Emma's Birthday Party

July 31, 2010 - MaKayla's best friend, Emma, had her 4th birthday party and we were all invited. I am sure this is just the beginning of birthday party invites. Emma lives right across the street from us and our two families have grown close. Here is the birthday princess!

Noah is trilled to be wearing a crown =)

MaKayla is tickled to wear her tiara

The kids decorated crown as an art project

Noah is cheating at playing pin the princess on the castle

One cool dude

MaKayla with the birthday girl

Emma with her princess cake

MaKayla, Emma and another princess playing in the new tent

Thomas Train Bedding

July 29, 2010 - Noah's toddler bed is now complete with Thomas the Train bedding. He loves it!!!

Sweet dreams my little conductor!

Jungle Gym Complete!

July 23, 2010 - A turkey that was eating bird seed that fallen on the ground from our feeder
July 25, 2010 - Andy completed the jungle gym today. He used rail road ties and wood chips to make it a safe area for the kids.

Noah peeking through the cracks

MaKayla enjoying the slide

Andy did a wonderful job as always!

Moving On Up to a Toddler Bed

July 22, 2010 - Noah climbing out of bed has become very frequent. He now does in several time just during his nap time.
He is a pro!
When Daddy got home from work we decided it was time to convert his bed to a toddler bed.
Noah is helping Daddy with pleasure!

I am glad that we bought the guard rail when we purchased the bed. With MaKayla we waited until we needed it. By then it was discontinued so we had to rig a guard rail. This is so much nicer!

My little man and his toddler bed. He is growing up so fast! I wish I could slow down time!

Noah was so happy with his new bed!

Sweet dreams little man!

Record Breaking Rain & Hail

July 20, 2010 -The Appleton area has officially broke the record for the wettest July and the month is not over yet. We have already had over 10 inches of rain. Add that to the previous 7 inches in June and we are at 17 inches in less than two months. The heavy downpours have our yard saturated with water to the point that the ground has been too soft to play on. I sure hope it lets up soon! Today's storm produced dime to nickel size hail. We were lucky and didn't get the damage that a lot of the homes did. It did rip holes in our grill cover but that is a lot better than a damaged roof or siding.
I had to go out and grab a piece of hail to take a picture of

A picture of our deck after the short lived storm of about 10 minutes

Climbing Out of His Crib!

July 17, 2010 - Noah has been climbing out of his crib periodically over the past couple of weeks. I had not caught him in the act until today. What a little stinker!
So that is how he does it!
He is controlled in his approach to getting out of his bed but I think we better be on the safe side to switch his bed soon!

July 19, 2010 - I did MaKayla's hair in a way that my Mom used to mine when I was a little girl. I used to make fun of it and now I doing the same thing to my daughter =)

Jungle Gym, Bees and a Mermaid!

July 17, 2010 - Andy has been working hard on the jungle gym and making progress quickly.
Noah is inspecting Daddy's work

Testing out the slide to make sure it is sturdy

It seems to be meet the inspector's approval!

Getting close to being done!

I had dinner all set up on the table outside. Andy and the kids sat down to eat while I was still bringing things out. Next thing I knew Andy ran in with MaKayla screaming and told me to go grab Noah. I ran out there and he was swarmed with bees but not one stung him. MaKayla was not that fortunate however. She ended up being stung four times before Andy was able to get to her. We later found out that there was a bee hive on the bottom of the chair that she was sitting on. She was a trooper though!

Our little mermaid!

Rain, Rain Go Away!

July 15, 2010 - We have had so much rain this month. This is the wettest July I have ever seen! It seems to rain inches almost every day.

This is a picture of our subdivision. It is a back up retention area in case of lots of water. Well, it seems to be working!
I actually saw kids swimming in the ditches!

Mike & Rylee Visit

July 12, 2010 - Andy's brother Mike and our niece Rylee came for a visit. MaKayla and Rylee are giving a thumbs up for a good time!
Rylee and Noah are hitting the road

Noah all dressed up in his sister's shoes

July 13, 2010 - Uncle Mike and Noah

Andy and Rylee

Rylee and I

We tried to let MaKayla and Rylee sleep together but that didn't go over so well. At 11:30pm we finally had to split the girls up from their slumber party so we could all get some sleep.

July 14, 2010 - MaKayla took Rylee to her dance class. Both of the girls had a great time!

Dancing Divas

We had an early birthday party for Rylee since we won't see her on her special day!

Happy 5th Birthday Rylee!

She wanted a lady bug night light that shines stars on the ceiling

July 16, 2010 - Rylee and Noah hugging good-bye

MaKayla getting a good-bye hug from Uncle Mike. It was nice having them for a visit. We have had a busy couple of weeks. I don't know what I am going to do with myself with only the four of us again!