Iowa Visitors!

On Friday night the Swanson family came from Iowa. They stayed at our house Friday and Saturday night. (FYI yes we still had my 5 nieces and nephew here) The kids all got along great especially at night when it was an all out boys vs. girls pillow fight in the basement. They came to help at their cousins graduation open house. The Swanson's are such an awesome family and it was so fun to see them. It does make us miss Iowa a lot!! Rowen loved their son Matthew and kept saying, " I want to play with that tiny boy." The tiny boy who is much older and bigger than RoBo. We had a great time with their kiddos at soccer games, swimming, and jumping on the trampoline.
Peyton and Mathew had an great time playing legos and just being buddies!
This is Bailee at her soccer game Saturday. She plays for the Terre Haute Flyers. They beat the Indy Burn 3-0. She is #15. Go Bailee!

Cheaper By the Dozen?!?!?

Thursday, I drove to St. Louis to meet my SIL Kendra and pick up her five kids. They are going to New Mexico on a job and house hunting trip. We are going to have them at our house for a week. My kids are so excited and LOVE to have the cousins come and stay!! Meanwhile, my friend Tammy went to Europe for two weeks and I told her I would watch her two boys (who by the way are like our family and my kids LOVE to have them over, too) while her husband is at work during the day.

On Friday we went to Hawthorne Park and went on a little hike. They all collected Rocks and we painted them later. (My kids are still in school so only Peyton and Ro were with us.)

Here is Peyton, Tori, Vince, Ro and Olivia looking for turtles. Which we did catch a big one in the backyard but he escaped. The turtle was too fast and gone before we could find him. Figure!?!?
Olivia, Kaylee, Sophie, and Tori painting rocks.

Olivia and the goose poop she got on her legs at the park--Yikes!?!

In the afternoon,we went to Peyton's Kindergarten program. They sang the cutest songs and Peyton is one to belt out the songs!! It was a jamacian story about a cat and a rat. The songs were cute and I will try to post part of it.

Peyton and his teacher, Mrs Toney. He has had a great year in kindergarten!!

Sorry about the sideways view I am still a beginner!!

Recorder Karate!

Elly had a recorder concert yesterday. She has been working on songs since January. It is recorder Karate and everytime you pass a song off you get a belt. The goal is the Coveted Black belt. The teacher had them play the song and if that was your last song to pass off you got the certificate and sat down. There were eighty kids and in the end there were only six who got the highest black belt. They even got to keep their recorder. Go Elly!! Anytime there is a competition you can bet she will stick it out to the end.

The Treehouse

One of the best things about Indiana is all of the trees. This is one side of our backyard. So when there are trees you have to have a treehouse and that has been our Memorial Day weekend project.

Biff has spent several days working on it. He is going to put a roof and more sides on it. I will post the final pictures when it is finished. The kids wanted to eat lunch in it after church today, the only hard part was getting up to the top without spilling the food. They are so excited to have it finished. Every prayer they say is to "Bless that the treehouse will get done soon" or "That dad can dig the holes through the tree roots." So far we are batting a 1000.

We also found footlong hot dogs at the store. We are so healthy! But that was the coolest thing ever. Eating a footlong in the treehouse. Gotta love that.

Here is Bailee who had to make it into a Chilli cheese footlong. I feel like we are at Circus Circus.

End of the School Year FUN!!

On Friday was the Riley Elementary Olympics. It started at 9:45 when all the grades did a mile run through the neighborhood. It was also 85 degrees and humid but we still had a great time. This is Elly's class playing beach volleyball. She won a blue ribbon in the shot put (takes after her dad) and long jump.

This is Braden and his teacher Mrs. Jarvis. They just finished the water fight (the best part) of Olympic day. Braden won a blue ribbon in the shot put (again a true Williams) and another one that he cannot remember (a Williams would remember that!!!)

This is the game that I helped with. It is concentration and each team has to find their five objects under the circles. It was very hot right there in the middle of the parking lot. Braden is in the orange shirt and the girl running across the circles is Audrey. Braden wants to have her over for a playdate because she is great on the pokemon games on the DS!!

Peyton's teacher Mrs. Toney decorated the kindergarten class like the Carribean. It is so decorated that Peyton did not believe it was the same classroom. His favorite part is the never ending amounts of crafts that they get to do at the Marketplace. He brings home a lot of "stuff" everyday. His other favorite part would be that you can dress up in your favorite tropical wear, sunglasses and all. We have spent many days this week perfecting the outfit.

Here is the part of the room that looks like a pirate ship. I helped with this part one afternoon and I cannot believe how much time his teacher spent decorating. But it was worth it when you saw the kid's faces!

Why now?

Monday in Wal-Mart everything was going well. Peyton, Rowen and I had our cart full and were in the checkout line. Everyone was being good and I was about to pay. Then it happened..... Peyton says," Mom, what does the word G-A-Y gay mean?" I was dying as I look around to see who is about to hear this lovely conversation. I said, "So where did you see or hear that word..." Needless to say I had a lovely talk about the "Word" with a six year old. I just kept thinking why now of all places. But I am sure this is just one of many opportune times for a great conversation.

After that Peyton went to school. The first boy that talked to him said the Lord's name in vain and he said, " Ya know that is a bad word and you shouldn't say it." Which he proceeded to say to one other boy on the way in, too. NICE! You do have to love what comes out of their mouths.

Follow that Bus!!

On the way to church today we saw this bus. It is from Iowa and Bailee was plotting ways to hide inside and head on back with the UNI track team.

Spring sports and weather

Peyton warming up.

Braden Playing catcher.

Elly in the outfield.

Biff just said, "Did we move to Seattle?" There has been a lot of rain and lots of thunderstorms. On Friday, we spent three hours at the baseball field waiting for lightning to pass so Braden's team could play meanwhile they just called Peyton's game. On Saturday Elly tried out for the all-star team and then we sat in rain for the first of Braden's game but the sun finally came out.

A Blog?

I have finally decided to start a blog. I know that I am way behind the times. Or some of you may think I am WOTing. But last week Robo came out of preschool and said to Peyton and I, "What'd I miss, guys?" That is when I decided that I needed some way to keep a journal or log of our crazy happenings. so here is my attempt.