Project 365 - Days 226-232

Well the good news is that I spent the good part of two days going through the rest of my photos from last year and quickly editing them and picking out the daily photo.  That means that hopefully, I can finish up my 365 project for 2011!  Based on the little amount of picture-taking I've done thus far, I might just be doing a monthly or at the most, weekly photo...

Day 226 - August 14

Here is our new cousin-in-law, Kory, with the girls.

Day 227 - August 15

My Dad and his sisters, from left to right, Kathy, Dorothy, and Nancy. 

Day 228 - August 16

Our family photo with my Grandpa and Grandma Lang.

Day 229 - August 17

It was difficult at times to see the swollen and flooded Mississippi River along our drive there and back.  The detours (due to parts of major highways still under water MONTHS after the rains) added many hours to our trek and while we were suffering from such a terrible drought back home, it was incredible to see the effects of too much rain here...

Day 230 - August 18

Once home, we quickly returned to our routine of swimming, lunch, swimming, napping, and then more swimming ;-)

Day 231 - August 19

Rosie is not a water dog, but even she would frequently wade onto the steps in the pool in order to cool off...

Day 232 - August 20

This is one of two hawks that live on or near our property.  I've seen one of them many times but this second one is darker and a little more elusive!  

Video of the Week - Week 32 - Fishing!

Here is the video I mentioned of Ava trying to unhook her first fish that she caught!  (And yes, we partook in the 'catch and release' program as we had no intention of eating that fish ;-)

Project 365 - Days 219-225

I'm trying to decide if it's worth it to try and catch up with this...life has become very busy and I'm finding I need to trim some of my schedule...so I will continue for now and perhaps trim this Project 365 as well!

Day 219 - August 7

We took off on a ten day vacation to attend my cousin's wedding in South Dakota (and for which Ava was going to be a flower girl).  We decided to take our time and first drive to Arkansas and spend some time camping at Ft Smith.  Ava was very excited to sleep out in her tent (while the rest of us enjoyed the air conditioning of the motorhome) and set out to set it up.  She actually did a great job and in a short amount of time, her tent was up!

Day 220 - August 8

The Ft Smith state park is actually quite nice and clean.  It was sweltering hot while we were there (though they did get several rain showers which we were desperately needing just a few hours south of here) but it didn't help to cool things down too much.  Still, we had a great time...

Day 221 - August 9

We were able to bring their bikes and Ava (and Amelia as well) spent a lot of time riding around.  Because it was the height of a hot summer, and the middle of the week, the park was fairly empty and there was a lot of room to spread out.

Day 222 - August 10

One of the fun things we did while we were there was rent a boat and go out to do some fishing.  Well, we tried to fish.  They even included a GPS device that detected where the fish were and at what depth, etc.  We still weren't successful although Ava and Jason went back to the lake later that evening (while Amelia and I stayed back in the motorhome) and Ava caught a fish - I'll probably upload that video as my video of the week so look for it soon!

Day 223 - August 11

One of the great things about going back for this wedding was the opportunity to see so many extended family we hadn't seen in a long time.  This was Amelia's first time meeting my grandparents and she quickly warmed up to my Grandma Lang (above) and my Grandpa Lang as well.

Day 224 - August 12

My sister and her family came as well so we had some fun times with Jack, my nephew.  He was a hoot with these goggles!

Day 225 - August 13

Ava excelled in her role as flower girl (as I'm sure you can imagine).  We had a wonderful time and feel so blessed to have been able to attend!

  

Snow in December?

For those of you in colder climates, this may not seem like a question but a certainty.  However, it's supposed to be rare or nonexistent for us in Texas!  However, last month, we received about 1 1/2 inches of snow.  Visions of the freezing cold, snowy winters of the last few years were parading through my head as I woke up to this:

Last winter almost broke me (although I say that a bit sheepishly because I know others endure worse but still, our buildings are not really built for this cold weather here in Texas!) 

As dawn broke, we found deer in our yard, searching for food under the thin blanket of snow.

It was a good sign that school had not been cancelled but still the roads were icy and this was NOT a good sign on our way to school:

But we made it fine and thankfully, temperatures rose that afternoon and everything was melting and almost gone by the end of the day!  So we are now in January and no other snow, though it has threatened at times, but we're not out of the woods yet!  The worst storms last year came through in February so I'm praying for a wet, but WARM winter! ;-)

Our Journey to Amelia

Well, it's been a long time coming but I finally finished a video of our trip to get Amelia, Gotcha Day, and our time afterwards...I'm not sure how long YouTube will let me keep this up so if the video doesn't appear or isn't working, click on the link below...

Direct link to Journey to Amelia

Video of the Week - Week 31 - Swimming

This video shows a little of Amelia and a little of Ava at one of the last lessons of the summer season...both have advanced so much!  Amelia is jumping in, by herself (!), and Ava has advanced to the butterfly, freestyle, and breast strokes!