Basketball Camp

Henry had a great week attending a basketball day camp with his friend, Caleb. He was there from 9am until 4 pm each day which is his longest camp experience so far. He had a blast and gained alot of new skills as well as confidence on the court. Here is a picture of him as we got home today in his new camp t shirt. The camp also gave out basketballs to all the campers which was a fun surprise.

6 Flags

It wouldn't be summer without the much anticipated trip to 6 Flags. The boys both won tickets to 6 Flags through a reading program at school. Last week we decided to leave Meghan with a friend and head out.

There was so much fun had that it is hard to summarize it. I am not even sure what the boys liked the best. It was either...... driving the Antique cars or riding on the Boomtown Depot train..... getting soaked (2 times!) on the Roaring Rapids water ride or speeding around on the Looney Tunes roller coaster...... drinking the the unlimited cokes or eating the pizza dinner..... seeing Sylvester or Bugs Bunny..... spinning around on the Tea Cups or floating through Yosemite Sam's Gold River Adventure..... winning prizes on the Midway games or riding the Batwing...... snacking on the Snickers ice cream bars or cooling off in the spray showers........ Henry and Eric would tell you for sure it was NOT Runaway Mountain (the indoor roller coaster that is pitch dark). Anyway, hard to say what was the best but the whole day was SO MUCH FUN we are still smiling.

PS Also note in these pictures that Owen is showing off his most recent lost tooth!

Ice Cream

We recently traded in our old ice cream maker for a new one. We hardly ever used the old one because of the mess of the ice and the salt as well as the noise. The new one does not require ice and salt and is a little quieter. You can see from the attached picture that Meghan and Henry like to watch it spin. It takes about 20 minutes and tastes great!!

The 4th

We spent the morning of the 4th of July swimming in the neighborhood pool with Uncle Bret. The kids enjoyed having another adult in the pool to swim with and I enjoyed not having to be in the pool the entire time.

Also attached are a few fireworks pictures from that evening. After the fireworks we said goodbye to Bret, Brooke and Elizabeth and went back to our hotel for our last night. Monday morning we slept in a little and then hit the road. The trip home was relatively easy. The boys did not lift their heads from their Leapsters. Meghan and Eric played together most of the way while I drove. We arrived home around 7pm and were very glad to sleep in our own beds that night.

Eric and Meghan

Here is a great sequence of pictures of Eric and Meghan at the Cahaba River on Saturday morning. There were too many of them to include them on the previous post but they are from that same time at the river.

Does this girl love her daddy or what!? and i think he may be a little crazy for her too... enjoy!

Downtown Helena

On Saturday morning we went downtown Helena to check out their farmer's market. It is not a very big town or farmer's market so that did not take long. Our only purchase was 2 bottles of Gatorade.

We ended up spending quite a while in the river that runs through downtown and is located near the park with the farmer's market. The kids had fun throwing rocks and wading in the water. We all got wet and dirty but the memory is totally worth the little time we had to spend cleaning up.

Henry is seen here enjoying his recently purchased Gatorade as well as trying to hit a barrel that is stuck in the river with a log. He and the little boy in the picture were fast friends and enjoyed trying to move this barrel. They were unsuccessful.

Meeting Elizabeth

Here are a few pictures of our new cousin, Elizabeth, in Birmingham. She is almost 6 months old and is so cute. The kids enjoyed playing peek-a-boo and snorting at her to make her laugh. She has red hair and blue eyes and is so beautiful. My favorite picture is the one of her with Eric where she is not too sure about him.... that Uncle Eric can be a pretty scary guy!

Oak Mountain State Park

We spent the first day of our trip to Birmingham at Oak Mountain State Park, a park located not far from our hotel near Bret and Brooke's home. We took a picnic lunch and played on a small beach on a lake within the park. The weather and the temperature of the lake were perfect for a long day of lounging in the water, building sand castles and trying to catch fish in a bucket. The boys enjoyed putting sand on their heads. After driving 10 hours the day before, it was great to be outside. Enjoy the pictures.