Pancake:)

Back when I posted this post we had just met pancake and found out she was going to have babies. Last weekend we went to Aunt Kellys for Cousin Mitch's birthday and saw Pancake looking like this...

and just knew her babies would be arriving soon:) Sure enough three days after the first picture she had her 6 babies:) We went to Aunt Kellys house again on Friday to have a campfire and see cousin Lyndie who is home for the week. So these little kittens are 2 days old in these pictures.
Aren't they just too cute:) Here is the proud mama with her very hungry kittens!

Riding Lessons...

This picture says it all:) Oh, she LOVES horses!

Alexis was given a few riding lessons to her for her last birthday. We were finally able to take advantage of them. So last Monday we went over to Tami and Ryans and Tami gave Alexis her first lesson. Tonight we will be going over again and she will be getting her second one.
Tami was astonished with how good she did! Which gets me thinking:)

What her/our future might hold...?

Fireworks...

This year we drove into town to watch the fireworks, we found a pretty decent spot to watch and I also got a few good pictures

My mom, Brother and his family along with Jason and the kids all watched the fireworks along with the moon in the background

Alexis

Alexis was a little slow to start skiing this year. She wasn't too sure about it but as you can see below she did just fine:)

On Sunday we went out and she tried to get up with our ski rope not the kid one, she tried twice and it was unsuccessful so we put the kid rope back in and she popped right up. Grandpa helped her while I took a few pictures

and Grandma and Brayden looked on.

Our 4th of July weekend

Jason had last Friday off so we went down to the lake and spent time with my parents, and also my brother and his family who were up for the weekend. The kids all tried to water ski. But their favorite thing to do was play in the water. Here's Brayden jumping and covering his eyes to keep the water out:) While Nick looks on.

Nathan LOVES the water, he enjoyed himself:)
Brayden and Grandpa spent some time on the jetski(I love the hair in this pic!)

Brayden and Nick played on the tube

Jason and the kids relaxing in front of the fire before we went to watch some fireworks on the lake.

Brayden was all smiles:)

While Alexis fell asleep watching...

We had a fun weekend with family. The weather wasn't the best but we were still able to get out on the lake.

Oh Brayden...

Brayden decided last Friday he wanted to go water skiing like his big sis. So once we got down to the lake we went right out in the boat. He was all excited to go

Uncle Brian got in the water with him to help
He did really good almost got up but tipped over and then he was done. No more for him!

Then comes Sunday afternoon I sort of convinced him to try again, see the smile on his face:)

Well it didn't last long!

Needless to say, maybe next year:)

12 and 13(just added today)

In case anyone really wanted to know. We still have them. Just one less now:) Just picked up the special meds for them tonight. Hoping that will take care of them!!


I need to catch up on my posting, hopefully tomorrow I will have time:) I have lots of pics to share.

Strawberry Picking

We went out last weekend and picked strawberries. Yummy! This is the first time the kids have gone, and really only the second time I had gone. We picked up my mom and off we went. Brayden helped Jason in his row and they found a few different kinds:)

Alexis really didn't think it was all to fun, she just liked to pick and eat:)

Here she is about to eat her 4th, 7th or maybe even 10th one!

It was just fun to get out and go pick fresh strawberries. When we got home Jason cleaned all of them and then we made strawberry jam. It was the first time we had done that. I think it turned out really well. We just finished eating our last strawberry yesterday. It only took us 4 days to devour them:)

Zoo Day!

Last Friday the kids, grandma and I all went up to the zoo. It was a hot but enjoyable day. There were a few new exhibits we hadn't seen this summer. So up to the zoo we traveled. The first thing we saw were these turtles basking in the heat on a log. The first one was waving to us:)

Then we were able to see this tiger running around his area. I wasn't prepared for that and only caught half of it in a picture. So I thought this was a better picture of it. Usually when we see the tigers they are laying down and not being active. It was fun to see this one running.
This was one of the reasons we wanted to go to the zoo. This is an American draft horse that was born at the zoo, recently. I can't remember how old it is.

sitting on the pig.

An Ostrich that looked like it had gone to heaven. But really it was just getting out of the heat, with us looking on.

Another baby horse

The next reason we went to the zoo. Africa was on exhibit, there were a few different giraffes hanging out. I took video that should be at the bottom of this post.

Three babies playing follow the leader

Alexis has been wanting to go through this splash area since she found out about it. The weather has always been cold when we are there. This was the perfect day to bring there suits and play in the water.

Brayden holding the water down

Standing in the water

The other new exhibit at the zoo was the butterfly exhibit. There were butterflies flying all around us, Alexis was super excited!

Grandma and the kids

The kids and I

a few of the Butterflies...

Giraffe

11

11 was running around the basement this morning with a cat chasing it. I killed it and threw it out the door. I'm calling for some power drugs tonight. Hoping that will take care of my problem. Oh, Dad(expect a phone call later today:))...