Some of my favorite faces

And then there were eight

I present the following pictures as proof that it is impossible to get eight cousins to all smile and cooperate for one picture:











Paul's sister and her girls came up yesterday to visit and to pick up Gabe and Elsie. It's their turn to have the cousins for a few days. I had hoped to get a nice picture of the eight of them together, but I guess we'll have to settle for these.

On a personal note, I've taken two marathon naps in the last two days, and am sad to report that I'm still tired!

Another day, another beach

Prescott Beach

Since it was finally a little warmer today we decided to venture out to the river. It was a fantastic 80 degrees with a light breeze, and there were very few people at the beach. The kids had fun collecting rocks and shells. (Sorry Barb, but Elsie has a big ziplock bag of stuff she's bringing back to Montana).

They swam in the cold water, but claimed it was "really warm."



Got covered in sand.



And tried to bury each other.



We came home tired and sandy, and so glad that we went! I'm really looking forward to Paul being off tomorrow- I think I might need a nap!

Lots of blocks

Every now and then Paul brings home a real "treasure". Yesterday he brought home a huge bag of foam pieces from work. The kids have all been having THE BEST time with these things! They've been working together to build skyscrapers, they built a staircase that Grayson actually walked up, and they've been throwing them at each other a lot. Nothing like a little free fun. Of course now I have to find somewhere to keep all of these things.












Sooner or later this always happens.

Then it's time for a war! Chaos breaks out and blocks go flying! I think they like this part better than building.

Sewing and bowling

I had the most delightful morning this morning! Elsie and I hung out in our jammies and sewed and chatted. It was so wonderful it almost inspired a little pity party in me, over the fact that I don't have a daughter. We made her the cutest little purse. She has great taste in fabric, and is a quick learner. She did an excellent
job manning the foot pedal on my machine as I helped her feed the fabric through.


She decided she wanted the purse to be reversible, so one side is orange and pink polka dots with a cupcake pocket,


and the other side is orange with bright pink and blue flowers with a polka dot pocket.

























I guess I shouldn't feel too sad about not having a daughter, Grayson was so jealous of the time I spent with Elsie this morning, that he's insisting he wants to make a purse too!

For our afternoon activity we went bowling. We lucked out and had the bowling alley all to ourselves. Elsie ended up being the big winner, much to the dismay of at least one of my ultra competitive boys.




















Fuller and Gabe kept us entertained with an impromptu soft shoe number while waiting for their turns. What silly boys!



Once they were done bowling they relieved me of all of my quarters and played some arcade games. It's been another fun day with the cousins!

Keeping Busy...........VERY BUSY!

I think we all are feeling that the time together with the cousins is going to go fast. So we have been making the most of every minute of every day!
-We've been riding bikes.


-We made personalized cups. (Which is also helpful to me having less dishes to do, since they always know which cup is theirs when they need a drink of water.)

- We saw Space Chimps.
- Swimming, even though it hasn't been very warm.



-We've been having some epic Star Wars sword battles. Poor Elsie, I'm not sure she's enjoying being cast as Yoda and Darth Maul!

- We had a fire and roasted marshmallows.
-This afternoon we turned these cool rolls of duct tape into some wallets.
















Next up is a sewing project for Elsie and I. We need a little "girl time".

Barb and Jason- Can we please just keep them?