What we've been up to

It's been a while since I updated, partly due to the fact that we were using a different camera that Tom bought & I didn't know how to get the picture off it to the computer. Plus, we've been busy as usual.

Tom had vacation after the 4th of July, so we all went to the zoo one day. For those of you that know Tom & I very well, this was more for the sake of the girls since we're not real big zoo people. Anyways, we rode the train for the 1st time ever (at least I don't think we've ever ridden it):
Camden checking out the goats:

We also got word on the 4th that Tom's grandma (his dad's mom) had passed away. So, we headed to Lima the following Tuesday for the funeral on Wednesday. Now, as most of you know, Tom has a reputation for getting flat tires. You all know that, right?? Well, we had to pick up his brother Jim & his son Dakota from the Ft. Wayne airport & bring them to Lima , too. We were chatting away & catching up on stuff since we haven't seen his brother in 2 years, when all of a sudden we hear this loud sound coming from outside the van. Tom said it was a flat tire, and we thought he was kidding! Nope! He wasn't kidding! So we pull over & start unloading the van which was packed pretty full since we were going to be gone the rest of the week, plus we had the jet ski behind us for a trip to the lake. Now mind you Tom was dressed in his suit pants & dress shirt for the viewing, I had capris & a dress shirt on, and Jim was just in jeans & shirt. So, we all 3 get out, and between the 3 of us, manage to get the spare tire out (neither of the guys knew how to get it out), and change the flat. BUT, the funniest part of all was that Tom's sister Julie was coming from Chicago, and comes along the same route. So, as we were finishing up the whole deal, she drove right past us, honked her horn & was on her way!!! And don't you know that when she went past, it was ME who was working on tightening the lug nuts as the guys stood around watching me, so she thought I was the one who changed the tire while the guys stood around. So when we did finally get to the funeral home she had told everyone that I changed the tire while the guys watched! It was pretty funny.

With all that said, this picture of Camden & Josie (Julie's little girl) was taken after the funeral while we were waiting for everyone to finish eating lunch:

And lastly, we spent 2 days at the lake down by Cincinnati. Here's a picture of Josie & Camden again wearing their life jackets, which neither of them liked. We had just gone on a boat ride & they had both taken naps & wanted desperately to get the jackets off:

One last pic of Camden in his life jacket:
The girls had a blast playing with their cousins in the sand, and Mackenzie even went water skiing again on Friday. She hasn't lost the knack since last year! There's one more funny story to tell about getting caught in a hail storm on Friday, but I think you had to be there to really find it funny, so I'll just leave it as "we got caught in a ridiculous hail storm"! And with that, I'll bring this long post to an end. Until next time...

Camden's latest accomplishments

Camden finally learned to roll from his back to his stomach, but alas, he has also learned to just sleep on his back as well since I refuse to continually get up in the night to "fight" with him to go back to sleep on his stomach.

We also started a little bit of cereal last night...he did pretty well. Didn't eat too much, but at least he didn't spit it out!

The wedding

And lastly, here's a quick pic from the wedding we went to near Pittsburgh, PA! This is Scott & Sue whom we met on our last cruise. They were so fun to hang out with! Sue even found a babysitter for us while in the midst of planning everything else for her wedding, so the girls didn't have to go. We took Camden & he was actually really good! He was quiet, smiley, and even took a nap during the reception while we ate!

Mini-vacation

This past week we had VBS (Vacation Bible School) at our church. The girls both LOVED it. On Thursday morning, though, we left for Pennsylvania. Some friends that we met on our cruise this last time, Scott & Sue, were getting married on Saturday, so we went a couple days early & stopped in Eria, PA at Splash Lagoon indoor water park. We had a fun time & Mackenzie really learned to love all the water slides! She wasn't afraid of any of them by the time we were done. There's only 1 that she didn't get to ride cuz I didn't feel like she was a good enough swimmer. Jenna was probably the funniest. She was scared of everything at first until we literally MADE her try things, then she realized how fun they were & thought she was big stuff doing the kid's slides by herself. Camden enjoyed the water, too, although he spent most of his time in the stroller chewing on toys or sleeping :)

In the kid's hot tub (which is really a "lukewarm" tub):

Jenna coming down the big red slide (more about this experience later...):
Kenzie coming out of the Black Hole water slide. The entire slide is enclosed so you can't see a thing coming down, but she loved it!
And now for a couple videos of Jenna. She was absolutely petrified of going down the big red slide, so I took her up, talked real sweet to her, and then when it was her turn acted like I was gonna go down with her (only 1 person is allowed at a time), then gave her a quick shove & away she went! It was pretty funny! Tom was at the bottom, and this first video is what she did when she got to the bottom.

And then I decided to take a video from the top of her riding all the way down. This one's a little tougher to see, but if you watch closely, she gets turned backwards on her way down. I thought for sure she'd freak out, but Tom said she came out laughing at the bottom. Needless to say, after a couple trips, she liked the ride & actually asked to ride it instead of us making her ride it!!

Company picnic

After a sleepless night Saturday night, we left straight from the camping trip to go to a company picnic. Tom's parents met us there and we spent the afternoon eating, riding rides, doing go-carts, playing mini golf, and playing in the arcade. Actually, we met Tom's parents there, then I dropped Tom & the kids off while I went home, took a hot shower, put clean clothes on, and took a much needed break by myself (those of you that know me, know I NEED my sleep, otherwise I am miserable to be around, so w/very little sleep the night before, I'm sure they were glad I didn't stick around), then headed back to the park & enjoyed the day with the family. Here's a couple pictures from our day:
(Tom's mom and Mackenzie are in the white car, and Jenna & Tom are in the orange car behind them)

Jenna loved this ride, the Frog Hopper, so Tom rode it with her. I just thought he looked so funny on a kid's ride:

Camping

Last weekend we went on a camping trip with a big group from our church. The girls had a blast playing with friends & riding bikes a TON! We got to use our new tent, and the weather wasn't too bad. It sprinkled a couple times Saturday and we had a slight drizzle Sunday morning, but it wasn't too HOT or too cold.



A few highlights from the weekend were jiffy popcorn which Tom still hasn't learned how to make over a campfire as you'll see from the picture below: (if you can't read it, the one on the left is what I made, the one on the right is what Tom made)

And getting ready to go was an ordeal in & of itself. The van was packed FULL with not a square inch to spare! And we didn't even have to really take much food! We never would have made it if we'd had to take food. There was barely room in the back seat for Jenna & the seat next to her & the entire floor were packed full of stuff. And Tom wonders why I don't enjoy going camping all the time :)

The worst part of the weekend was that Camden decided he didn't want to sleep Saturday night! Since we were in a tent we (actually I should say "I") couldn't let him just cry it out because I didn't want to keep all our "neighbors" up. Tom couldn't have cared less about them, but anyways, Camden didn't go to sleep until probably close to 11 p.m. to begin with, then woke up at 2:15 crying. I let him cry a little bit, but he didn't want to settle down, so I got up & walked up & down the road by our tent for about 20 minutes until he went back to sleep. Then he was back up at 3:50 crying again! This time he didn't want to go back to sleep....so I walked with him for almost 45 minutes around the campground. Finally I decided to try to feed him & see if that would put him to sleep. Nope! He wasn't crying when I help him, just didn't want to sleep. So, I put him back in the pack 'n play while I walked across the way to the restrooms. As I was using the restroom I could hear him screaming! I didn't know what to do at this point since I was SO TIRED!! I had an idea - I ended up buckling him into his carseat & putting him in the van & shut the doors. Now no one else would hear him, and he could cry to his heart's content and he obviously couldn't get hurt or anything, and I could go to bed! That was probably around 5:00 a.m. Tom got up around 6:15 to check on him & he was still crying!! But as soon as he took him out of the carseat he fell asleep from pure exhaustion I'm sure. Needless to say, he took a couple really good naps on Sunday.