COUNTY FAIR

We just finished up with our local county fair, which turned out to be a big hit for our family this year! Eric, Bay and Heather entered LOTS OF STUFF (Dennis' woodcrafts are too big to enter!) and we won lots of ribbons. Here's the run-down:



Bay: 1st place on a noodle/painted art piece

Eric: 2nd place on a model airplane, 3rd on a wooden table, 2nd on a noodle/painting, 3rd on a drawing of a dinosaur and lots of honorable mentions on other artwork, writings, lego collections, etc.

Heather: 2nd on canned green beans, 3rd on canned applesauce, 2nd on a women's skirt and a dress for Leah



We all had a great time viewing the exhibits, walking through the animal barns (Leah especially love the bunnies), wishing we could get some of the really neat looking chickens, and having ice-cream.



Some miscellaneous news on the kids:
Leah is talking more and more, and is learning to speak up for herself...she is very good at saying "NO!" when Bay tries to take something from her. She is expanding her vocabulary as well, and is getting out some two-word sentences, "Grandma bye-bye", "Mommy shoe" and the one word she has the most trouble saying right now is Eric-it comes out "Icky" He really doesn't like that one!

Eric is doing great in school, and has started up with a homeschool support group once a week. He is glad to be meeting some new friends...he even got to hold the flag for the pledge at the first meeting! He has learned to sing and memorized "America the Beautiful" and is very good at it!

Bay has started to join Eric in his violin lessons, and is doing some pre-Twinkle activites....learning to bow, hold his box violin...and loves to hum the Suzuki songs while playing, but absolutely does nothing on cue or performs for anyone! He is such a character!



Life seems to have been rushing by at an exhausting pace lately...but hopefully this busyness will only last for a season!



More photos from the fair are in our webshots link...

Our Funny Little Cowgirl!

Leah with her new boots, and her new smile! She walks around saying "Boots, boots, Daddy, daddy" which translates to, " Look! I have boots just like Daddy!" If you are taking a picture and tell her to smile, this is the funny face she makes!

New Table

Dennis just finished making us a new dining room table, and we are very excited about it! Whenever we have people come over for dinner, there is never enough room, so now we have plenty of room...I think I calculated we can squeeze 14 around if necessary! I painted the bottom the same color as the walls in our living room, then added 2 coats of polyurethane for protection against knicks and dinks. The top is black walnut from a tree that once stood in our back yard. It is finished with 100% tung oil, 8 coats to be exact!

Next, Dennis will make a bench to match the table to go along one side and we will probably have some chairs made to match by the local Amish folks.

Also I've inlcuded some recent miscellaneous shots of the kids in our webshots album....

Night at the Carnival

The kids just had a blast this past weekend at the local fireman's carnival. Same simple rides as there are every year, but oh so much fun. It was even more fun this year that Leah got to enjoy everything as well. Bay's favorite ride is pictured above, he rode it many many times. Leah loved the train and "dinging" the bell. Eric's favorite was the Tilt-a-Whirl, but that goes too fast to catch on film! Even mommy, daddy, Granni and Gramps rode on a couple of rides, though the last ride I went on with Eric made me sick...guess my stomach's not so young any more! Follow the webshots link to the Carnival folder for more pictures!

Keeping Cool!

We have been trying to just keep cool the last couple of weeks...the temps have soared into the high 90's and heat indexes above 100, so unless water is involved, we have stayed indoors! We enjoyed a visit from Laura, Heather's cousin...eating some crabs, going to swim meets, and just hanging out!

Leah got her cast off this week, so the first thing we did was head to the pool for the afternoon. She was so happy to finally be able to get in the pool, and we all enjoyed the break from the heat. Eric is done with swim team for the summer, and we are trying not to think about school until September. It has been nice to shed the routine for a while.

We took a ride in Heather's parents' boat up the river to a local seafood restaurant. The boys got to ride in the tube most of the way there. There was a beautiful sunset on the way back. The rest of the photos are in the webshots album.

Dennis and a friend took Eric, Bay and friends Nathan and William to an Orioles baseball game this month as well. They had excellent seats, right behind the dugout and first base! It was a great boys' afternoon!

Summer Fun

We have been very busy this last week...the weather is unbearably hot...yet we continue to spend most of our time outdoors in it! There is just so much to do! The kids have enjoyed playing outside in the shady evenings. Eric had 2 swim meets last week and did a great job. Leah is getting better at walking every day, she especially loves chasing Bay around.

We had a bit of a crisis with one of our kittens, Lucy, this weekend. She disappeared on Friday, and it wasn't until Saturday morning when we found her halfway down our road, face torn that we realized that she had crawled up into the wheel of Dennis' truck Friday afternoon and bailed out partway down the road. She is okay, thankfully, except a bit of road rash on her little face. We are all glad to have her back, especially her sister, Luke, who cried and cried while she was gone!

Enjoy the pictures on webshots of our summer activity!

Camping in July

We just got back from a great camping trip in Ohiopyle State Park http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/STATEPARKS/parks/ohiopyle.aspx in Pennsylvania. We were not sure what to expect for July camping, as we normally go in the spring or fall, but the weather up there was absolutely gorgeous! We actually had to turn on the heat in the camper each night it got so cold! There was lots to do, and we didn't get to do it all, so we plan on going there again.

We did enjoy quite a bit of bike riding. There is a great trail that follows the Yaughigheny River that is fairly flat and easy riding. We rode 12 scenic miles one day to a little town called Confluence, PA to have some ice-cream, and then rode the 12 miles back. Views of the river, rapids and even rafters going down, beautiful mountains, rock formations, and old pioneering homesteads were along the trail. Eric was amazing...he pedaled the whole time without complaining. Of course the promise of ice-cream at the end may have helped :)

There were many sites to see along the river as well..the falls at Ohiopyle were amazing, and since we have had so much rain, the water levels were extremely high. We actaully forgot to take a picture of the falls, so here's a link to someone else's pictures. http://www.fay-west.com/ohiopyle/waterfalls/

On the way home we stopped at Dennis' Aunt Jeanne's house for a great lunch and also saw his cousin, Linda and her husband, Ray. The kids loved seeing their great Aunt, and it was a nice break from the long ride home.

Enjoy looking through the pictures in our webshots album!