Birthday Party!

We only sent one kid for stitches, so I'm calling the birthday party a success! Although, Owen never did manage to get his legs to stretch far enough to reach the pedals on the go-cart. It certainly wasn't for lack of trying!

The "I finally give up" face.

As per our usual summer birthday party routine, the party consisted of kids running around, playing in the kiddie pool, shooting arrows, and riding quads and go-carts. This year we were able to borrow quads from the next door neighbor and Grandma Sallie, so there were twice as many turns as usual. Which was especially nice once the go-cart broke!

Owen and Simon

My nephew Braeden

I was mostly busy manhandling little kids, so I didn't get many pictures of the kids riding. I think Devon got some, but I haven't downloaded her camera yet.

Brenna got a belated birthday present to open which made her VERY happy. She'd been feeling a little left out with all the presents that weren't hers. In case you are wondering how to tell boys apart from girls, the girls are the ones who are excited to get clothes for their birthdays! Even at two years old, Brenna was thrilled to get clothes for her birthday. The boys not so much, except for Owen's John Deere hoodie. He was really excited about that since his other one doesn't fit anymore and it's his favorite.

Owen was even excited about one of his cards! A Skylanders card that talks, he played with that as much as any of the presents!

The wind wasn't cooperating with the candles, but we finally got one lit for Owen to blow out. That's his favorite part of the cake, since he can't actually EAT the cake. We did get our little tubie friend to eat some frosting as well as the M&M's off of most of the cupcakes and part of a hot dog. So that's a plus even if we did send his big brother to the hospital.

I think overall, the kids had a great time. I'm absolutely exhausted and quite glad that we don't have another birthday for several months!

Swim Social!

Owen's fever finally broke yesterday (he hasn't been coughing since Wednesday) so we were able to attend the Parent to Parent swim social. Parent to Parent has been such a wonderful support to our whole family since Owen was born. Tonight was especially nice since this event was designed to be fun for the whole family. Okay, well, actually only Rod and I and the 4 youngest kids attended since Devon had already spent a lot of time at the pool over the last few weeks and the older boys had just barely gotten back from a week at camp and just wanted to go home and eat. All of us who went had a lot of fun though!

We got to catch up with friends we haven't seen for almost a week and friends we haven't seen for almost a year.

Duncan spent much of his time racing against some of the other boys. He was also the only one of our children present who was tall enough to ride the water slide, much to Owen's disappointment.

Owen and Brenna loved to just float and be pulled around the pool. neither one of them has even the tiniest bit of fear about the water. I actually wish Owen had a little more fear. He seems perfectly convinced that he can breathe underwater, or maybe just not breathe at all for minutes at a time. Brenna, at least has enough fear of strangers to not go very far away from Rod or I.

Morgan did a lot of playing in the water, but also practiced her swimming skills so that she can go down the waterslide once she grows another inch. Yes, she was ONE measly inch too short to go down.

My New Best Friend

Keeping Owen busy while everyone else eats.

I have a new best friend. I don't actually know her name or anything, but that's totally irrelevant, she's still my best friend.

Yesterday, I ended up at the grocery store with my three youngest kids just before dinner time. Yes, I know better, but sometimes life doesn't work out as planned. We made it through the store, got everything on our list  and were waiting in the endless check out line. Now, my kids are pretty good in stores, Owen has a few issues, but grocery stores are pretty much torture for anyone on a diet as restrictive as his. They were being pretty good, but check out always taxes our good behavior to the extreme. They were still doing pretty well, but were getting a bit antsy. And the line was long. The lady in front of us asked me if they were all mine (yes, I know, I only had three with me, but three is really pushing the limits of family size these days). I said that they were indeed all mine and she asked if we were planning on any more. To which I replied that I actually had four more at home.

LONG PAUSE.

 I'm bracing myself at this point for the upcoming negative comment, since it's virtually impossible to admit to having SEVEN children in public these days without some sort of rude comment. She looks me up and down and blurts out "How old are you? You can't possibly be old enough to have 7 kids. You don't look like you can be more than 30 tops!" So anyway, like I said, I have a new best friend! For those of you who don't remember, I turned 43 last month. Then to make things even better, she went on about how much fun we must have at our house with all those kids! Seriously, I can't believe I didn't get her name and number. Even my husband says I look 35 now.

Camping - June 2014 {Ketogenic Diet}

We made it through the camping trip with no ambulances or tow trucks! I think I need another week to recover. I've pretty much caught up all the extra laundry and dishes, but I still need to make up for not cooking keto meals all weekend. The trip to the campground went pretty well. We had one minor bout of car sickness, but that was all. The trip home was a bit of a different story. My two youngest were suffering from a severe lack of sleep and change of routine and pretty much whined and/or screamed the whole way home.

The older kids and Rod got to go river rafting, but fire was the favorite activity of the little kids. I thought someone was going to fall in several times. It took most of the weekend to teach Owen about safety circles. Brenna thinks she's 12 or maybe 20, so she was quite convinced that she could do anything the older kids could do. No one actually got burned though, so I think we did alright.

Owen's keto cheese sandwich

Yes, Owen got to roast hot dogs and marshmallows even though he couldn't eat them. He actually seemed fine with making them for everyone else. Owen's favorite way to cook marshmallows is to just flame them to ash. I figured a package of marshmallows cost less than a dollar, so why not just let him waste them if it makes him happy.

Brenna still mostly clean

Brenna a day later, not clean!

Morgan had lots of fun

Rod finally got Brenna to take a nap, but only as long as he held her. She didn't sleep well at all the first night. Sleeping in the tent freaked her out, especially when the big kids were still up and shining their flashlights around. She slept better the second night, but was still pretty grouchy on the ride home.

Unfortunately, I came home with a whole bunch of really blurry pictures. The kids just wouldn't stop moving long enough for me to get good photos!

Owen photo bomb!

These two were so adorable! They play so well together.

Sunday, we headed into Leavenworth before going home.

While everyone else had goodies in the gingerbread shop, Owen and I played with the cutest little beagles outside.

Owen doing a little dance while everyone else eats lunch on the way home.

Traveling with Owen's keto diet went very well. I made most of his food up in advance and just weighed out his fruit and butter with our travel scale at the campground. It was very nervewracking packing for him. We can't just go to the store and get anything we might have missed bringing, so we had to bring everything we might possibly need. I made up for it by being pretty lax on packing for everyone else. I can always run to the store if I forget anything any one else needs. I can't even pick up sunscreen for Owen as there are only a couple of brands he can use and most aren't available at small stores. But, like I said, everything went fine. We had no major mishaps. Although I will admit that I'm not ready to do it again any time soonI