August

8/5 - we started August off by meeting up with my friend Julie who was in Branson for a few days with her kids.  We got to go swimming at their resort pool and then out on the boat with them, which of course the kids loved!  It was a fun day and great to catch up.

8/9 - Great day at the zoo with some friends!

 Josiah has been wanting to grow his hair out.  We keep telling him that if he grows it out, he has to put gel in it every day.  It actually looks pretty good when it's spiked, but he prefers to flatten it down as you can see from this pic.  When his hair got wet in the zoo misting fan, he immediately flattened it down and wouldn't let me fix it.  On the bright side he's totally nailing the look from the Dumb & Dumber movie.  Wait, is that the bright side?

 8/11 - our last trip of the summer.  I took the kids to my parent's house, and on the way we got to stop and see my Grandma in her fancy new assisted living place.

 8/13 - from my parent's house we drove up to Hannibal, MO to see my brother and his family. We all went to a festival with Native American dancers and artifacts.  The kids had a great time hanging out with their cousins.  Kason and Josiah got to shoot a bow, and my dad and brother got to shoot an old musket.  We were thankful we got to hang out with family again before school started.

8/17 - I took the kids and a friend to the community center to do some rock climbing and swimming.

8/21 - family trip to Roaring River after church where we did some climbing and hiking.  The kids are not ready for Colorado hiking yet, as they were bored and tired after what Jason and I would consider a short, easy hike.  They much preferred climbing rocks and giving me a heart attack.

8/24 - first day of school!  Josiah started 3rd grade and Levi started Kindergarten (3 days a week).  They were both very excited to go back to school.  No tears from anyone (not even me!).

Levi's hair looks a little crazy because I put gel in it but it dried too fast and then every time I tried to style it, he said "OW!".  So he went to his first day of school with punk rocker hair.

Everyone keeps asking me what I've been doing with "all my free time" now that both kids are in school 3 days a week.  One day a week I am in Springfield - going to the gym and running errands.  One day a week I'm usually cleaning the house.  I'm in a bible study group once a week, and I have a few hours of work every week that I now have more time for.  Between those things and some projects I want to get done around the house, the time really does seem to fly by and I haven't been bored or lonely yet!  Next school year may be a different story, but for now I'm enjoying my alone time as well as my Tuesdays and Thursdays that I still get to have Levi around.

8/25 - hanging out with Batcalf and cracking me up.

8/27 - we all did a 1 mile fun run and water balloon fight benefiting Habitat for Humanity.

I ran with Josiah, and he needed to stop and walk several times, so we weren't very fast.  However, I guess there weren't that many people who did the 1 mile race, because I ended up being the first female finisher - much to my embarrassment because we were really just participating to be with the kids.  Jason teased me quite a bit for beating the little girl that finished after me.  Guess she should have run faster (kidding!).

The water balloon fight was really fun!

Also sometime this month calf #5 was born!  I don't have a picture but we're thankful for our 5 healthy calves this season!  As an update...Jason is still talking to the guy in Nebraska about buying the red poll cattle (they've been talking for a month at this point).  More to come on this!