August Recap

The garden is still producing...fresh flowers this time. 

I got inspired by this red checked tablecloth that I inherited from my Grandma Beam. Normally I wouldn't post so many pictures of the same subject, but oh, my! I'm smitten...

Love his signature crossed ankles in this one and the next...

Back to Ohio we went, and this time we DROVE. Partially so we could see Grandma Keffer again as we passed through Greenville, and partially just to see if we could do it. Our kids were TROOPERS. They did so great on the drive. Seriously, we borrowed a DVD player for the car and never had to use it. I was so encouraged that we can get out and travel with these little ones and actually enjoy it.

(In the interest of full disclosure, the drive was not perfect. Lorien threw up three times on the way through St. Louis, and the neighborhood where we stopped to clean up the mess was, shall we say, a bit ghetto. Fastest puke clean-up in the history of road trips. Also, on the way home, we had a double meltdown in the back seat just as we were crossing from Kansas to Colorado. I suppose you can't blame them after the neverending drive through Kansas.)  

Ohio highlights: 

Christy, Nathan and Macrae came down from Michigan to visit, and Dad Beam rolled out the red carpet...er, the slip-n-slide. 

Christy and Macrae on the slip-n-slide

Mommy and Lorien. She liked the slide better this time than she did last summer. 

Josiah and Grandpa

Josiah turned 11 months old on August 14 and needed some farmer boy photos...

Macrae is a pretty big tractor fan too. 

Mmmmm....love this place.

The official reason for traveling to Ohio a second time: to celebrate Steve's graduation from Full Sail University AND his 24th birthday. Congratulations, Steve!

Lorien's 3rd Birthday

The other very important thing that happened in July was Lorien turning three. Words to describe our girl at THREE: articulate, observant and compassionate. She loves to jump, loves to sing, loves books, and is pretty uninterested in eating and potty training. She is an awfully good big sister and she brings us joy every day!

To celebrate, we had a Veggie Tales Party with family and friends: 

July Recap

In July, we traveled to the Midwest. Lots of folks had a loving hand in bringing Josh's Grandma Keffer from Greenville, Ill., to Indianapolis so that she could meet Josiah for the first time. Uncle Richard and Aunt Judy made the drive, and Uncle Jim and Aunt Marti hosted all of us. 

Mini Family Reunion

Great Grandma Keffer with Lorien and Josiah

Three (out of four) generations

The next day was July 4th, so we headed for downtown Indy, where Doug and Chad and their boys were renting a condo for the summer. We started our Independence Day celebration with a trip to the zoo — our kids' first. I hope I never forget the look on Lorien's face when we entered the first exhibit: the aquarium. She was enthralled! The other thing I won't quickly forget is the heat. It was beastly hot.

Hot, fat baby

Daddy and Lorien at the zoo

India baby: Ezra couldn't care less about the heat!

Effalumps!

From the condo, it was a short walk to view the fireworks. It was probably the latest our kids have ever stayed up and they did great!

Josiah with his cousins, Ezra and Cedric. They are 2 months younger than him. Josiah may have been guilty of squashing Cedric's nose right before this picture was taken. 

Both of the kids loved the fireworks and weren't scared. 

We headed back to Ohio to spend more time with family and friends. One special visit was with my good friend Lori. We got to meet her new little guy, Micah. Boy have they been waiting a long time for this baby!

Elli, Micah, Lorien and Josiah. Can you tell from this photo that Josiah out-eats his sister at most meals?

What's a trip to Ohio without a visit to Young's Dairy?

Feeding the goats

A tractor-tire tunnel

Back home in Colorado... The garden is producing!

Holy zucchini, Batman!

It makes me so happy that our kids like each other so much. 

Family Photo

Josiah turned 10 months old...

And our annual Institute alumni reunion brought some old friends back to visit. 

Lorien with her buddy Mindy

June Recap

In June, we welcomed the 50th class of the Focus Leadership Institute. Because of them, I will always smile (instead of cringe) when I hear the song "Call Me Maybe." Summer classes are always super fun and this one has been no exception. 

Bonding at Black Forest Park on Day 2.

May Recap

 In May, we finally "dug in" to a project we had been planning since we moved into our home in 2010: making a garden.

Josh borrowed a tiller and dug up a plot

Lorien and I planted seeds

May was pretty chilly, so we tried planting some inside first. We ended up having better luck with the seedlings we bought and planted later. 

Josh's big project in May was the shooting of the latest installment of TrueU. 

Here's his view form the rafters of the set. 

My project in May was to turn this $12 Goodwill coffee table into a bench for the end of our bed. It felt good to be creating again. (The newborn fog kind of takes that creative spirit out of me for a while.) Somehow "after" pics have eluded me, but I will remedy that soon. 

Josiah turned 8 months old on May 14th. I have to admit that these aren't the best set of photos I took during his first year, mostly because he was crawling really well at this point and would. not. stay. still.

Such a sweet face!

if you look closely, you can see my feet clamped around his legs and bottom . That's the only way I could get him to hold still for a photo. 

My sister-in-law Mandi nicknamed Josiah "little lion cub," so I thought this outfit very appropriate. 

Major purchase of the month. Okay, of the year...

Josh bought a Canon 5D Mark III to help outfit his business, 550 Productions.  And sometimes he lets me play with it. :) 

Friends from afar... Beccy and Andrew Thompson came to visit with their boys, Seth and Gavin. We only got to see them for a little bit, but it was fun!

Lorien and "Aunt Beccy"

Beccy's sister Abby and her family just moved to Colorado Springs from Denver, so here are all of the kids (well, minus the babies, Maggie and Josiah.) 

If you look closely, you can see Josiah's first major "bonk" of his crawling days. Lorien had gone out the back slider and left the screen open. Josiah went barreling out after her and face-planted on the concrete steps. 

During most of May, Josh and I completed The Whole 30, which is a very strict Paleo diet. (No grains, legumes, dairy or refined sugar whatsoever.) We were attempting to discover what has been bothering Josh's digestive system lately. While we didn't really succeed at that, we did learn a few things:

1) We CAN add lots more fruit and vegetables to our diet.

2) As a family, we want to move toward a whole-foods diet and eliminate as many processed foods as possible

3) While we are making changes to our diet at home, we don't find it's realistic for us to eat strictly Whole 30 (or even strictly paleo) in social situations. If someone else is preparing the food, we eat what we're served.

4) We both have pretty strong sugar-popping habits, but we CAN break those when we put our minds to it.

Yummy, Whole 30 approved kebabs for Memorial Day dinner. 

And rounding out the month...

Raspberry shortcake to celebrate Papa's birthday.

The one I forgot

I knew there was a cute Lorien saying I was leaving out of the last post, and she has since reminded me of it: 

She thinks cheese is the plural of chee. 

So if she just wants a little more, she will ask, "Can I have another chee please?" 

Makes me laugh every time. 

Bloths and other Lorienisms

Every few years, Colorado Springs receives a springtime invasion of miller moths. This has been one of those unfortunate years. Lorien is kinda freaked out about them. She definitely needs to make sure that there are none in her room before she goes to bed.

The moths have provided an occasion for some of her entertaining phraseology. At first, she called them bloths. Now she consistently remembers what they're called, but that thing we use to kill them? It's still a swatwater. She is awfully impressed with Daddy's skills with the swatwater.

A few other cute sayings of late:

"He bless-youed." - after a Josiah sneeze

"A hollypop" for a lollypop

And, she's still got some of her Yoda syntax: "I drank my juice all."