Another fun day yesterday – I spent the morning with Gran, & Shea was able to join us for lunch, now that she has her new job in Rock Hill.  I haven’t had a chance to visit with Shea in a while, so that was great fun.  Then after I picked Mallory & Clara up from school we headed back here.  Mason had so much fun last week making the apple pie French fries that we decided to make a batch, too.  Here is Clara rolling out the pie dough.  I mean, it was refrigerated dough – she just had to undo the roll 🙂

It was another hot, hot day, which was just screaming Sprinkler Time :-).  Our sprinkler is one of those that rotates for different spray patterns, and the kids always have a good time switching it over & over.  Just a good day…

What a fun time Mase & I had yesterday.  We spent some time that morning scrolling through the Clover Presbyterian Preschool page, which has become one of our rituals when it’s just him & me here on Friday mornings.  Their policy is not to show the children’s faces in their pictures, but they are great about sharing pictures of different things they’ve had going on all week.  And it is so much fun to look through all the pictures with him, & hear how excited he is about school, & listen to him talk about all the fun things they’ve had going on.  One of the really great things about a computer…

Before Jeff got home from work we made some Apple Pie French Fries, which were SUCH a hit – both the making and tasting.  A fun morning…

Yesterday when I picked Mallory & Clara up from school we went to their house, because Lindee was due to be home early to take Mallory to Rock Hill to auditions for “The Nutcracker” this coming Christmas season.  I loaded up all the supplies & equipment before I left the house that morning, & when we got to their house after school we made our first attempt – for any of us – at making crepes.  They actually were much easier than I expected, & tasted pretty good, too :-).  Here is Clara adding eggs to the blender, before we mixed up the batter.

Mallory as she is getting ready to leave the house with her mom.  The are very rigid at her dance school about them wearing something over their leotard as they go to & from the studio, so she went with a happy pink dress :-).  I texted with Lindee this morning, & she said Mal had fun at the auditions, & now they are just waiting to see what dance or dances she will be in.  It was a good day!

Monday night was June’s first softball game of the fall season.  She’s still playing for the Clover Crush.  Here she is just as the game was beginning, taking her place on the field, with her dad, who helps coach at the games, out there with her.  I love this picture of her 🙂

Saturday was the annual Butts & Bluegrass Festival in town.  What a great time we had – Jeff & I took Meg, Mike, & Hope with us, to celebrate Meg’s birthday earlier in the week.  There must’ve been twenty barbecue vendors there, & I actually could not sample them all.  Wow.  Good music, and bake sales and craft vendors to see if you wanted – it was a hot day, so we didn’t spend too much time tarrying around those.  It was a good day.  Here is Jeff chatting it up with one of the cooks.  Yum.

Another good day yesterday.  Mason was here by himself in the morning, & we did a little bit of cooking, making marinade for chicken.  He was very interested in the way the soy sauce and oil stayed separated in the bowl 🙂

This picture looks a little crazy because it was a little crazy.  After we picked June up from school we came back here for snack and visiting and craft time, etc. etc. etc.  And then all of a sudden we looked, and there was a bright green lizard running across our kitchen floor.  Thank goodness the kids were here – I’m pretty sure there was no way ***I*** was catching that beast.  They’re running around chasing it, I’m running around trying to stay away from it – it was nuts.  Another fun day :-).

Last night I headed straight to York when I got off work, to meet Lindee & the girls, and Emmy, for the fundraiser at Pelicans Snoballs.  Here is Clara posing with my Olaf Snoball :-).  Yummy and fun.

What a fun afternoon we had yesterday after I picked Mallory & Clara up from school.  We came back here & had a snack, & then started on our craft – monsters made out of old shampoo bottles :-).  Here is Clara sketching her monster on her bottle before we started cutting…

And Mallory, showing off her three-eyed, no horned, sitting Purple People Eater :-).  Fun day.

Saturday afternoon we headed over to Andrew & Jenny’s house to celebrate Adam turning six.  His actual birthday was Friday, but Saturday was the big celebration.  He had a monster truck cake.  So cute!

As our gift to him, we got him the Bean Boozled Game, after hearing a sterling review from my friends Dick & Kirkie’s granddaughter.  She & I even e-mailed about it, so I could make sure it would work for a 6-year-old.  It was hilarious.  There are ten different colored jelly beans with good flavors:  peach, blueberry, etc., and then ten, with the same colors as the good tasting ones, with horrendous flavors:  skunk spray, barf, boogers.  They didn’t actually play the game while we were there, but had great fun just trying all the different kinds of beans.  Here is Charlie very tentatively chewing a jelly bean to see if he got a good flavor or a bad one, while his mom passes out pieces to the rest of the party guests.  The barf one actually brought tears to their eyes – sort of like actual barf does.  They were a hit.  It was a good, good day.