jell{oh}my

this little bit of heaven i read on a blog somewhere

{sorry if it was your idea, please let me know and i'll link you to it}

my neighbor made something very similar in a casserol dish for my birthday.

it's awesome.

while camping we had s'mores, cookies, popcorn, and licorice.

however, i made each kiddo one of these beauties.

 it took a while to make as you have to wait for the color to settle

before you can pour the next color on top.

i would say a day, but that sounds crazy

{although i think it really is a day to make}

{i l.o.v.e. little bear's face in this picture. i believe this was the last night of camping}

 

it would be really good with whip cream on top.

maybe some sprinkles {cause everything is good with sprinkles}

it was a lot of jello for a kid.

i think they each had a few bites before they were full.

however,

making these still keeps me in the running for

"mother of the year"

{at least in my eyes}

adoption

we have 3 little boys and a pet is not something i am interested in dealing with.

a few weeks ago while out watering and harvesting the garden,

this little man came out of our squash and has been attached to our feet ever since.

he walked into the house like he owned the place and has made himself comfortable.

the boys named him marbles

and after a week of making sure nobody was looking for him,

he became ours.

best part is he's 100% potty trained.  he lets us know when he wants to go outside

and has not used the house once for his personal restroom. {what could be better}

he is wonderful with the kids

monkey is always making sure he knows where marbles is at.

they are all very adorable together.

so we've been adopted

and it was a wonderful decision on all parts.

just another{random}monday

 football...work...therapy...clean house...laundry...groceries...garening...

that pretty much sums up what we have been doing

these last few weeks.

the boys and i took an afternoon to get out of the house

and went down to a local middle school to pick blackberries.

they had such a blast....who knew?

i made a blackberry pie {oh even yesser}

and have enough blackberries to can some jam.

they grow like crazy around here so we have a couple more

good months of berry picking.

for free...why not?

we got to sit on this baby for an evening.

he's our most favorite alden in the whole world!

{sorry about the blurry pic, but he's darn cute!}

jack was trying to teach alden

how to climb up the stairs to get in.

as if he didn't know.

adorable.

and he sure loves his "memmitt"

kept giving him hugs the whole evening.

the garden is doing pretty amazing.

this is what we pick off the garden weekly.

we canned our first batch of salsa this weekend.

epic! 

 little bear is doing great.

enjoying his summertime

swimming, eating, playing

and doing it all again the next day.

we've been able to go across the street to our sweet neighbor's house and swim

needless to say, a pool may be in our near-er future.

 we've been celebrating a few birthdays.

this was shay's 4th birthday on the river.

such a blast, we need to go down there more often.

emmett got to go on a jet-ski ride.

{yeah, a boat might be in our future also}

they have such a wonderful little cove the kids can play in

out of the current, away from the boats.

 for having such a huge fear of the river in the past few years

little bear only took about 5 minutes to warm up to the idea

before he was in, and you couldn't get him out.

even when the boats drove by.

he stopped to watch, then it was back to playing.

{so proud}

 yeah....

it didn't suck!

 handsome monkey

isn't he?

 monkey fell asleep in the shower

{ever happen to you?}

 there's something down right adorable

about baby butts

am i right?

emmett has been in football all month and is loving it.

their jamboree is coming up this saturday and then the season is on.

we have 2 weeks left of summer

before these monsters go back to school.

{yyyyiiiiiiiippppppppeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!}

i can't believe the summer is almost over.

for enjoying a summer stay-cation,

time sure did fly by.

happy monday!

family{♥}

minus one of my littles...

these boys are my everything ♥

we do this alot.

marshmallows and graham crackers.

giggles and snuggles.

 little bear has a constellation book

and a telescope

so we did a little star gazing together.

 snuggled by the fire

nestled in between mom and dad

these 2 felt safe and fell asleep.

 we are going to try our hand at harvesting sunflower seeds.

i love how giant sunflowers are.

i could fill my whole yard with them.

 you see that?

it's broccoli, can you believe it.

i'm actually growing broccoli!

 we did our first actual harvest this weekend.

so many onions that needed to be pulled

zucchini squash that was bigger than my leg.

cucumbers taking over their garden box.

green beans and peppers,

and our tomatos are starting to ripen.

{seriously, we think we have about 500 pounds of tomatos

and once they start turning red...it's on!}

 dinners are starting to look like this.

{♥}

i love when dinners are free.

just add a little chicken or steak and we're set.

our staycation summer is still

epic

even though we are pretty much doing the same thing every weekend

sitting pool side

harvesting the garden

a little cleaning here and there

we're saving money which was our goal

and just enjoying eachother's company.

♥♥♥♥♥



random{tuesday}

 it's august already.

i can't believe it.

we are just now getting summer weather

and it is heaven!

 monkey is the only one who will sit still long enough for a picture.

so i hope you enjoy all of him this post.

 we had a hulahoop contest at my sis-in-laws the other night.

hubby somebody got some very unflattering pics of my back side

as i tried to beat my niece.

{she's awesome. she won. she's 7.}

i'm loving the 60's vintage editing choice on picnik.

it reminds me of what all my pictures look like in my baby book.

 we are elbow deep in football.

a schedule that consists of practice tuesday - friday 6-8 p.m.

{i know...whuck???}

peanut is the Grants Pass Raiders.

he's not happy about it, but i am glowing!

finally my family has to cheer for my favorite team!

he's gonna rock it no matter what team he is on!

remember this picture?

our garden in the beginning of july.

 well august is here and this is what we look like now.

everything is blooming and overflowing with the fruits of our labor {literally}

in the next couple weeks we will hopefully begin harvesting

and then it's on.

 what's in our garden you ask???  well....

pumpkins; corn; sunflowers; strawberries; 4 different kinds of peppers; cilantro; 13 tomato plants; cucumbers; green beans; carrots; 3 different kinds of lettuce; spaghetti squash; zucchini; snap peas; onions; oragano; basil; chocolate mint; and regular mint.

we may have had a small clogging incident that resulted in 2 trips to the hardware store for plumbing snakes {regular size and then industrial size}

hubby working on it every night after work for a week

the boys all using my bathroom {ick!}

and ended in defeat when hubby had to take the toilet completely out of the bathroom

only to find a foam D and a 2 causing the problem.

{boys....am i right?}

♥ hello best friends ♥

 and monkey again,

if you haven't gotten sick of his pics.

that's it.

back to reality after momma and nephew left.

work, swimming, laundry, cooking, work, cleaning, swimming, football, therapy...

i know sleep is supposed to go in there somewhere, right?

august is here

which means only 5 more weeks of summer to enjoy

before school starts.
yikes!!!

pictures worth {1000} words

my mom and nephew, austin, came to visit from nevada.

we had the best week together!

we canned strawberry jam with the new canner my grandparents got me

for my birthday {thank you, thank you, thank you, love it!}

we drank wine

colored eachother's hair

and i got hubby to put my feathers back in.

my nephew is a critter kind of kid

so everywhere we went,

we had to take some time to do a little digging.

 the neighborhood boys had an exciting game of football

hubby even got to relive some of his highschool football days

it was an epic game!

 we went to the coast for a night

to celebrate my turning the big 32!

 it was the most amazing time at the coast

i wish we could have stayed longer

the weather could not have been better!

our hotel was right on the beach

we ate dinner right across the street.

and afterwards we put the kiddos to bed with grandma

and hubby and i got a sunset beach date.

we've decided that we want to live on the ocean.

{it could happen}

 the next day we had breakfast and came home

celebrated our little buddy alden's 2nd birthday

and then had a huge bbq for my birthday, again.

{yeah, my birthday lasted about 4 days, it was awesome}

and as if that wasn't enough

in between all that fun and excitement

we shopped till we dropped {literally}

took the kids to see cars 2

dined out multiple times

basked in the sun

mom read an entire book

we got pedicures

and did i mention we ate...cause we did...alot.

it was the best birthday week a girl could ask for.

thanks momma and austin for coming to visit!

until next year...