our first homegrown watermelon

we decided saturday was the day to finally pick our watermelon

with our fingers crossed it would actually be ripe

gardening has been a lot of fun and a big experiment this year

we have successfully grown kale, lettuce, green onion, carrots, lots of cantaloupe, one watermelon,

zucchini, basil, one tomato :), and we have a ton of pumpkins coming

 there she is!

 seriously, best watermelon we've ever had

 we ate it with nachos on the back porch

 it's a good thing we have such a cute resident gardener here

 we love spending time together in our backyard

michael gave the kids airplane rides and they allll loved it

i love them all lined up waiting their turns

michael figures he'd better do it while he's still young :) 

i feel like he's forcing me to have like 12 kids because he's such a good dad

 trampoline time

 after some jumping i tried to get a family picture of us all laying down

i'm under henry :)

 we got one! even if henry and eleanor weren't super thrilled about it

i could not love this family of mine any more

yay for end of summer nights and homegrown watermelon!!

labor day weekend

after we got home from camping

and all showered and cleaned up

we went to lunch at cafe rio and target to get hazel's friend a birthday present

noah offered to wear henry in the ergo 

it was so cute!

 and michael got a picture of me with some cute girls on our way out

 saturday night we went to the balloon glow and hung out with the hunts there

the balloons were so pretty all lit up

 sunday we got ready for church

and eleanor asked me to take their picture

so i did and they were so funny

especially noah....

i love his outfit bytheway

 after church we made an apple pie and started prepping food to can today

i was lucky enough to start my labor day with three cute girls cuddling with me

michael came out of the bathroom and took these pictures for us

 i love these girls and their insistence on being as close to me as possible

today we got up and went back to target (my favorite) but this time was mostly to return a few things

and michael and noah had fun playing with the star wars stuff

we also went and saw shaun the sheep at the dollar theater and grocery shopped at winco

 then we got home and made pear and plum jam

with fruit off our trees

tonight we finished watching the national treasure (we'd started it a couple days ago)

and henry got himself into the doll shopping cart all by himself while holding a book!

talented baby

 eleanor fell asleep about 5 minutes into it

noah, hazel and olive loved the movie

i was worried it would be too scary but they really liked it

i guess they're growing up!

it was a pretty great weekend! i'm so glad we went camping

and canned some jam and had some quality time together as a family

our first family camping trip!

on friday we went camping for the first time ever as a family

i can't believe we waited so long

we kind of decided to go on a whim

so we hadn't reserved a spot 

and despite it being labor day weekend, we found a spot right away at our first try

we went to gray back gulch

 we loved this little tree trunk chair

 the kids were such great helpers with everything

 henry tried to get into as much trouble as possible

but that's pretty normal for him 

 we were so happy that fires were permitted in the pits 

 the girls thought it was so fun to roll around on all the bedding in the tent

 the trees all around were so pretty

 hazel and michael went and got us water from the well

 we roasted hot dogs for dinner

 they were delicious

 noah had so much fun exploring around our camp site

 we roasted marshmallows

 s'mores!

 we got super sticky but they were super good

 as a little bedtime snack we made some popcorn with the whirley pop on the camping stove

  hanging out at the fire

 olive loved the lantern

 me and my boys

 sleeping went about as well as expected

michael took henry to the car to fall asleep in his car seat

then brought him in and we all slept pretty well

until henry woke up around 5:30am

not terrible for a baby

after everyone got up we made pancakes and hot chocolate for breakfast

 henry was so happy to have his own hot chocolate

 funny story..

i bought michael this tent and sleeping bags

for his birthday like 4 years ago when we lived in pullman 

and other than a few backyard camp outs and father son camping trips

this was our first time to use it

happy late birthday, michael ;)

 i used to be so anti-camping

but the memories we made in this one little trip are irreplaceable

we'll have to go again soon

when the weather is warmer

we were pretty cold when we woke up

 we left the camp site around 8:30 am because we were so cold

and drove through idaho city because we were close by

it's such a cute little ghost town

we'll have to explore it some time

i thought this was a cute sight

all in all it was a great trip

and i'm so glad we went

and so grateful we got a spot so easily and the kids did so well

they were great!