Summer Zoomed By!

Oh my! Here it is nearly August and I haven't blogged since April! Well, it's been a little busy, though, with what I sort of forget!
In May, we celebrated Clayton's 2nd birthday with a tractor themed party...still have to get pics from my sister for that one. We did Mother's Day stepping stones, which I need to make a few for my own garden, and Dennis traveled quite a bit for work.
June and July, we've spent playing. Really, we've been to the zoo a few times, the Tulsa Air & Space Museum, Muskogee Water Park, a movie, visiting my grandparents at their cabin, Fourth of July cookout, Dennis's birthday, visiting friends, and I can't even remember what else other than lots of outdoors time. The weather has been fantastic this summer with pretty mild summer temps and rain...yes, rain...in late July!
Our garden continues to make all sorts of great produce for us, so this summer, I have cut our grocery expense quite a bit on the produce part. The kids enjoy getting out in the yard with me and helping out a little.

That about wraps up May, June, and July for us. Clayton starts Kids' Day Out on Monday and Cooper starts homeschool Kindergarten with me the same day. We are super excited (and a little nervous) to start this new adventure but it will be amazing!

Happy Valentine's Day

Ok, so normally, I don't really get into Valentine's Day. It's never really been a big deal to me, especially since my birthday is 2 weeks after it. But, this year, I decided, since I had some time on my hands because of the weather, that I would get creative and make some things for my boys.

 Placemats for dinner

 Goodies for Coop...will have candy attached...

 What Coop made for Dennis...sweet! Thumbprint hearts on the card and hand print heart

 My goodies for Dennis are travel themed....little notes to leave around

 "Travel Itinerary" folder

 Here's what's in the folder...a "Map" and "Travel Coupons"

 This is a "map" of where we've been with milestones along the way...I thought this was more fun than just a regular card and it was fun to remember stuff from the past 12 years!

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!

Happy Halloween!!

I can't believe it's October 31st!! Last Sunday, Cooper and I carved our pumpkin and I put his costume together last weekend. I was so very proud of the costume because I made it! (sort of) I bought the overalls and he had the green long sleeve t-shirt, added a hankerchief and some gold colored felt and voila!! A scarecrow! I sewed the fringed felt on to look like straw. When Traci took his pictures last Sunday, I put brown eyeliner on his nose, too. (See the pics so far) His cap even has "straw" on it! He loves his costume, too. He's worn it twice already and he doesn't like to take it off.
I know the last picture looks very strange...I'm wearing a Halloween shirt and decorating my Christmas tree! Well, the reason for that is that I do it before Thanksgiving for holiday open house, and since the next couple weeks are rather full, I thought, why not do it this one. Dennis just thought it was hilarious to take that pic!

On another note, I officially start my new job as part time youth director at our church starting tomorrow! I get to kick it off with a hayride/ weenie roast! Woohoo!!

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Our happy Jack-o-lantern


Cooper just wanted to play with the scoop and pick up stray seeds

Retreating

I had such a great time last weekend! I went to a ladies retreat with our church and had so much fun! It was at Camp Egan in Tahlequah and it was beautiful there. I wish I had remembered my camera, though. Saturday morning, I was up and about with the sun and I made a trip up the really steep trail to the top of this cliff that overlooks part of the Illinois River and all the hills in that area, it was cold up there, but really nice and quiet. I just sat up there for a little while (only about 10 minutes, before I got too cold) and enjoyed watching the hawks circle, then I headed back down. Mind you, I am not a dare devil, but I tend to do things that I should really not do alone, but I made it back down the steep, brush cluttered hill just fine and it helped me to remember what our theme,"Unplug from the World" really meant. I had so much fun learning and studying Scripture, and getting to know some of the women better. I even learned how to use a knitting loom and am in the process of making a scarf. Chloe informed me today that she wants a purple and pink one, so I now have a second project when I'm finished with this one. I am so thankful to Mamaw and Papaw, who let Cooper sleep over the weekend with them, so we all three had a little break from the usual. I will definitely go again, it was just awesome!