Run for the Red

Gavin ran in his very first "official" 5k today! The "Run for the Red" aka "Rockin' Red" is a race here in Fayetteville, with all of the proceeds going to the American Red Cross. Gavin ran 3.1 miles in 33 mins!! The course is very hilly, and incredibly challenging... and guess who won the bronze medal for his age group!!! Great job Gavin!!


We are so proud of him!

Of course, Gavin didn't run it alone. I pushed the babies up that same hilly, challenging course too. Everyone of us was registered for the run, and guess who won the silver in her age group! No, not me.. I'm a slow poke with that stroller... Lily won the silver medal in her age group! She had a time of 34 mins! Great job to Lily too!

New Talents

New talents are emerging all over the place! Gavin with the piano, Dean with his abc's and counting to 15!... and now Lily:

What an awesome trick! Good job Lil!

Lovely Lily

Lovely Lily has always been 100% girly. I write the word 'always' as if she is completely grown already. Lily is 2 years old, she will be 3 in October, and already she is completely high-maintenance. Yesterday morning I asked Lily to go to the potty (for obvious reasons), and when I entered the bathroom to help her, this is what I found:

When I asked her what was going on she matter-o-factly replied that she was doing her nails.

I love this girly girl so much! She cracks me up day after day!

Keeping Busy

We found this really cool park near downtown Fayetteville with Tennis courts, a running trail next to a lake, and very new playground equipment. Here are a few pics of us at "Mazarak Park":




I love this one below.. I think I am going to get it blown up, maybe black and white.





Of course with the lovely heat and humidity, eventually the kids wanted to find a place to play that was air conditioned. We found the Fayetteville Children's Museum downtown, and that place totally rocks! The kids can pretend shop, play dress-up, learn about TV stations, and a whole lot of other activities that were age appropriate for all three of them. Here are just a few pictures:
Lily shopping:
Dean was racing around with that shopping cart! He did not want to move on to any other activity!

Gavin was at the working register pushing buttons and really getting into the job:

This is Gavin at the stationary bike. The computer would tell kids how many calories they burned in terms that kids can understand; for example, Gavin peddled pretty hard and it told him he burned as many calories as one glass of chocolate milk.

Gavin and Dean working with simple machines.

More pictures and blogs to come soon! Summer is almost over already!!

Summer Jack-O-Lanterns

This is why we don't carve pumpkins in July:

I asked Gavin if the pumpkin was just sad because there were no trick or treaters coming around, and he said, "No, its just hot and it needs water."

I guess Gavin is getting a little old for the pretend stuff.

Gavins Post

Gavin is going to have a go at writing the blog today. Enjoy:

The leaves were dying, so it was time to pick the pumpkin and the watermelon because they looked ripe. We used a knife because the pumpkin was too hard to cut with scissors.

Today what I want to do with the pumpkin is carve it into a summer jack-o-lantern.

We are going to share the watermelon with our neighbors Mrs. Dailey, Mrs. Smith and our family.

The pumpkin is 10 inches tall and 23 inches around. I wanted it 23 inches tall and 30 inches round, but I am still happy.

The watermelon is 29 inches round and 10 inches tall. I like it that size and it look delicious.

Silly Lily

This morning Lily was being especially silly.. I mean she's always cracking me up, but today was over the top. After we saw a commercial for "America's Got Talent" in which someone was singing opera, Lily said she wanted to be a singer and to be on camera, so here are the results.

Silly Lily, I love you!

This mornings nonsense

This mornings nonsense included sweet Lily "feeding" Dean some of her yogurt. Really it looked more like she was doing his makeup. Either way they were both laughing their heads off so I had to grab the camera and capture the moment.

I've also gotten a few requests to see what the garden looks like, so here are today's pics after I added a little patriotic decoration to celebrate America's birthday.

I agree with everyone who has been telling me to add some more color, problem being that funds are tight at the moment. I will be heading to a nursery sometime this weekend to find some bright, discounted flowery things. If you can see in the pics my gladiolas are almost gone for the year, and the corn is already half picked and will be ready to be ripped up soon.

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY EVERYONE!

Today was our first family pool day of the summer.


Lily is getting very brave learning how to kick and paddle and now jump into the pool. Check out her on the video:







Gavin found some of his friends from school to hang out with.
Brother and Sister having a good time.

Dean was really freaked out by the water and was much happier just checking out the girls by the side of the pool.

Brandon finally got Dean into the water (without him whining too much). But only for a little while.