Summer wrap-up

I know summer officially ended in America a couple weeks back, so I'm a tad late. But this post has been several weeks in the making. Half the pictures got deleted after two hours' worth of downloading so I kinda gave up for a while. :) Besides, we live in the land of perpetual summer, so the changing of the seasons is only something we study in school - kinda like the Pyramids or the Great Wall of China. :) But, for what's it's worth... here are some of our favorite memories of Summer 2011....

We moved to a new house at the beginning of June. This is the view from our porch. I love it; it's so peaceful and beautiful and amazing to watch storms sweep through the valley up to our house.


Ezra moved to his big boy bed...


To celebrate the end of Elijah's first year of school, we had a camp-out at a friend's house. Elijah and his little friend who finished kindergarten!!!


The best part of camping is playing with the fire.


The graduated kindergartener and the daddy. :)


The little boys and I came and joined the big boys for dinner around the camp fire. (A tad smokey!)


What's a camp fire without marshmallows? (Sent over from the States just for this!)


One of my best friends and roommates from college, Jen, came to visit for a week in June. SO fun! Of course we had to take her to the beach.


Our annual 4th party with LOTS of yummy food....


And lots of little friends to share it with....


Brant was most excited about the apple pie. :)


Elijah helping crank the 4th ice cream.


Ezra with his ice cream on the 4th.


The summer was not all fun and games... both Brant and I had amoeba in July. :P For two weeks, I took this many pills twice a day. Ugh.


One of the highlights of the summer... peaches. :)


I tried to keep the kids on some sort a routine, so every Tuesday we did a craft. Here's Elijah with his clay creations... he's into space stuff now. :)


We also had "pool day" on Wednesdays and met several other moms and their kids for swimming and a picnic. It was a tad crazy - but way fun - about 15 kids under age 6 and 5 moms trying to make sure no one drowned. :) Hence, no pictures. :)

On the boat on our second beach trip of the summer. Note on Ezra's progress this summer.... on our first trip to the beach this summer he called it a "boap." Now he can say "boat."


We really enjoyed all the fruit and veggies we are getting at our new house... but after 19 pineapples in one week, I decided it was getting a little out of hand...


So I borrowed a friend's dehydrator and had my husband (who has a home ec teacher for a mom) show me how to use it. :)


It took two DAYS to get all the fruit dry.


This was all we got from 6 pineapples.... (we did eat a FEW pieces along the way, just to test the dryness) :) But still, not much...


But the consensus was it was way yummy, so I might try it again...



So thankful for a fun summer with Brant and our little boys!