Maggie

So getting an animal has been a topic discussed on and off for the last year or so. We tried Matilda the cat this summer and that lasted for about 5 seconds. So we decided to try the dog route. We waited until Uncle Jason came to visit for his vet conference in September and he helped us pick out a good fit for our family. Thanks for all your advice and time Jason! I swear, I was like a 1st time mom when we brought this girl home and I had my own personal in-house doctor! Sorry for all the dumb questions bro. but you gave me much peace of mind.

So without further ado, here she is in all of her furry glory:

The kids absolutely adore her which is good because they are why we got her in the first place.
We named her Maggie and have since had her shaved down to the naked version. She came to us with a lot of sticker burs and her hair was all matted. She we decided to start over. She looked pretty, um, gross... yeah, that's an accurate word.... when we got her back from the groomers. I don't think we realized that 11 pounds equated to such a skinny dog under all that hair! But thankfully it's growing back. She's a shih tzu that's about 1 yr old. My dog loving friend has had a couple of shih tzu's and says their super duper long hair comes in at about 2 to 3 years old. Hmmm... not really what I signed up for, but oh well. With Maggie we just take things one day at a time. She's pretty good if you can get past the chewed up toys, shoes, holes in the backyard, and barking at strangers. We have her enrolled to begin obedience school this week so wish Tim the master trainer good luck!

Audrey & Dale 2010

Dale came down to TX this year and as usual we so much fun there was just no time for picture taking! We ate at yummy restaurants, went shopping, and had fun reminiscing with Heather. Finally on our last night we remembered to take a picture:

And here's me asking if I had food in my teeth. Nice.
I had tons of fun with you Dale! Watch out Disneyworld... we're coming in 2011 and this time we're bringin' the kids!

Random Fun

Lillie made and flipped these pancakes all by herself! Now she's like "I can make dinner every night mom!" Yes Lillie, I would love that. And I'm sure you guys would love pancakes every night! Seriously though, it was pretty sweet and I was way proud.

I watch a little boy during the day and him, Samuel, and Grant have a lot of fun together. Here they are turning our couches into and indoor trampoline..

Guadalupe River

Well, it stays hot around here for awhile and we wanted to enjoy the nice weather before it got down in to the shivering 50's. We took a day trip with our friends the Easton's to Guadalupe River. This is a great place, and only about 45 minutes away. Unfortunately we decided a try a new route with our friends and we caravaned some 2 1/2 hours getting lost on little TX back roads that the GPS didn't recognize. I think there was a short period of time where we wanted to give up but it didn't last too long. I think we were just so frustrated, we concluded that we would find this place no matter what. So we ate our picnic lunch in the car instead of the river, but we finally made it there and we had a blast!

Lillie was in heaven. She floated all afternoon down tiny natural rapids, made friends with total strangers (which I have never seen her do), and practiced her underwater swimming skills. The girl is a fish and completely taught herself to swim this summer.
Samuel and his friend Aydia.
Grant and Genvieve sharing river rocks.
Good ol' Samuel boy and those goggles. He never sticks his head under the water but he is absolutely convinced that he needs these things to swim. Always be prepared right?

1st Day of School 2010

We had a blast this summer and it was the first summer in TX in my own personal history that I didn't get to tired of the heat... MIRACLE! I think after Lillie going to Kinder last year I really enjoyed all of the relaxed down time and fun hanging out. It was hard to give it up, but the kids were really excited to get back to school.

Here's Handsome Sam ready for his first day of Pre-K. Though you can't see it he has a Spiderman lunch box that we was super excited about.
And here's our gorgeous girl all ready for 1st grade. She has really enjoyed herself so far this year and has truly blossomed in 1st. She's at the top of her class in all subjects and has really lost a lot of the shyness she used to have. I love to see that newborn confidence in her!
Here are the kids with some of their friends on one of the last days of summer. That's a $10 pool and a stepladder that all 6 of them are playing in/on. Amazingly it kept them occupied all summer.

Grandma and Grandpa come for a visit

Grandma and Grandpa came for a week to see Uncle Brian's Army Medic graduation and to have some fun time with the TX Doolittle's. We were all really excited to have them come out. Samuel was so excited about it that he jumped on the bed, slipped, hit his eye on one of the awesome food storage cans that pose as our bed frame, and nearly lost his eyeball. Pictures of course never do things justice and I can only promise you that the whole eyeball situation was way worse than it looks here. Boys.

Here is my beautiful Lillie waiting for her dinner at Outback.
The whole crew. Congratulations Brian on your graduation. We are so proud of you and we know that you will be so successful!
Grandma playing tea party with the kids. She taught them how to hold their pinky up and spea with a British accent!
Grant snuggled his way in.

There were lots of fun things that I didn't get pictures of: We had a great day at San Antonio's famous Broadway Kiddie Park. It's this old amusement park that's been around since the 1920's. It has all the same old rides, just restored, and you still buy individual tickets for the rides. It's mostly marketed towards kids 6 and under but luckily that's us and L and S had a blast. We also had a really fun time going to Brian's graduation and celebrating with him. The kids were so good during the whole things and thankfully it wasn't too hot! We also had a great time shopping, going out for breakfast, and just generally relaxing and visiting. We had a great time guys and we are so glad you could come for a visit! We can't wait to see you soon!

Summer Fun with the Zufelt's

We have been enjoying another spectacular summer with our family BFF's, the Zufelts. We are super lucky to have friends as awesome as they are!

Here are a couple of pics of us celebrating Austin's 1st birthday at Big'z. Strangely there are no actual pics of Austin. Sorry buddy! But here are some of the kids playing in the awesome fenced in "yard" they have.

Samuel and Tristan are so cute together! They are always so excited to see each other and hold hands practically everywhere they run off too!
Ashley invited us to swim with them at Spectrum's awesome pool this week. We went swimming 3 days in a row! I am swimmed out, but I finally have some semblance of a tan! We had so much fun at this pool. It was especially cool because the whole thing was shallow enough for the kids to stand in and of course there was the fabulous water slide. After day one Samuel was brave enough to go down by himself and then I was able to start taking Grant down. He was a little unsure for the first ride but then he really got the hang of it and he had a blast!
The Girls
Grant also had a great time splashing around in the super shallow part. Him, Tristan, and I had some pretty good water fights.
Here's Lillie just coming off the slide and Samuel swimming in from his recent trip down.

Great summer fun you guys. We love hanging out with you!