My Blessed Life: Summer Update (May-August)

It has been a very long time since I've updated this blog....a whole 5 months! So much has taken place in that timeframe so I'll try to recap in this post what has been going on.

May: I had a great mothers day, as I have the sweetest kids. Aliyah lost her first tooth this month! We went camping Memorial Day weekend and got to use our new backcountry kitchen! It came in handy by keeping food on shelves and off of the ground. I loved having a sink to use too. I got to use our dutch oven a little bit and made a quiche, pizza, and brownies in it! Also this same weekend, we woke up to a text from Frank's brother Daniel letting us know that their first daughter was born! We now have a new niece, with a sweet name of Cadence!

June: I dyed my hair red!! I have always wanted to be a redhead and finally did it and love it! The highlight of this month was when Frank's dad and stepmom stopped in for a quick visit. We had a blast those few days that they were here! We took them to the beach and enjoyed visiting at home as well. This time, the water at the beach was much warmer.

July: Frank's maternal grandmother Anne, died suddenly of a heart attack at the beginning of the month about 3 hours after meeting President Obama when he ate at her restaurant. She was a sweet lady and very hard working. We went to her funeral and got to spend some time with family that Frank hasn't seen in many many years, including cousins and their kids. We also go to spend some time with his mom and meet our niece Cadence. After the funeral, we stopped in PA for a few days and got to see my sister and her family again, along with my older brother Mike and his family and my parents. Seeing Mike and my parents was the first time in 3 years! Crazy! It was great to see everyone and I wish we didn't live so far from family.

August: Not much went on this month, just homeschool planning for me and Frank was gone with his JLOTS mission for work. The major thing this month was that we completed our dossier and sent it to our agency!! We are officially now just waiting for our referral!!

As we are into September now, I'll be posting new pictures and such of the kids beginning their new school year. At this moment we are currently at Great Wolf Lodge enjoying the waterpark. It is after 9pm and I'm in the hotel with the two little ones sleeping, while Frank and the big kids are playing a magiquest game.We found a homeschooling coupon deal in which we were able to book 2 nights at GWL for about 60-70% off the normal cost so we decided to pack up some food and spend my birthday (tomorrow) here and enjoy one last big thing this summer! Frank has these 2 weeks off so we are enjoying some time together! This past weekend we were blessed with a free trip to the outerbanks of NC for a marriage retreat. All of our lodging and meals were covered along with childcare during the meetings. The seminar we watched was called "laugh your way to a better marriage". It was hilarious and so great! I highly recommend it to all married couples! The speaker is a Christian pastor and is so stinking funny and doesn't try to make men be women, which I see too often with marriage seminars. Anyhow, it was great! We also had some free time and got to enjoy some great beach time with the kids :)

So here are some of my favorite pictures from this summer. Enjoy! Oh, and some of the pictures I thought I added but they never uploaded so I had to add them again in the end, so they are out of order. Oops!