Our Summer

No, I haven't completely given up on blogging. We've just had a crazy busy summer, which leaves little time for blogging. And, it is so hard to get caught up after getting so far behind! I'm in the middle of getting some things ready for a consignment sale, so if you saw my bedroom right now, you'd say, "Why is she blogging instead of cleaning up her bedroom?!?" I'm just going to post a few pictures from our summer adventures in order to catch up, and then start fresh from there. Sound good? Good.

Alan and I were blessed to be a part of a mission trip with our SS class. We went with these people:

Our trip was to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi - an area that was hard hit by Katrina 5 years ago, but is still struggling. Some of our friends from SS had their house destroyed by Katrina in a different part of MS, and they said that their state was largely ignored because New Orleans got so much publicity. I can't believe in this country, there are still people without houses due to this disaster. The house Alan is working on in the picture below was for an older lady who has been living in someone's garage for 5 years. She has already planned where she is going to plant her sycamore tree outside this new home.

Anyone can drive to Bay St. Louis on any given day, show up at the project headquarters (The Mission) and tell them how many people you have, what your skills are, etc and be given working orders. It's so simple to help, and I would love the opportunity to go back.

For the 4th of July, we went to Chelsea's annual Big Kaboom (lots of fun - music, free food, etc., and then a big fireworks display afterward). We had lots of fun and saw everyone in the world we knew - it's fun living in a smallish town :)
The boys spent (probably) their last summer in matching clothes... And they had different outfits for every day. I'm sad that Carter is growing up and I can't make much for him anymore :(

We bought this...

Charlie became obsessed with sunglasses and loved wearing them everywhere. He would put them on top of his head when it wasn't bright, and got mad if they fell off, like when I put him down to change his diaper or something.

We did a lot of this:
We're all sad that swimming is wrapping up for the year. We MUST become rich and build an indoor pool.
We took our previously mentioned purchase camping at the lake (Wind Creek State Park at Lake Martin). We went with the Purkeys, who have been going camping for a while. All the kids stayed filthy, scratched up, and just stinky. But it was wonderful!

We went on a really fun playdate at Cherub's Clubhouse. Not somewhere I would really get excited about going, just by looking at their website, but it was so much fun for the kids. I really liked how I felt safe - like both my children were safe, and I could see them all the time. They had 2 separate play areas but kids could go back and forth if they wanted to. I could stand outside the entire fenced area and watch both at the same time, in two different sections. At most places (jumpy places and other play areas), I feel very stressed out trying to keep up with them both.

We went to another really fun playdate at Chelsea HS... The cheerleaders and football players were all there to play with the children, and there were different game stations set up. The local coffee shop brought their traveling booth w/ shaved ice and smoothies, and kids could even try on helmets, pads, jerseys, etc (of course mine would not).

Carter was REALLY good at the hula-hoop. Who knew?!?

Carter and Claire had their first official date at the movies to see Toy Story 3. Of course Charlie wanted to sit with Claire!Alan and I celebrated our 10th anniversary on August 19th. Wow, 10 years! We took a cruise to Cozumel, Mexico. We've actually been on that cruise before (from a different port) but wanted something close by, not too long away from the kids/work, and it worked out well for us to go on that one again. We relaxed a lot, and didn't do too many of the activities but we still had a good time. We left the day before and stayed in Mobile so we could wake up there on our actual anniversary. We had a nice dinner out before we boarded the cruise the next day.

We took cha-cha lessons up on the stage :)

Right after we boarded the ship, we found a waiter to take our picture at the EXACT minute we had gotten married, exactly 10 years prior. :) Well, I think that's our summer in a nutshell! Much longer than I hoped, but much shorter than it could have been, for sure!