School Days

Gracie and Em are back at school. They were excited and nervous. They get very valley girl chatty when filled with these emotions. We pretty much had the chattyness til I dropped them off with their teachers the first day. The boys and I missed them like crazy. Drew and I have "Drew time" when he chooses what we do. We pretty much have Drew time much of the day with hil time to get stuff done scarce. Oh well.

Called To Serve

Alec got his call to Charelston, West Virginia! We are so excited for Alec and the people of West Virginia he will meet, teach and serve. He is such a stand out. Such a great example for our kids. I know our family is blessed when we have a missionary serving. He enters the MTC on November 19th so he will get to spend about a month with Caleb before he leaves. Caleb gets home October 15th ish. Drew said he wants to serve his mission in "Rimrock" ( the area of the foothills by our house). Sounds good to me. I just love that when we have missionaries out we talk about and pray about missionary work more. I really don't know what effect he was going for with the yellow mesh hat, maybe a shout out to cabe since he closes his emails "keep it gangsta".

Rick planned a boy's camping trip with the Rumsey family. They went to kilgore for fishing, four wheeling, and I really don't know what else. Given the Rumsey boys, I'm sure lots of stimulating conversation was involved. heehee Drew loved it. While our boys were gone Gracie, Em and I loaded up on back to school clothes, went to lunch and got pedicures. Adam hung with the girls this time. Maybe next year he'll camp with the boys. We have had such a wonderful summer. I find joy as a mom building relationships and making memories with my kids. This summer we did lots of reading together, and playing together. We read the first in the Series of Unfortunate Events Series and Pippi Longstocking and lots of picture books. We had bum wars on the tramp, played badmittin, statue store, freeze tag, hide and seek, etc. I will cry when the go back to school on Thursday. I always do.

Miss Em

Emree turned 7 on August 2nd. Crazy. She is such a tender hearted wonderful little girl. She is so concerned about Adam and if he is safe and well taken care of. Adam begs her to walk with him. When he finally gets it by himself it will be due to Emree's patience with him. She is just the right size to march him around. Emree loves the scriptures and amazes us at what she understands and remembers after reading. Em wanted a baby alive for her birthday. I wasn't quite sure about the idea, but she is so maternal and loving to take care of baby dolls keeps her "little girl" with a big sis who's into big girl stuff. We love Emree millions and will keep her our little girl for as long as we can.

More Oregon

So I wanted to post some more of our Oregon vacation. Some friends have asked me for details...so here's what I know. We stayed just outside Florence on Heceta Beach. There are beach houses and condos to rent. We all got beach houses and they vary in price depending mostly on size and location. Lots of info online of course if you want to search. Here's some more pics while we're at it .Heceta Lighthouse (tours to the top - really interesting)
Our Beach House

Lots of beautiful sea life in the tidepools

Drew, Gracie, Nathan, Peyton, Emree, and Broc

Adam's 1st Birthday!

We celebrated Adam's first birthday with a family bbq

on the fourth complete with fireworks! Adam is such a fun little guy. So smiley like his dad. He has Rick's dimple's and shows them off every chance he gets. Emree made up a dance for the party. She was a big hit!

Florence OR...our paradise for a week

I LOVE SUMMER! We have been busy playing this summer. By playing I mean yardwork which is my play I have to admit. We have done some other fun stuff though. The kids took swimming lessons the first two weeks they were out of school. The girls started a cheer camp they love. We spent a week on the OR coast and loved it! We stayed at a beach house straight out of pottery barn magazine. We toured a beautiful lighthouse, aquarium, ate yummy seafood, hiked, rode a 25 passenger dune buggy, and discovered all kinds of ocean life in the tidepools. We loved the beautiful landscapes of bright blue ocean and lush forests. Best of all we spent time with family we don't see often. I love my family.