This Week's Photos By Amy

We recently found Amy's camera and now no one is safe. She loves bringing it to the pool or creating funny pictures of everyone. I even caught her videoing me doing laundry. (She uses a speed up tool that makes everything go really fast and then laughs hysterically at whatever you were doing.) No one is safe with her around!

Tyler is usually her willing participate.

One day they had been outside and Tyler came into my room, dripping of muddy water just staring at me. I like the kids getting dirty, but I prefer it not leaking it all over the carpet. I asked Amy why she wasn't wet and she said, "Well, it was more fun making HIM all wet!" Good grief. But these were the photos from whatever they were doing.

She caught Lee and I napping. 

And then she brought her camera to the pool. We like using it there because it's waterproof. I've decided we really need a GoPro! We have several of the cheaper versions but none of them work very well. So I'm going to have to move that up on the priority list!

Happy Fourth of July 2019

Our usual group of friends wanted to do their own thing so we did our own thing for the 4th.

Amy gave us a brief history lesson

I made red, white and blue striped jello. No one ever eats it, so I'm not sure why I make it. But I think it's fun.

Tyler got into the spirit of things.

I printed off some games (bingo, word search, American history quiz, etc) and we all competed against one another.

We've never done it before but we bought fireworks! (Yes, they are legal in Tennessee.) We had no desire to drive across town to the big show and all that goes with that so we had our own fun. We had no idea what to buy but we chose well as our own fireworks were great!

We set off all the black snakes at once. (Despite their faces, they thought they were cool)

And we have a million sparklers left over from last year. We only used half our stash, so we have 1/2 million left.

We needed glass bottles for the bottle rockets so I had the kids drinking IBC cream soda (couldn't find root bear at the store.) 

And it was finally time to light the good stuff.

 

We call this their Harry Potter shot. It looks like they are all using wands!

I obviously didn't get pictures of all the fireworks. Only so many would show up with my phone camera. But it was a lot of fun and they all declared it the best night ever. I think this will become our new tradition! It's certainly much easier than driving anywhere! I must have been in a good mood as the kids didn't go to bed until 11pm. (Which if you know us, our boys are in bed by 7pm each night!) We didn't even eat a "dinner" until 9:30! haha. I guess the 4th brings out the best in me. haha. Everyone slept in this morning though, which was nice!

It was a good day.

Getting Back to Normal

Normally it doesn't take long for us to snap back to reality after a vacation, but this past week, we've been taking everything slowly. There's only 1 month of summer left, so I guess we are trying to soak it all in!

While Lee was mowing the lawn, Amy was wandering around looking for bugs- something she normally does. She flips up rocks, cement blocks, leaves... anything in search for any kind of creature. This particular day, she struck gold as she found a box turtle! It quickly became a pet she and the boys named Herbie.

He got put into a plastic container and was given a plethora of dining choices. The bowl of water seemed to be his favorite as he would climb in for awhile, and then climb out. And repeat.

She was quite disappointed with me when I told her we could not keep him. She and Tyler plead and plead but I finally let them realize we did not have the adequate equipment to keep a turtle alive. Apparently box turtles usually live near water and eat meat (slugs, worms, etc.) Lee took her to a nearby creek where they released him. But not without a few more pictures!

This girl and animals!! We had a bird stuck in our garage the other day. I kept trying to coax him out and the bird finally dropped into a scrap wood pile and refused to move. It looked terrified. I was afraid it would break a wing or something but Amy walked right up to it, gently lifted him and put him outside where he flew away. She was quite excited about the whole ordeal!

I've been drying herbs from my garden. So far I've got some basil, parsley and mint tucked away. I'll harvest more all season to stock up for winter.

I took Amy and Will (you can only see his legs in this picture) to see the Goonies at a local theater. I can't remember why Amy was laughing.

Tyler all dressed up as ..... I have no idea.

Will hard at work with his legos. Each kid built a house and they played for hours.

Tyler stubbed his toe and it swelled so much we were afraid it was broken so Lee took him to the Dr for an x-ray. It wasn't and after a few days it looked like normal again.

We sent some Happy Birthday wishes....

The boys were supposed to be asleep one night and I saw them like this. Pouring over some book and laughing about it. I thought it was too cute of a moment to get onto them. So I took a picture instead.