Special Request

I had a special request for this picture so here it is Steph! Thank you for being so kind as to take this picture of me getting drenched at hands of our very own (and very merciless) Karl and Jerry.
For those that do not know what I am talking about...
I was freezing cold when we went to Knoebels. FREEZING!! but my kids wanted to go on this ride so I went with them. Now, normally you do get a bit wet on this ride but not this wet! At Knoebels they have quarter machines at the spot where the log goes by. Put a quarter in and if you time it just right...the nice lady in the log gets soaked. Unfortunately for me, my brothers-in-law have good timing. Twice I got hit by a giant plume of water. Thanks guys!!

Steph, thanks for not taking a picture of me afterward looking like a drowned (and frozen) rat:)

A visit to PA

Kem had off this week so we headed up to PA for some fun with his family. Our first stop was the 110 acre park in the back yard of our first apartment (a farm house in Mechanicsburg) I walked this park nearly every day both before Eric was born and after. It was so much fun to come back here. The boys got to go for a spontaneous dip in the Yellow Breeches which runs thorugh the park. Grammie Carey and the dog got pretty wet too!

Next we went to Messiah College to reminisce about the days when we met. Cody was scared to death of the "swinging bridge" but the boys enjoyed bouncing on it. The next day we went to Knoebels which is a little amusement park in the hills of nowhere. All together there were 43 of us from PA, MD, DE, and FL. It was pouring down rain and really cold. Those of us from the warmth of Maryland were freezing because we didn't bring warm clothes. After lunch it cleared up enough to go on the rides. It turned out to be a great day because there weren't to many crazies there. We got right on the rides with no wait.

Grammie Carey bought the boys some bags of dirt so they could pan for "gold" and other gems. They loved it!

Conner and Eric enjoying the water The dads and teenagers in our group filled up the bumper cars and bumped the tar out of each other. It was rough in there but it was cool to see such a large group of family having so much fun together.

We got home and had a great visit with my mom and brother we went to the beach and I forgot my camera. This weekend we are off to PA again for some more camping. Then I think we'll start thinking about getting ready for school!

What we've been up to

We have had a crazy busy summer. We have spent most of our time visiting family in PA or having them visit us. Here we are in a few of our few quiet moments at home.

David doing the "boogie board fly" off the ladder into the pool. Of the three boys he is certainly the fish. Always the first into the pool and in long after the others have gotten out.

Levi thinks he can swim. In reality, if he fell off this board he would be in trouble but he insist he will not fall off. Needless to say I am keeping a close eye on him.

We found an empty egg shell in our yard. We looked up and found a nest in the tree. We have been watching this momma and baby bird for a while. Eric shares his binoculars with the boys so they can all see. When we came back from PA this week they were gone:( They are hard to see in this pic but you can see both of their eyes and mommas tail feathers hanging down the back of the nest.

Happy 4th...5th...6th!

We had a thunderstorm on the Fouth of July so we did our fireworks on the 5th. I'm not getting them posted until the sixth.
Anyway, I thought this picture turned out fun. David made a number 4 (which of course is backward) with a sparkler.

We hope you all had a fun Fourth!

Assateague

When we got home from New Jersey we thought "Hey, let's go camping!" So I called Assateague and got the last site available. This was the first time we went camping with all three boys...and the dog.

Cody was not excited about the beach at all. The poor thing was scared to death of the water.

Cody spilled his dog food which the horses were extremely happy about. They came right up to us and cleaned up the mess. You can see Cody under the table just watching them eat his food.

Move it horses...We gotta use the facilities!!

S'mores!

Good Morning!

Vacation!

We just got back from our first family vacation. We went to Ocean City, New Jersey. It seems kinda dumb since we live near the beach but it really was a blast. We went with another family and there were 6 kids in the house between the ages of 3 and 9, five of them were boys...so it wasn't the most relaxing time I have ever had but it was fun. I did have a mid week meltdown because reality set in that a mom still does her full time job on vacation just in a different house. Fortunately I recovered!

We took the Ferry from Lewes, DE to Cape May, NJ. The boys thought it was awesome. This is obviously just a model size.

Smart Phones with internet are very dangerous. The office found that they were having a difficult time living without Kemuel. I'd feel the same way! He didn't do much business and that phone came in really handy when we needed to find something!

Here we are on our last beach day. As we were walking off the beach we realized we hadn't taken any pics of all of us so we snapped this one quick.

I am happy to say that I am going to have three little surfer boys on my hands.

We are off on our next adventure...Camping on Assateaque Island with the horses!!

Workin' too hard to blog

Here's me on Mother's day. Yep...I got to cut a hole in my bedroom ceiling and help Kem hang a ceiling fan. There's just something about wrecking stuff that if soothing to the soul. (The boys took me to Red Lobster for lunch and got me a basket of flowers too but puting a hole in the ceiling was the highlight.

other projects I have been working on:

Painting --I did a coat of KILZ all over the place to cover all crayon marks and the marks from all of the things that get launched down the stair and hit the walls. I got the stairwell painted but still have to do the upstairs and downstairs hallways and all of the trim.

Digging -- I have been leveling out a big spot in our backyard so that our pool doesn't lean down the hill again this year. It has been so hot but it feels good to work so hard.

Putting up the Pool-- I put up the pool yesterday by myself. I only did it by myself because my dear husband made a comment last year that I probably couldn't do it alone. Well I had to prove to myself that I could. He of course has no recollection of that comment! It also is supposed to be 93 degrees this weekend. That was pretty good motivation.

Reorganizing -- I put shelves in the boys closets and moved most of their toys to their rooms. Got rid of the play room and rearranged the computer room so it is more like a guest room. If you know me at all you know that I LOVE to rearrange furniture and move things all over the place just for fun!

Cleaning-- I'm sorry, did I say cleaning? I have definitely NOT been cleaning. And the house looks like I have been busy elsewhere. For once, it doesn't even bother me too much because I have been having such a good time doing the other stuff.

GPS knows best?

SO, Kem and I broke down and got a GPS a while ago. We did it to save our marriage! Our marriage really was not in any danger but if we took many more trips where I had to look at a map and navigate it could have become an issue. It really has been a wonderful thing but to prove that it's not always a perfect solution look at the picture.

Looks like a great road right! TOMMY (That is what we have named our TOM TOM) told us to turn onto this road. It was a dirt road! Since we didn't know how to get home we followed TOMMY'S directions. We figured it was probably just a short stretch. Yeah Right! We were on this dirt road for like 3 miles. The only glimpse of civilization was two horseback riders.

We were laughing so hard as this road went on and on that we had to stop and take a picture. As you can see by the screen of the GPS there are no other roads around. I told you we were in the middle of nowhere! To TOMMY'S credit, he did get us home with no trouble. I'm just not so sure the 10 MPH dirt road was the fastest route. At least if I was using a map to navigate we would have been on an actual road!

I love it!

One thing I can say about my boys is that they play hard and they sleep well. On this particular day Levi missed his nap. He was very sleepy when I set him at the dinner table. I walked away to bring something else to the table and when I came back he was gone...well actually he just fell asleep on the chair. Yes, I got under the table to take his picture because it is just too funny! That absolutely cannot be comfortable.

Who could resist?

We got three loads of topsoil to put on our yard so that we can grow grass. The boys loved getting to see the dumptruck so close and they loved the really loud and unexpected BANG that the door makes when the truck pulls away from the pile and it slams back into the hopper.

Did you expect anything other than some really dirty fun to ensue? My poor washer and dryer have been working over time!
It's so much fun, as a mom, to see the sheer delight in these boys over some dirt
by the way...in case you thought I was color blind...Levi proudly dressed himself on this day!