a couple of my sisters!  Now I need to figure out how I can visit Leah and Natalie (and my parents)!!!