Still here

Summer is passing us by quickly! Between crafting, camping, and just regular summer fun, our days are flying by. So when I realized it had been over 10 days since I posted, I thought I'd just write a short note letting you know I'm still here. :) Last weekend, the kids, my brother and I attended a camp for kids with special needs and had an absolute blast! I had attended about 14 years ago while still in high school and was looking forward to taking my kids with me this time. They did really well and are already asking to go back. More details about this later....as soon as I get some pics from my brother! :)

We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of my sister's baby, Ms. Jaycee Dawn...I'm not sure of the spelling yet but we know that's what her name will be. Everyday is a waiting game at this point and we can't wait for her to join us.

We are not ready to start school yet because I would like to help my sister get settled as much as possible before we start. With two active boys, she is going to need some extra hands for a little while and I want to be available whenever needed without feeling guilty about missing school.

Meanwhile, we are planning some upcoming trips this fall and one of them is to see my COLTS play in Houston!!!!! I can't wait for football to start....we drew for our fantasy football draft order yesterday and although I got a crummy pick, I'm excited it means that football is getting ready to start. I love me some football!

That's about it...this is a really boring post and if you lasted all the way through, congrats! :) But at least you know I haven't given up on blogging....just boring these days!

Rainy Memories

Last week we decided to try something different for the Fourth of July. Down in Clarendon near the ranch, they had all kinds of activities going on and so we wanted to go take part in them. And then Hurricane Alex hit and we got rain, rain, and more rain. It wasn't a hard flood out the roads kind of rain but just a steady drizzle that kept everything very wet and muddy. Since it wasn't raining so hard outside, we still tried to continue on with our planned activities. Some things got canceled but we did our best to have fun. :)

The rain brought great opportunities for pretty pictures....this was taken from the front yard of the main house. It got brighter and ended up being a full rainbow but I didn't get a shot of that because my camera was not to keen on being in the rain.

I just thought this was really pretty....pictures really don't do it justice.

We went to the rodeo Friday night and all the kids decided to go down for the calf tag race. The calves have tags on their necks and the kids chase them down until they get the tag and then whoever gets the tags win. Sounds like fun in a muddy and other things rodeo arena right? The kids thought so too until they got down to the gate and then Princess decided that maybe getting nasty by all the mud and other stuff wasn't such a good idea. But it didn't stop the boys and Little Man chased one calf all by himself around the entire arena. Just as he got him cornered, a bigger kid ran in and took the tag. Little Man did all the work but missed the reward. I wanted to boo that bigger kid but figured it wouldn't be very role modelish of me.

The next day we thought it would be great to go fishing in the rain! So we bundled up in our ponchos (or as my nephew called them: burnachos) and went to fish. I'm telling you, we refused to stay inside and let Alex ruin our weekend. It was wet....

...and muddy...

but great fishing! Little Man finally caught him a fish! All by himself! It was a big catfish too...not an easy reel-in. He got it in mostly by himself and then Daddy had to come help a little bit. You can see him doing his victory dance in this picture...

and then stopped long enough to pose for a picture.

My brother-in-law caught one too that we just had to show off....isn't it impressive?

There are five new calves at the ranch right now and one of them was just a week old when we were there. It belongs to the black and white longhorn named Rosa and is so cute!! I want to keep him or her (we're not sure yet.)

The rain made the cows feisty and the one longhorn that is very friendly anyway, really made herself comfortable around us. She is gentle but still makes me nervous when she uses those horns to swat flies. She could take off my head!!!

After awhile, the rain stopped long enough for the boys to go shoot skeet. At the nudging of my hubby, I shot a target out of a nearby tree. I don't do flying targets but watch out when I'm aiming at stationary things. I have to admit that I'm pretty good with a gun. :) Better than my hubby at least...I proved that to him once but he doesn't like to talk about it.

Since the rain started again and seemed like it was going to continue, we decided to come home Saturday night and join in on our neighborhood parade and cookout. Of course, that day was gorgeous! Oh well. It was fun playing in the rain and watching the kids make good memories. That's what I'm all about can you tell? Making memories...that what life's about. :)

Oh, and the mud/probable manure, wet, soggy and stinky laundry was memorable for me as well. The kids asked all the way home what that smell was and I couldn't bring myself to tell them it was them. :)

Summertime

This rainy, cool weather is really ruining my plans of spending every day at the pool. Oh well. It feels like it used to in the mountains when we would go there in the summers. I do like listening to the birds outside, they are so happy it's not blistering hot outside. So what's been going on? We've been just enjoying our summer every chance we get. When we don't have a sports camp or a VBS going on, we've been sleeping in, watching cartoons, I'm obsessed with a new craft, swimming, working out, and just enjoying our days. One might say it's laziness, but when I think about how starting in September it's football and then basketball every weekend, I tend to be okay with it. One thing that we have started doing more of is golfing. As a family. :) It is so much fun to see my kids enjoy this game that both my hubby and I enjoy. I played in high school and so when I met the hubs we played together a few times before I realized that he is WAY serious. So then I didn't play for years with having babies and all and so it's nice to go out with our kiddos and really all enjoy playing the game. And the hubs has really mellowed out when it comes to his game. Either that, or he just really behaves himself while the kids and I are around. :) Anyway, being that my in-laws live on a golf course, we took advantage of that and went and played with Bogey last week. Even Princess had her own set of clubs and shot on a few holes. She isn't ready to play a full 9 holes yet but she does like hitting it when the big boys do. She then picks up her ball, runs to the next one and hits again. So cute.

She really enjoyed the attention and time she got to spend with her daddy...

...and liked it when Bogey helped her hit the ball better.

Little Man had a blast playing golf but really liked driving the golf cart too. :)

The big boys had fun giving each other a hard time....

and memories were made by all.