July

Enjoy a smattering of pictures and activities from July, in no particular order...

 Watermelon eating - a summer must.

 We FINALLY got our storage room organized! It's so pretty! Haha. I am still in shock how organized it is when I go down to get something. And yes, I realize how completely spoiled we are to have an entire room dedicated to storing our junk. (And food...not all junk).

 We've gone to the pool LOTS of times! Hooray! Grace just recently started going in, before that she'd either hang out with me or herself somewhere in the shade. She's not always this happy, but we're glad when she is!

 Lots of new pantry items for us this month. I'll have to do a separate post about this, but we found out recently that Eli has Celiac's disease, so gluten-free it is. I now own buckwheat flour, oat flour, brown and white rice flours, tapioca starch, potato starch, xanthan gum, and all sorts of other things I never knew I needed (is your head spinning yet? yeah, mine too).

 Our garden a few weeks ago...the spaghetti squash is taking over the land.

 Poolside!

 These kids are amazing swimmers! Both Eli and Connor are little fishes and even Anna jumps in now (with her Puddle Jumper) and puts her face in! Big improvement for that girl. She may be swimming by the end of the summer if we keep working on it...

 We (or mostly Eli) have also done a lot of reading this summer...this kid will read anything and everything!

 We've gone to play in the river a couple times. The kids have collected frogs and tadpoles and lots of little shells.

 Garden produce! I planted 7 varieties of tomatoes, so it's fun to see all the different colors and sizes!

 I convinced Eli to read a story to them...he doesn't like to but I love it!

 And LOTS of yummy summer grilling. The only thing I prepped in the house for this meal was some sliced watermelon. Winner!!

 Yum yum! We got some patio furniture and I love eating outside! I'll definitely love it more in the spring and fall, since it's often too muggy to be enjoyable right now, but it's still fun when we do decide to do it.

 YUM.

 This year, the Fourth of July was cold and raining. Not so great. So we spent the day playing games and watching a movie...not exactly festive. To make up for that, we had a fun BBQ/slip & slide party the following Saturday with a bunch of friends. It was a hit! We need to do things like this more often.

How many kids can you cram on one slip and slide?

Jeremy's now-famous grilled chicken was a hit with both the kids and the adults!

 Family Float. Haha. My legs look really white in this picture...this must have been earlier in the summer. ;)

My friend Brekke took this picture of Jeremy pushing his friend Matt on the swings next to me pushing Anna. Haha, nice guys. This was at a park near our house for our Ward Ice Cream Social.

And now on to August! AHH!