Saturday the 15th...

We went on a little getaway with my mom and dad. My mom had to make an exchange at a store in Stillwater and we told them we would tag along with them. I had never been to Stillwater, it is a really neat little town. Its your basic tourist area by the river, which has a lot of little boutique shops down main street.

While making the exchange the lady at the shop had asked us if we had been to...
We hadn't, so she gave us directions to go down the street and up the hill and we found a really nice play area:) With a BIG teddy bear...

The view overlooks the downtown and the Stillwater lift bridge...

Grandma had her camera and took a few pictures of the kids playing

I talked Alexis into climbing this wall

to get on top of it... Grandpa tried to get Brayden to go up but his legs are still a bit short!:)

And here are mom, dad and Jason hanging out in the humid weather, watching the kids...

We wandered back down the hill and walked down to see the river

We walked down just in time to see the bridge up, to let a few boats through...

Then the kids(and adults) were getting hungry so we found a restaurant by the river to eat at.

It was a fun day!

Goodbye...

After our family left I sent my camera lens off to be fixed:( It had not been working right for a month or so. Which means I really haven't taken many pictures. My backup lens is a standard 50mm, which means I can't zoom! Zooming is my friend. And it being 50mm I have to stand far away from what I want to take a picture of. I did hear that Nikon received the lens and it is logged into their computers(whatever that means?) They gave me no estimation of when I will have it back. I did use my old camera this weekend, but need to catch you up on the weekend before this last weekend first!

OK thay probably didn't make any sense:) So, in simple terms I will be posting again very soon!!:)

Rainy Day

Friday was a rainy day. The night before Kayla, Mitch and Luke went to Valleyfair. They spent the night at Aunt Kelly's and came out to our house mid morning. When the rain was in between downpours they brought in the prized monkey that Kayla won!

Brayden jumped on it

Aunt Kelly and Tyler

There was pretty much no way that Monkey was getting back to California so guess where that monkey is! Yes, its keeping the huge pony company but guess what, the pony is no longer huge!!!:) Thank you Kayla!

The End(of the pictures):) We had such a fun time with Jen and the family that we recently booked some very reasonable tickets to visit them this winter in San Diego! We can't wait:) But, shhh the kids don't know yet!

Firetrucks and Birthdays

Tuesday night we went to Aunt Amy's house. When we were there a firetruck pulled into their neighborhood for family night out(or something like that?) The kids had fun getting into the firetruck

Baby Michael didn't know what to think of the boots:)
Then later in the week we celebrated a few birthdays. Aunt Kelly

Oops this picture is out of order! Sydney and Alexis spent the night at Aunt Amys on Friday and they went to the Mall of America. They did a few rides and Sydney did a little shopping and then they ate at the Rainforest Cafe. Later when they went home they made bracelets and Rice Krispy Bars. Oh yes and the girls stayed up way past their bedtime!:) Saturday when they came to the lake they took a self portrait:)

I made a cake:) It was very yummy

Sydneys birthday

Kaylas birthday

More to come...

Another Lake Day

The slide was a hit

The kids and adults had a blast on it!
Sydney
Alexis
Jeff doing a flip off the diving board, ready to go pull the kids skiing

Alexis

Kayla

Sydney

More to come...

Lake Day

Tyler fell asleep on the pontoon

Brayden and Aunt Kelly rubbing noses
Our great nephew Michael with Abigail
A group of us on the pontoon towing the slide back to the dock

Luke and Mitch

Tyler enjoying the weather

Jason diving into the lake

Alexis didn't want Sydney to ever leave! They had such a great time together:)

More to come...

Monday the 3rd of August, Jason's sister and her family came for a visit from California. They stayed at our home until Sunday the 9th. We had such a great time catching up and just relaxing. Jason took the week off and the kids were happy to have him home! The weather was really nice and we were able to spend a lot of time at the lake.

Sydney, Alexis, Jason and Brayden

Jason and his sis Jena
Jason and his Brother in law Jeff
Jason with Alexis after her gymnastics class on Tuesday

Tyler on the pontoon

Kayla and Sydney(love this picture!)

Brayden, Riley and Alexis in the cold lake

Abigail didn't enjoy her time! She usually loves the water and she was crying on the boat so we tried the water but as you can tell it was a no go!

Somebody forgot to tell Jen we are suppose to be realaxing:)

More pictures to follow...

(:Family:)

Can you tell I am avoiding posting?:) I finally sorted through most(there are some I haven't gotten yet) of the pictures that were taken when Jason's sister and family were here the first week of August. It took me all afternoon to sort and label! Here is a sneak peak of a group picture. Now that they are organized I will start posting a few different posts.

August 1st-My work party

We invited my work friends out to the lake for the day, for our 2nd annual get together. The weather was pretty chilly and to top it off it was windy. We did manage to make the best of it and some got in the lake, and some stayed in their sweatshirts:)

The kids had a blast!

The adults did too! Here we are headed out to go tubing
As the sun started to go down we got out a game

and desert:)

some did some fishing(and caught the ugliest fish I have ever seen!)

and enjoyed the sunset:)

We had a fun time!

It was also my moms birthday this day and they were on a little vacation up north!! Happy Birthday mom:):):)