Happy Birthday Taylor!

We got to celebrate Taylor's 1st birthday on the lake. What a great time we had! It was nice to see family and Mati enjoyed the sand, sun, and water.

Mati lounging lakeside:


Mati floating in the lake; she did not want to leave the water!


The birthday girl and her cake!


All of the grandkids...

Pool Time Part 2 - The Video

A video of Mati splashing around in her pool.

Pool Time

The hot weather has provided the perfect occasion for Mati's new pool. Here she is enjoying the water...

Getting ready to head out; can you believe my baby's hair is long enough for a pony tail?


Washing the inflatable dinosaurs:


Kicking around:

Tire Swing

Grandpa Armock installed a new tire swing in the backyard and it was quite the hit. Here are a couple swinging videos:

Aly's Fun Birthday Party!

Cousin Aly turned one and she had a super party! Aunt Jen worked her butt off to put together a sensational "garden" themed party. Here are some of the highlights:

The super-duper cake that Jen and I co-decorated. It was fun and turned out cute I think. It tasted great too! Jen did the work of baking and crumb-coating the cake ahead of time, then we met up Friday night to decorate.


The buffet, all garden themed, adorably labeled, and delicious!


All of the kids got to make a bug jar and then go on a "bug hunt" for plastic bugs and gummy bugs. Mati loved it!




Our family! We need to get a good one with Mati smiling. She's so on-the-go when you pick her up for a picture she gets annoyed.


The popular recreation item of the night, the new tire swing!


Here she is! The birthday girl diving into her cake!

It was a great night for a soccer game!

Too bad I didn't get to see any of it. I took Mati out to the high school soccer game to enjoy the great weather and see some MHS soccer. Mati however is only interested in running everywhere. When I took her in the soccer complex she kept running onto the field; when I picked her up to carry her away she threw a good old toddler tantrum so we went next door. The football stadium is adjacent and tonight was unoccupied. Mati typically comes out to the track meets with me to run and scoot under hurdles while we wait for Doug to pick her up and my announcing job to start, tonight she got the full run of the place!

Running the bleacher platform...


Running the track...


Up and down the bleacher stairs...