The month of the travellers...

I just cannot believe that what I'm about to tell you is true. Our family--our whole family--went on 2 weeks of vacation in the month of July. This is, mind you, right in the middle of wedding cake season and one of the busiest for the bakery. We NEVER go anywhere as a family during this time of year. Usually, it's just me carting the kidlets off to the wild blue yonder all by my lonesome.

At the beginning of July we went on a surprise journey to Michigan with a lovely stopover in St. Louis and spent time with my wonderful in-laws (who might read this! :)) and then with my fantastic Aunt and Uncle (who also might be reading this!).

Two days ago we just got home from our presbytery's family camp just south of Estes Park where we spent a relaxing week. My hubby fished and fished and fished, we kayaked, and went down a zip line. I tried to climb the rock wall but was terribly hindered by the 6.5 month old in utero. And I'm sure it had nothing to do with my lack of arm strength. The speaker was fine but I don't think he added much to what we already knew. The most interesting conversation was about church architecture and "aids to worship." But we had some great family time.

And in the middle of it all, Bug had swimming lessons. Whew! It's been a busy summer and it just doesn't look like we're going to be slowing down much. My cousin will be visiting us (he's 15) for about 10 days and he's coming on Tuesday.

What fun!

Covenant Heights

6 Months in Utero...

And the gender of the baby is...

A BOY!

And if you have any suggestions about the name, please feel free to pipe up. I'd like something with 5 letters and European sounding that matches my kids' names. There's nothing like an herculean task to take the mind off your worries!

St. Louis

This was the best photo we could get of the Arch. But it was absolutely incredible! Just the sheer size of the thing was astounding.

Both the kids were so bummed that they couldn't have any beer at the end of the Budweiser tour. And they wanted some so badly! The worst part was that the soda was down for the count so all they could imbibe was water. Boring!

I just love shots like this!

Happy Birthday, Opa!

We went on an adventure. And I'm talking 51 hours in the car to surprise Opa for his July 3rd birthday. He hadn't the foggiest idea we were coming and the look on his face was wonderful. Oma, of course, was just as thrilled. Although I wonder if they weren't a bit more worried about more noise and more mouths to feed!

Most of the photos are self-explanatory and I tried to get a sampling of everyone in groups. I have several more fantastic photos but for Tante Lien and Oom Bill, these are the best for the blog. Enjoy!

This was the morning Tante Tina absolutely did not want to get out of bed. She found little Caleb sitting fully clothed in his breakfast chair covered in, well, you see the photo. The poor kid had it all over the place.

July 4th...

Is anyone surprised that while at the beach Oom John uses his time to read some worthy book about sailing?

The boys and girls just loved wallowing in their mud holes!

The 4th...

And what would a family gathering look like if the toddlers didn't imbibe just a little?

I'm pretty sure that's just a "I'm so happy I got to hold a frog on this fabulous trip" look. Really.

The end of the 4th...

We caught the lake just right that day!

Well, I have 48 fantastic photos and these are the samplings that I thought you'd like the best. I just couldn't believe how much the kids have grown.