Lemonade Stand

A while back Arissa, Ariana, and their friend Allison had a lemonade stand set up in Allisons driveway down the street. Of course, they made out pretty good thanks to nice neighbors. Ariana told me that one lady had a whole bunch of change and just dropped it all in their little bucket. I think the boogie board is a nice touch...dont you?

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Pretty variety of daylily.

I can't believe how big my tomato plants have gotten! There are LOTS of tomatoes on them...cant wait for them to turn red.

Purple coneflower, flowering plum bush, and some yellow daylilies in the back.

This is our biggest daylily plant. It is getting ready to do another big show of blossoms. I'm amazed how bushy they can get. Do you divide them???? I guess I need to do some research.

Huge hostas! They get really big here in WI. This one is up to my thigh.

Bell peppers...a first for me!

Church Callings

Doug is now our ward mission leader so he gets to visit with these good young missionaries on a daily basis now. This is Elder Forsythe from Southern CA and Elder Vance from Idaho. We had them over for dinner and a game of Apples to Apples Jr on Sunday. It was fun to get to know them and share experiences. We are trying to grow spiritually as a family and are praying for opportunities to share the Gospel. We love our faith and it has blessed every aspect of our lives so much; we want others to be able to enjoy the love and peace that can come into their lives by living the Gospel of Jesus Christ! I am currently the Achievement Days leader for our ward so I get to work with the girls 8-11 in helping them achieve goals, skills, and spiritual growth. Along with that I also teach the 4-5 year old children at church. It is a great privilege to serve Gods children, teaching them gospel principles. For those of you who may not know, church callings are inspired job assignments received through our Bishop. They are on a volunteer basis and could last anywhere from very temporarily to years. A "ward" is the local congregation.

Like Father...Like Son

Our church's older Boy Scouts are floating down the Mississippi River for a few days next month and Doug was asked to do a little welding for them. He thought it would be a good opportunity to teach Dakota how to weld. Dakota ended up doing most of them and really enjoyed it! (Papa was so pleased with that!!!)

Backyard Camping

The girls found their tents in the basement this week that grandma Watkins gave them for Christmas a few years ago. They decided it would be great fun to pitch them in the back yard so I figured what the heck. They have spent 2 nights out there over the last week and one of them they had a friend over for and even Dakota and his friend Forrest pitched a bigger tent out there and had a good time. Ariana and Sienna ended up coming in and sleeping on the couches at about 11 because they were scared. We are going on a real camping trip next month that we are so looking forward too! Its just hard to decide which place to go when you dont know the area. Should be interesting!

Babies- Big and Small

Here is an update on our baby robins. They have feathers now and have doubled in size...they are starting to look cute! The 3rd egg never did hatch. I think we are all going to be sad once they learn how to fly and leave us!

Our family's favorite baby...Chad Stevens!!! He lives down the street and he and his family go to our church. His big sister Allie is Ariana's best friend. Chad is a constant source of entertainment for us. He came and played in our backyard for a bit this afternoon and I caught this cute shot of him throwing rocks into the pond.

Timber Rattlers

Last Saturday we took the kids to the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers (a semi-pro team) baseball game here in Appleton. It was a new experience for us all...none of us have ever been to a baseball game. Our friends the Gregory's had 6 extra tickets and were kind enough to invite us. Baseball is kind of a slow game for me...seems to drag on and on. After about 2 1/2 hours Alayna, Dakota, and I had enough and we had church first thing in the morning so we went home. It was a pretty good time and a good thing for us to try. Visiting with Lindsay and Seth was definately the best part of it for me. We decided that Doug could take the 2 youngest to a game again soon since they were really the only ones enjoying the game.!

Making new friends..and summer delights

Arissa will be attending a new school in the fall called Oddysey. It is a charter school for "gifted and talented" kids. One of the mom's that lives nearby contacted us about carpooling and we got a couple of us together to introduce the girls to eachother. We met at the neighborhood park and they hit it off well, these are Arissa's new friends and classmates Lauren and Jaycee.

I also took Ariana and her very good friend from down the street Allie Stevens.

My first produce of the summer, and the very first time I have grown broccoli. It was yummy!

This is my favorite flowering bush. It is a hydrangea and blooms in pink, purple, and blue.

2 of our eggs hatched yesterday...meet our new baby robins. Looks like someone is hungry!

Happy 4th of July!

We went to the Appleton fireworks show last night at Memorial Park. We were all in silly moods as you can see from the pictures. We had a good time and the show was really pretty good. It was hard to be away from Cache Valley this 4th of July. We missed our family and friends and the great patriotism that we feel while there during this time. There is always next year!

JAMMIN AND CRUISIN

We had round 2 of strawberry picking the other day. We decided what we picked last week wasn't enough to last a year. So we took our friends the Stevens and picked about 22 more pounds! This time we went in the morning and the weather was absolutely PERFECT!!! We had a great time picking, eating, and chatting but you could tell it was time to wrap it up when 20-month-old Chad kept stepping in his mom Marci's strawberries! He is such a cutie and a big source of entertainment for my little girls. In the afternoon we made lots of freezer jam and froze a bunch more berries. All of the girls were great helpers! Our freezer is so full, I couldn't possibly put another thing in it. Time for a freezer in the garage.

This is Alayna backing out the car. So far we have stuck to our neighborhood but tomorrow I'm taking her out on the open road! We have to get lots of practice in before she starts Behind The Wheel in a few weeks.