It's.....Meeting Time!

Tuesday: Performance Customer Appreciation Meeting

Wednesday: Pioneer Seed Customer Appreciation Meeting

Thursday: Performance Customer Appreciation Meeting at Beattie

Friday: Exhaustion and Recovery.

Found some cute kids at the Pioneer Meeting...

Flashback!

These boys were having the time of their lives both nights...

and these boys were just glad when it was over...

Got one, just ONE picture of Daddy.

In the midst of meetings, Connor went to Barb's one day, and Jace and I stayed home and watched baby Brook for the first time.

Talk about a milestone.

She was fairly happy....and Jace loved having her at our house.

The day after the meetings, this is what you get.

A super tired princess.

A hot mess.

(We had to go somewhere super early, and I wasn't wanting to fight her to take off the pajama top...)

And this happened somewhere in the mix.

It's a crazy week.  And we are ALL glad when it is over. 

A Weekend with Cassidy.

The Luedke's went to the Lake over the weekend.  And they didn't take Cassidy.

So, we got her at night, and my mom watched her during the day.

These two fight like sisters.  All. The. Time.

Don't let them fool you.  They fight over everything.  And it got worse as the weekend went on.

Jace kept busy hauling haybales.  And taking pictures of his work.

This picture cracks me up--she apparently doesn't have one of these in her car.  She had so much fun looking at herself and laughing! 

Meanwhile...Connor got to try out Jace's carseat.  Gonna be hard to switch her back now...

We visited Grandma and Grandpa Boos.  They loved sharing their animal crackers with Grandpa...

And Grandma got covered in Paw Patrol stickers.

We Love you Cassidy, and it might take us awhile to recover, but we can't wait for you to stay with us again!

Fun with Family...

We had a girls day last week, to do some back to school shopping...for all of us.

I didn't coordinate my pastel shirt, so I couldn't be in the picture.  :)

This girl, and this dog.  Melts my heart.

And this is what we do in the evenings...safety first!

Connor doesn't like to hold my hand in parking lots...but she will hold Jace's had.  I'll take that!

The most random phone call from Dad last Thursday led to a random supper at Fritz's!  Jed called and asked if we wanted to go on a chemical run to Wellsville with him (40 minutes south of Legends).  I had JUST laid Connor down.  He shows up to get us in 30 minutes, and we hop in the truck.  Before we even get to Fanning, Connor has dumped water all over herself.

Oh boy.

HOWEVER, both kids ended up sleeping almost the entire way down there, then I handed out the phone and ipad.  Ironically, we drove right by a Fritz's, and also ironically Jace had just asked me when we would ever go back there.  So, we took advantage.  Jed hadn't ever been there before...but I think he was impressed.  It's not expensive, and the kids LOVE LOVE LOVE it.

Connor was so excited, I can't even describe it!

Water, Water, Everywhere!

To say our kids have grown by leaps and bounds this summer...is an understatement.

And I've probably already said that.

But they amaze me.

2nd time on the river?  Connor tubes with Dad.

You can barely see her little hand waving....

And Jace tubes with Dad.  Jace has always been afraid of tubing with Dad, because he thought Jay would drive super fast if he did...

Tired waterbug...

But oh my goodness...she has found her sea legs.  She wouldn't stand at all last week, this week, she walks all over the place and it doesn't bother her.

This is from earlier in the summer at Grable's...

Where she was a very tired water baby...

And then this happened.  We thought it was important to teach Jace how to doggy paddle.

(Because last weekend he randomly jumped from the boat to the tube that was really right next to the boat, without a life jacket, and it freaked his mama out.)

So, he did some swimming lessons with Jed at Jena and Carl's pool.

Wow.

He goes from being afraid to jump in, to jumping in, at the deep end, and swimming all the way to the shallow end with not help.

Amazing.

Just another reason it has been a GREAT summer.

Bottles, BBQ, and Beer

Saturday night we went to a couples baby shower for Aaron, Melissa, and Baby Girl Powell!

Looks like everyone is growing right on schedule...

Aaron got some helpful tools for baby...

Including a cute Peterbilt onesie with matching leggings and bow!

His facial expressions....

The Boos girls!

Yep, that's a baby bump!

Can't wait for September!

A "Slow" Week...

Ha.  That doesn't happen around here.  I just didn't take many pictures...

Took the kids to the Aquarium.  Also known as Hiawatha Wal-Mart.....

This was an experience.  Was sitting on the couch with Connor after her nap.  Jace was gone (he got to spend the night with Jay and Morgan and was still with Jay I think...).  I'm a little sleepy myself, but I look towards the entertainment center...and see something that looks like a small snake.  As I'm staring at it, trying to convince myself it's just trash...it moves.  It was a salamander!  It crawls over to where the kids' toy box is and hides in there.  I freak out.  (No surprise there...)  

I end up chasing it with a broom, towards an open door, Connor standing on the chair in the dining room.  She tells me it went outside, and I couldn't find it, so I was hoping she was right.  Later that night I had some people up for pictures, and as we are standing in the living room I see it go from under one couch to another.  EEEEEK! 

In his infinite wisdom, Jed tells me to set out a sticky trap.  Jace is home by then and assures me he will hunt it in the morning.  I was SO excited to see the next morning that he was sunk down in the glue on the sticky trap.  WOOHOO!!  

I tell Jace, and tell him we will have to leave it until Dad comes home, and he proceeds to call me a scaredy cat, gets his pliers, and takes care of it for me.

Middle of this week marked 9 years with this handsome fella.  Sounds like a long time, but it has flown by!  Fun fact:  We have been dating 15 years ago.  That's almost half of my life! 

Thursday was an exciting day for Jace.  His friend Cooper Albers got to come over for the day.  They had SO much fun.  The day started with the boys finding a cow out in our driveway...

Played some Mario...

And a little finger painting.  Aunt Debi was there that day too, so we had all sorts of fun going on!  So much fun that 5 minutes after Cooper leaves his mom sends me a picture of him asleep on the way home, and I find Jace crying on the couch.  "I didn't want Cooper to leave!"

She reminds me of the dog on 101 Dalmations...

Friday night we went to the RODEO!  These kids LOVE their popcorn.  LOVE IT.  And turns out Connor LOVES the rodeo.  Horses, cows, it was so exciting!  We tried to get Jace to Mutton bust...but he wasn't interested.  He was very excited for the boot scramble though!  He was the first kid to get his boot....but they took both boots off (usually it's just one), and he only got back with one boot!  He had to go back, and actually yanked his boot off another kid that was trying to put it on!

And a little Saturday morning cleaning...everyone gets a vacuum!  Seriously, these kids can be a lot of help sometimes!  Better enjoy it while they don't complain!