Smith/Gardner Wedding

Gabie dancing on Monty's feet....................................................Daddy with Rachel












Monty dancing with Eliya.....................Kira (Pastor Fritch's daughter) dancing with Gabie

We were able to go to a wedding on our way back home. The wedding was the daughter of our church secretary and one of Mark's elders and she was getting married in Lincoln. Although we didn't know the couple real well, we had so much fun with her parents, some of the family from here in Gettysburg, Monty and Lori and the Fritch family. Pastor Fritch was a pastor in Gettysburg previously ~ we've been able to see their family a couple of times and just love them, they are a very nice family.

One Last Picture

I made everybody get together for a picture right before we left after church. Not everyone was there, but at least we got a few of us in the picture.

Family Time

Saturday we went to Dinae and Hugh's new house that they just built. Here Hugh is showing Mark the aquarium/water fall that is still in the making. We had a family get together at their house for the day, visiting, watching college football (a family tradition) and just having fun being together.


Rachel and her favorite buddy - she has just latched onto grandpa everytime they get together.


mom, dad, grandma and grandpa and Byrl (a good friend of the family) hanging out on the porch at Diane's house.


Hugh (my aunt Diane's husband) has some granddaughters the same age as the girls - they had so much fun playing together on Saturday, mostly with dolls and an extended game of hide-and-seek which was quite amusing to watch as they all would hide together sending one to count and then proceed to hide in the same places over and over again, giggling as they ran through the house.


Getting ready for bed the girls had great grandma read them a bedtime story.l

No Pics

I forgot to take any pictures of Friday....so instead I'll just share a little bit about our Labor Day weekend. We left from Lincoln on Friday morning to head to Arkansas. My grandpa gruhn will celebrate his 80th birthday in December, but instead of waiting till winter to try to get together to celebrate we decided to party over labor day weekend. I wish I had my camera with me at supper on Friday, but I forgot it. We all got together at a restaurant and I got to see some of my cousins I haven't seen in years. My dad, his sister and his youngest brother all were there. Jim his other brother was in the hospital so he wasn't able to come. It was fun surprising grandpa with the family at supper, we were so glad we were able to share this special time with family.

Omaha Zoo

We met Nana at the Omaha zoo on Thursday for our annual trip ~ this was our smallest group yet, but we still had a great time.


I used the timer to take this picture - the statue was really hot, so we gingerly sat around it.


The tradition of feeding the spitting fish (otherwise known to most people as koi)





they loved watching the gorillas, well, that is except Rachel who was terrified by them - she clung to us whenever we got near the cages.


The girls posing with the penguins ~ we measure them each year by how tall they are in comparison with the statues of the penguins


Family Picture Time

Baby Boy!

This is Rachel H, who watches our girls for us. She gave birth to a beautiful baby boy today. They dropped of Pepe (nicname for Philip) there son that is Rachel's age early this morning when she went in to get induced. The girls loved having him here to play with, and Kirstie came too, so we had a house full of little people, and they all played together great! This afternoon we took Pepe to meet his baby brother, Bobby.

Fakers

Really, we're sleeping....can't you tell?! :0)

Clean Up Clean Up

clean up, clean up, everybody, everywhere, clean up, clean up, everybody do your share....

This is a song we sing at clean up time, althoug the girl's version is a little different. Gabie usually sings, "clean up, every-ody do yours shares" ~ notice what she is doing during clean up time (playing with her music maker) Rachel was having some issues throwing some things away tonight - she missed the 'basket' a good 3 times before finally getting her bread crust into the bin :0) By the time I grabbed the camera she had scored.

Congrats to Noah and Amanda on a beautiful baby girl!

2nd Tooth

Eliya lost her second tooth!

Too Cute

These are just a couple of pictures from last night that were just too cute not to share.

Beautiful Day!

At church Mark found out that there were a coule of members at the hospital in Pierre so this afternoon we headed to Pierre. I did a quick Walmart run while he did his hospital visit (somehow we ended up one shoe less then what we started with - after checking out I looked down at Gabie's feet and they were bare - she was riding in one of those jumbo impossible to push carts - I then retraced our steps through the store and found one, the other eluding us, ugh!) Then we all went to the river. We had brought our bikes and the bike stroller and went all around the river, over the bridge, down the Lewis and Clark trail and onto some island trail. The trail was a few miles longer then we anticipated, but it was a beautiful day and we had an awesome time. The other picture we took while on the trail, I set up the timer on the camera sitting on a bike seat.

P.S. - For Claudia: I did a 5 miler in 45 minutes this morning! :0)

Storing up for the winter

We are so thankful for the end to the drought that we've been experiencing since we moved here. This summer has been abundant for the farmers and the gardeners in our area. We've had plenty of rain (almost too much from time to time!) and we are reaping the benefits. This is just the beginning of the harvest and we put up 6 quarts of sweet corn (in addition to all that we've been eating as we go :0) and 6 quarts of zucchini (shredded) today. We will be so thankful come this winter that the freezer is full of some fresh veggies! We devoured the loaf of zucchini bread I made this morning already!

Since we've been home....

somebody missed her big sister....



The fair was here over the weekend (while Elie and I were at little lambs and into this week. We went to the pig show on Tuesday morning and checked out all the booths and animals - it was VERY muddy!





we've been playing outside A LOT...partially due to the beautiful weather, partially due to the fact that we have a mouse or mice in the house and I just can't stand to be in here very much. So far they are confined to the basement, but I'm putting things up upstairs just in case. In the meantime the trustees have been helping to determine any possible points of entry from the outside and sealing them off, while trying to find an exterminator or someone that deals with pests and helping set lots of traps. We also are babysitting a cat starting tomorrow for some friends so hopefully that cat is a good mouser!


Eliya and Kirstie decided they wanted to bake an apple pie (mind you they decided this at about 6 this evening when Bridget came to pick Kirstie up from spending the night last night. So we picked the apples this evening and I told Kirstie she can come back tomorrow and we'll make a pie.


We had a bit of chaos here this morning through lunch when I offered for the twins to come over and play so Amber could get her lawn mowed - therefore I had 6 kids four and under (Kirstie, Neva, Olivia and ours). Needless to say I didn't get any pictures....can't imagine why? When Mark came home for lunch I told him this is what our lives would be like if we had had twins, then triplets and then Rachel....let's just say they were wonderful, well behaved and played great together, but NO THANK YOU!!!! My life is crazy enough w/out the multiples.

A Little Stress

Barney is back....
Gabie decided she doesn't want to be potty trained anymore...
I'm having one of those days

Little Lambs

finding seashells on the beach together - we brought home quite a collection!



playing parachute games



Eliya the Superhero! (that was the theme for camp this summer - superheros)



painting nails together (pink of course!)


snuggling together



walking together on the Great Island Tour (a game we played on Saturday evening)












Singing Time!

















eating smores and staying warm with mom's sweatshirt



group shot in front of the indoor chapel


Eliya and I stayed after family week was over for a mother/daughter retreat called Little Lambs. We had a wonderful time! It was great to get to spend one-on-one time together. On Sunday morning we got in the car to head home and I asked her what her favorite part of the weekend was - she took my hand and said, "Getting to spend time with you mommy." Needless to say I was in tears, and it was one of the best times I've ever had with my daughter :0)

*cute story - Gabie and Rachel sat with a friend Sunday morning in church and whenver someone asked where mommy and Elie were Gabie would tell them "They're with the lambs." Which apparently some took to mean we were off at a special farm or petting zoo somewhere hanging out with lambs :0)

Home Again

Hello friends and family in the blogging world, we are all home again for the first time in about 3 weeks (minus one night). We have been at our annual August Family Week at Lutheran Island Camp, and then Eliya stayed for the weekend to do a Little Lambs camp where a child stays with a parent for the weekend. It was wonderful and I will add pictures and videos in the next couple of days. Thanks for checking on us!

August Family Week 08

MONDAY

The girls did a great job of cleaning up the cabin, they all seem to love to clean and actually fight over who gets which broom at home - I hope that it lasts! - ha ;0)

We had a trip early Monday morning to St.Cloud to take Gabie to the pediodontist. Dan and Amy met us there and we had a fun morning haning out with them, school shopping for Eliya and we had lunch together before heading back to camp - thanks for meeting us guys!

just lounging around

aaaawwwww....kisses!

The girls were thrilled that Mina came to play for the week - they absolutely ADORE her! We were so happy that Elly, Andrew, Sarah and Wilhelmina came to family week and had a fun time hanging out with them.

We spent a lot of time in the sandbox, and needless to say their

clothes were less then clean at the end of the day :0)

square dancing - notice in the top left picture where Rachel and Gabie are during the dancing (needless to say Mark and I got quite a workout!)

TUESDAY

we did this group picture right before lunch of everyone that came to August Family Week

(can you find us?!)

The girls went to craft time for an activity and they painted prayer rocks

(unfortunately we forgot them at camp!)

What would a week at camp be without a Granny's run?!

(it's a place with yummy ice cream and candy in Battle Lake)

ring toss














fishing for a prize


football throw


face painting














mini-golf


WEDNESDAY

playing frisbee golf with daddy


Eliya and Rachel walking together

THURSDAY

rachel giving her breakfast a standing ovation













singing in the chapel - the kiddos helped to lead the sheep song



we did this picture last year too...it was a lot easier then!



as we were walking in the afternoon Rachel just got out of the stroller and plopped down right in front of it like she was protesting something - or maybe she just wanted to eat some more dirt.


there was a sandcastle building contest in the afternoon and we worked together to build an impressive building with the Dangers (actually it was mostly Mike and Mark that did it, but the kiddos did try to help and Sarah and I just did our best to keep the little ones from destroying it!)


Parents night in - where we get to eat and the counselors take our kids for the meal, it's very nice to carry on a conversation w/out interuption and eat while the food is still hot!


Baby Bachlor - a skit we came up with where Josiah had to give a flower to one of the little girls of his choosing...he picked Wilhelmina :0) I will hopefully get a video of the girls dance they did for talent night on here soon too.


campfire the last night was a bit earlier which was nice for those of us with little ones.


after campfire we went on a horse drawn carriage ride - the girls even got to sit on the horses for a bit!


FRIDAY










these were a couple of packing up shots, the girls were playing with our friends Emma and Libby 'next door' and we got a shot of our cabin name as well.


group shot in front of our cabin right before we left.