End of Summer

I tried starting with the text first but this blogger dumbfounds me with the layout. Enjoy the pictures first I guess!

Sorry about this one, the blogger kept rotating it. It's M and new cousin B cuddling.

There's a Broadway show calling his name in the future...

Demo of the shed. It looked like it was leaning but turned out to be still sturdy. We took it down the hillbilly way, with chains and a car!

Our new car. The payments still make me ill but we needed something to haul the camper.

I always laugh at that office supply store commerical where they play "It's the most wonderful time of the year" with the dad skipping down the aisle but it also makes me bitter. Teachers love their summers off, make no mistake. I go back Monday and the youngin's the Tuesday after that. This will be my first year of freshmen, pray for me. I love my older kids, freshmen are even too young for me. It will be a learning experience. The first football game of the year is this Friday already! I'm excited to see the TMB (Trojan Marching Band) take the field again.

The last few weeks has been crazy. Our house is on the market, with hopes to upgrade slightly. We just need more room now with two kids. A few last minute house repairs and cleaning, a yard sale, lots of craziness. Just the other day I got to thinking we need to get to Bronners to do our Christmas Card picture soon. Fall already?????

Cheeseburger in Caseville

For those of you who have never ventured to the tip of the thumb the 2nd week of August to take part in the Cheeseburger in Caseville festival, you should. It's 12 days of parrots, palm trees, flamingoes (or as Z calls them, Mingoes), Jimmy Buffett music and of course cheeseburgers. The genius part of this festival is that Caseville created it out of nothing. They just decided to have a Jimmy Buffett festival and what started as a weekend event became 12 days. Now about 60,000 people cram into town on Wed night for the Parade of Tropical Fools. This year the National Guard was brought in to do crowd control. The floats are awesome and the kids leave with bags of goodies.

As for us, we went for 3 days. Since Aunt Moira lives in Caseville, we have a great place to stay only one mile from the beach. We took in the parade and the rest of the time hung out at the beach. This year's festival was hot and muggy so we didn't get to do much else. The kids had fun though, summer is slipping away and any beach time is good.

Papa doesn't do the beach thing.

Cool floats in the parade.

5 Months Already

Physically it doesn't seem like M has changed much this month, she's still tall and thin but she's so much more interactive. She's "talking" to anyone who will listen, getting very close to sitting up, showing a lot of interest in food and eating and finally has discovered that hands are for grabbing things and shoving them in her mouth. Whether she will be a blondie or redhead is still being determined, her hair color changes by the day. Her doc wanted her tested for anemia because she is so skinny and pale, anyone who knows our families can appreciate the humor there. She comes from very pale skinny stock on both sides. Z still loves her and calls her his best friend. Of course, she isn't crawling and chewing on his stuff yet...