Are you tired of hearing about our dog yet?

If so…sorry.  He’s just a BIG part of the activity around our house right now!
We really want him to learn to play fetch/Frisbee.  He loves, loves, LOVES to fetch…but he’s not so good at the bringing it back and dropping it part yet.  But we’re working on it!

and the tired boys walk home…

Celebrating!

I made a really yummy cake to celebrate the fact that everyone was going to be home for the weekend.  Cameron and Caleb quite successfully completed their first and third years at the University of Iowa.  We are so proud of them!

Cameron will be managing our local pool for the summer, so he’s home for a while.  Caleb has a job in Iowa City so he just came home for the weekend.  We enjoyed having everyone here for that brief time.

In celebration, this is the cake I made.

I simply made a double layer 9 inch chocolate cake following the recipe on the box (I also added a cup or so of chocolate chips into the batter, just because I could)  After the layers were baked, I cooled them, and stacked them together with a layer of frosting in the middle.  I frosted the entire cake with chocolate frosting.  Then, I just covered the outside of the cake with mini Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups.

Is it ok to admit that I even impressed myself with this cake?  It was SO easy, and oh.  my.  goodness.  Was it ever delicious????  Yes, is the answer!

Ron felt that he had an entire year’s worth of chocolate with just one serving.  Others of us…not so much, LOL.  It was (obviously) VERY, very rich.  But amazing. 

Try it for your next celebration.  You won’t regret it!

Introducing….

MOSES!

Our family has been without a dog for almost a year.  While we enjoyed the freedom of being able to get up and go when needed, we REALLY missed being greeted at the door by a loving friend when we got home!  Rachel left notes around the house for her dad, asking “Daddy, can we please get a puppy?” 

It just so happened that within a day or two of the notes, Ron got an email from Chickasaw County S.N.A.P. with this gorgeous fellas picture in it!  Our entire family went “awwwwww…..” when seeing this picture. 

We went to meet him and we just fell in love!  We decided that HE was THE ONE for our family!

When we went to pick him up (his name was Buster at the time), we had to wait a little while.  Ethan was almost beside himself with anticipation.  He sat right down and petted the dog the whole time we waited.  And the dog (formerly known as Buster), stayed right there in the corner of his kennel the entire time.

Finally, the two (high energy!) boys were together!  Ethan has waited for this moment for a year now, and he is just so very excited to have a new dog!

We can only hope that Moses is just as excited to have US as his family!

He is HOME!

And he is adjusting pretty well to life in our household.  He’s high energy (did I mention that already?)  We’ve commented more than once that it is like having a toddler around the house again.  He definitely takes a lot of our attention, but we are happy to give it.

Look at that beautiful face!  He loves his treats, he enjoys taking walks, and he likes to relax outside on the deck while someone reads a book.  HE LOVES his toys!  We are working on not jumping on people, and we are working hard to get him to walk nicely on a leash.  He does tend to run away if he gets outside, so we are also trying to work on “come”.  We are all looking forward to being able to play fetch with him and have him actually drop the ball when he gets back to us. 

Mother’s Day, 2012

Moses has provided hours of enjoyment, entertainment, and love for our family.  We are all looking forward to many more years of love ahead of us!

Relay for Life

Rachel and Ron participated in the annual Relay for Life Talent Share. 

Rachel performed a beautiful song on the piano.

 

Ron and Rachel’s Talent Share song

Prom!

Rachel attended the Prom this year.  She had a great group of friends and they had a good time!  High school is definitely about making memories!

Rachel and Alexis

“Just hurry up and take the picture already!”

beautiful flowers from Katelyn!

The girls…aren’t they lovely?

probably my favorite photo of the evening!

And then off they went in the “short bus”

The kids kept us hopping

with all of their various activities this spring!  It’s fun to watch them participate in things that they enjoy!

Rachel had her spring band concert in April.  It was a treat because Grandma was still here, and was able to attend!

and Ethan ran track for the first time.

This was the 4 x 800

and this was the 100 meter dash.

And he threw discus

Handing off to Uriah

Ethan also had an awards/fine arts night.  He got awards for participating in several music events.  He had a very successful year!

Great job to all the SF-MS fine arts students!  You’ve had a GREAT year!

Easter Eggs

I tried something new (as seen on Pinterest) when I colored my share of Easter Eggs this year.  I think it turned out REALLY cool!

I put stickers on each egg, and then stuck it in the dye.  When they were dry, I pulled the stickers off.  SO easy, and they look really cool!

Try it yourself next year!  You can do all KINDS of different things this way!  Polka dots, or random shapes…whatever you have for stickers!

Life…just keeps on going…

even when I don’t make the time to keep up with this blog!  I had really good intentions with the project 365 thing, and did end up taking photos for almost 3 months straight!  But then life happened, and it went from busy to busier around here and not only did this blog suffer, but so did my “project”.  Oh, well.  It was fun while it lasted.  And I’m sure I’ll try it sometime again.

In the meantime…I’ll try to do a few catch up posts in the next few days. 

The BIG event around here this spring happened on April 1. (yeah…it really has been that long since I updated here!)

I got a new grill!  And Ron and Bill put it together!  Isn’t that exciting???

Ha…just kidding.  Well…I’m not really kidding…I DID get a new grill, and Ron and Bill DID put it together, but that wasn’t the real excitement of that weekend.

It was Ethan’s confirmation! 

We had a great weekend.  It was full of lots of food, lots of family, lots of friends, and lots and lots of fun!

Ethan and Aidan, and Ethan and Uriah.  Great friends!

Ethan, Madi and Jordan!

my kiddos!

The family

Soon to be “Uncle” John, Aunt Martha and Grandma

with Aunt Sue Ann, Uncle Bill, Jordan and Madi

Aunt Martha, Kelly and Bill.

Grandma Marge and Grandpa Richard

We also had a “flarp” contest that weekend, compliments of Kelly!  What FUN!

 

And some of us visited the Little Brown Church.

It was a wonderful weekend, and we are so happy that so many made the trip here for the celebration!