Pampered

Grandma took Madison and Jenna to the mall and got them pedicures. (For the record...I'VE never had a pedicure!) They had a great time feeling pampered and their toes are sure cute!

Hi mom, It's me!

hi mom and dad in Indiana,

I am having a great time so far, I have been swimming, to the mall to shop for school clothes, and help at ragbri! I miss you guys a lot to and i pray every night that you guys aren't to worried about me.=]well tell cocoa, quinn, and tigger I said hi and tell them I love them. i am going to help pull weeds out front. bye!!!!!
Madison

Busy Weekend

I don't have any exciting pictures b/c I left my camera disk in my computer when I last downloaded my pictures. That is sooooo me! My sister I am sure is laughing. Let's see...what did we do since I last posted?

Friday night after cleaning up at the church from our RAGBRAI event we went home and had left over baked potatoes with cheese and sour cream etc. They were pretty yummy although tasting a little "microwaved" now.

We had rented the girls a movie so they could chill awhile. Jeff and I worked all evening on some landscaping. I will show a picture of that when I get my disk in my camera! Ken and Katie (Jeff's sister) arrived during our dirty project. They are thinking of moving here, Ken is looking for a job with Geico headquarters and he can work from his home. We are very excited to think of them moving here. Of course Jeff tells them that they will have to watch the girls all the time while we jet around the world on vacation and then watch the dogs when we leave on family vacations. I think that by the end of the weekend they were changing their minds about moving close to us! HA!

Saturday we slept in a little, drank coffee a lot and stayed in our pj's too long. Very nice!
The men then went to help someone from our church move-Ken hasn't even moved here yet and is already helping others move. They also went and bought like 40 more bags of river rock for our landscaping project. The kids, Katie and I went to the mall. We ate lunch there and walked around. Madison and Jenna went to "Journey to the Center of the Earth." Mikayla wasn't happy because I wouldn't let her go, too scary. Sometimes being a mom doesn't win you any popularity contests. Ken and Jeff met us at the mall where we watched Mik and Haley play on the Play structure inside the mall.

We then left there and went home. The guys took showers and us adults went out for dinner. Before dinner we drove around and looked inside about 5 different condos that K & K would be interested in. They really like one of them. After dinner we drove around and walked by the river for awhile.

Sunday we went to church and then we all went to Applebee's with 2 other families. We had a nice time. We then went home and crashed on the couch and watched the Cubs for awhile. K & K left about 4:30. Without giving too much info. and if you feel like adding to your prayer list ...you could add Ken and Katie. Their last 2 years has literally been "hell on earth." You can't imagine the awful stuff they have had to endure...caused by ex-husbands and rebellious kids. Their lives will never be the same! One reason to move to Iowa is to try and "start over," if that is possible. Please life them up in your prayers.

This morning we all slept in...even the dogs! They didn't wake up until almost 9! I can't tell you the last time I have slept so late. The dogs were kept busy yesterday by the girls as they performed many "dog shows!" We also got to bed late. In fact it is 11 a.m. and Jenna is just now crawling out of bed!

Today I plan on going to JCPenney's with the girls and hopefully finding some school clothes, they are having a huge sale. I will let you know how that goes!

RAGBRAI

Every summer in Iowa an event takes place called RAGBRAI. It stands for: Register Area Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. (Register stands for The Des Moines Register, a huge newspaper). This is the 30something year for it. Anyway, I will spare all the details, but it is a HUGE event that bike riders come to ride in. Each year there are over 20,ooo riders and their support teams that travel across Iowa.(so about 35-40k people) They ride for a solid week from one side of the state to another. 2 years ago Lance Armstrong rode a leg of the journey. People come from other states and even countries for this ride! Anyway, so each night the riders all stay in a different town. The towns do it up! There are bands, vendors, roads are blocked off etc. It is a HUGE DEAL for towns to get to be a "sleeping town." The cities begin working on it in January when the bike route is announced. Our church had a baked potato bar to raise money for our children's playground when we eventually build our new church, hopefully breaking ground this fall. We were busy from sun up to way past sun down with this bar. We were right on the bike route and it is just an amazing sight to see the riders come into town after riding some 70 miles that day. They come cruising in as fast as they can, so relieved to be done with the days journey. Can you imagine witnessing more than 20k bikers come barreling down right in front of you?

I have included a few pics although it is hard to capture the mood.

Top: Jeff stands with his sandwich board to advertise our booth. He really enjoyed his day just standing out and talking to all these bikers. In the second picture Jenna and Madison (my neice who is here with us for 10 days) work the raffle booth. We raffled off the herkey statue you can see on the table. Here a few bikers put in a raffle ticket.

2nd row: a feeble attempt to capture a group of bikers coming into town. They come in all through the day, some get in town before noon because they left the last town at the crack of Dawn, some roll in later because they slept in (or had a hangover!). Jeff, Shawn, Rachael, her sister Audrey on her lap, and Amanda from our church all sit on the curb and watch the bikers roll in. It was Amanda's turn with the sandwich board. In the 3rd pic Shawn and Rachael are actually getting ready to ride out the next morning. Rachael's whole family rides in RAGBRAI every year and we hosted 20 of her family members for the night. Some slept in tents/rv's, or on our floor. Jenna gave up her bed for Shawn and Rachael! Rachael has a veil coming out of her helmet and they have "Just Married" signs on the back of their bikes. It was cute. (Notice the white outfit for Rachael and the all black for Shawn?)

3rd row: This is the bus that Rachael's family's support staff drives. It hauls their bags etc. Most riders travel in teams, and have team buses or vans. Amanda poses to gather customers and in the last picture is a customer at our booth. We did "ok" with our potato bar, it was a lot of work and the profits were just ok. Looking back I don't think we would have done food that is so "involved" but I tell you the bikers really appreciated a healthy alternative to all the other vendors, the normal hot dogs, hbs, etc. They did complement us on our delicious bar. One guy said that he ate at a potato bar a couple towns ago and our was "so much better!" That made us feel good.

Yesterday then we spent cleaning up and putting our church back together afterwards, it was a busy day. Jeff's sister Katie and her husband Ken came last night. We were up late with them. He is thinking of taking a job around here so they came to scope out the area. Of course they have been here before but they weren't evaluating the area to see if they would want to live here, so they are here checking it out in detail this weekend.

Where has the summer gone!? I am astounded that there are only 3 weeks left of summer on Monday. The girls can't believe it, and are sad. I am a little sad too. Time passes too quickly...

"Leah's hospital"

Leah is on a "staycation" this week. But on our way to the fair she had to go in and see a patient & sign some prescriptions. (She is a nurse practitioner and works in a pain clinic that treats chronically ill patients with pain.) While she was busy at work Jeff got busy being mischievious. He swiped her lab coat and stethoscope and doctored up the kids and also "stole" a perscription pad and wrote himself a rx for vicodin. He wanted something like 3000 pills at once and the expiration date he wrote was "death." Leah said that she thought that that rx would raise some red flags at the pharmacist! Jeff is always a party waiting to happen!

FOOD!

A run-down on the food at the fair!

Row one: Loaded nachos, breaded vegies, ice-cream and donuts.
Row two: pretzels, ribs/chicken dinner,
Row three: chinese, more ice-cream! (yes, the girls had ice-cream two times today!)


Not pictured: funnel cakes, hot dog, popcorn, elephant ears.

Memories from the Fair

We got to the fair yesterday around 2:00 and had to drag the kids away at 9p.m. On our way through the fair to leave we realized all the things we didn't get to see today. It was wristband day-unlimited rides-on the midway. We spent most of our day riding rides and eating. My neice and nephew entered some really awesome projects in the fair and all won ribbons. We did go and see all their projects. We are not sure if we are going to get back there today as we are going to go to a HUGE flea market instead for most of the day. We did go and see a Bengal tiger show, they are massive and so pretty. Jeff went on a few too many rides today and by the end of the day looked like he was going to puke! He was miserable, but that didn't stop him from eating his way out of the park. I think we stopped at 4 different food stands from the time we said it was time to go, and by the time we drug the kids out at 9:oo. All we heard was "one more ride, one more ride." And while they were on a ride, we had to get some food to pass the time!:)

Fair Fun

Check out Haley's dirty foot in the middle picture. When Madison picked her up her Croc fell off and we noticed how dirty her foot was!!! When we got home and looked at both feet we could barely even see the skin! Gross! Madison showed off her cake she decorated for the fair. She got a blue ribbon and an honors ribbon for it. Last years cake won the Grand Champion!

At the fair...Day One Continued

After the concert Haley and Mikayla rode the ponies, we walked through the horse barn where I saw some of the HUGEST horses I have ever seen, weighing over 2000 pounds, and we ate lots of fair food: corn dogs, Saratoga chips (basically fresh potato chips piled a foot high on a plate), funnel cakes and elephant ears! We'll see what food we can sample today at the fair! :)

Nicole C. Mullins-At the Fair-Day One

We left at 5:30 Sunday morning to travel to Indiana to my sister's house for the 4-H fair. This fair is larger than a lot of State Fairs. It is huge! We went to lunch, then to the parade, home for a little bit of relief from the awful humidity and then to the fair for the Nicole C. Mullins concert! She has always been one of my very favorite Christian singers. She sings, "My Redeemer Lives," and "When I Call on Jesus!" IT WAS AN AWESOME CONCERT! It got over late, and we stayed even later...eating all the yummy fair foods. We are going back later today. It is wristband day, meaning you buy a wristband and can ride all the rides unlimited. The kids are ecstatic. I on the other hand, who got dizzy on the ferris wheel at Shawn and Rachael's wedding, (read that post) am not so excited. I know I will get drug on many rides though. It will be a fun day.

20 Year High School Reunion

I had my 20 year high school reunion this past weekend. Only 16 classmates were there, less than 1/2 but we had a great time. We had a brunch with all our kids present in the morning and then had a family style meal (Amish made!)...it was to die for! It was great to catch up on everyone's lives. We really enjoyed our time catching up and reminiscing.

Fun at the Beach

On Friday some moms and I all took our kids to the beach. The kids just played for hours and the only way we could get them out of the water was a promise of a trip to the ice-cream store on the way home.

WaterPark

After the wedding we stayed overnight again and went to a local waterpark. We had a great time although it was a little windy and sometimes chilly. We stayed all day and at the end of the day the girls declared that they actually enjoy a regular swimming pool more. The just like to swim better, and not do the slides etc. That is a much cheaper option we will have to keep in mind!

Putt-putt golfing

Our friends Shawn and Rachael, Shawn is our worship pastor and Rachael is a co-worker/Haley's pre-kindergarten teacher, got married the weekend of the 12th. (Yes, I'm that far behind!) After the wedding rehearsal dinner Shawn's parent's paid for us all to go to a fun park, there was putt-putting and go-cart racing. We had a great time. We got done around 9:45 and went back to our hotel, when the girls saw that the hotel pool was open until 11 they begged to go swimming so we let them. It was a late night.

A couple picture explanations: Jenna is standing with a few teachers from school, we had to split into two teams to play, she played with Miss V. her math and computer teacher and also with Ms. B. Ms.B was Mikayla's Kindergarten teacher and next year will be Haley's teacher. The bottom picture is of Haley and Mikki looking for their ball in the bushes, one of them hit it in there and couldn't find it for the longest time. I had to go and rescue the ball. We laughed pretty hard. The picture is blurry b/c my camera is so old that it can't focus right when the light wanes.

Shawn & Rachael's wedding

We had a great time at their wedding, it was the weekend of their 12th. It was in a beautiful setting, out in the country with a pond right behind the gazebo they were married in. Jeff performed the ceremony. She had kids that she has taught over the years walk down the aisle before her and wave ribbons, it was really cute. They walked in to the Shrek song, "I'm a Believer," (I think that's the title.) There is a picture above of Rachael with "her" kids. Mikayla and Haley walked in it. They a ferris wheel at their reception. The wedding party got to take the first ride, Jeff and I got to go on that first ride. Then the kids had free rides all night. I went on it so many times I got dizzy. (Yeah, I must be getting old to get dizzy on the ferris wheel!) I told a co-worker that I was going to go home from the wedding and tell people,,,"yeah, at that wedding I had a few too many!" (ferris wheel rides! :) )

Wedding Dance

Friends

Yesterday my friend Jenny came over. She and I went to school together from Kindergarten through 12th grade! She and I are planning our 20th high school reunion together. She came over with her kids, Cole and Kennedy, and they played while we planned. They found 2 frogs right before they went down the water slide. Let's just say those frogs will never be the same. (One died from its adventures on the slide with 4 kids!) The other one we convinced them to let go...it probably died of shock later. If I didn't have such a distaste for frogs I would have felt sorry for the things.

Anniversary Party in Illinois

Here are some snapshots of our trip to Illinois for Jeff's parents anniversary party. We met at a restaurant for supper and then back to his parents house for chatting and cake. It was a nice evening. All of his 5 siblings were there.

Top row: Jeff and his brother Edwin discuss their "play" for the backyard football game. Jeff is "drawing" the play out on his shirt. The game didn't last too long as Edwin and his other brother Jimmy hit heads and both split their heads open, like almost taking them to get stitches! Edwin woke up the next morning with his eye all black and blue and almost swollen shut. These men need to realize that they are in their 40's (except Jeff) and stop being so competitive. Mikayla with her cousin Ryleigh. Ryleigh is Wayne's daughter (Jeff's brother). His parents with their cake.

2nd row: Wayne and Ryleigh. She is THE cutest and sweetest baby around!
Jeff, Edwin, Brawson (Wayne's step son), Wayne and Ryleigh shoot the breeze. Haley and Mikayla and their Aunt Teresa (Jeff's sister).


3rd row: Haley and Edwin swing and shoot the breeze. Haley wanted to sleep in the crib at her grandparents, she slept "like a baby" all night long.
Ryleigh gives Daisy a hug. Daisy didn't have a moments peace the whole time we were there.

(Not pictured but present are his sister Katie and husband Ken, Teresa's husband Darryl, his brother Jimmy, Wayne's wife Shelby, who had to work after the dinner, and myself. Lots of cousins were missing as they are all spread out now, one in in Pennsylvania and one is in England!)

Happy 50th Anniversary Jim and Rosemary!

Haley and Daisy

We traveled to Illinois last weekend for Jeff's parents 50th anniversary and we took Daisy along. She climbed up behind Haley and stayed there for awhile in the car. Jeff's parents house was FULL!! Daisy was up and awake at 5 a.m. and there was no where to go with her. (couch and floor full of sleeping people) So...I had to take her outside for 1/2 hour and take her for a fast walk (in my pj's!) to tire her out so she would go back to the house and sleep for awhile longer. It worked, she was an exhausted pooch and came back and slept with me for another 1.5 hours. PTL!

Aunt Lydia's funeral

The background is a quilt that Aunt Lydia made and it was draped over her casket. The top picture is of the cousins (5 out of 14)with my grandma and the bottom picture is of the great -grandchildren with their great grandma (4 out of 7).

Can you spell C-H-A-O-S???

I can't even remember the last 2 weeks, it is a total blur. We are in the new house. But it is a mess with piles and boxes every where. Jeff finally consented to getting someone to come in and clean the old house so we wouldn't have to do it, she comes tomorrow morning. So we are here late getting out the last stuff!!! That's all I have time for now.