Chores

A farmers work is never done. You can imagine how grateful my dad is to have Mackenzie's " help". Here are a few pictures of them hard at work:

Harvesting some funky gourds:

Off they go:


Feeding Chester:

" Here you go, sweet lil chickens"
Time for dinner, cow!

There is even time for a little fun:
Papa pays in trampoline jumps and kisses:
The end of a late summer day in Colorado:

Making up for lost time

A year is a long time to be apart. Here are a few pictures of Mackenzie catching up with her family. And there's more to come! Auntie Nikki comes in TONIGHT!

Grams and Mack looking at pictures of butterflies:
Papa and Mack talking to Buddy the puppy through the window.Kaleb

Brooklyn

The kids having so much fun on the trampoline. We sure do ,miss Taylor and Coley, though.

Mufasa ( Moofie)

Auntie Carley

First things first

After a long trip, there are a few things every traveler needs to do first upon arrival.

Quench:

Cleanse:


Satisfy:
Grams told Mack she had a treat for her and asked her what she thought it might be. Mackenzie thought for a second before she answered very certainly " Chocolate." She was, of course, right.

Should we?

In our " Love and Logic" parenting class last fall, we learned that we aren't raising a child, we are raising a mirror. As Mackenzie creeps closer to three than two everyday, we have found this to be true. She has soaked up many of our mannerisms and phrases. One of her favorites is saying " Should we..." because we usually ask her things like " Should we go home now or play for five more minutes..." .

As we were speeding towards Chicago at 80 miles per hour, we hear a tiny voice from the back seat " * yawn * Should we go home now?"

Off like a heard of turtles!

All packed up and ready to go, Mack and I headed toward Ann Arbor to pick Mike up from work. Taylor bug sent her friend Flat Stanley so he came along for the trip( btw, it's 1989 miles from Gilbert, AZ to South Lyon):

We decided to leave in the evening , hoping Mack would sleep through the night and we wouldn't need to stop so much. On the way to pick up Mike, we stopped at the park to run of the last of Mack's energy.

Mike and I both agree that leaving when we did was a great idea. While Mack didn't sleep as well as we hoped ( she woke up at 2am and stayed awake until 4 am) she was content to sit in her car seat and watch the lights of the scarce traffic trickle by. She never fussed or cried to get out and she lasted the whole drive with out having any accidents! We are very proud of her!

After 16 hours in the car, we were all very glad to catch of glimpse of the " Welcome to Colorful Colorado" sign. So much so, that Mike broke into song!
Watch what you do! Every bloggable moment caught by camera is fair game!

See you on the flip side!

Today is the day! We are packing up and heading west. I plan on trying to blog a bit while I'm there so stay tuned!

Mx3

Ushering in fall!

Our friends Ben and Lynn invited us over for a bonfire to welcome fall. We had a great time and hope to do it again soon!

Mack and Jillian being acrobats:

Mack checkin' out the lay of the land:

Nothing says fall more than gathering around a bonfire ( and watching last years Christmas tree go up in flames!)

GO MICHIGAN!

Quite possibly one of our favorite days of the year is opening day of the college football season! We are die hard Wolverine fans , in my opinion, have the prettiest cheerleader!
My favorite fans:

Great day for a picnic

Newly "graduated " ( retired) Aunt Janet wanted to squeeze in an end of summer picnic and boy did we all have fun! Someone as kind and loving as Janet is bound to attract people as sweet as she is and that was evident when I looked around the yard at those who were invited. We all had such a great time. Here are a few snap shots from the party. Thanks again, Janet!
Janet's neighbors were there and they brought their grandson , Austin, who is, in his own words " A really good boy". I agree, Austin! He was so gentle with the little kids and kept them busy all afternoon.
Austin brought over the mother of all toys!

Mack "drove" for a bit but was much happier riding along.

As we were waiting as patiently as we could for party time to arrive, Mack wanted to make a blanket tent. I took the idea one step further and made her a hammock. According to Mack that was " A BRILLIANT idea, Mommy!"

Happy half birthday!

Who needs a reason to have cupcakes? Not anyone, really. But this past Tuesday we had a reason! It was Mackenzie's half birthday and she has been asking for cake for a few weeks now.
She shared half with daddy and devoured the rest herself!

Another trip to the zoo

I sense a new tradition! For the second year in a row, Jeanette and I have taken the kids to the Toledo Zoo on the first full day of school. The weather was great and we had lots of room to roam!

The obligatory picture in front of the fountain:

Playing in the bee costume:
Mack is telling Ben " I'm a BEE! BZZZZZZZZZZZZZ"

After 3.5 hours of wandering the zoo, it was very evident that both kids were ready to head home...

What daddies do

I snapped some sweet pictures of Mack and Mike today and wanted to post them. Mackenzie is so blessed to have a father like Mike and I know one day she will agree with me.

Playing with spaghetti swords ( which they both ate once I took the pic):


Mike and Mack working in her preschool book:

Countdown to Colorado!

14 days (when the pics was taken) before our big trip!


We decorated the bottom with pictures of some of the things we are most excited about doing on our trip. You can see Mack and Auntie Nikki at the park as well Brooklyn, Kaleb, Mack and me jumping on the trampoline ( with Buddy the puppy watching)

This and that

Just a big post full of pictures:

Not much baby left in my girl! I actually got all her hair in a french braid:
We melted down some old broken crayons and made some of our own:
Silly picture of Mack helping me make smoothie popsicles ( Thanks for the molds, Grammy!)
With a two year old in the house, you never know what you might find or where. Discovered these " Motatoes" in our bedroom after Mack was asleep :

"C"

Mack can now write the letter " C"( even if it is sideways) :

All Aboard!

We made another trip to Greenfield Village last week and it was our favorite family trip yet! Our last trip was about 5 months ago and it's really fun to see the changes in Mackenzie even since then. On this visit, she walked most of the way and even ventured into several of the exhibits. She loved the carousel and the train even more as a 2.5 year old . She was so excited about the train ride that she still talks about it days later. Here are pics from the visit:

We made friends with a sweet barn cat we found lounging in the sun:
She could hardly wait for the "merry-sel" to get going:
The train lovers got the best seats right in front!
Watching the fountain: