For Dad

Hey Dad, well we sure are missing you at Grandma and Grandpa's house, but we're having a lot of fun. Here are some pictures of what we've been up to.

Macy Showing off her new trick next to cousin Ava.


James The Bull

Helping Mom blow out the candles on her Birthday cheescake.

A relaxing morning walk...

That turned into a case of "I too dizzy."

We hope you are having lot's of fun at the hospital, and we cant wait to get back home and see you.

Memory Game

I don't usually like to do this kind of stuff... Don't bother tagging me or sending me one of those paste your email address here and send it along kind of things cause I probably won't do it.

I saw this one a friends sight though and thought it looked like fun.

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember--it can be funny, weird, awkward, random, etc.!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.

Fun with the "Actions"

This Saturday we went to the lake with our friends the Ashtons (Samm thinks their last name is Action) It was a really hot day...perfect for being out on the lake.

Samm and James were both finally brave enough to go out on the tube, but Samm preferred to be swimming in the water.

Darren was nice enough to not complain when James kept asking to help drive. Actually, he didn't really ask, he just said "I want to sit here with you."

This is James showing us his back flip!

Macy did pretty good the whole time, as long as she could chew on someones finger.

Last time we went to the lake, Josh tried to wake board, but wasn't ever able to get up. Apparently when your that big, you swallow half the lake while the boat tries to pull you out of the water, and it is really hard to hang on to the rope. This time, he made a few technique adjustments and got up after only a few tries.

Then, after the boys were done, they convinced Lindsay and I to give it a try. Normally I shy away from this type of stuff. Prior to Saturday, I had only given one attempt to water sports, but since the kids both did something they were afraid of I thought I better do it also. Getting up out of the water was no problem, but staying up was a little bit difficult for me. After four or five attempts though I got it figured out and it was really fun.

Even though I'm pretty sure no one wants to see a boring video of me being pulled behind a boat, Josh insisted that I post it. So, here it is for your viewing pleasure.

And since Josh couldn't get shown up by Keith and Chris...

Twinkle toes

I shot this little video clip of Macy mostly for me, but thought I would share it with anyone who is interested. She has the funniest little habbit of twirling her feet constantly and I wanted to record her doing it before she decides to stop.

Did you see the fly?

Ok, So I didn't realize the fly wasn't very visible on the computer screen. Sorry. I was thinking that it looked so white trash having a fly buzz around her head, but I shouldn't have even mentioned it. If you look really hard though, you can see it at the end buzzing around the left side of her head.

Photo Shoot

A couple days ago while I was watching my niece and two nephews I was messing around with my camera trying to figure some stuff out, and all of the kids suddenly swarmed around me wanting their pictures taken. So, we had a little photo shoot while they requested what color they wanted to be. It was pretty funny.

James is always up for doing crazy faces.

Gabe doing a scary face.

Samm and Lexie looking cute.

James and Lexie being silly on the bed.

Samm's intense model face.

Logan was too cool for a crazy face, but still wanted his picture taken.

Macy kept staring at Lexie and wouldn't look at me until she left the room.

Have you ever seen a face quite like that?!!!!

Paging Dr. Rollins

So, I thought Josh was having the time of his life while we were in Mexico and he was golfing away with his Dad and brothers, but I was wrong.

Yesterday he got to do some sort of hip surgery (I can't remember the technical name) from start to finish all by himself. The Doctor of course was standing right next to him supervising, but Josh did all of the work.

As he was telling me all about it and trying to shovel in some lunch at the same time, he just kept saying "That was awesome!" He loves to use power tools at home, so being able to drill into someones body was just about the coolest thing ever.

Not very many students get that opportunity, so I am very excited for him. I'm just hoping he doesn't get really bored during the rest of his rotations.

Mexico, Macy, and More

Since I know you have all been dying to no where I have been and what I have been doing these last couple of weeks, Here is a quick up date for you...

From June 18th to the 25th we were in Mexico with all of Josh's family. Actually I should be more specific, because it was the adults only. Yes, it was heavenly! Unfortunately I really didn't take very many pictures so I'm still waiting to get copies from everyone else. Here are a few though.

This is me standing in front of the main temple at Chichen-Itza. You can't walk up the steps anymore, but when we were there 3 years ago Josh and I got to and it was amazing

This is Josh's idea of a dream vacation

This is what I did most of the time, except replace the iguana with a book. Heaven!

Since we've been back I really haven't had much going on, it's just been really hard to get back into the swing of things, and blogging was not on the top of my list.

Macy has had a really big week though full of firsts. She got her first tooth, got her first hair cut, had her first taste of rice cereal which she loved, and finally rolled over for the first time. Instead of being excited though, I'm a little bit sad. She is already growing up too fast and I wish she could stay frozen as a baby forever. OK, maybe not forever, but a year or two might be nice.

In other news, Josh started his rotations this month and is loving it. Even though he has to be away from us for a couple of days at a time and is on his feet for 12 hours straight, he is finally out of the classroom and into the hospital. I have a little bit of a weak stomach though, so when he starts describing all the "cool" stuff that he is doing I have to remind him that I just want an overview, not details.

And of course I can't forget to wish all of you a Happy fourth! Our kids had a great time watching fireworks this year, but Samm still had to cover her ears.

Princess Fat Face and Grandma.

Samm and James watching the fireworks with their cousins. I promise Samm does have shorts on under her skirt.

What would I blog about if I didn't have kids?

I am really impressed with anyone who doesn't have kids that can keep up an interesting blog, because I don't think I would have a single thing to write about without them. So, here is another annoying blog post about a mother bragging about her kids.

So, up until the end of last summer Samm was so afraid of the water that she wouldn't even stick her face in it. By August she was finally putting her face down in the water, but only her eyes and nose. This summer she is actually going all the way underneath so I decided I should start teaching her how to swim. so, last week I got in with her for a few minutes and after an hour of practicing on her own she had it down pretty good.

Well, yesterday at the pool I guess James decided he wanted to be like Samm, so he went under the water and started swimming around. Surprisingly really well too.

So, not only do I have two little swimmers, but last week James finally decided that he would be a big boy and out of the blue started going to the bathroom all on his own. I can't even express how relieved I am to only have Macy in diapers now!!!

Bad poison Ivy

Two years ago when we bought our house we learned three things. 1) We have poison ivy growing in random spots along the fence. 2) Poison ivy is extremely hard to get rid of. 3) Samm and Josh are both highly allergic to the stuff. Both have had it several times and it usually takes weeks to clear up all the way. The worst time was last summer when Samm basically rolled around in it wearing apparently only her underwear, right before our two week vacation to California. I ended up taking her to the hospital for that one and had a very mean nurse make me cry, but that is a whole other story.

Anyway, on Friday some friends were over playing and the kids decided to make a tree hut out of the branches that had fallen a few days before in a big storm. I thought it was a pretty clever idea until Samm woke up Saturday morning with a rash on the side of her face and I realized the branches had been stacked by the side of the house where Josh is always having to spray for poison ivy.

Fortunately it's a pretty localized case, but it is on her face and her right cheek is pretty swollen. Once again she is being quite the trooper though and hasn't complained much at all.

Some things to make me smile

So today was one of those days that made me wonder why I even bothered to leave the house.

I was supposed to have an appointment at 10:00 this morning at the preschool to get James all set up, but somehow the clock in my bedroom got set ahead an hour so when I was just about there I realized that it was only 8:50 not 9:50.

Instead of driving all the way home and back I decided to let James play at a nearby park for a while and hold my overly tired and very cranky baby until it was time to go. This would have been fine with me except for the fact that when I got to the school the lady wasn't there. One of the teachers called her on her cell phone and apparently she forgot to pencil me in, even though she had just called me on Friday to find out when I could come.

Still in pretty good spirits, I decided to run a few more errands, stop in and see Josh for a while, and then go pick up Samm at my sister-in-laws house and hang out for a bit before I took the kids to the pool.

Unfortunately we were only at the pool about an hour before some kid majorly puked after going down the water slide and it was so bad they decided to just shut down the pool for the rest of the day.

So, after being gone almost the entire day I really wasn't in the best mood until we got home and I noticed this.

Apparently I'm not completely void of a green thumb. After I planted two of these last year some bugs ate them all up. Both plants grew back this year, but this one has been pretty small and until now hasn't bloomed at all.

And then I got on to check some blogs and saw this cute little girl giggle. And now I'm smiling.