End of Summer

Summer doesn't technically end till September 21, but summer around here "ends" when school begins.  Here are a few pictures from the last days of summer.

Cal, Clark, Lee and I take turns emptying the dishwasher.  Somehow Cal has been able to get Shanna and/or Haley to help him.  He doesn't offer anything; he just asks in an excited voice, "Do you want to help me?!" Sometimes it works!




Clark moved up in bike, and Cal of course gets the hand-me-down.  But technically the hand-me-down bike was a hand-me-down for Clark too.  Lee bought it off of craigslist two years ago and worked on it for a few days cleaning it up and scraping rust off of it.


Our friends came to visit us on their way home from St. Louis.  My friend Megan and her family have two boys and twins...just like us!  What a great family.  We love having them so close!


Ahhhh....a happy boy.  Chocolate and bikes.  Can't get better.


Pure content.




Farewell summer.  I am already looking forward to your visit next year!

Birthday Party

Last night we went to a birthday party for our friend. His parents reserved the pool so it was a private party. We had a great time!











Shanna and Haley and their little buddy




During the day you can't take your children with you down the slide, but I guess at night they don't care.  Cal, Shanna and Haley all went with me (one at a time).  Cal was really excited to go, but once he got to the top and saw the slide he did not want to go.  I grabbed him anyway and made him go down. After he got out he was pretty upset.  But after he calmed down, he wanted to go down again and thought it was very fun!


We had a great time with our friends and getting better acquainted with some of our neighbors.

I love to see the Temple

Friday night we had a great time with our friends visiting and eating treats.  We were going to play a game....but maybe next time! Saturday morning we headed to St. Louis to go to the temple.  While I was in doing a session this is what Lee did with the kids.













This is what I did for a few minutes with the kids while Lee did sealings.






Next we headed to the St. Louis Zoo.  My friend Megan told us about the turtle park about a block from the temple.  We found a great parking spot (FREE!) and enjoyed the turtle park for a few minutes.




We lucked out at got into the Sea Lion show for free. (Otherwise we wouldn't have gone!)  The sea lions are in mating season.  The trainers weren't sure if any sea lions would come out, thus the free admission! But one did.


These are the same breed of monkeys that we saw in Nicaragua.

Little Getaway

We had a great weekend with friends and family!  Our trip started off by visiting our friends, Megan and Jeremy.  Megan and I were roommates at Ricks College our freshman year.  (And no, it was not BYU-I then, so I will write its proper name for the proper date.)  It's been 4 years since we've seen them. It's funny how Megan and I have had similar events happen in our lives--like missions and twins. Good thing no one has held Jeremy up by gunpoint (Right?) Lee and had a great time visiting them. They had to get up early the next morning and I hope they felt somewhat rested.  We didn't go to sleep till after 1 am....

We spent the night (well, we slept a couple of hours) at their house and then left at 4:30 Saturday morning.  We headed to Oklahoma for Katie's baptism, my brother Darrell's oldest daughter.  Darrell and Stacie and family are there while Darrell is going to school for his PhD at OSU.  We live fairly close to them and haven't visited them enough.  And Mike, thanks for the GREAT pictures!!! 


My dad and nephew Eric


The always lovely Stacie...Darrell's better half!




Haley helping.  Clark just saw this picture and asked: "Why didn't I get to help?"


Family time with Darrell and Stacie and everyone else!




I am so glad you stayed longer Deborah!


Such squeezable cheeks Elden!!!








That afternoon we tagged along to the stake Pioneer Day pig pickin'.  YUM & FUN!




















That night we celebrated Clark's birthday.  We thought it would be fun to do with so many cousins around.  Two of my sisters and their families were there--if you hadn't guessed from the pictures, along with my parents.  There were 29 of us! Clark requested a Lego cake.






I love this picture of Clark.  What a sweet, energetic and loving boy you are Clark!!!


It was fun to be with Lena on her actual birthday.  Which of course we celebrated too!


Katie, the girl of the day, got to join in the celebration with opening a belated birthday present.




A few weeks ago we FINALLY made an FHE chart. Once a week we get together with our family for a special night which includes...well, the picture can tell all! (Mom, how much can I bill you for product placement?)


Last Monday for Family Home Evening we talked about pioneers and Lee shared a couple of stories about his great-great-grandpa Robertson. One little story was when they traveled from St. Louis to Utah they hooked the container of milk/cream to the wagon and by the end of the day with all the movement, it had turned into butter.


Clark had a very fun 7th birthday.  And of course it was a Lego filled birthday.  He got Legos from us and then later that morning spent his birthday money from Grandparents Robertson/Bartholomew and Great-Grandma Lena on MORE Legos!  He was one happy little boy. Two of his friends came and played that afternoon. I took some pictures but accidentally deleted them.  I was not very happy!

Just the normal things have been going on...swimming, shopping with five kids, buying school supplies, family bike rides, finding a snake in our toilet.  You know, the same old, same old.  Now that it's the end of the week, enjoy the weekend! By the way, the bit about the snake and the toilet never happened.  Stuff like that never happens to us! And Mom B, Clark loves the flashlight!