To the Beach!

This is our favorite place to hang out in the summer! The beach is an easy walk from the house and we have fun building sandcastles, playing in the lake and riding the kayaks and paddle boats! And, of course, cooling down with Popsicles! It is always even better when Daddy can come too!

The Ladies are Growing!

'The Ladies' (aka. our chickens) are growing up fast! They have almost doubled in size and are pretty fun! Victoria has been doing a great job looking after them. I made a mistake, however... The strawberry patch is right next to their enclosure and whenever I was picking strawberries and came across one with a worm hole I threw it to the chickens. I have effectively conditioned them to LOVE strawberries. So, now they run for the strawberry patch every time they are let out-as you can see from the little chicken bum sticking out from the strawberries. Grrrrrr!

The Doodlebops!

Here we are watching the Doodlebops at the Calgary Stampede! The girls did not seem to really believe that they were really seeing the Doodlebops live. Oma took them to the very front of the stage (see Naomi there in red right by 'Moe'?) and they enjoyed that!

I know that I have really entered Motherhood when the only concert I have gone to in the past 4 years is the Doodlebops (I knew all the words, sang along, and even did all the actions! Crazy!)

The Stampede

Yes, I am crazy! I took my kids to the Stampede this year- thank goodness my Mom came along to help; what a zoo! (I have not been since Victoria was inutero). We visited the agriculture building and saw the miniature horses (did you know they have miniature horse jumping ??!! Well, they do and we watched it!). We also saw goats, Llamas, Alpacas, many varieties of horses, cows, pigs and even chickens! The kids loved it (and I loved it because it was free). We went to go on some kiddy rides, but at $4-$5 per ride per kid we opted for some ice cream and MINI DONUTS!! There is a Stampede staple!

Victoria loved to see all the games and midway rides (almost as much as she enjoyed all the treats!) and thought milking the pretend cow was great! Naomi just sat back and took it all in. Olivia, of course, wanted to get out of the stroller and climb on everything! We finally found a play tunnel and she went back and forth through that over and over again!

To the Woodruffs!!

Here's to the Woodruffs! We were thinking of you last night when we were eating ice cream with our garden strawberries (in my opinion you cannot get anything better than that anywhere!!). We had to toast you!

By the way, I have found the BEST ice cream (called 'Extreme Moose Tracks') and we will have to indulge in a carton when you come to visit this summer!!

The first harvest

These strawberries are from our garden!! We have had an amazing strawberry harvest so far this year- we have already picked about 4-5 pounds of strawberries!! They are amazingly sweet and delicious. They make the ones in the stores taste very watered down. It seems as if we have about a 1/2 pound ripen every day! Yummmmmmm.

Soccer

This was Victoria's second year in U-6 soccer. Daddy was her coach and their team was the 'Black Jets'! She was much better this year at getting to the ball and being aggressive. She went for passes (even if they were only two feet from her teammate!) and, most importantly, had fun each and every time she played! Naomi and Olivia loved to go and watch her play!

Mud Bogging!

Who would have thought that watching mud bogging would be so much fun??!! Part of the Canada Day celebrations in Rosemary was 'mud bogging', and I thought to myself: you just cannot get more red-neck than that! Better go watch because this will probably be my one and only opportunity!

The local farmer had dug a trench in his field about 20 ft across and 150 ft long, filled it with water and then dumped the dirt back in. The trucks were lined up to try and make it across. Some looked like they were just regular street vehicles, and others had modifications to be REAL mud bogging machines (exhaust pipes over the flatbed, etc.). Most of them had big tires. Only one guy made it across! A tractor pulled everyone else out!

Canada Day Parade

Here we are in Rosemary, Alberta celebrating Canada Day! (James' brother lives here and the population is about 350, so it was Rural Alberta at its best!!). It was perfect for the kids and they had a great time! The parade was great and had lots of horses, tractors and even some Llamas!