Happy Father's Day!

Since we had gotten together to celebrate for Clark and the Dads, here are the present goodies that the Daddys got:

Nathan

The cousins got Jeff a Shelby Cobra!  He is doing his silly smile like Clark was doing ;)

I helped the kids do this shirt for Jeff.  I was so excited to find him a Ford shirt!

The kids loved adding their hand prints to the back!

Jeff is a great Daddy!  He loves our kids so much and wants to spend time playing and teaching them!  He provides for our family and is so concerned to be sure that our future is provided for!  We all just love him!

The Big 5!

Since Father's Day was Sunday and Clark's birthday was on Monday we combined efforts and gathered on Saturday to celebrate the Daddy's and Clark!  

Here is Clark's celebration!

Daddy loves to help light the candles!  

 Clark is so ready to blow them out!

So cute!

 He wanted a watermelon cake (probably because Jeff always has one), so I made my own version of a cake made from watermelon.  I frosted the watermelon in cool whip and added the strawberries for decoration.  He loved it!  The kids ate it pretty well and really it tasted great too!

By the time I thought to took a picture this was all that was left!  It was kind of fun to eat a cake that doesn't make you regret eating it later :)

 After dessert Clark got to open all of his presents.  It is sure fun to live by family... Clark enjoyed getting a few extra presents ;).  

A bey blade from cousins. 

Inflatable sword (cousins)

Ball and bat

fishy

 another cool car (cousins)

 A mouse from Grandma and Grandpa

 A game from Mommy and Daddy! 

Clark and all of his goodies!

Clark is a great kid!  He is so sweet!  I think Lorna is his best friend.  They love to play together :).  He loves cars, trains, animals, dinosaurs, swimming, balls, basketball, puzzles, games... you get the idea!  He loves his brothers too!  He is really a happy kid!  I think one of his funnest qualities is how naturally silly he is.  He brings so much joy to our home!

It was fun to talk to him about his birthday.  He had a nice list for me of what he wanted.  It made shopping pretty easy!  He wanted a ball and bat, a fish stuffed animal, a black car, helicopter, bouncy ball, and a remote control car.  I had to get the game instead of the car because I couldn't find one when I went shopping.  He is also pretty young and I figured he would get over it.  He was a great sport about not getting a remote control car, even though he was sure to ask me about it later.  

Well, on his birthday a package came from Grandma Whitmer.  It was great to have something for him to open on his birthday!  Really, after celebrating on Saturday he was convinced he was 5 already.  I think we convinced him he wasn't yet, but still no fun to still have to wait to be 5!
Anyway, he opened the package and there was a shirt AND a remote controlled car!  It was a present miracle!  He was so happy!  I was sure to tell Grandma what a great job she had done on the present (since I didn't give her any hints).  

He's so happy!

Clark is a wonderful boy and we are so grateful he is part of our family!  He is growing up so fast and will be starting kindergarten in the fall!  He has been doing great with his speech and has continued to improve and communicate more and more.  It is amazing how quickly time can fly and how big our baby boy is getting!

Happy Birthday to our Big Dog Clark!  We love you!

Scout Camp!

Talmage is finally old enough to attend Boy Scout Camp!  He was very excited!  This is the first time he has been away from family .... like ever :/.  Jeff was able to go down and spend a few days with him at camp so I think that helped.  It also helped that he was so busy doing as many merit badges as he could that he didn't have a lot of down time.  

This is the tent set up.  It wasn't the best, but the tent did tie down pretty well.  They ended up with a remnant hurricane storm blowing through for a few days.  That made everything really wet!  

So cute going to all of his classes :)

Daddy and Talmage!

One day they did a canoe and swim relay challenge.  Talmage didn't participate, but his troop did.  One of his friends, Tanner, is on a swim team and brought their team back from behind to tie for first!  Jeff got to be there for the race and was amazed at how fast Tanner could swim!  Way to go boys!

Talmage got 9 merit badges and is well on his way to getting his Eagle!  Way to go Talmage!  We missed you!

Somewhere over the Rainbow!

With May being gone so is the crazy, constant rain.  It is nice and hot... even muggy.  The bugs are out in full force.  Even though the rain has died down we will still get the occasional shower.  It is always nice to keep the grass growing, that's for sure :).  

A storm moved through the area and we just got the tail of it.  Really, I think it only sprinkled on us.  I was out with the kids and I saw a beautiful rainbow!  It was over the greenbelt above the lake.  There was a faint reflection of it about it, but it was too faint to capture with the camera.  

I wish it was even brighter.  I think rainbows are amazing!

Grant with the rainbow behind him.  Getting more and more faint.

Sandra and Lorna

There is just a hint of the rainbow going right above Sandra's head.  

Because of the rainbow I decided to go upstairs on our small balcony and try to get a better shot of it.  When I went outside I was being attacked by tiny little gnats.  They seemed to be everywhere.  Then the Crepe Myrtle tree was blocking the view so it wasn't even a better angle.  After thinking for a minute there were several pieces that fit together.  First, Jeff has had gnats in his office with no explanation.  We have them around the house, but really no source.  His office has a door that connects to the balcony.  That's when I figured out where his bug problem was coming from!  It is actually a problem with the crepe myrtle tree.  It attracts a beetle that secretes a sweet sticky substance.  That attracts ants, wasps and apparently gnats.  After I bug sprayed the balcony and the front porch (also completely overrun with gnats) I worked on taking off the limbs of the crepe myrtle so there are no more beetles to start the evil chain.  We will eventually take the trees all the way out, but for now the bug problem seems to be more manageable.  I think it's interesting that I never would have thought of this if I hadn't gone out to the balcony to take a picture of the beautiful rainbow!  
You never know what problems can be solved along our way!

11 year old Camp FUN!

Grant got to attend the Stake 11 year old Camp this year!  I was also able to go and volunteer for one day.  Talmage was old enough to help take care of our little ones and a friend had the 2 girls.  It worked out really well.  Jeff got to go and stay the night for the camp out part too!  Grant had a great time!  They worked on leather working, aviation, and first aid merit badges. 

Here they are at the Grand Prairie Airport control tower!

Learning about an airplane

Flying their own planes :)

Grant helping with the flag ceremony

Building a fire

The night Jeff went they had a dad and son soccer game!

Pretty high grass for soccer.  Plus it was so hot!

The evening program

Jeff and Grant hanging out in the tent!

Grant really enjoyed camp and is all ready to join Talmage next year at Boy Scout Camp!

Member Mondays!

Our Zoo does Member Mondays in June.  They have snacks, free train rides and carousel rides as well as free admittance into their new splash pad!  We headed on out to enjoy some perks of our membership. 

We were really looking forward to the new splash pad.  It costs $5 to get in normally and members get a discount at $4... per person (over 2).  Well, since I don't plan to pay that sort of price we were really excited for the member Monday promotion!  When we pulled into the zoo there was a sign stating that the splash pad was currently closed due to technical difficulties.  We were so disappointed!  We really had just been to the zoo a week earlier and really wanted to enjoy the splash pad this time around.  I filled out a comment card hoping to get tickets to use at a later time to make up for our loss during this trip.  Well, they responded with the idea to hit another member Monday in June with no reference to any other way to make up for the inconvenience.  I was sad, but life goes on. 

Well, here is what we did enjoy on our Member Monday at the zoo!

An animal encounter with a Macaw :)

New baby giraffes! 

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More lion cub action!  There were actually 3 cubs!

A statue that I hadn't noticed before... who had extra guests living in a very personal area!

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Nasty wasps!

 Clark hugging a turkey statue.  Silly boy!

Free carousel rides!  
Grant

Bree and Mhari

 Ella and Sandra

 Lorna

 Clark and Talmage

Despite the disappointment we really did have a nice day.  It was hot and we spent plenty of time playing in the water tower splash water just to let the kids cool off.  I'm glad the kids got to enjoy some of the perks that were being offered!

Last Soccer game!

This season really dragged on and on with all of the rain outs.  We finally finished up in June!

Clark's team played hard and won their last game.  It was great to see them play!  Clark really does play well!  I look forward to seeing his skills progress in the future!

Team photo after they got their team medals for playing!

Talmage and Grant had a double header Saturday.  It was a hot day and it was tough to pull off.  The boys played well, but they lost both games.  We were so worn out after Clark's game and the boys first game that Jeff went back with the boys for the last game.  I'm happy they are learning so much, but I hope they are able to improve as a team next season!

Talmage had a turn as goalie in the last game.

Team pizza party afterwards!  

It was great being a Spartan!  The boys really have enjoyed soccer!