We are in Wisconsin! We arrived on Saturday afternoon and have been busy ever since. The kids are all enjoying each other's company and have been really well-behaved considering the choas and lack of sleep. Libby has been sleeping in the twins room and Kolbe and Joe are having slumber parties every night! We have found Libby sleeping with Patrick in his playpen on several occasions. We think she keeps choosing Patrick because Luke's playpen is too high for her to kick her leg over and climb in.
So far the kids have been to the public museum, which Jeff remembers his Aunt Sue taking him to as a child. They now have a replica and bones of the big gorilla, Sampson, which everyone visited at the zoo years ago. We went to the children's museum yesterday morning. Kolbe HAD to work on the car. He has been talking about that car since we were in the parking lot leaving the museum last year! They had a few new additions this year and the kids had a great time. Yesterday afternoon we went to Jeff's Aunt Sue and Uncle Mike's house. Libby's jaw dropped when she saw they had a pool. Kolbe got to be the captain of their pontoon boat. The weather was beautiful!
We are hoping to get to the zoo this week if the weather cooperates. Scott, Suzanne and the kids go there quite often and have a pass. There is also a zero entry pool we may try to get to. So many things to do and quite honestly I think the kids are just as happy being together and playing in an unstructured setting. Since the cousins are never together to celebrate their birthday's, we are having a "birthday party" tonight. Suzanne made a cake and we're having a pizza party. We got the kids some small gifts so they have a little something to open.
Don't know when we'll be heading home, but will post some pics then!

Last night Libby looked so cute in her nightgown I had to take a picture. She has been saying a ton of new words and putting words together a lot more than she had been doing. It is so exciting. She has always had such a precious little voice, but because she is relatively quite, we don't get to hear it as often as we'd like.This afternoon she wanted to wear "flops", her name for flipflops, or any sandals for that matter. She informed me that she needed her toenails polished. Whenever I polish her toeanils, she walks around on her heels so she doesn't get her toes messy.

Today we celebrated Grandpa's birthday. After the party Janelle went back to Little Rock. It has been great having her home and we cannot wait for her last 3 months of training to be finished so she can return to K.C. The kiddie table. Hot dogs and chips were had by all. Kolbe and Libby couldn't quite figure out the crescent roll dogs. They both love crescent rolls, and like hot dogs, but neither ate the crescent roll dogs. They picked off the crescent rolls.
The third generation surrounds Grandpa. He has 11 Great Grandbabies. Several commented that Grandma would be LOVING all these kiddos. It will be 5 years that she's been gone at the end of this month. She had only 1 Great Grandbaby when she passed away, of course Gabby, #2, was on her way.
Marvin set up the "Southeast Kansas version of Oceans of Fun." The kids had a terrific time on the waterslide, in the pool, and with their gangster guns.
They especially marveled in shooting the fully clothed adults. :)

A couple of Kolbe funnies.

Lately he has been telling all kinds of lies. Jeff commented that he has a very active imagination, which he definitely does, but that's no excuse. This morning Janelle took him out for a bagel while running errands. He loves bagels. When he got home he told me no one gave him anything to eat. Janelle said he had eaten his bagel, but Kolbe vehemently disagreed. He is not the neatest of eaters and I asked him how he got the cream cheese on his shirt if he hadn't eaten a bagel. He said Janelle dumped it on him, without any hesitation to develop his story. He also had a bit of his breakfast on his cheek. He said Janelle dumped the cream cheese on his cheek too. We'd think his lies were a bit more believable if it weren't for the fact that are so blantantly and obviously FALSE. I guess the lies will worry us a little more when he is clever enough to hide the evidence.

Last week Kolbe happened to be in the living room by himself with the twins as I was walking in I heard him say, "Twins, do you want to sit on my lap? I've got a leg for each of you."

Usually Kolbe uses the right words in the proper context, but once in a while we hear something like this: After leaving his cereal untouched for several minutes he informs me, "I don't want to eat my cereal, it got all...melted."

A few days ago we had no milk, so the kids and I searched the fridge for something else to eat for breakfast. We found some crescent rolls and decided to make cinnamon rolls out of them. When I took out the sugar bowl Kolbe said, "Dad doesn't like us to have that stuff." We made the cinnamon/sugar mixture and started to sprinkle it on the rolls. Kolbe got a little carried away and one roll had a huge pile of cinnamon. Jeff and I looked and each other and made gagging/chocking sounds. Kolbe said, "I'll save that roll for Libby."

Saturday, Kolbe and I went to a water park. Our Mothers of Young Children Group from our church as well as a neighboring church had the park to ourselves for a few hours. Kolbe had a lot of fun.This was the smallest of the slides, but Kolbe did go down all of the slides at least once. He loved the red baby slide! The blue slide was the biggest, he went down once and liked it, but did not ask to go down it a second time.
We celebrated Janelle's 25th birthday. Libby enjoyed helping open presents.

Even though she had helped wrap the gifts, Libby looked thoroughly suprised after opening each one. She has always been so expressive.
We love Aunt Janelle!

Our 4th of July photo album

We went to the annual 4th celebration.

There was a naughty little monkey in the cage. We watched him get into all kinds of mischief.

Last year Libby was a bit too small to ride the pony, but really enjoyed it this year.

Whoo hoo Kolbe, one handed. He waved "hi" almost every time around.

Kolbe was fitted with a bike helmet and wore it to "drive" the tractor.

Libby was keeping rhythm with the marching cobras. She loves to sway, dance, and sing.

Kolbe operated the fireman's water hose putting out an imaginary fire.
The three big kids held hands while in line for the inflatable obstacle course.
What a big boy...Libby is cheesing for the camera. After naps we went to our city celebration. Due to a brief rainshower late in the afternoon, the barbeque was held indoors.
Kolbe and Dad doing some kiddie fireworks.

Little Miss Liberty