Birthday trip to the zoo

On Saturday morning, we planned to do the Tour de Carmel bike ride. Uncle Kevin even loaded up all the bikes on top of his van for the 3 hour ride south. Because of his efforts, we had the first rain in 6 weeks. It was a pretty worthless rain because all it really did was succeed in stopping us from doing the bike ride and made us move Annalise's birthday party inside. The grass is still dead.

So we decided to load up the crew for a trip down to the zoo. We figured there was enough inside stuff to do and see to keep 5 kids busy and burn off some energy. Plus we have a family pass with 4 kids and 2 guests so it would be free for everyone. Don't ask me how Tessa made it in.

Because of the cool weather, the animals were very active. We watched the ringtailed lemurs leap from branch to branch.

Everyone also had an opportunity to feed a baby giraffe.

Oliver feeds the giraffe

Natalie feeds the giraffe. I like how Evie is leaning back in all of these pictures.

Even Tessa fed the giraffe.

Ok, these pictures are out of order because we were working from 2 cameras. (we hijacked Uncle Kevin's pictures before he left.) 5 goofballs waiting for the Elephant bath show to to start.

We had the chance to pet the Elephant as we left the show, but Tessa didn't want to pet it.

There is a new exhibit about Cheetas. It was neat to see them, but as you can see, Shlee wasn't impressed.

Whoops, this is the start of the Elephant show

Here we are back at the Cheetahs where Tony Stewart challenged us to run faster than a cheetah. Mom tried to distract Tony and Oliver was embarrassed by his Aunt Jenni

Jim and Sweet Baby Tessa wait for the show to start.

And our pretty little birthday girl having a great day.

Annalise's 4th birthday party

Annalise had her first ever "Friends" birthday party on Saturday. She flipped flopped between a farm theme and a fairy theme. She eventually settled on Farm 4 days before the party. It was also at this time I discovered all the different kinds of fairy cakes and party favors available but absolutely no farm stuff. We did ok and it seemed that everyone had a great time.

When everyone arrived, we had craf time which consisted of painting bird houses that looked like barns. Of course, with all the little girls in attendance, we had a lot of pink barns.

They all worked very hard and everyone managed to stay pretty clean and not get paint on their party dresses. Yes, this part of the party took place in the furnace room. The party was supposed to be outside, but the wet morning pushed it inside. Of course, the weather cleared as soon as we had everything set up inside.

The birthday girl blows out her 4 candles! What a big girl. Can't believe how fast this has gone.

Everyone enjoys cupcakes and a scoop of ice cream.

We didn't have enough chairs, so everyone stood around.

Oliver decided that there were too many girls at that party for his taste and ate in the dinning room.

Here's a close up of the cupcakes we decorated to look like cows. We also made sheep cupcakes, but it mostly looked like a pile of marshmallows with eyes.

There were lots of fun presents to open including Hungry Hungry Hippos. The loudest game ever made. Everyone wanted to play.

Thanks to all of our guest who made this a great birthday party!

Not again!

On Thursday, we were doing the rounds in the neighborhood. After we helped out feeding some kitties and picking vegetables for our friends, we walked home. The girls were eager, as always to play with the neighbor girls who they love. The neighbor girls also have a trampoline, which I don't love but reluctantly allowed Evie to play on.

Until now.

After playing for about 15 minutes while I was making dinner, Evie showed up at the door with the neighbor girls' babysitter. She said that Evie had fallen, but didn't think Evie's arm was broken. The way Evie was carrying herself indicated immediately to me that her arm was indeed broken. So I set her up on the couch with an ice pack and finished making dinner because Jim wasn't home yet and there was no way I was taking 2 kids to the ER if I didn't have to. Evie continued to cry and complain about how much her arm hurt, so I stuffed her with some leftover pasta, turned off dinner and left Annalise with the neighbor while we went to the ER.

We were seen right away and Xrays confirmed the break of her humerus bone at the elbow. Then we were given another stern talking to about trampoline use. Evie went to the orthopedic DR on Friday and he said the break was bad enough that she will have to have surgery to have pins inserted so it will heal properly.

On Tuesday morning, she will be at Peyton Manning Children's hospital to get her pins. No word on if #18 will be scrubbing in. The surgery will be outpatient and she will only have to stay if there are complications, but the dr. doesn't foresee any. Any and all prayers, good karma, and happy thoughts would be appreciated this week, especially on Tuesday.

KEEP YOUR KIDS OFF TRAMPOLINES!!!!

Annalise's first day of preschool

Today is Annalise's first day of preschool. She was super excited to go and be with her friends instead of hang out with mom and do boring things like laundry or going to Meijer.

She chose her outfit. A change at the last minute from her favorite multicolored dress.

We decided to ride to school since it was a nice 60 degree morning for a change. Besides, mom couldn't go anywhere fun since she had to come home and wait for the dishwasher repair man. Cleaning bathrooms and dusting. What a great way to start the school year. Almost as good as that massage I had planned before the dishwasher broke.

She rode pretty fast!

And when we got there, I don't even think she said goodbye. Definitely no kisses or hugs. Just straight into school.

Way down in Dixie

We yanked the kiddos out of school last Thursday and headed down to SC on a 575 mile trip to see the Turner family and the newest Turner, Georgiana. It was a long drive through the beautiful Appalachian mountains (which, I think could be my most favorite mountain chain). The kids did great on the way down watching the School House Rock DVD over and over. We arrived at Becky and Brandon's and the fun started.

Aunt Becky heard about this county park in the next county over that had a bunch of waterfalls you could swim under and play in the river (at your own risk, of course). This was the picture perfect falls that were right beside the parking lot.

Uncle Jim rounded up the crew. After a good nose pick, they all set out to check out the falls closer.

Georgie took full advantage of the hot day and slept as long as someone was holding her.

Juner has a bum ankle and didn't want to go far from mom.

The Seibert branch of the family tree.

This park also boasted the longest suspension bridge in the county. I don't think there were any other suspension bridges in that county, but we aren't sure.

It bounced when we walked over it so the kids ran back and forth jumping around.

We made it down to the river where it was really shallow and the kids could play on the rocks. June was a little timid and needed to be close to Mama.

The other three were pretty fearless. They eventually got their suits on and played all over the rocks. If the moms really thought about it, we had visions of chipped teeth and head wounds, but fortunately, no one slipped and fell except for Jim. And he wasn't even wearing a swim suit.

Like a Bob Ross picture. Zoom in and you can see the kids playing in the bubbling brook.

After lunch, the kids played with more rocks on the hillside. Who needs toys when you have rocks?

After a quick nap back at the Turner house, we all oranged up for a trip into Clemson for the "First Friday" parade to celebrate the College football opener. One of my most favorite weekends of the year (although it looks like it is going to be another long one for the Boilers)

All the former sorority ladies were cooing over sweet baby Georgie and her appropriate clothing.

This was our crew waiting for the parade to start. Since we knew we had to wait a while, we stopped at the Sonic for dinner (frito Chili cheese wraps for Uncle Jim!)

We attempted to blend in to the ACC, but we gave ourselves away when we said "Boiler Up". Clemson has a similar meaningless cheer, "All In" so no one really made fun of us.

Finally the parade started. That's a lot of orange.

Clemson is a land grant University so they had an ag entry in the parade.

I don't think they have a mortuary school, so I'm not sure who sponsored this entry. But there are probably Clemson fans who ride to their eternal resting place in this car.

Georgie slept through the whole parade and woke up disappointed that she missed all the cheerleaders and the 4 Miss Clemsons.

Evie rocked her back to sleep. The oldest and the youngest Grandchildren.

On Saturday, during the pitiful Purdue game, I constructed this net for Aunt Becky to pose Georgie in for newborn pictures. The problem was that we tried to put her in it while she was sleeping, but she woke up. And none too happy about being hoisted like a bunch of tuna out of the ocean. We still think this is awfully cute and are scheming of other ways to embarrass her. I think she may have to sit in a flower pot with petals around her head for her 6 month pictures at Christmastime.

On Sunday, Jim took the kids to a park while Becky and I rearranged furniture and figured out where to hang pictures on the wall (and cuddled Georgie).

Juner moved around pretty well, but was bummed when she couldn't keep up with the big kids.

There was lots of jumping. Notice the tie dye theme. They formed a band earlier in the day and these were their "matching " outfits.

Not sure who thought of this idea, but it doesn't look like a good one.

A bunch of goofy kids.

Later, we had a mini birthday party for Annalise and Aunt Becky gave her a fairy doll. She has been playing with it ever since we came home.

Our trip home was good. We stopped 5 times and made it in about 10 hours. It was fun to see the Turners (even uncle Bran who only showed up for the last 6 hours because he was at a conference). Now it's back to work, school, and mom's mega volunteer schedule. No vacations for those kids until Thanksgiving.

The Big Red Deck

It's that time of the year again. The time that we dread almost as much as the annual spreading of the mulch. Deck maintenance time. Sometimes, we can get by with a power wash and touch up. Last year, we painted all the railings. Unfortunately, the sun did a number on the deck this summer and it needed painted. All 1000 square feet of it. The painting is not so bad, it's the prep that will kill you. We likened it to childbirth.

First, the anticipation. You know you have to go through the birth. It's going to hurt and people will cuss. But you also have an ideal of how easy it will be and the problems that other people have will never happen to you because you are so well prepared, and in our case, have been through it a couple of times before.

It even starts out as a family affair. It's cute to have the kids involved in something that will drastically (??) change their lives.

But then the heavy contractions start and you know what is coming. In our case, the heavy contractions were renting a floor sander and sanding the entire surface. It went ok with the exception of hitting a couple of screw heads and ripping the sand paper on the sander.

Just when you think the end is in sight, the Labor stalls. Or in this case, the Labor increases. After we sanded the deck, Jim power washed it which loosened up a bunch more paint. The only way to really get rid of it was to scrape the deck on our hands and knees with wire brushes. It wasn't too bad, it was only 93 degrees in the direct sun. Yuck. I think I would have rather went through childbirth again.

During this time we all but completely ignored the children. We let them take some pictures of us working.

Evie kept us hydrated with water bottles and we listened to some rocking good music on the Ipod to keep our spirits up. Again, kind of like having a baby. In this picture, Jim is standing around while I do the work. Definitely like having a baby.

And finally, the "pushing" of the roller begins. All the hard work and anticipation leads up to this.

I believe I wore this same expression while giving birth to our daughters.

And a red deck is born. Unlike a baby though, we shut the door to the deck and will be ignoring it from now on. And we don't have to pay for college or get up 5 times a night. We are taking suggestions for a name of our newest baby. We will be having a Red Deck Naming party on Sept 18th in the afternoon. Stop by if you are around and place your vote on the names.