Crazy Ideas

So I'm going to be the first to admit that I am very stubborn.  When I get an idea in my head it is going to happen no matter how difficult and un-fun the journey may be.  I think this is a positive quality.  And I also think it is a negative one. This past week has been full of ambitious plans and I am VERY tired for it, but I also am happy with the fun memories we have made.  (I have already pushed the un-fun memories out of my brain so that the next time I make ambitious plans I will be confident that everything will go perfectly smooth).

We went tenting this past weekend with our old friends, the Audettes.  Our parents have been friends forever and us kids grew up together.  Its so fun to watch our kids play together now!  It was a TON of work preparing for this and not so easy getting kids to sleep/nap in a tent, but that's all behind us now.  We had FUN.

Gotta love the food when you're camping!

5 out of 7 kids!

Sunny starting to look she's really roughin' it

Griffin and his little love, Talyah

Teddy was really roughin' it!

Gibby crawling in and out of the tent

Last picture of the trip... not a very good group shot considering there were 22 of us... but we were all ready to go home!

We got home late afternoon on Monday from camping. Troy and I wished eachother a happy 7th wedding anniversary that evening and headed to bed early. Then we had a playdate Tuesday. I had a girls night Tuesday night. Then a playdate Wednesday followed by 5 hours at the local fair grounds. I baked muffins at 10pm so that we'd have breakfast to bring to the parade this morning which started at 9am.  The kids are napping now and I am going to go do some packing because tomorrow we are headed to Calgary... where we will be participating in a walk for multiple myeloma saturday morning in support of my Uncle Terry.  And finally, Sunday we will travel to Shaunavon to celebrate Troy's grandpa's 104th birthday. I'm sure it'll all go smoothly, right?! 

I was feeling overwhelmed when I started writing this post, but now I am feeling very lucky.  So lucky to experience so much with my family. 

Sandbox Fun

I feel like it's been busier than usual around here lately.  I also feel like the kids are fighting, whining, and crying more lately.  I will chalk it up to some molars/eye teeth arriving and possibly some hormonal imbalance on my part... oh and did I mention we are preparing for a camping trip this weekend?  Ya, maybe I'm nervous about sharing a tent with my family?! That should be an interesting post next week.

Anyways, here's a little idea of how the week has gone.  Do you see Fletcher's scalp??  Yep, that's sand.  A whole lotta sand!  Griffin poured a bunch on his head cause "he liked it, mommy".  And Fletcher being the big sweaty guy that he is, the sand kinda melted to his scalp or something cause it was really tough to get out!

Our BIG TRIP

Last summer Troy and I were feeling a little depressed that we were so home-bound with all our little babies... so we booked a lake-front cabin down in Sandpoint Idaho for the next summer so that we had something to look forward to.  Well, we just returned home this past saturday night from our week long vacation and it was soooo much fun!  We went with a great group of friends and the kids were superstar travellers.  Thanks goodness!  I may have had an issue with map reading and added an additional THREE hours to our 8 hour trip... we left at 9am and arrived at the cabin at 9pm... and the kids only slept for one hour of that entire trip.  Pretty amazing that nobody lost their mind... well, maybe Daddy did a tiny bit lol!  I have this one shot of Natalie and I and all the kids, but unfortunately my camera is having some issues so I really don't have any good pictures.  I'm hoping Candice and Tara will share some of their's with me!

Thanks guys for braving a trip with us and all our kids... we're so lucky to have patient, loving friends!!