Summer Happenings

One of the best parts of our summer is that my parents/Grandma and Grandpa Andersen get to visit for a whole month.  And because we only get to see them during that month (they live in the Dominican Republic), we cram it all in and try to spend every waking minute with them.  There's a dinner, swim party, or activity of some sort almost every day.  Lots of late nights, lots of driving back and forth, and lots and lots of fun.  Then when they leave, we crash and sleep for a few days to catch up. 

They flew home last week, and we're left with lots of fun memories. 

Years ago, when Taylor was 8 years old, he wrote a really neat poem about the importance of the Sabbath Day.  This past year my mom wrote music to Taylor's creation.  Taylor wrote two more stanzas, and now they have a beautiful song put together.  My mom had it printed, and we sang it as a family several times.  It was a neat experience for Taylor.  And a beautiful song too!

 The rest of these pictures are from our week at the cabin, with all my siblings except for two. 

Game night--who can create the coolest thing with tooth pics and gum drops?  These guys won!  Still not sure what they created though. . . any guesses?

For an early Christmas present, my mom presented all the grand kids with ukuleles.  Every day after lunch, we had "Uke" practice.  Nate and I taught a few chords and songs.  As I write, I can hear someone in the living room playing "Shoo Fly, don't bother me".  Pure talent!

Forth of July Festivities--we enjoyed a flag raising ceremony by our boy scouts, a parade, pony painting and riding, lots of fun water games, festive food, and a family dance.  The best thing--all the kids got to play with their cousins all day, every day.

Grandma with all her grand daughters.  She's just the best!

Two of my sister in laws brought fun crafts for the kids to do.  It worked out well, as it rained every afternoon, and this gave the kids something constructive to do inside while the storm passed.  Andersen and cousin Grace got a little carried away. . .

 The older girls loved making hair accessories. 

One of the most memorable, disgusting things about the week was all the crawdads.  After the boys caught a pot full of crawdads, Nate helped then cook them up, then served them to anyone interested--which was pretty much just the boys.  Gross.

 Boat creation.  The boys had to make sure it was "floatable".

This isn't a great picture.  But one of the funnest things about visiting the cabin this summer was the new Zip line.  The kids loved it, I went down once and survived to tell about it, and John couldn't get enough of it.  Super fun.

 All in all, it's been a great summer.  Other than two weeks at the cabin, we've spent lots of time swimming, camping, reading, playing board games, cooking up fun recipes with the kids, and being lazy.  Next week we're headed to La Jolla for a reunion with the LeSueur family, then school starts the following week.  Hard to believe it's almost over!