Labor Day Weekend

Hold your hats folks...this post has a lot of pictures:)  I wanted to remember all that we did in these few days, so I had difficulty scaling back the number of photos to include.  We enjoyed a nice 3-day weekend at home and had lots of fun while getting a lot accomplished around the yard.  Our new neighbors moved in and we learned that they have a 2 1/2 and 3 1/2 year old little girl.  Poor Sam is outnumbered by girls around here!  We were hoping he might have a new play mate close by, but are super happy they have young kids too.  After more than a year of having an empty house next to us, it was nice to see activity in the back yard while we were outside this weekend too!  On a side note, above is Emmeline with her new pet horse "Whitey."  He was a horse I had for one of my cabbage patch kids when I was little.  Emmeline has taken him in as her new friend and even named him herself.  She carries him around all over and always asks if we want to pet him:)

On Thursday evening we went to Sam's favorite local summer hang-out to check out what classic cars they had.  There was a charity event going on and it was super busy with lots and lots of classic cars.

On Friday evening, even though it was a bit windy, we ate dinner outside and then roasted marshmallows on the fire.

 The girls enjoyed their first S'Mores...

 And I think all 3 decided they like just plain "raw" marshmallows the best:)

I'd have to say the highlight of the weekend for the kids was getting "off-road" rides in Ed's old explorer.  They love just sitting in it and can be occupied for long periods of time just putting seat belts on and opening the glove compartment.  But on Saturday morning Ed decided to take them on a ride around the yard.

 Through tall grass and up hills...

They all thought it was the "BEST" new fun adventure and asked for many Explorer rides throughout the weekend:)

Now that the grass is finally soft and green again, we took the opportunity to blow up a huge ball that Sam got for his birthday.  It's big enough for him to go inside and be rolled around.

 All 3 kids enjoyed getting in and out and rolling around in the ball.  It made me dizzy just watching it:)

Sam and the girls discovered a new method of transport!  We hooked the wagon up to one of the little bikes at my parents house and the girls had an instant hands-free ride from Sam.  Emmeline is even practicing her parade wave in this photo!

On Sunday night we had a special movie night and watched Nemo for the first time.  I think we made it about half way through the movie before the kids were ready for bed.  I'd call it a success!

Yesterday we enjoyed a few more Explorer rides and also worked on clearing out more climbing trees for the kids.  Sam climbed the highest he has yet in one of these white pines.

 Mollie and Emmeline both climbed into this tree for the first time by themselves too!

 It was pretty fun to watch and they were both so proud!

It was quite hot yesterday, so after all of that tree climbing and branch clearing, we decided to take one last trip to the lake.

 The kids did some good floating around and enjoyed cooling off a bit.

We played in the sand and enjoyed being able to make it to the beach one last time to mark the end of summer.

On the way home, we came across this great park, so couldn't resist stopping to check it out.  We love finding new parks:)

Sam helped Ed finish adding some supports to the wood shelter he built this spring.  It was a great project for Sam to be able to use some tools to help Ed.

Then in the evening, we made a trip to surprise the kids with THIS play set:)  We've been looking for something with swings on Craigslist and saw this one with 3 swings!!!  Perfect!  It was super cheap, so we couldn't pass it up.  Ed started taking it apart last night and will finish the job tonight.  We'll have to fix a few things and re-stain it, but I think it will give us many years of fun for the kids.

So it was a fun-filled, work-filled, busy weekend.  We tackled lots of little projects and had lots of fun!  We hope all of you enjoyed your Labor Day weekend too!