Summer is OFFICIALLY here!

About a week later from the previous host, the same family by the lake had a Welcome Summer Party on June 22. We were met with festive punch drinks and little umbrellas.

There was eating...

and swimming...

and fishing!

What's a party without a chance to hit someone? I mean, without a pinata?!

Happy Memorial Day (a bit late)

Well, baseball finally ended this weekend with a big tournament. More on that later. So I now have a little more time near the computer to update my blog.

Memorial Day was gorgeous up here this year. Perfect weather for a picnic with friends.

But these friends live on the lake and it was only about 72 degrees. Of course that is warm enough to swim, isn't it?

Aaron didn't think so at first, but later on, most of the children were either in the water or having a water fight at the edge of the lake.

Church Camp Day

On Wednesday, we had our annual church picnic at a nearby church camp. It looked like rain as we approached the camp. I was concerned that we had driven for an hour and a half to sit under a pavilion all day. But through it looked bad a good part of the day, it only rained a little bit when we were eating lunch. It still was a little too windy for the moms to swim but nothing could stop the children.

One dad braved the cool winds and went out with the children. They had a great time with the inflatable boat.

Deborah went canoeing with some of the older boys.

The best amusement was finding the perfect balance between one person and all the others on the floating dock near the edge of the swimming area.

Usually this ended with most everyone falling into the water.

We played in the sand...

...while the moms knitted on the beach. (I told you Mike that knitting was the new hot thing!)

And of course, once the children were thoroughly tired out from the water, the sun came out and it would have been actually pleasant to go swimming. But we changed back in our regular clothes and went to their remote control car course and ran our truck and car for a while.

Some of the other folks brought their instruments.

And of course, we had to have a big picnic supper. Followed by the mandatory somemores.

This is my favorite picture of the day. The boys are watching their friends play what I heard called Hillybilly Golf.

Tea and Manners

The church ladies had a tea last night. Everything was decorated so well. We had a delightful meal and had a good time socializing. Almost all the women of the church were there.

We played a purse scavenger hunt game. As you can see, it was very funny!

And what were the children and my dh doing while I was at tea? Having a No Manners Night of course. They can't have any good manners at the table. So they get to talk with their mouth full or yell "gimme the carrots" or get up from the table and run around. They don't get to throw food but they can do about everything else. The children just love it.

Easter, part 2

Happy Easter to everyone! We started the day out with our Araucana eggs. No sense in dyeing them since they were already light green.

We had to open the church building so our Easter morning picture was taken there. We had a wonderful service. The pastor compared Matt 28 with Romans 4.

Now to the egg hunt. We had 17 children participate. Notice the coats! It was pretty chilly this morning. But since the snow wasn't deep and the ground was still frozen and the sun was shining, it was deemed warm enough to have the egg hunt outside. Here all the children are lined up ready to go.

The teenagers hid the eggs and then the youngest children were allowed to find their amount. The older children were then let loose to find their amount of eggs. Here Deborah and her friend talk about what they found.

We had two families from church over for Easter dinner. It was quite a spread. We couldn't even get the potatoes on the table. We had ham, applesauce, potatoes, fruit salad, rolls, pickles of every kind, and green beans for dinner. Dessert was pumpkin pie, jello cake with sprinkles on the frosting (big big hit with the kids), and chocolate cake.

The Faerie Queene

On Friday, we had our monthly book discussion and pot luck dinner at our church. We've been studying a variety of books since we started last September. This month, we read book 1 of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene.

Once I got used to the verses and some of the old English words, I found that I really enjoyed it. So for my part of the pot luck, I brought dessert. To make it fun, I used my heart shaped cookie mold and made the following:

The cookies are coming!

Don't get mad at me; I don't have all my Christmas cookies done! In fact I wouldn't have even started yet but I had a cookie exchange at church yesterday. So I made a double batch of my favorite cookies (Swedish Pepperkor) so that I would have enough for us and enough for the cookie exchange. They have to be frosted and then left for the frosting to dry hard. And of course, that makes for a great picture.

Besides exchanging cookies, we also made some cookies in a jar. We are giving them to some of the folks in church and to the local charity that maintains a food pantry and clothing closet. It was a lot of fun. We did get flour all over us. Those of us in black and red looked a little funny when we left the church!