Spectacular Summer!

Our summer has been jam packed with memory making moments. I remember before summer even started thinking that this was the year to squeeze in as much fun as possible! We've succeeded in milking every ounce of fun out of these past few months and I think we've succeeded in wearing ourselves out a bit too. Classes start tomorrow for Dave and I and the fall with all of it's busyness (and babyness!) will soon be upon us. While we're sad to say goodbye to summer, we'll treasure our precious memories.

Beach Day! We visited 35th St. Beach with friends from church.

Dave ended up being the target of lots of our little bitty church girls... they look innocent enough, but wait until they have a bucket of water in their hands!

Dave joined in on a bike ride from church, around the Pullman and Roseland neighborhoods.

One of my favorite summer spots is the symphony concerts in Millenium Park. My wonderful husband made sure it happened this year! Molly liked dancing to the music and watching the violins.

We couldn't pass up some wading in the fountain.

This was the summer of pirates... here Molly's working on her Jolly Roger.

We loved picnics on the porch!

We said a sad farewell to Roseland Christian School this year. I got to make some special cookies for the event.

I got to connect with old students and see generations of alumni at the RCS closing ceremony.

The Berrien County Youth Fair is always a highlight! Grammy was a goat magnet this year!

Molly liked this robopumpin!

We took a great ride on the Ferris Wheel! WOO HOO!

Dave and I LOVE making fun of the "stuff with some similar ingredient" displays. This one seems to revolve around the idea of artificial cherry flavor.

Molly's goal this year was to find "Cupcake Nibbles", her favorite calf from this year. While this one may have had a different nametag, we're sure it was actually Cupcake Nibbles.

I met up with some friends from high school and their daughters... BCYF is the place to see anyone who's anyone in Berrien County.

We all needed our own elephant ears (and Korndogs, and snowcones, and sirloin tip dinners...) Dave tried a deep fried twinkie along the way too. We highly recommend any food the fair has to offer. 

Our friends Jake, Kim, Amina and Ira showed up at the fair and gave us a chance to be tour guides.

Molly liked mooching rides in the double stroller.

We showed off Cupcake Nibbles to Emily and Bryce!

Molly and Amina were big girls on the rides.

Watch out! I'm not sure these two are ready for their licenses.

We made it up to the cabin again this year and had a wonderful, accident free time! Dave's Calvinist Cadet Corps leaders would be proud of his fire building techniques.

Bompy built (and forged) a new bed out of grape posts and iron... what a cool addition to the cabin!

Molly serenaded on her harmonica. Her favorite was playing the chicken dance and watching Dave and I dance to it!

The s'mores that we made tasted even better than our flame broiled steaks!

Making toast over the old stove for breakfast!

A beautiful day on Selkirk Lake!

Molly caught her first two fish! (and a lily pad!) The lily pad was the only thing big enough to keep this year.

On day 2, Molly, Bompy, Grammy and I took a paddle down the river. Molly and I had fun wading and sometimes pulling the canoe through the shallow parts.

Our peach cobbler experiment turned out successfully! We even had the leftovers for breakfast the next day.

Day 1 we all paddled out into the lake together. This is about as much of Dave's face as I saw all afternoon... he doesn't do a whole lot of shifting and turning in the canoe! :)

Molly was a trooper with lots of trips to the kitty house!

We celebrated Emily's upcoming wedding with a hen party this weekend. One highlight was learning "thriller" at a dance studio in South Bend. We all looked a bit more like zombies by the end of the night.

We embarrassed Emily with lots of fun trivia games and personal questions. Congrats, EM!

Our raspberry bounty from the garden. It took Molly about 10 seconds to finish these up!

Molly gobbles up tomatoes almost as fast as she does raspberries. Here she's in front of our tomato jungle.

She's still small enough to get some air... Maxi Waxi will probably be a welcome size for Dave's muscles... of course he'll just have to keep throwing around that big sister too!