OtterPops: Summer Wrap Up

We had been working on completing our goals for the library summer reading program and braved the "end of summer" party at the library. This is our 3rd year of participating and usually we come away with a bunch of cool giveaways, books and fun to make it worth the crowd, but this year was pretty much a bust. We waited in SUPER long lines for practically nothing and I would have given up and gone home had we not had Maren there as backup for us. The kids seemed to have a good time and it did motivate us to finish our summer reading goals, which is the most important thing, but it was a little frustrating.

Cait and Kids with balloon shapes outside of library. Jonas requested a blue sword. Lillian got a purple snake and Jocelyn got a yellow dog

Maren & kiddos waiting in line

Toward the end of summer our super good friends, The Woolfords, moved away. They are also known as our carpooling buddies, our family photographers, our go-to invites to any dinner or party, our regular play-date buddies, walking partner & BFF, holiday "family", etc. We spent the better part of a week helping them gear up to move by watching kids, having them for dinner, etc. and we are already missing them desperately.

Cait & Tami at 4th of July parade

We also got our 2nd annual load of peaches delivered and Maren and I had quite the day of canning, freezing and making jam to use up the 60 lbs of peaches. Yum! We are already enjoying the fruits of our labors (that cheesy comment was for you, Maren).

We took advantage of the time that Greg and Maren were here to help us with house projects. This was one of the biggest and most involved project of the summer. Jared, G&M painted and added in these cabinets (hand-me-downs from Jared's boss) tiled over the fireplace and on top of the cabinets and built the mantel from scratch. My minor contribution was inside of the fireplace and can barely be seen behind the screen. We aren't allowed to put anything on the mantel for days to let the paint dry, but I think Emma is speaking for all of us with the picture below.

The family room 1 year ago

The finished family room

Emma's new favorite seat in the house. Seriously.

We had so much fun with this one night after we had gone out to dinner and shopping with Greg & Maren...The boys found these Quicksilver shirts for super cheap and since their brother Jeff (who is on a mission for 2 years) is super patriotic and they all love that brand they decided to buy these shirts in honor of him. The natural next step was to come home and have a photo shoot with fake Jeff (Maren wearing Jeff's printed face). Even Emma thought we were being weird (see her expression below) but we had a blast.