Faceplant

Peter Meets the Sidewalk

Poor Boy!

Camping

Well, it has been a while. Life has taken us for a crazy ride lately-house projects, church callings, two mobile and mischievous children, etc. I have finally decided that our crazy new life is the new normal, so I had better get use to being busier.

We were able to go camping last weekend with my friend Shauna and her family. Shauna and I were roommates in college and now we usually talk on the phone at least once a week, so it was nice to actually talk with her in person.

We went to Mother Neff State Park to camp. It is the first official state park of Texas. A Texas governor, Mr. Neff (forgot his first name), set aside some of his family's property and named the park after his very influential mother. Here are some pictures of our fun:

There was a local watch dog that kept getting distracted from her job. The campers were just too much fun for her to pass up-especially the kids. Her name is Shelby, and the kids just loved playing with her. We had to send her home several times.

Of coarse, camping is not complete without a messy s'more.

We hiked a short way to this little alcove. There were some skeletal remains found here and it is believed to have previously been an Indian burial area.

Trevor, Shauna, Clara, and Moriah

"Get me out of this thing and let me crawl around and eat dirt and bugs, Mom!!!" Rigby was done with this carrier by the end of two days and so was I!

So, I gave him a little crawling break inside the tent.

Peter LOVED camping. It was like his dream come true-playing outside all day in the dirt, special treats, family sleepover in the tent, fun bugs to watch-the kid was in heaven. The only issue we had with him is that he streaked through camp while we were trying to load up and leave. He has this habit of not making it to the bathroom for number two, so we are ALWAYS cleaning it up. There were only port-a-potties and we had already taken down the tent, so we had to take care business out in the open (no worries everybody had already left for the day- except us). In the midst of the wipe-down, he takes off running after Shelby with nothing on but a shirt. Shauna and I were laughing so hard that we could barely chase after him. Of coarse, a car had to drive by as he was running around half naked. I wonder what they thought?

We have the camping bug now and are already trying to plan when we can go again.

My Life Just Got Crazier . . .

. . . because this cute little stinker . . .

. . . has just learned how to crawl, . . . and this cute big stinker . . .

. . . is being potty trained (we hope).

Rigby started with an army crawl, but that only lasted for a week. He is much more proficient now. In fact, today he almost crawled right through a little pee puddle that Peter left at the base of the stairs. Oh, potty training. How am I ever going to survive this adventure?!


Another unfortunate result of crawling is that the "Ninja Spitter" (as Scott's family affectionately calls Rigby) is recoloring my carpet with his spit up. Every time I walk into a room, I see new orange spots, and I am always stepping in little orange puddles on the tile. I really hope his digestive system gets it's act together soon! He is such a happy baby and so cute that I can never be upset with him for more than a few moments though.

Let's see, what else is going on?

Oh, our electricity went out for 9 hours the other night, so for dinner we had to warm up canned soup on our backpacking stove. It felt nice to be prepared. Scott has that silly look on his face because he was trying to get Peter to smile.

And this picture made me laugh. I found George like this the other day. I wonder what he did to deserve this?

One last story that happened about a month ago. Peter is fascinated by the garage door. When I was opening it the other day, he grabbed onto the ascending garage door until he was hanging 8 feet above the ground. I was in shock because I thought for sure the door would have stopped with the extra 30 pounds hanging off it, and I thought he would have let go before getting that high up. His screaming brought me out of my daze, and I ran over to help him down. I think he learned his lesson though, because now he keeps his distance when the garage door is going up!

Family Pictures - South Carolina, August 2010

We were able to get some updated family pictures during our beach trip. Don't mind the labeling, it is for family history purposes.

Doug & Kristine Flamm Family

Back to Front: Ryan, Lindsey, Daniel, Jason, Melissa, Eric, Kristine, Doug, Rachel, Rigby, Peter, Scott, Kathryn, Stephen, Gabriel, Fatima


Doug & Kristine with their four grandsons. Quite the armful!
Kristine, Rigby, Daniel
Doug, Gabriel, Peter


5 Generation Picture
From the Kid's Point of View: Great Grandpa Freeman, Great Grandma Freeman, Great-Great Grandma Peterson, Jason, Daniel, Kristine, Rigby, Peter, Scott, Stephen, Gabriel


Girl's Night Out

Kathryn, Rachel, Kristine, Lindsey, Melissa

All of these babies are grandchildren or great-grandchildren to Ralph & Claudia (Scott's Grandparents) and were born within a six month time span. Getting a good picture of ALL these babies was a challenge to say the least.

Rigby (6M), Daniel (9M), Levi (1 yr), Caroline (1 yr), Gabriel (6M), Sawyer (7M), Rawlin (5M)

Our Family Picture

Rachel, Rigby, Scott, Peter

The Beach 2010

Scottie's family has a reunion near Myrtle Beach every summer. So, armed with a bink for the baby, a DVD player for the toddler, and caffeine loaded Mountain Dew for the adults, we began our 20 hour car ride to South Carolina. And guess what? It went GREAT! Now, twenty hours in the car is still no picnic; but when the kids hardly cry, the weather is good, and the car does not break down, I consider it a success to be happy about.

Here are just some of fun things we did:

HANGING OUT WITH THE FAMILY

Here is one, of the many, late night sessions of "BANG (great game by the way)." Starting at the bottom: Lindsey, Jason, Rachel, Scott, Kathryn, Eric, Sam, and Lindsey.

Peter, Rigby, and I enjoying the condo pool. Well, Peter was actually extremely terrified of the water, so we bought floats and practiced having him swim back and forth to different people. By the end, he was doing MUCH better.

Peter swimming with Gramper Flamm.

Ryan, Peter, and Rigby relaxing at the condo.

Brothers bonding over video games.
Eric, Scott, and Stephen

Daniel and Rigby playing with a clothes basket. This age is great because anything can be a toy.

Here is Peter trying on hot pink ear plugs.

Peter and Kathryn glued to the computer.

Rigby, Stephen, and Gabriel

You cannot tell when you look at them, but Rigby and Gabriel are only six days apart!

Great-Grandpa Freeman and Peter
Rigby and Melissa hanging out at the Freeman Family Reunion (Scott's Grandfather's family).

THE BEACH

Scott, Rigby, Lindsey, Jason, and Daniel hanging out under the beach umbrella.

Peter throwing a tantrum at the beach. Oh, ya gotta love two year olds.

Rigby mostly just hung out in his stroller while we played at the beach.
Scott, Rigby, and Peter
The kids really did love the beach; they just do not love picture time.

Lindsey, Jason, and Daniel

(Scottie's brother and his family)

Daniel (9 months) is a little fish. It was so cute to see him crawl off into the ocean-supervised, of course!

Gabriel and Rigby looking cool in their sunglasses and hats.

Peter LOVED playing in the sand. Here he is dumping sand on Eric.

Peter usually screamed when we first drug him out into the waves, but after a little while, he started to enjoy them.

Peter had a blast. With so many people around, there was plenty of soda and treats sitting around for him to swipe. Rigby had so much entertainment to keep him happy as well. It was crazy having 16 people (3 of which were babies) in a condo with one bedroom and a loft, but it actually worked out quite well. We were at the condo for seven days, and the babies and Peter pretty much slept through every night.

The 20 hour car ride back went okay. We had no major problems, but a lot of minor ones. We ran into a lot of traffic and it rained fairly hard for half the trip. Also, both Scott and I were suffering from sleep deprivation and head colds. Thankfully it will be a while before we attempt another car ride like this one. At least I hope so.

P.S. This climbing vine, originally from Japan/China, is everywhere in the South. It is called Kudzu or "mile-a-minute vine," among other names. I love how it just blankets the plants; unfortunately, the plants are eventually choked to death. It looks really neat though, huh?

Food

Food must taste really terrible at our house.

Peter refuses to eat it . . .

. . . and Rigby has resorted to eating socks.

Summer Projects

As I was reading through old posts the other day, I realized that I hardly ever mention anything about what Scott and I are up to unless it is a family outing/vacation. Of coarse, we are not nearly as cute, interesting or photogenic as Rigby and Peter; but if this is going to be a sort of family history, then I had better start recording a little bit more about Scottie and I.

It is no secret that I STRONGLY dislike cooking. The past few weeks I have had a goal to cook more consistently and try a few new recipes. I found a recipe for chicken pot pies, and they turned out so well that I had to take a picture. Now, they do not look as good as Marie Calendar's Pies, but she was not taking care of a 2 year old and a baby while making them! I'm pretty proud of myself if you can't tell.


I have also been making a felt book (a.k.a. a quiet book) for the kids to use at church. It took way too much time and effort to make, but Peter loves it. So, here are pictures of some of my favorite pages to document what it looks like before the kids destroy it sometime in the future.

Barnyard Animal Finger Puppets

Mr. Potato Head (his parts velcro on)

Flower Buttons

Picnic Basket with Food and Table Cloth

Road Mat and Pockets for Cars

Shapes and Colors

Scottie has been wonderful to paint lately. We have had a couple of painting sessions until 3 am because that is the only time we can paint without help from Peter and Rigby. I will put up more pictures of it later, but here is a look at how high up we had to paint in the entry way.

We had some wood rot around the garage door, so Scottie has been able to practice using his router and miter saw to fix it. In the process we found what we think are some old snake eggs. I suspect it was only a rat snake (small and not aggressive) because we chased one away right before we moved in. Since we live next to the levy we experience an extra dose of snakes, bugs, birds, etc.