Temple Trip

We had the opportunity last weekend to go to the Washington D.C. temple with our very best friends, the Jorgensens. We went down Friday night and spent the night playing the Settlers of Catan. We let the Jorgensens win both games becuase that's the kind of friends we are. While the boys were in the temple, Melanie took me to Ikea for the first time. I think the kids had more fun there than we did! We checked them in to the play area and as they handed us pagers, the girls said it was just like being on the Disney cruise again. I was also able to see my brother and his wife atthe temple! They just happened to come the same day we did. That was a very fun surprise.

This is Rachel with her best friend, Lucy. The move has been hardest for her .

She's 10!!!

Ashley turned 10 years old yesterday. That makes us feel pretty old.

Here she is with her brand new guitar! She played until 11:00 that night and didn't even complain about sore fingers. My fingers were sore after only a few minutes! She is going to play just like both of her grandpas.
None of my kids care much for cake, so Ashleygot a chocolate cream pie this year. It was great!

Cute Pictures

Is that the cutest naked butterfly in the world? I need to post a movie of her flying. It's very funny.

My four fun girls. Melissa looks a little scared.

My New Lighting

The genius who owned this house before us installed new kitchen cabinets, not realizing that having them all the way up to the ceiling would interfere with the spotlights. You can see how this makes it difficult (if not impossible) to open the cabinet door.

So Jason and I decided that since we had already replaced one light fixture, why not seven more? How does it look now? We've only replaced one so far. I'll get to the others eventually.

Here's the first light fixture I have ever replaced. Too bad I didn't get a "before" shot. It was an ugly, broken flourescent fixture.

The Butterfly

Our butterfly bush (right behind Ashley) was covered in blossoms and butterflies last month. One of the most common ones was this Great Spangled Fritillary, a very friendly butterfly! It was a dream come true for Ashley to have one land on her.

First Day of School

Here are the girls just before leaving for the first day of school in Danville. This was taken at about 6:30 in the morning (the bus comes at 6:58), so if they look tired, it's because they are.

Our bus stop is conveniently right across the street, but the street is very busy at both drop off and pick up times with Geisinger Hospital traffic, and there are no sidewalks. It's a little scary!

Lake Tobias

This weekend we took a trip to Lake Tobias (a zoo) about an hour away. We met Jason's brother, Shane, and his family there and had a great time once we got there. The internet map sites need to do a little updating in Pennsylvania. This isn't the first time we've gotten lost in this state. We even printed off two different sets of directions, one from the Lake Tobias site, and neither was correct. We were an hour late. Sara's favorite was definately the goats. I think she wanted to take one home. She had no problems feeding them, but finally did get mad at one when it tried to eat her hair.
Ashley really liked the miniature horses.

Hmm. Where's Rachel in all these pictures? She was scared of the goats because they had horns, so she was clinging to me the whole time.