during the kitchen overhaul...

i took the kids to grandma and grandpa's pool on saturday to give chris some space to work on the kitchen. while we were there, uncle bo came back from a trip out on the boat and had some baits left over. good thing he is "the best uncle in the world" as jack lovingly referred to him while he got a rod ready for jack, because he helped jack land a couple fish. (interestingly, i heard jack call uncle jacob the same thing when he let him buy a new game for the ipad.... weird.)

jack caught his first jackfish!

 and a 28 inch snook that was so heavy, 

he needed some assistance holding it for the picture

ellie made friends with a dead baitfish

and was pretty distraught when i made her toss it back.

today to entertain the kids (ok, maybe more myself) 

i was being silly and tried to wear ellie's cowgirl boots, and it ended up making my legs look freaky long with teeny feet.

i laughed till i cried because it reminded me of the best snl skit in the history of snl. 

ok, one of the best.

and just because charlie is such a ham, here is a video i took of him in the car recently

it has begun

our kitchen remodel has started!

chris and i pulled out the upper cabinets on friday night for our date-night-in (so romantic!)...

then chris cut away all the old tile on saturday...

luckily he was given the day off today because he got called in to work yesterday, so today he had some help from my dad patching up the new drywall.

unfortunately this is going to be a slow going remodel since we are doing all the work. which means that pretty much the only day to work on it is saturdays. BUT these guys are making great progress and hopefully, fingers crossed, the new cabinets will finally move from the guest room, where they are currently living, into the kitchen this saturday!

when the cabinets arrived ellie screamed, "this is so much more exciting than disneyworld!!!"

not that she would know, since she's never been, but i definitely agree.

this is what the kitchen looks like currently. luckily everything functions so i still have full use of the kitchen.

once the cabinets and sink are in place, they will measure for the counters.

it has been fun/interesting to go to the various granite businesses to see all that beautiful stone.

after going back and forth between quartz and granite, we ended up selecting a slab of Super White Quartzite. its the closest thing we could find to marble, without being marble. it's going to be beautiful.

it's interesting that they call it "Super White" because its not white at all. The majority of it is gray.

gruesome twosome

these two were able to participate in the YMCA's

Gruesome Twosome Challenge 2013

last saturday and we all had a blast!

the challenge:

an obstacle course

for 5-12 yr olds.

some of the obstacles were: 

running through a bus

carrying sandbags

military crawl

wall climb

slip and slide

and a MUD PIT!

but i think the kids would agree that the most challenging obstacle of all was just the running. it was a fairly long course. we are guessing at least 1 1/2 miles.

jack came in the top 20 and ellie came in the top 10. 

yes, top 10. 

she got to one point in the course and without realizing it, completely skipped that last loop of the run because no one was there to tell her where to go. and without ropes blocking it off, she just took a wrong turn. oh well!

afterwards the fireman hosed them off.

i was so proud of these two. 

i even got a little teary watching them run their little hearts out. 

ellie only walked twice and after a few seconds started running again.

and what did charlie do during all the fun?

enjoyed the free hot dogs, cold water, and fire trucks.

oh, and tried repeatedly to get into the mud pit :)

all in all it was a success. both kiddos have already talked about doing it again next year. i think the only thing we will change is that chris and i will be signing up for the adult run :)

buckeyes in the sunshine state (part uno)

aunt amy and uncle tyler came to florida!!!

our kids had never met these cousins before, which is just sad.

so they made the 17 hour drive from ohio to visit for a week and we all had the best time ever.

seriously, the kids had such a blast and it was wonderful to get to know their beautiful girls.

we crammed each day full of fun activities and then at night the kids all packed in together and laughed and giggled and had a grand time falling asleep while the adults stayed up talking, eating key lime pie and chips and salsa, and watching youtube videos. it was awesome!

are you ready for a picture overload?

here we go!

after dinner the first night, we went for a walk on the beach to see the sunset.

chris didnt want the kids to get wet, so we decided not to wear swimsuits. 

HA. HA. HA.

no trip to sw florida is complete without a visit to our favorite crazy, cheap, red-neck petting zoo: skunk ape.

hadley and ellie

kate holding the gator

amy

lauren

dont let their sweet looks fool you-

kate and lauren were brave little chicas!

 go amy go!

i still havent worked up the courage to hold that big boy

tyler and madeline riding the tortoise

 charlie was.not.happy.

 this cockatoo curled right up and started purring

picnic time

it rained a couple times, so we had to get creative. good thing amy is awesome and has a billion fantastic ideas! like soap snakes...

lauren was the champion of our egg game!

her egg cracked all the competition

bo and larissa invited us all over for cake and ice cream on sunday evening after conference. we took full advantage of their beautiful backyard and played red rover, tag, and the kids all took turns on the swings.

on monday afternoon we were lucky to use a nice (heated!) pool courtesy of our dear friends the tucketts. kate and lauren got the hang of swimming and may have even sprouted fins :)