Hello Summer!

Bella and I kicked off summer vacation with new haircuts! Shorter hair for the win!


Afterwards, I treated the kids to Starbucks.


I really splurged. They each got their own frappuccinos.






Curtis now loves Starbucks and asks to go there all the time. What have I done.


A church family has this awesome property where they built all sorts of tree houses, swings, and zip lines for their grandkids. They invited us over and it was so cool.






























They also had these cute baby kitties in their garage that Bella fell in love with.


Later that evening, Andy got taped to a wall to raise money for Relay for Life.


It worked!






Family dinner at Steak N' Shake.


While Bella was trying on some clothes, the boys did their own accessorizing.


And they found another use for laundry baskets.


Watching the boys play a double header.


We celebrated Father's Day a little early since the kids and I will be in Wisconsin on the actual day and Andy won't be joining us until later that evening. These are some of the boxes that his new toys came in.


He is ready to do some yard work!


Graydon woke up early and then fell back to sleep on the couch. As I was sitting on the other couch, a photo of him sleeping as a baby loaded onto our digital picture frame. I decided to take another sleeping photo to compare.


He's changed a lot in ten years.

End of the School Year

This kid wishes for glasses and braces. As a former glasses/braces kid, I think he's crazy. For what it's worth, he's also looking forward to pimples because he thinks it will make him look older.


End-of-the-year awards for Bella. Blurry photo = the best we could get.


She received just about every award that she was eligible for. This little lady is doing exceptionally well in school. She had the highest average in most of her classes. Her report card was all A+ and one A. In fact, she is skipping 8th grade math next year and jumping right into 9th grade Algebra. She's a smart cookie!


She's also pretty athletic. This is from her track banquet when she was being awarded the Most Valuable Player award for the girls.


I went on a field trip with Curtis to the pool. All of the kids who reached their AR goal earned this field trip. It had rained every day leading up to this field trip, but thankfully they had the perfect pool day!


The following day, I drove up to the Chicago area to celebrate my sister's 40th birthday! It was a fun, relaxing little trip and nice bonus time with some of my family and several of my sister's friends.






The kids did some night swimming while I was gone.


I couldn't find Curtis one day. . . and then I looked out the window.


That's how I like to relax too.


More swimming. I've only dipped in once so far. The outside temp needs to be at least 85 degrees before I feel warm enough to get in.


May 30th - the last day of school! The last day is awards day on the elementary end. Curtis usually tucks his pants into his socks, and we usually let him; but on this day, we asked him to wear his pants regularly and he did.








Curtis received a Certificate of Completion, was a Passport Winner all four quarters (Passports are slips of paper given by teachers when students are caught doing something good), Excellent Attendance, and All A's Honor Roll.


Graydon received a Certificate of Completion, Passport Winner all four quarters, Kindness Kid, All A's Honor Roll, and the Art Award.


Super proud of these boys!


School is officially out for the summer!!!




Notice how Curtis changed his clothes right away after getting home. And his pants are tucked back into his socks. He'd been waiting all day to do that.


Hello Summer!