Camping at Ledges...

Brice cooking it up!

Riley, I think he's saluting me!

Cameron, he's so cheeky! Got to love the grin.

A pretty view!

Our campsite...

Ledges State Park, Boone, Iowa

This weekend Brice and I took our 3 kiddos to Ledges State Park and went camping. I think our campsite was in a good location and we did pretty well. Of course at 7 am that morning I went out there nad picked our site out. The park was packed, and there were no places left but I noticed a family packing and leaving. So I grabbed it up. We got there around 1pm, set up camp and then head down to the creek. The boys really enjoyed walking the creek and get soaked. Even Mckenzie had fun at the creek. She put every rock in her mouth and then would throw it out and pick a new one to chew on. I wonder if she has a Mineral deficiency or maybe she's going to be a geologist when she grows up. We grilled hotdogs and hamburgers for supper and then took the kids to the little playground and let the kids run off any remaining energy they might have had. Put Mckenzie down for the night shortly after and then the boys did sparklers and made smores. The boys went down pretty easily, mostly due to exhaustion. Brice and I sat around the fire for a little while longer talking and then finally we hit the sack too. We did have a visitior though. A masked bandit was trying to get into our coolers with the food in it. Guess he wanted some smores too! So we had to put the coolers up. Surprisnly we all slept in til 8 am or after. Made breakfast. Brice is very handy in the camping cooking area. He would barely let me hold the spatula. Which is nice since I do most of the cooking at my house and a break is nice. Of course you really can't do to much damage with pancakes:) We cleaned camp up and then went on a a hike, stopped at the creek again to eat some more rocks and then headed home. I love camping and it was nice to do it with everyone. The kids really did wonderfully and made it a nice expierence.

Mckenzie Walking!

Mckenzie is finally up and going! She is walking everywhere and getting into more trouble than usual!

Memorial Weekend in Colorado

This weekend Brice and I went to Greeley, Colorado to visit his brother's Darren and Steve with their wives, Brenda and Ruth. We stayed at Darren and Brenda's home. They took us to Estes Park which is very pretty even in the clouds and you can't see a thing in front of you. It was a fun weekend. We talked a lot, I watched them play Rock Band and we played some games. Brice went golfing with his brothers on Monday morning and then we left around noon and started our 7 1/2 hour drive home. Brice has a wonderful family and I always enjoy watching their family dynamics.

MAC-ZILLA

Ok, I honestly feel sorry for Riley, being a big brother can kind of be traumatic! He loves to play with his train set and it hast to be set up in the living room cause that is pretty much the only space that is big enough. But he has to contend with his 1 year old baby sister that we now refer to as MAC-ZILLA! She is an avid crawler but in the last week she has decided that walking can get her, to her destination just as easy and maybe faster. She has the whole hands out for cordination thing and the step by step assault down to a T. I almost think she's been watching old japanesse movies of Godzilla. She even does this little scream that could hold very nicely against Godzilla, minus the fire breathing trick. As cute as this may seem, Riley is not thrilled by it one bit. She comes and starts picking the train track off and just tosses it around. Trains are being eaten. Riley gets mad, he cry's. MAC-ZILLA gets mad, she cry's! It's very scary:)

Birthday gone bad!

Poor Riley, today is his 5th birthday and at 2:30am this morning he started throwing up. Every hour on the hour I was cleaning him up. He wasn't able to go to school and pass out his birthday treats to his classmates, and he was barely able to eat his birthday cake and ice cream. He had asked for a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. I made it for him last night but hadn't decorated it yet, which is good cause we had to slice his cake and put his candles on it so he wouldn't blow his little germs all over the whole cake. When I got home from work I tested him for strep and lo and behold he was positive. Dr. White called him in some antibiotics. What a way to spend his birthday. I would like to point out that Mckenzie did really enjoy Riley's birthday cake!