Happy Birthday America!

I love the 4th of July! Even more so since I have
been reading and studying about our founding
fathers. What wise men God blessed this country
to have as it's founders.

Normally, Ian would have been with Jenna and
I as we wait for the annual San Carlos Park
parade. But, this year he had to miss. He was sick
all week with a high temp brought on by bronchitis.
So, Jenna and I headed our for 4th of July traditions
while John stayed home and took care of Ian.


Most years, it is soooo hot. This year was a switch,
it rained on my parade. Of course I did not come
prepared with an umbrella, but Jenna thought my
yoga mat would protect her just fine.


Nothing says small town parade like pick up
trucks decorated in red, white and blue.


Jenna thought these crazy rides
were pretty cool. They were so
tall!

This is Jenna's favorite part of our parade

adventures.

Sand art...it was a pain-staking process picking

out just the perfect combinations of colors.

The final product!

The other piece of our July 4th tradition is

actually on July 3rd. We always attend the

Miracle baseball game which is always followed

by fireworks. Usually this game is sold out but

due to the rain...that lasted all day...most of

the seats were empty this year.

Even though Ian and John couldn't make it,

The Gavin Family did come. It was an extra

special treat because Renee and Mrs. Gavin

came too! Renee is usually working when Shawn

and The Girls come down to visit his Mom, so we

rarely get to see her . Don't they all look like

they are really enjoying the game??? This was

the first baseball game for Shawn's girls so I

enjoyed teaching them the basics of the game.

Here is Shawn's mom, you couldn't see her in

the other photo because she was hidden behind

Hailee's umbrella. I hadn't noticed how much

Shawn resembles his mom...same cheeks, same

smile....until I posted this picture.

Jenna did not enjoy sitting in the

rain. Thankfully, it finally stopped

some where around the 5th inning.

Carlos Bel Tran (from The Mets) is down in the

minor leagues doing some rehab with St. Lucie.

He popped out each time he was up to bat.

Due to the rain, the game started about 1.5 hours

late. Then, due to an injury, there was a 30-40

minute delay during the game. All of these delays

added up to us actually seeing fireworks on July 4.

They weren't set off until around 12:15 am. But,

they were well worth the wait!

Despite the rain and the late fireworks,

it was a fun night. I was glad The

Gavin's came to help us celebrate.

As far as John and Ian's night went,

they ended up having a good time too.

Jenna had the idea to buy one of the

packs from the grocery store for

The Boys to set off while we were

gone. Grammie came over too

so they had their own fireworks party!

"We hold these truths to be self evident,

that all men are created equal, that they

are endowed by their Creator with certain

unalienable rights, that among these are life,

liberty and the pursuit to happiness. That to

secure these rights, governments are

instituted among men, deriving their just

powers from the consent of the governed. That

whenever any form of government becomes

destructive to these ends, it is the right of the

people to alter or abolish it, and to institute

a new government, laying its foundations on

such principles and organizing its powers in

such form, as to them shall seem most likely

to effect their safety and happiness.

.....And, for support of this declaration, with a

firm reliance of the protection of Divine

Providence, we mutually pledge to each other

our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor. "

Adopted by Congress on July 4, 1776.

Additions to the Family

If our kids get good grades, they get to pick out
a "treat" to celebrate their hard work. 2 or 3 days
before school was finished, Jenna announced
what she would like for her treat. "I would
like a new pet." Uh Oh...Hmmm...."what kind of pet?"
"A python". Ummmm. NO! "I don't think that
is a the best pet for us. What else?" A short
pause, "a lizard". Hmm..."I think lizards are
really hard to take care of. What else?" A shorter
pause this time..." A hamster, yeah, that's what
I want!" Oh great, what excuse can I come up
with for that answer??? They are stinky?

And so, after many discussions, John, Ian and Jenna
brought China home.

I have a sneaky feeling that
a hamster was what she wanted all along and
her first two answers were just to ensure she
got what she wanted. Of course, she really might
have wanted a python. You never know with
that girl! :)


After a dozen attempts, this was the best picture
we could get of China. She received her name because
she is a Chinese Hamster. She is very cute and very
active. Jenna is so proud of her and loves taking
care of her.


Ms. Debbie, next door, had some work done on
her house and the person working on her gutters
found about 10 of these eggs tucked in the leaves
caught in the gutter. She saved two of them to
show the kids. With the light behind it, you can
see the dark spot (the shadow) where the bird
is growing. (I know...a little gross)


John decided we should see if we could incubate
them. For the past two days, they have been
under the warming lamp we used for the turtles
during the winter. Jenna was concerned that if
the eggs hatched, they would be worried about
not having a Mother. So, she brought out some
of her duck stuffed animals to keep them
company.

Once again, I find myself hoping that our
science experiment is not successful. :) What
on earth would we do if these eggs hatched
into some kind of duck or something????

Real Life Treasure Hunting!

My sister, Angie, turned me on to a new to me
past-time...geocaching. You log onto the website
(Geocaching.com) and using your zip code, it shows
you where the caches are hidden. Most caches are
a container with trinkets and a log but some can be
the answer to a trivia question or the location to
another cache. The website gives you the latitude
and longitude coordinates of the "treasure" and using
your GPS as a guide, you find it. (We used John's phone)


Here are Jenna, Hailee and Ian near the 2nd
cache we found. This was our first "virtual cache".
We had to find the historical marker that answered
some trivia questions about Fort Myers history.

We had "technical difficulties" at the first cache.
I couldn't figure out how to make John's phone
take a picture. The first cache was hidden between
two branches of a tree...Ian found it and signed the log.


Our 3rd cache. We couldn't open it because we
were all so sweaty from walking around downtown
in the the crazy hot weather. Jenna was so hot that
she was no longer having very much fun. But, she
hung in there with us.


This is near the 4th cache.


Ahhhh, air conditioning! We stopped at Oasis
for sodas and sundaes so we could cool off a bit
before heading back to the car. We all voted
that it was too hot to look for any more.


After the afternoon rains, we
decided to head out and try for
some more caches. We spent
forever looking for the treasure
hidden here but could not find it.


Our last try for a cache. It was getting dark
and it was hidden in the spooky woods. We
were not brave enough to look for too long!

Angie, thanks for the information. I can't
wait to try this during our trip to Colorado!

Football and Cheerleading Awards

Wow...the eight weeks are already over!

Jenna had a blast with her cheers and really

put her loud voice to good use. I am sad to report

that the Eagles (Ian and Joshua's team) did not

win a single game. Even though we were win-less,

those boys played every down of every game.

They never gave up and they handled

the losses with class. Tonight we celebrated all

of their hard work with dogs, burgers and medals

at The Fort Myers Aquatic Center.

The proud, yet silly, participants.


The Cheer Medal and my sweet girl.

Ian receiving his medal from Coach Patrick, with

teammates Casey (Coach's daughter) and Miks

by his side.

The boys proudly wearing their medals. Aren't

they handsome young men??? Good job boys,

you did a great job! We are proud of you!

This was from my car last night. Tuesday evenings

after work, Toni and I meet downtown for a good

run. This is proof that it was HOT outside yesterday.

What my car can't show you is not only was it hot but

it was so windy making the run even more tough.

Despite the conditions, we finished and we felt great

for toughing it out. Thanks for the inspiration Toni!

Camera Tricks

We were supposed to have Football/Cheer leading
awards tonight. But, we had thunderstorms and
they were cancelled. Since Joshua was spending
the night, we needed some substitute fun.
Sparklers, smoke balls and amazing fountains
seemed to do the trick just fine. As I do with all
outings, the camera was out but tonight I was testing
different settings. We ended up with some
interesting pictures when we used the
"night scenery" setting.


This one made us do a double take. The image
at the bottom is Jenna, up to the left is Ian...just
his shadow, and holding the sparkler is Josh.


Cool huh? It looks like Ian is shooting a spark
over to John.


This looks Joshua is drawing an arrow towards
Ian.


Double trouble.

John was doing is sword techniques

from his martial arts days using

two sparklers. (for those

who may not know...he used to

TEACH martial arts!).

We thought these turned out neat

and decided to share!

Trophies, And yes, they earned it!

With Daddy, Papa, and all
of the other "Dads" we have
adopted, we need a good craft
so we could honor each one with
a gift. We decided on homemade
trophies.
The Wengels kept Ian and Jenna
the first two days of summer break.
We kept Sophia and Micheal
the third day. Plus, a good long craft
is the perfect solution for keeping
kids who have been around each
other all day long for three days
straight from being at each other's
throat. :)


At least Sophia was having fun.
Our trophies were two Styrofoam
cups taped end to end, covered in
masking tape, painted gold and then
mounted on a gold base.


A sample of our final product.



We gained a 5th kid for the day. His parents
own a mobile detailing company (Breakdown
Mobile Cleaning---645-3403). John's Father's
Day gift was to get his car detailed. Damon
and Stacy did a phenomenal job. Damon had
babysitter issues and had to bring his 10 yr
old with him. We invited Connor with us to
a picnic at our tree house and he ended up spending
the rest of the day playing with the kids like
he has known them forever.
Here, the boys are playing catch in the park, well
we call it Marjory and David's yard. You can see
David's awesome garden behind the boys.


A picnic shot...from left to right...Connor, Michael,
Sophia, Ian and Jenna. Connor was amazed to find
out that our tree house was actually in a tree. He was
a good kid and we were glad everything worked out
so he could play with us for the day. He even ended
up making a trophy for his Dad.

To close, a few quotes about our Dads...

What are men so reluctant to become fathers?
They aren't through being children~ Cindy Garner

A father carries pictures where his money used to be.

Blessed indeed is the man who hears many gently
voices call him father! ~Lydia M Child, 1839

He didn't tell me how to live. He lived and let me
watch him do it. ~ Clarence Budington Kelland

Happy Father's Day! We are thankful for all of you!

A Badly Needed Do-Over

When we moved back to Fort Myers, John and
his Dad tried their hand a building a pond.
It sounded lovely but there were just a few
items I didn't love. But...it was a great effort.
So, we had some money saved and decided to
give the pond a do-over, with professional help
this time. We are very happy with the (almost)
final result.

Before, our pond was some black pond liner with
a cement hill that was originally intended to
become a waterfall. We could not figure out
how to finish off the edges so it looked pretty
instead of like plastic.
In case you are wondering what Ian is doing, he
is talking to his pet turtle, JJ. He greets JJ every
morning and says goodnight every evening. This
little turtle knows his voice and if Ian is out, so
is JJ. If Ian calls him, he comes. It is quite crazy.


Step one...bust out the ugly cement hill. Ian and
John worked for hours, they pulled out the liner,
and had a lot of the "ground work" (ha ha pardon
the pun) done before the pond-scapers came.
I think this picture makes Ian look older than
9. He worked his tail off this day. Because of their
hard work, it only took a day and a half instead
of three days to get the basic pond in place.


I know it is poorly lit but this give you a pretty
good idea where we are going with the pond.
It is beautiful! We are still adding in rocks and
will eventually buy some nice plants to
finish off the edges.

A close up of the fountain. The blue
rocks are called Blue Ice. They add
a really neat touch. We have some
goldfish from the first pond in there
right now but will add Koi once
we are done with everything.



Tonight, John added lights. They are extra fun
because you can change out the light filter so
we can make them match the holidays. It adds
a little extra ambiance!