Track Time!

The beginning of the school year at middle school means track time!  We had two in track this year since we now have two in middle school.

 Colson, running the mile.  He competed in the mile at every track meet, and shot put at all but one.

Trenton competed in the mile and long jump at each meet.

I loved being able to got to all of their track meets to cheer them on.  Way to go boys!

Labor Day 2012

On Labor Day, we decided to enjoy the pool one last time before it closed for the season.

 

Preston and Vivi spent lots of times jumping from the side and swimming to their grandma.

 Daddy and his girl.

 Sisters.

 Buds loves nothing more than a day at the pool.

 Taking a little lunch break.  The boys spent almost the entire day flipping, jumping, and diving off of the diving board.  They sure worked up an appetite!

 Lou was quite content for the longest time to sit in her chair, eating her apple.  She loves her bapples! (As she so fondly calls them.)

After a few hours of pool fun, she had had enough!

This was a perfect end to a wonderful summer.

Jilly's Happy Place

My little Lou is always at her happiest when she can make chaos out of order.  She loves, loves, loves to get into things.  Any drawer, cupboard, shelf, closet or toilet (grosses me out to no end) within reach is far from safe when Jilly is around.  When we go to grandma's, she knows right where to go to make a mess.

 She LOVES this drawer!

 She'll grab the items, examine them for a second, then chuck them on the floor.

 She'll keep on going until the drawer looks like this...

 and the floor looks like this.

 She is so pleased with herself!

Ants!

When Trent was a kid, he used to go with his dad to collect ants in a glass jar.  Then for the next few days, they would watch as the ants made tunnels all through the dirt.  Over Labor day weekend, we had all gotten together for dinner at my mom's, and Trent and his dad got to talking about when they would make their own ant farms.  Well, of course the boys were intrigued by this and wanted to do it.  So my mom found a couple of glass jars, and Trent, grandpa, uncle Dustin, Trenton, Colson and Preston all piled in the car to go in search of ants.

 Jilly was quite fascinated by them.

 We all took our fair share of time studying and watching the ants.  It was quite amazing to see how quickly they went to work building their tunnels.

We All Scream For Ice Cream! Well, Jilly Does Anyway

At the end of August, my mom took the four older kids for one of their Dairy Queen runs.  This time they decided to bring a Blizzard home for Jilly.  She was in heaven!

 We started off by feeding her bites, but she wasn't having any of that.  She wanted to do it all by herself!  I knew if she was in charge of the spoon, things were going to get messy, so we peeled off her clothes and let her have at it.  She was so happy!

 She was eating it so fast, I think she kept giving herself a brain freeze.  (Or a freeze brain, as Preston calls it.  Ha!)

Needless to say, she went straight to the bath when she was done.  :)

Curly Locks

Vivi LOVES to have her hair curly.  Not with a curling iron though.  (She says she doesn't like standing for that long.)

She prefers rag rollers.  Which is funny to me since it takes almost twice as long to roll them in her hair as it does to use the curling iron.  My silly girl!  :)

Jilly Bean

I sure love my Jilly girl.  She sure makes us laugh!

Here are just a few pics I got of her at the end of the summer.  She had a habit of stealing my friend Michelle's sunglasses every time she saw Michelle.

Stylin'!

  

Garden of the Gods

Growing up, my parents used to take our family to Garden of the Gods on a regular basis.  This past summer, I realized that it has been years since I had been there, and some of my kids had never been there at all.  Well, that just wouldn't do.  So we went down on a Saturday, grandparents and uncle Dustin included.

 A shot of the kissing camels.

 Baby girl, enjoying her time in nature.

 More of the scenery.  I forgot just how beautiful it all is!

 The kids loved climbing on the rocks.  There's much less climbing allowed than when I used to go as a girl.

Uncle Dus.

 I love this boy's crooked smile. ;)

 Grampy and the boys.

 This girl loves her grandpa.

 Daddy and his girl.  After a while, we stuck Jilly in the back pack.  She wasn't too excited at first, but she learned to love it after a bit.

 Vivi spent much of the time hunting for these little acorns.

 "Look ma! No hands!"

 Viv and grandma Guercio.  Such buds!

 Jilly loves her uncle Dus!

All that hiking made us hungry, and we just couldn't be down in the Springs without making a pit stop at Rudy's.  It's the best BBQ there is!

 The night before we went to Garden of the Gods, Colson had a campout with his scout troop.  I guess they stayed up all night.  Colson was exhausted by the time we started our drive home, to say the least.  :)

 Poor boy.  He slept the whole way home.