I'm so proud of him!

I'm so proud of Papa Vaughn for helping with the Mariposa "Telegraph" fire. Today starts his first real day out there. He called last night and said they were starting 24 hour shifts, clearing hot spots and areas around homes to try to get people back in them safely. It won't be easy work, but I know he will be so rewarded by the service he is doing for others. There was an interesting article in today's Fresno Bee about the status of things. If you'd like to read it, click here. I'm sure lots of prayers and good thoughts for the workers and the people who live up there would be greatly appreciated!

Family Update & Weekend Recap

Quick family update - Okay, basically an update on Papa Vaughn. We talked to him earlier today and he is officially being assigned to help at a fire. He will be shipping out to help on the "Telegraph" Mariposa/Yosemite fire. It will be nice to know he's that much closer, but we're not sure that we'll be able to get up to see him. At this point he's expected to be up there for close to 30 days, possibly to Sept 1. It sucks he won't be able to go with me and the kids on the family vacation to visit my family in Washington, but he's excited about helping and the pay is really good, so we'll make due.

This past weekend we got the chance to lay low and have some "quiet" around the house. Saturday afternoon, Big Darren & Carolyn came and watched the kids for me while I photographed a small wedding ceremony. After getting home around 3:30 it was fun and games. Sunday, due to a change of plans we simply stayed home. I didn't even get out of my pjs until mid afternoon and that was just so we could go play in the backyard. It was fabulous! I have some backyard pictures to share later, but until then here's some other fun from the weekend.

The kids LOVE their bounce balls and hop all over the house chasing each other.

While I worked on editing some pictures upstairs in my bedroom, the kids watched Monsters, Inc for the 50 millionth time. I took a brief break and gave the kids horsey rides. When I was tuckered out, Big Boy being the wonderful big brother he is, offered up rides to Boopy. They were too cute playing together. (Excuse the messy bedroom, pile of clothes to fold/hang, etc. - this is generally the room that the door gets closed when guests come over!)

Silly kiddos decided to try to go in the tunnel while riding horsey!

Once tired of horsey rides a game of bed bouncing ensued. Gotta love a good bounce or two. At least my kids are more Tiggers than Eyeores!

Picture Catchup - Round 2

Obon Festival!

For many many years my dear friend Jennifer (otherwise known as Auntie Jenn to my kids and one of Boopy's godmothers) has danced in the Japanese Buddhist Obon Festival. For many many years we've mentioned to Jenn that we would love to come support her and watch the dancing. For many many years we've only found out about the festival AFTER it occurred. This year however, her fiance sent us girlfriends a link to watch Jenn on the local morning news promoting the festival This year, we knew the date BEFORE the festival took place. So...this year, we took it upon ourselves to surprise Jenn. Little did we know, however, that we would be the ones surprised. This year, Jenn wasn't dancing! She had a wedding to attend! Regardless, my friend Anne, her kids, Russell & Lindsay, and Aunt Kat (who was in town to watch the kids for us) all had a great time visiting with Jenn's parents and sister and joining in on the festivities. And yes, we will be sure that we know the date ahead of time next year AND that Jenn will be dancing!

It ended up being a beautiful Saturday night. Definitely still summer temperatures (hot!) but a nice breeze picked up as the sun began to set giving beautiful lighting for a beautiful festival!

Big Boy and Boopy both tried out the chopsticks at dinner. Big Boy actually did pretty good even using just one hand for a couple of bites. Unfortunately I didn't get a great picture of him using them. Boopy on the otherhand, tried, but found it much easier to use both hands. Uncle Five should be proud of them!

The temple. All ready for the dancing.

The kids sweet talked Russell & Lindsay into some of their game coupons and joined in the kids activities. Thanks Russell & Lindsay!

Showing of their prizes.

Boopy getting a better view on Aunt Kat's shoulder and hugging mama.

They had lead dancers up on stage and then everyone danced around in a large track like circle around it. Beautiful!

Boopy, being the dancing queen that she is, had fun dancing along.

Lindsay got brave and joined Jenn's sister, Kim out in the dancing arena when they invited anyone in the audience to join in. I'm sure had Auntie Jenn been there, Boopy would have been out there too. Maybe next year!

Picture Catch-up - Round 1

So I finally finished all the pictures from the Vegas sessions and now have a wedding to work on from yesterday. I am however, rewarding myself by allowing a bit of time to work on my own pictures. So, here we go on picture catch-up round 1.

Since I finally found them on the computer, we'll start with the Grizzlies game that we were given tickets to at the end of June. While it was over 100 degrees even at 6:00 pm at night and muggy we still had fun tromping around all the ag related vehicles on display. We only ended up watching about 5 minutes of the actual game. But since the tickets included dinner and the kids loved all the stuff around the ball park the couple hours out as a family were well worth it.

Poster for summertime kids!

There was a plethora of big trucks and tractors that we had a hard time pealing Big Boy away from!

He was just a little excited, don't you think? Hey Big Boy, wait for us!

We splurged on a ride on the merry-go-round which was nice since we only had one other kid on there at the same time since everyone else was watching the game.

There was a small petting zoo and 4-H bunnies on display in honor of Ag night. I think if we let them we would have gone home with a bunny. Big Boy really didn't want to give it up and Boopy couldn't stop trying to kiss the poor animal.

On our way out of the stadium we stumbled across the billboard that Papa Vaughn designed for the Air National Guard! Very cool to see it up on display!

Stay tuned for picture catch-up round 2!

Carwash Anyone?

*Warning - semi nude toddler pictures ahead.

I love that the kids are getting more independent these days. They're at an age (4 & 2) where they can play I don't have to hover over them constantly. They can play independently with each other, playing make believe, coloring, bouncing on their bounce balls, you name it.

Well the other night while I was cooking dinner they were playing in the living room. Anyone that's been to our house knows that we have a very open floorplan. So open that the kitchen opens right into the living room and aside from the section where the pantry is you can generally see whats going on. So anyway, I'm cooking and big boy asked if he could wash his cars. He has a toy carwash he likes to play with but instead he wanted to wash his cars in the bathroom sink. The bathroom is also right next to the kitchen and with the door left open I can keep an ear out for whatever is going on in there. No problem, right? Big Boy took a handful of cars and was splashing about happily for quite a while until Boopy decided it looked fun and wanted to join in. not long after she was in there, Big Boy comes out to me and tells me that Boopy is doing a "no-no"!

I walk in to find this: naked Boopy sitting in amongst the cars in the sink. Guess a bath sounded fun or perhaps she making up for the fact that I never bathed her in the traditional baby bathtubs in the sink.

Poor Big Boy was a bit worried about the condition of his cars.

Making herself comfortable.

This is how Big Boy had been playing before his sister took over.