Too much fun

Who has time to blog when we are so busy having fun this summer? I have great ideas of blogging, but then lack of time, energy or heat tolerance slow me down. So, before we head off to the beach for a little getaway, here as a glimpse of what we have been up to.

A little fun here at Coulon...

Then a little more at a family day at Remlinger Farms. I'm pretty sure they opened the park ONLY for us this day, because there was no one else there. We rode this roller coaster maybe 8 times in a row... such a great day.

Then a Dad and Me Campout with a group from church.... you would think there would be some good pictures of DAD AND the girls, or sleeping in the tent or SOMETHING, but at least I got a few hiking pictures. The big girls LOVED this event.



Then a busy week at Vacation Bible School, where I taught Bible Adventures...



And the girls had a blast.


And straight into Upward Cheerleading Camp the following week. I would not have planned it this way, but it's how the weeks fell!

There was a lot of cheering around our house this week, and it was so cute.

Then some time swinging on this great rope swing at our neighbors!

Whew, that was kind of a long post, but I had some catching up to do! Hope your summer is just as fun... I'm looking forward to all the ocean pictures I'll have in a few days! Stay cool:)

Sweet Symantha is Seven!

Although it was a little hard for me, this was the first year we did not do a big party with all ages of family and friends invited to Symantha's birthday. We discussed some ideas of what she would want to do for her party and she decided on Build-A-Bear workshop, which meant she could choose 4 friends (and Hailey!). She chose 2 friends from school and 2 from church, which worked out to be a nice combination. We packed up the van with a bunch of very silly 7/8 year olds and headed to Bellevue!

It was such a fun experience - the perfect number of girls, and I had nothing to do but take pictures.... only a few, of course:) The party planner does a great job of steering the girls towards the amount that each gets to spend in choosing animals, accessories and so on. They go through the whole process...

Derek had some fun with them while they were giving their animals baths. None of them knew there was a pedal underneath that you use your foot to push to make the air come on and they couldn't figure out how to make it work. Derek had his foot on it and he told them they had to say a magic word to make it come on. They all started trying words, and then discovered whenever they said, "Please" it came on. So the whole time they would take turns and come up to it, lean over and say "Please!" loudly to make it come on. It wasn't until almost time to go home that all of them figured out there was a pedal underneath! These are the ways the grown-ups get to have fun at the party.

Symantha and her friend Alicia with their twin bunnies. At the end, they do a little parade through the store and then they sang Happy birthday to Symantha. She loved every second of the attention, of course.

We left Build-A-Bear and headed to a little shop called "New York Cupcakes" to do the rest of the party. The 6 little girls fit perfectly around this round table and it was such a cute sight. All pink and girly, with fancy cupcakes.



We sang happy birthday, ate cupcakes and opened presents here.


It was by far the EASIEST party I've had to do, and I loved being able to just enjoy it and not coordinate so much! Not that I haven't loved doing big birthday parties for the girls.... but this was the perfect celebration for this year.

Happy birthday, Symantha Brooke!

I'm on a roll...

Here's one more project, I just couldn't resist! It is so much fun....

Vintage

Here was the original picture, with no cropping or photoshop fixing....



And here is the edited version...



This is my third project - Vintage and hand tinting. I loved this picture of Hailey and thought it would be perfect for this technique. The changes to the original are very subtle, but when you compare the two (and see it larger) you can really see the difference. I love it!

Surprise! (or not so much...)

I really thought I had him. I thought I was being so tricky and nonchalant about having an impromptu home group get-together at the park on a Thursday evening. Little did I know (due to dealing with Addison) that Hailey's prayer at dinner included, "thank you that we can have a surprise birthday for Daddy." Or the fact that he thought there is NO way our home group with all their crazy schedules could do anything spur of the moment! At least he didn't know up until 24 hours before... and I'm amazed that Hailey held the information in for the 1 hour that she did:) It was still a great little celebration, and one of these years I will REALLY surprise him.

Derek was welcomed with silly string... meant for the kids to use, but Sandy couldn't resist.

I was glad so many could make it, with summer schedules and me deciding to do it very last-minute. I just couldn't let his 40th birthday go by without some kind of celebration, despite his trying to convince me that he didn't want any big deal made about it!

Derek and Mom

The kids loved being right next to the lake and climbing over all the logs. It was a beautiful evening, thankfully!

Happy birthday, Derek! I love you!

Side note: That first picture is my second project in the photoshop class:) So fun!

First Assignment

Here was my first assignment in that free photo editing class a bunch of us are taking. Even though this first lesson was pretty basic, I did learn a couple of things that are helping me to understand photoshop better. I didn't spend a ton of time picking a picture for this assignment, so I wish it would have had a lighter background - then the frame and wordart would show up better. But lesson learned, and I am looking forward to more practice!