Camels in Abilene, TX?

What? There aren't any camels in Abilene, Texas...Abilene isn't exactly a desert, but it is hot enough to be a desert! This summer, Piper, Finn, and Seven went to VBS at Granny's church. The theme this year was, "Egypt, Joseph's journey from prison to palace." They had some live animals on different days of the week. One day, they had camels! I have seen a camel live and in person before and have even ridden one, but how often does someone get to experience this in their life time, unless they live in a desert over seas?

There were two camels. Here is one. He is just chillaxin' in the shade with some hay.

After we dropped off Piper, Finn, and Seven at VBS, I took Rilian to see the camel. I was surprised when he reached out to touch it. I thought he would have been scared of it. He is scared of animals that he hasn't had much experience with.

And a close-up with Rilian reaching to touch the camel.

And the other camel. This one is a little lighter in color and seemed more fuzzy. I was trying to coax Rilian into touching this one too, by telling him it was soft.

He finally got brave enough to touch it, too. I love how just his finger is out to touch it! Rilian got scared when the camel whipped its head down real quick and got "too close". After that, Rilian was done. 

Finn's 5th Birthday Party

I am way behind in my posting, but we can't leave out what happened on July 7, 2010...Finn turned 5 years old! 


I am disappointed that something was wrong with the camera at his birthday party and most of the pictures turned out blurry. This one was the least blurry of "Stick the smiley face on the Transformer." But I decided to post it anyway. We had a huge poster of Optimus Prime and Finn's friends had to see who could stick the smiley face closest to his heart. It was another version of "Pin the tail on the donkey." We just modified it for Finn's Transformer birthday party.

Jeremy decided since Finn was having a Transformer birthday party, his cake would actually transform from a car to Bumblebee, Finn's favorite Transformer. Here is the car.

It starts transforming...arms and legs come out...

And there is Bumblebee! Good job Jeremy! Way to make Finn's birthday cake awesome!

The candle is lit...and everyone is watching.

Time to blow out the candle!

Cake time! The top part of the car was actually a chocolate chip cookie sheet. The rest of the Transformer was chocolate cake...mmmmm!

Enjoying the cake...

This year was apparently the year to get giant stuffed animals for my kids for their birthdays. Seven got an alligator. Piper got a raccoon. And Finn got a tiger.

It is almost life-size!

And takes up a big portion of his bed!

Slip and Slide

Another thing we did this summer was camp...not camping, but we went to Camp Zenith, which is a camp at Oklahoma Christian University for high school students and Camp Cornerstone. Cornerstone is also at Oklahoma Christian University, but it is for junior high students. In the afternoon, the campers choose which activities they want to participate in. One afternoon, there was a huge slip and slide. It was made out of banners that weren't being used. One of the teachers sprayed water on the banners and another teacher dripped baby soap on it, this together caused it to be pretty slick! Our kids had a blast with it!

Piper and Finn went first and Seven wasn't too far behind.

I managed to get some close-ups of the fun...here is Seven.

And Finn, with his mohawk.

And Piper. I was trying to figure out what the big white thing she has in her hand. I think she found a bunch of soap suds and was pushing them along as she slid down.

Jeremy would take them and throw them onto the slip and slide, hence Jeremy's weird stance. I guess Finn decided to go down on his back this time.

Swimming

We have had a very busy summer. I'm sure my faithful readers have wondered where I have been and what my wonderful children have been up to since I haven't posted very many blogs lately. I apologize and hope to be more regular at blogging as things hopefully slow down some as summer comes to an end. But with four kids, it probably won't slow down too much :)

One of the things we did this summer was go swimming. My kids love the pool, I love the sun! We have a friend who is wonderful and lets us swim in her in-ground pool as often as we want. She also has an underwater camera. Here is a picture of Piper under the water. I like how one strand of her hair is floating.

Rilian is now 18 months old and is starting to think he is a big kid like his brothers and sister. He wanted me to put some goggles on him because he saw his siblings wearing them. I had tried to get a picture of him wearing the goggles before this one, but he took them off when I got my phone to take the picture. I tried again, without any success. So when he wanted them on later, I told him I wasn't going to get up to get my phone because he would just take them off before I got back. When I put the goggles back on him, he just stood there in front of me. I sat there staring at him. So, he pointed to the goggles and didn't stop pointing at them on his face until I finally got up and came back to take his picture. That stink pot! But, hey, I got a cute picture out of it.

Piper and Finn know how to swim. In fact, they taught themselves! I am so proud of them! Well, they like to wear this life jacket sometimes in the pool, just for fun. Piper put it on like this and said it was her big diaper. She is very creative. You are probably wondering if she got in the pool like that...yes, she did. To my surprise, she did not flip upside down. She stayed upright. She also likes a challenge, she often doesn't take the easy route.

Since the beginning of the summer, Seven hasn't been too much of a fish when we go to the pool. He refused to wear the arm floaties and decided to stay on the steps for a little while. Then he was done and would go sit in a chair or walk around the pool until it was time to leave. One day, I was gathering up stuff so we could go to the pool and Seven saw me get Rilian's floaty. It is one Rilian can sit in and float around the pool. Seven wanted to take his floaty, the ring one that he can wear around his waist. Once Seven got to the big pool and got in wearing his floaty around his waist, he was soooo happy! He was a totally different kid in the pool! He "swam" all over the pool in his floaty. Everyone was amazed at the difference in him! I wished we had thought to take it at the beginning of the summer instead of the middle of the summer. (I hope Whitney doesn't get too mad at me for posting a picture of her in her swimsuit on my blog. Sorry, Whitney. At least when I took the picture, I thought of that and tried to keep you out of it.)

More pool fun...

And there's Finn in the pool

This was just a little snippet of our summer. Stay tuned for more!