All is well and noisy at the Robertson Retreat. Sacrament meeting was great today (if I don't think about how our kids acted.) For some reason Shanna thinks it's jungle-gym time when we sit down in the chapel. But the speakers were great and you could feel the spirit. I guess every 3rd Sunday the focus is on missionary work. The Bishop had several converts share their testimonies. The youth speaker talked on fellow-shipping each other and the ward mission leader spoke on missionary work. My lesson went well I think. And of course Relief Society was great!

Thursday afternoon we went to the river and then to the USO for free junk food. Friday night we had some friends over and played Settlers of Catan.

Saturday the library on base had a "Beat the Heat" end of summer party to wrap up the summer reading program. They went all out! Snacks (yes we got to eat inside the library!), drinks, free cheap toys, a puppet show, a free little stuffed dog (an advertisement for a business), face painting, balloon shaping (what is it called?!), door prizes, bubbles, sidewalk chalk, water guns, a dunk tank, an critter show of local critters, and to top it all off two firetrucks shooting water at each other and kids could play under the spraying water. They gave away bikes to people who participated in the reading program.














Lee enjoyed a bike ride later that night and we tried to finish a movie, but our DVD player is still acting weird and we could only watch about 30 minutes of it.

A couple weeks ago I found out from a blog, Hip 2 Save, which I would recommend to you all, that Tulle was having a fabulous clothing sale! I had never heard of Tulle, but Lois was planning on buying something from there, so I decided to go ahead and look at the website. The sale was amazing!

Here is what I got: this brushed twill skirt for $6.99 (looks great after a Sunday at church, ha ha.) By the way, the jacket I am wearing Lois gave to me, and she got it for free. The white shirt I got on my mission at Ross' I think. You know sisters, the one south of the VC?


The corduroy jacket I got for $5.99, and the black bermuda shorts (the fabric reminds me of seersucker fabric and it probably is?) were also $5.99. I got lucky and guessed right on the sizes. Shipping was on the high end for me, but tolerable at $8.90. I am really excited for their sale next year! I'll be shopping earlier in the day next time too. There was a shirt that I really liked, but was already sold out by the time I started looking at the clothes.


While I was in Columbia, my parents came for several weeks to help out. My Dad loves gardening and is amazing at it, so I took advantage of that and asked him to plant a garden for us. Well, I think we're hooked! Lee has enjoyed watching every thing grow, and the kids overall have been good to the plants. The one problem has been the tomatoes. The kids (Cal and his tomato raiding band of pirates) keep picking the green ones! Our first tomato to ripen was a little one, but it was so good! Well, today I got to pick two more. Oh so good. I made salsa. YUM! Cal, Shanna and Haley loved the salsa and were chowing down on it, onions and all! Cal was even drinking the "juice" from the salsa.



Cal and Elden hanging out today




I LOVE Elden's smiles!

Clark's second tooth came in before his baby tooth fell out. I pulled it out this evening and hopefully the rest of our kids aren't tainted for life. Lee had a screaming Clark in a full body hold while I was trying to get the dental floss around his tooth. Luckily it came out in one yank. We tried last week, but after two yanks, we decided to give it another week. You can see the adult tooth and the hole where the baby tooth was.


This weekend must be spoil-your-wife-weekend because Lee has done just that! Saturday I was planning on just doing towels and such for the laundry and saving the rest till Monday. Well, he practically did ALL of the laundry! Then today he made dinner for all of us, cleaned up the kitchen and made muffins. And for the icing on the cake, Lee put the 4 oldest kids to bed! We normally both help out with dinner and bedtime, but tonight he gave me a break. I for sure wouldn't have had 5 kids if Lee wasn't helpful. He is a wonderful husband and my best friend. I could go on and on about how much he helps me and does things for the kids! I am truly blessed to have such a wonderful husband.

The boys wanted blue muffins, so I added the coloring to Lee's summer squash muffins.


Clark is enjoying school and aside from the fridge raiders, it is pretty quiet at home during the days. This will be the first full week of school. I have been doing some stuff with my budget and that has been SOOO fun! We are super excited about this Saturday because we get to see Harry Potter for free and we won't have any kids with us! Take care everyone, and you husbands--spoil your wives this week! We're excited about Roger and Brittany's baby arriving this week!