Camping 2011

At the beginning of August we escaped the heat of the valley for a week and headed to the coast for a camping trip. My mom and Aunt Coreen are professional, every-year Memorial Park campers - and they were gracious to invite us all over to invade their relaxation! And to make it even better my mother-in-law offered to let me use her swanky new, almost-as-big-as-our-house trailer. I was set!
We had a wonderfully cool time, complete with a bit of rain, lots of junk food, and family memories...

dinner the first night - before we get toooo grungy

early morning breakfast before sending the daddies home

Mmmmm can't beat Marianne's ice cream!

a critter in our camp stealing our cookies!

Aunt Marsha's first s'more ever

sweet cousins

even got daddy to sit on the beach with us!

love the sparkle in those eyes even when it is a very ornery sparkle ;)

pinch pinch pinch

going back next year a family of 4!

We're getting really excited

to bring our baby home!

Only 6 weeks to go... this pregnancy has gone unbelievably fast, and I realized we better start preparing lest our wee one has to come home and sleep in a cardboard box! My mom came over one evening while Clinton was spraying late and we hauled up the tiny baby things from the cellar and sorted through them. So fun and hard to believe Emma was ever that small! Of course our pink pile was waaaay larger than the little blue pile - can't wait to see which one we'll be using!!!

Emma had a grand time trying on the baby clothes, and in true girl fashion exclaimed "aawww cute, Mommy! So tiny!" and then proceeded to claim the yet un-used boy blankies to add to her ever growing "mikey" collection. She's been sleeping with it ever since, reminding me "I need my baby mikey mom!" if I try to ease it away. Cringing a bit to think of all the adjustments coming to her little world but knowing it will be so good for her.
The next few months look huge to me, I have to continue to take one day at a time so I don't hyperventilate! It's a moment by moment process of faith for me - guess that's what happens when we pray for God to strengthen our faith. Then we actually have to practice it instead of just having our faith magically be tuned, honed, and perfect. Praise Him that it is a lifelong process!

Emma's "Bee-Day Party"

Goodness! hard to believe it's been almost a month since Emma's birthday party! She saw a bee birthday party in a magazine many months ago and decided then and there she had to have one herself - so all summer she talked about Emma's bee party and Uncle Del and Taylor coming to her bee party... all other details besides those didn't matter to her :) As long as it was a bee party and Uncle Del and Taylor were there she was a happy girl! What a fun evening we had celebrating with our family...

cutest little bee cake made by Aunt Kristi

fun festive girl cousins

loads of fun for Emma!

bzzzzzzz

So blessed by these godly great-grandmas - we love them!!!

tried the ruffled streamers (thanks for the idea Sharon!)

very serious to blow out the candles

party hats!

can't take time for pictures when there's cake around!

learning to properly hammer on her special gift from her special Taylor :)

Thanks for joining the party Caroline (Tuuurline)!

Emma's birthday 7/28, Aunt Kristi's birthday 7/29,
Papa's birthday 7/30 means they get special birthday hats!

*~* The beat up birthday girl *~*

Little Red Riding Hood Tea Party

We are blessed with this very special Aunt in the Bowman family... she is just brimming with fun ideas for little girls, and we are so thrilled to be part of the girls who benefit from all her creativity.

Last year Aunt Lou started a new tradition of a Bowman girl tea party with a Teddy Bear Tea Party; and this year's theme was Little Red Riding Hood. So all the little Bowman girls donned red and white attire and set off for a treat of a time at Aunt Lou's house... complete with the story of Little Red Riding Hood's adventure, their very own red capes and baskets, a stroll through the "woods" to gather their lunch, tea party dainties fit for princesses, special memories with cousins, and the sweetest Great-Grandmother any girl could wish for.

Elaine's Baby(s) Shower

How very special to take part in throwing a celebration for ***3*** babies on the way! I'm pretty sure this opportunity won't happen again (but then again I never imagined my big bro would be daddy to triplets either!) We had fun making all kinds of sweet treats and imagining Clark and Elaine with their very own 3 little monkeys. Praying for a safe and healthy pregnancy for Elaine and that Clark returns home very soon!

proud Grandmas :)



How lucky for us to go from 2 sisters to...



4 sisters! and they give us nephews/neice 3 at a time!



That's a lot of excited aunties!



How cute is this little Sweet Pea Pod containing 1 of 2 twin boys?

I'm sure Elaine's getting lots of advice from this circle of pros

The very best gift box is always from Grandma Brubaker ~
full of special hand-knit blankets, booties, hats, and sweaters.
She's really getting a workout, as she is the great-Grandma of 2 sets of twins
and now triplets too!

Little Miss and her sweet friend Marisa... pretty sure they helped themselves
to several cookies and cake pops all evening. No worries - they ran it all off :)

3 little monkeys swinging all around... just a little insight into a few years from now at the Brubaker household ;)
Oh what fun it will be to see!

Housework

While our carpentry skills are pretty much nill... we can prime beams and v-boards. and prime...and prime... and prime... All the while reminding ourselves that when it comes time to paint, we will be so happy that we did this before they went up! I will probably be posting lots of "new house" stuff from now on, as that is what most of our spare time is spent doing, and I want to remember this process :) It is so fun to feel like we are actually DOING something hands-on! It's getting more and more exciting - electric, plumbing, heating and air are pretty much done; roof and windows within the next few weeks and then on to the really fun decisions!