Jasper's Amazing Foam Birthday!

Jasper chose an amazing birthday theme this year, Foam Party! We celebrated this 10 year old's party on the 10th this year and it was a perfect sunny day to slide down our hill into a pile of foam! 

One hundred feet of plastic + a great slope down to the lake + John Schock's magical foam machine + friends = one great 10th birthday party for our Jasper.

Jasper you are so much fun! You alway have a rhythm going in your head, your feet, your hands and your mouth.  You love to dance, build, sing, kayak, Heely and Rip stick. You are happy all the time! You are Mr. Friendly and don't know a stranger. You love your hair and named him Arnold. You don't get in trouble often and if you do, or someone talks sternly to you your throat tightens and you can't breathe. You are a size 7 and growing. You've decided that you can't have milk, peanuts or strawberries and don't even eat ice cream because it makes you hurt. You make good decisions and stand up for others. You choose the right. You love your big brother and sister and play with Kivi most often. You are helpful and often go the extra mile around the house. You are diligent and get your school done quickly. You are great at math and comprehending what you read. You are a blessing and we love that you are in our family, Jasper. You will do so much to spread God's love to others! Happy 10th Birthday, Bubba! We love you!

Mimi and Family Photo Shoot

Since Mimi was up here in Washington, and now so was all our Tague side family, we decided to have an impromptu photo shoot. Dodie and Bug helped everyone round up some black and white outfits and a friend came and took some pictures. It was last minute, but they turned out great especially with this many people and babies!

Our whole family with Mimi!

Goodbye Summer - Seaside 2016

We continued our tradition of getting away to Seaside, OR at the beginning of summer and now at the end. It's a fun way to say goodbye to our crazy months of no school. Which I never intend to happen. I always want to to homeschool all through the summer, but we get so busy, have so many people visit and this year especially hosted so many parties!! Nine this summer, so Lake Steilacoom and this new house are getting used.

We went to Goodwill of course, bought our toys and activities and Tuffy and Eben both got bikes! We watched lots of movies, ate lots of snacks, rode bikes, played at the beach and ate our ice cream daily.

Berg learned how to ride his two-wheeler on this trip, though he was very timid.  He did it! Then Pella wanted to learn too and she picked it up super fast! I see a resemblance here. Kivi trying to beat the Eben and Pella trying to catch up to the Berg.

Tuffy was either on his new bike or stomping around in the only puddle on the street while the kids zoomed around him.

Kivi and Mama both spun the wheel and won a prize at the Candy Man, our daily ice cream stop!

We spent a lot of time at the beach this trip too. Pella collected every stinky crab shell and Tuff collected sand in his pants.

The kids jumped in the waves and Dada and the boys threw a football around.

We did something new this trip! We went to the community pool! It was great. Everyone swam, even Coal, Berg and Mama. The water was sooo warm. They had life jackets for the kids to wear, floaties, a rock wall, a cool slide, flippers, huge floating mats, and a rope swing! We went there twice!

Right outside the pool there was a skate park on which the bigs were super excited to try out their rip sticks. They gave us a great show!

Our family beach line up, taken with the self timer! Only Tuff's not looking, so you can't beat that.

Dada bought some wood so we could have a sunset, beach bonfire and roast marshymallows. Coal loved it! Well, everyone did. It was a great ending to our Seaside Goodbye Summer Getaway.

Kivi's Camping Birthday!

Kivi really wanted to go camping this year for her birthday so she had to wait until August. She chose 3 friends and 3 brothers to go with her. The other siblings stayed with Nonnie, Poppie and Mimi at home.

First we stopped at the falls to eat lunch, sing "Happy Birthday", have pear cheesecake and give Kivi her birthday kiss.

We set up our tents at Cougar Campground right next to the lake. The girls set up their own tent and the boys help set up the rest.

As soon as the tents we set up the girls made their tent comfy, and got to playing games and coloring inside of it.

 Kivi opened her presents and we had extremely spicy thai noodles in a cup,

and a popcorn mustache party!

The next morning after making a human totem pole, we got ready to go to the Ape Caves.

We've been there before and have done the lower cave and part of the upper cave. This time we did the full 1.5 miles of the higher lava tube, scrambling over large boulders in the pitch black darkness and coming out of the top.

Berg only fell into a three foot hole once! He did a great job climbing with all those big kids.

 They all loved exploring any little off shoot or ledges and tried to race along those big rocks. I thought for sure someone was going to get majorly scrapped, but it turns out they were born spelunkers. 

On the way back we went over a fun suspension bridge. 

For the rest of the camping trip, the big kids created a horse ranch - with logs. They each gathered a large log from the shore and carried them into the lake. They named each one, made them all corrals and would take them out and try to ride them! They spent forever doing this!

Happy 11th Kivi Pea! You are a wonderful daughter! You are so smart, helpful, creative, loving and kind. You are a great leader. You are competent. You can memorize anything. You still love pigs and all things pioneer and camping. You love to try new things and water sports. You can wake board, slalom ski, kayak and paddle board. You love historical fiction, playing with the doll house, heelying and drawing dresses. You read your sisters a devotional at night. You take such good care of your babies that Tuffy calls you "Mama". You are an amazing servant! God is using you to encourage others and be an inspiration for His glory! We love you so much!

Apples and Mimi

Our house in August. Dada painted our white wicker swing red!

Our friends let us come pick their apples - two bushels from one tree! So we made lots of applesauce.

For Christmas we had given Mimi a trip up to WA to come visit so she came in August and got to meet Coal.

We set her up with an electric scooter that was left at this house and had her try it out up and down the driveway. The kids (and Dada) ran along side.

All the kids and their Mimi.

Family Camp & Berg's Baptism

August 12 - 14th was our church's Family Camp at Black Lake. Peter and I backed off in the Programming dept. and just ran the skit night because we knew we'd have an infant. It worked out that we didn't try to do too much because Peter ended up having to work and coming later on Saturday. So I took all 8 kids all by myself for a day and a half to camp. It was crazy. I like it way better with Peter.  On Saturday night, Eben and Kivi did an amazing job performing the Rumplestiltskin skit from Studio C (Eben's costume was epic), but since Peter was running all the behind the scenes act changes and I was the MC, we didn't get any pictures!! Thanks for these, Chris!

We did get lots of Eben and Derek on a photo challenge, which they won.

 Sunday morning was a big day for Berg. He decided he wanted to be baptized! He was pretty nervous, because of course this symbolic ceremony required dunking in water, his arch nemesis. But despite his being afraid, he wanted to do it and after reading his testimony Dada baptized him in the cold lake. He was so brave! I know how much this kid hates water and he did it anyway, without any prompting from us.

All of the Johnsons came out to see Berg's baptism!