Oatmeal and yogurt facials.

More deck progress.... Flooring.

Flooring, cross braces, top stair.

Laying down in the middle of Main St.

We will have to kennel Lucy during bath time...

We heard excessive splashing come from the bathroom, and Nick was yelling from the other room that they needed to knock it off and stop getting water everywhere. Turns out the boys were not to blame. Except for the fact that they might have encouraged her a little bit to join them... doesn't Zane look guilty?

Crazy dog

Well this is a first for me - Lucy jumped into to bathtub as soon as Zane got out. She is splashing the water and trying to catch it in her mouth, and panting because the water and room are steaming. I suppose I will give her a bath, since she volunteered...

More progress on the deck... Stairs!

Signs pitches for the first time while Zane provides background commentary on the state of his stomach. (Zane starts at :38)

The pool opens today!

And we were already waiting in line for the noon opening. Of course after last weekend's scorcher it is a breezy 68 degrees today, and I've been wearing a thin sweatshirt most of the time. As you can see in the second picture Karsten was the first to decide to warm up over an hour after playing... the other three are still going strong.

Hall Hockey

Zane's buddy Hewson Spencer and his younger brother Cash are over playing this afternoon, and there is lots of competitive fun happening. Lucy is determined to steal the ball, so she's an added defender in the middle to work around (her younger puppy self is also responsible for the torn nets).

Signe's last softball game

Signe had a big learning curve this season, and her improvement has been remarkable. Tonight she hit a hard grounder RBI up the middle for a base hit (off of coach soft toss, which happens after 4 balls. There are a LOT of walks with these young girls).
She has wanted to try pitching all year, and last night in practice her coach helped with her technique and said she did well enough to pitch in the game. After mostly playing outfield all year, she was thrilled.
They only got in 3 innings before time was called and the next game had to start. She first pitched the 2nd inning very well with numerous strikes, facing only 4 batters including a strikeout and a line drive she caught. Coach gave her one more inning where she struggled for awhile to throw strikes and 4 runs scored, but overall she did awesome for her first outing with limited experience - and they pulled ahead at the bottom of the third to win 8-7!

Even more progress...

Progress on the deck...

Posts and beams finished. Starting on the joists. Going up more quickly than I thought it would.

Piles of wrestling boys

Summer baking

There has been a swarm of 6 male cousins running around inside and out of my house this afternoon, all between the ages of 4 and 12. Even though Theo will be a mature 7th grader in the fall, I'm impressed how well he still interacts with and humors the younger boys.
And they are currently drooling in my kitchen, waiting expectantly for the girls to finish their snickerdoodle cookies.

Biggest cedar outside of the Redwoods... Near Elk River, Idaho.

Largest cedar tree outside of the Redwoods in North America.

Someone found one of the holes I dug for deck footings.

An exciting baseball finish!

This is a picture of the texts Nick was sending me when I was in Colfax for Signe's softball game. There was one excited little boy when I got home.

Gunnar just hit the winning run in extra innings!