Love this SO much!

Chalkboard calendar / wall art! Too cool!

http://www.marthastewart.com/article/chalkboard-wall-calendar?backto=true&backtourl=/photogallery/25-closet-storage-and-office-organizers#slide_6

Summer drink

Corey made this amazing drink last night. I think he called it a "Cantaloupe - Mint Fizz".

Isn't it pretty? It was so refreshing and light. You could easily leave out the alcohol and make a virgin version for the younger folks.

He used:

1/2 ripe cantaloupe
1/2 cup gin
1/2 tray of ice cubes
*edit 12 mint leaves
4 Tbsp sugar (or to taste)

Blend it up in the blender and enjoy!

Water baby

We got her a little splash pool today because it has been so darned hot lately.

Here she is, ready for some pool action.



The pool has a little sprinkler and her favorite thing to do is wet her hair with it. She would get it wet, shape it into an elvis do, and come over and have me squeeze the water out. She did this over and over.







Happy Father's Day to Corey, my Dad and my Father In Law!

A bit to grow

Songs with mommy

Here is a wonderful opportunity to listen to my lovely singing voice (you may want to turn your sound off for this!) and enjoy some Lily cuteness.



I was watching this video while posting and so was Lily, she kept singing "Row, row, row, row" behind me.

Freaky weather

A huge line of storms went through last night. A tornado was spotted 5 miles west of us, so we took shelter in the yucky basement. The muggy, wet basement held 2 panting and freaked out dogs, 2 cats, me, corey, and a half asleep baby who we'd snatched out of the crib while sleeping. The wind was howling. I ran upstairs once to look out the window and see what was up. The rain and wind seemed to be swirling and all at once a huge blast of wind came and laid all the trees in the distance over. I screamed and ran back downstairs, cats were right behind me.

In the end, all was well except for many hours without power. The storm snapped a healthy tree in half just about 150 feet from our house, so I think we were pretty lucky. There were trees down in the park, so as soon as we got out of the basement Corey had to head over there to cut them out of the roadways.

Got to love spring/summer in Indiana!

Lily update

It's been awhile since I've posted what Lily has been up to. She now thinks she is a goat, and climbs on anything and everything. She has been doing this for a few months, but now she is tall enough to reach stuff that we don't necessarily want her to have. She climbs onto the dining room table chairs and gets up onto the table. I pulled all the chairs away from the table, so now any chance she gets, she is standing on top of the chairs. It freaks us out and we are trying to teach her not to do this. Good luck, right?!

She is also very into mimicking now. She sweeps the floor with a full sized broom, loves doing the itsy bitsy spider movements, wears our shoes around the house, and pretty much copies everything else we do. It is so cute, it makes me teary. She is just the best little thing ever.

She loves getting stuff out of the cabinet where we store baking items. I moved the flour, etc. up a level to keep her out of them. Here is how that worked out.







The girl doesn't even like oats. I don't know what was up with that.

Here are some other random photos.





She still thinks her daddy is the best thing since sliced bread. So do I, actually.

Holiday World

We have this theme park down in southern Indiana called Holiday World. It is in Santa Claus Indiana. No joke, that is the name of the town. Everything is Christmas, all the time there. It gets a little annoying, actually. Anyway, the water park is really fun. I don't have pictures of that because I didn't bring my camera there, but trust me, Lily was ADORABLE in her little 2 piece. She loved the splash playground area with squirting water. She acted like a little conductor, conducting an orchestra of water. The water slides were fun too, but the long lines were not as fun. My niece "big Lexi" (we have 2 Lexi's in the fam) was really brave and rode a roller coaster and some big water slides. She's becoming such a big kid!

The cottage Corey's parents got was really nice. There was a fishing deck off the back of each one and the pond was stocked to the brim with easy catchers. Now I DO have photos of this part.



I loved how Lily has grown up enough to run with the gang of cousins. She's just one of the kids now!

Playing cars with cousin Josie




Lil bravely touching a fish (she wanted to squeeze it)



Me and my "Lunker"



Lexi and her lunker. Look how Lil still wants to get in on the action.



Here is why it was so easy to catch fish. If you look close, you can see all the fish just waiting to be caught. A big water snake was also fishing below our deck. At one point, Uncle Johnny caught a fish and the snake caught it too. Johnny lifted the fish and the snake way out of the water before that snake gave up and let go.



and one last shot of cousin Gracie, just because she's so cute.

Camping at the lake

For a few weeks we have been making plans to camp at Monroe Reservoir with our friends Doug, Lex and Chloe. I was not about to let a little thing like wisdom tooth removal keep me from camping! The trip went off as planned and boy, did we have a great time! Our friends Jennifer and Jeremy joined us for the 2nd night, too.



What made this camping trip extra special was that the site was boat-in only, meaning there was no way to access the site other than by water. We were in a secluded little cove where very few boats even entered. It was like we had an entire lake to ourselves! The site was sloping into the water, so of course we had to be super diligent with keeping up with the kiddos. Here is a view from our campsite:



The girls LOVED swimming in the 85 degree water.



Lily also loved "skipping" rocks.



Much time was spent hanging out in the hammocks, chillaxing.



Cute little Chole:



Thank you, Doug and Lex, for grabbing some shots with my camera so I have a few with me in them for a change :) Unfortunately, I didn't take many shots myself, so this time I didn't have many of other people!

Last weekend

Lily and I spent a nice long weekend at my parents in Illinois.

This time Lil really became smitten with my mom's horse, Rusty, and the 2 donkeys. You can see the pasture from almost anywhere in the house and Lily would constantly look outside and point and wave to the horse.

Here is my mom getting Rusty to smile:



Lily not far behind:







She also discovered a love for watermelon this weekend:

Good times

Got my wisdom teeth out today. Nothing is more fun than a little oral surgery, if you ask me.

It was a last minute/emergency thing because my one wisdom tooth decided to turn against me over the long weekend. I went ahead and had 3 taken out, while I was at it. What this means is that my last day of work was today instead of Friday. Not a very fun way to start stay-at-home-mommyhood!



I came up with this ingenious way to hold frozen vegetables to my face. It involves 2 headbands and a t-shirt. I think I'm gonna patent it.

I'm actually not feeling too terrible - at least not yet. I've been icing and gauze-ing and all that. The Oral Surgeon called to check on me at 9pm. Weird time to call, but nice none the less.

Thanks!

Thank you all for being such a supportive and encouraging bunch. I want to give you a great big hug just like this.