Camping and the 1st Day of School

 Our family camped at Mohican State Park for a whole week.  We had an awesome relaxing time.  I especially loved taking the kids to the pool.  This is a shot of the 5 of us before we started our hike.  No after shots were taken.  It was a fun hike but we were all pretty much exhausted afterwards.

 Jacob's friend Carson spent a few days with us.  He is a great kid and the boys had a lot of fun together.

 Adam loves to take the kids on rides down the river.  It extremely low this year but they still had a great time playing in the water.

 I love this one of Jonah.

 Adam and Laney climbed all the way to the top of this 80 foot fire watch tower.  I was so impressed with Laney!

 I have a lot more cute pictures from camping to post but couldnt find them on my computer for some reason. 

 Jacob's first day of 4th grade!  He was so excited to go!  I still don't love putting him on the bus even after all these years!  I would rather just keep him home with me.

 Laney's first day of Kindergarten.  She goes 2 full days and 1/2 day each week.  I am so glad it's not full time.

 Waiting for the bus.

 Off they go!  Kind of a sad day for me.

 And this is what Jonah learned on the first day of school.  He can now open child locks on doors.  Great.  Not that playing with the pots is so bad...

 It's the fact that they have to be filled with something.  I went around the corner for 1 minute....possibly to go to the bathroom? and came back to him filling pots with milk.  At least there was only a little bit on the carpet!

I have no idea what this is.  Just ignore it I guess!

Summer Fun

 This day, Jacob and Laney asked me to pile all the cushions on top of them.  Not sure what made them want to do this but it brought alot of giggles.

I had another picture here that showed their laughing faces but it disappeared suddenly. It's too bad because it was really cute.  This blog

thing drives me nuts sometimes.

 We've been spending alot of time at the Fountain this summer.  Jacob has been wanting to dive for a long time but just couldnt get the hang of it.  Well, on Monday, he did it!  He was and still is super excited about it!

 Laney loves to jump off the dock.  She is quite a little fish.

 We love when Autumn and Alyssa can come with us.

 What a happy bunch.

 More diving.  Jonah loves to jump off of this raft.  I am always with him when he does this.  I wish I could capture it on camera.

 Jonah learned to shoot Jacob's nerf gun today.

 He laughed every time.  He loved to watch the bullet bounce off stuff.

 He was quite proud of himself.  So I have had a cold the past couple of days.  I have blown my nose a million times.  Apparently Jonah has noticed this because this morning he said "Mommy, give me a Kleenex.  I need to blow my eyes."  He proceded to wipe his nose and said "Here Ginger (this is what he calls Laney... both g's are pronounced with the hard G sound.) blow your eyes."  He is so funny.  He makes us laugh all the time.

 Laney's self portrait.

Jacob doing what he loves...putting together Lego sets.  I hope everyone has a wonderful rest of the week. 

Jacob turns 10, Laney turns 6 and other stuff

 Here's Laney in her birthday pajamas from Lane and Lanae.  She loves them and wants to wear them every time they are clean!  The first picture I downloaded was of Jake on his birthday...don't know what happened to that picture.  This blogger thing drives me nuts sometimes! 

 This is what my bed looks like alot of mornings.  Notice the absense of me and Adam!

 Jonah bedhead. This is the real thing... I didn't stage this at all! 

 I took Jonah to the outlet mall one evening when Adam was gone with Jake and Laney.  We rode the train.  Jonah absolutely loved it!  He's really into trains right now.  Actually anything with multiple parts that hook together. 

Laney enjoying the Rittman Sleepwalker Parade.

 Jacob announcing the arrival of the firetrucks at the parade.

 Jonah was in awe of the firetrucks, tractors and other floats.  This is what he looked like most of the parade.

Laney and Jonah's favorite float was the miniature horse.  He was very cute.  We are enjoying our summer vacation so much.  I'm very thankful for all the time I've had with my kiddos.  They are so precious.  Here's a laugh for the day. We were all shopping at Kohl's one day and I had Jonah in the dressing room with me.  He peeked under the stall at the lady next to us and announced "I see her butt, Mom."  I was mortified and ran as fast as I could out of that room!  I laughed until I almost cried though.

Ok, so I was able to add this picture in again.  I can't believe Jacob is 10!

Time just seems to fly faster and faster everyday.

I have to laugh a little at this picture. I didnt actually mean to get Adam in the picture.  Jacob could not wait another minute to open his gift so we woke Adam up.  Believe me, he was not thrilled to be up yet.  It is a wonderful shot of his bare belly.

Jonah, Rolling Ridge Ranch

 I could dedicate at least one entire blog to funny Jonah antics. This particular incident involved a bottle cap and an entire half gallon of Hartzler's whole milk which is only $3.50 per half gallon.  He decided to pour himself a bottle cap of milk...he overpoured just a tad.

 He came up to me very seriously and said "we need to get more nilky, Mommy."

  What can I do but laugh?  The next night, he decided to make chocolate nilky when I was at the grocery store.  He was "sound asleep" in his crib so Adam decided to sit on the porch swing for awhile and relax.  Adam thought he heard a noise so he poked his head in the door and Jonah had the fridge open and his ingredients spread out on the carpet in the kitchen. He was poring chocolate syrup into a half gallon of Hartzler's milk.  He also had two sticks of butter and a stick of cream cheese.  I'm not sure who taught him to make chocolate milk this way!  I guess it was his own recipe.

 We went to Rolling Ridge Ranch for the day with Grandma Hartzler, Tonia, Autumn, Alyssa, Lane and Lanae.  Jacob was thrilled to get to drive the horses.

 This picture cracks me up for some reason.

 So we pulled into the place and this is the first animal I saw.  I decided it should be called a Zonkey, but the guide burst my bubble and said it's a ZDonk.  What kind of name is that?

 This is such a good picture... do they take bad pictures ever? 

 We each got a bucket of grain to feed the animals.  The kids loved this.  The big animals kept stealing our buckets though.

 Me and Jonah.  Jonah just loved seeing all the animals and of course I loved holding him on my lap!  He is such a sweet baby.

 I happen to think zebras are very cool looking.

 I guess you don't have to be in Texas to see a longhorn.  This guy looks like he could use a few good meals though.

 Jacob's favorite part was holding the ducklings.

Jonah liked this part too. Poor, poor ducklings... not sure how many Jonah's they could survive through.  We are having a wonderful summer!  I am really enjoying my kids! They are growing up so fast.  I thank God for my family every day.