The newest member of their family? My little beehive with the brightest personality and warmest heart, Katie Nalder (Now Medley). I was her camp director when I first moved to Idaho and now Gideon has snatched her up and she fits into their family so well. Because yes, she is also so refreshing to be around. I loved watching her light up whenever she was talking about Gid and I loved watching Gideon stare at her as if she was the only person in the room crammed full of bodies.
What did my kids do while I was mingling with the Medleys? Well, they did a lot of hanging out with Aunties. Sariah watched them Thursday night and Jolene took them Friday night and spoiled them rotten as she is known to do. A refreshing swim at this fun indoor pool. Johnny loved the big twisty slide and Alex went off of the high dive all by herself!
Then they topped it off with a refreshing scoop of ice cream. That's right, it was an all around refreshing weekend and I'm so glad I was able to make the trip down there and sneak into their family one more time.
Lots of relaxing
Lots of snacking on treats
Lots of time spent together as a family
Lots of fireworks
And lots of memories being made
Monday night she watched the kids so I could join Brad in some outdoor volleyball. Tuesday night she watched the kids so Brad and I could go out and celebrate my birthday. Then Wednesday was bitter sweet, It was my actual birthday and I turned 30 (you might think this is the bitter part but not in my eyes). I am happy with how I've spent these last 30 years and am looking forward to the next 30. We have to live in the present right? Sariah made me fajitas for dinner and Brad mixed me up some Brazilian Lemonade. It was bitter though (the day, not the sweet sweet lemonade) because we had to say goodbye to my nephew Hunter for the month of July. He will be spending it in Colorado with his Dad and as much as we're going to miss him, this is going to be a great opportunity for Sariah to get things checked off of her to-do list and to be able to job search.
Today Alex helped me harvest our first batch of blackberries from our neglected garden. I'm so glad to have a helper because I'm having a hard time keeping up with it since we really haven't been home much since it started producing fruits and veggies. Oh ya, I almost forgot to mention our day at Roaring Springs water park the day before I left for Medford. Alex is now 50 inches tall and meets the height requirement to go on all of the rides at the park. I'll be surprised if Johnny makes the 42 inch mark by next summer though to go on some larger rides. He's fine with that though, it took lots of coaxing to get him to go on the ones he was allowed on. Then of course after the first run, he wanted to go on them over and over again.
Now we are taking off to Cascade to spend the weekend with Brad's family up at the cabin and some fun on the lake. It's always fun when we all get together, especially when jet skis and fireworks are involved (not at the same time of course). :o)
When I saw this nest building on my front porch I was hesitant to allow it's progression. I don't like the birds waking me up at 5:30 every morning, I don't like the pile of poo they've left on my front porch and I don't want this to become a permanent nesting spot for their family. But alas, the eggs were already laid and I didn't have the heart to take it down. Now we have 5 cute little baby birds who greet us whenever we step onto our front porch. The kids enjoy, sitting on our porch swing and "talking/tweeting" to them. They've seen the parents bring them worms to eat and love that anytime a flash goes off in their direction, they all perk up and start begging for food. It's nice to have something close and immovable for them to observe. When we were on our trip and in the car for 2 days each way, so much was happening around us. However, every time I pointed out a double rainbow, lightening storm in the distance, long train moving through a mountain view valley or a fighter airplane whizzing past our window, they would always be too slow to see it and disappointed that they missed out. I had a hard time learning to just keep it to myself. Now I have something incredible that I can share with them and hopefully we'll be able to watch them grow and eventually fly off on their own.