Baby

Reading:

Loves the smell of new tennis balls:

Entertaining himself in the bathroom:

With a new sock monkey quilt made by Aunt Kathy!

And a first word:

Monarch Tagging

Grandma Joan came up one Saturday and we spent an hour catching and tagging monarch butterflies in the Baker wetlands:

In the fields:

Even baby got in on the action:

Recreating a photo of Grandma Farm and a butterfly:

Cooper:

And Cooper a bunch of years ago!

More hiking pictures

Finished!  And tired!

Bridge-building

We came to one area of the trial with lots of water, enough so that we didn't want the kids all sloshing through.  So we rounded up as many logs as we could to build a make-shift bridge.

I made it across and then had to go find another log on that side to add to our bridge:

Success!

Hiking

Cooper and I met Carrie, Gus, and Eleanor at a random state park in Iowa to go hiking:

Snack / drawing break:

Hanging out at home

A perfect play set-up:

New book:

Even baby gets an iGadget:

Cooper and his friends watched in Indiana Jones movie with a projector down in the basement:

Working on 6th grade math homework:

Brushing teeth:

Food

Breakfast -- pancakes, eggs, sausage:

A much tastier snack:

Coop making breakfast muffins to sell at the Coffee Cart at Raintree (to raise money for his 6th grade trip to Chicago):

Working the Coffee Cart:

Blacklight Slide

Coop and I went to KC for a giant water slide event.  We didn't end up staying until it was dark, but the slides were filled with special water that would glow in the black light.  We had fun in the daylight, though!

New things

First day of sixth grade (in a new outfit):

And check this out!!

FUN!

Spoons are always a hit:

Bath time:

Cooper decided to get blue streaks in his hair:

We match!

Birthday crowd

We invited Zayonn's bio-siblings (and their other foster siblings at their homes)  to our house for his birthday party.  It was a crowd, to be sure!

The four siblings:

A fun new toy!

BIRTHDAY!!

Zayonn turned ONE!

 Snacks for all the kids: