Summer Photos

Here's Dan doing what he does.  Winning my heart with chocolate chunk cheesecake.  He's got it perfected so it's as good as the stuff we used to get at Garden Café in Lincoln.  I do love a man who can cook.

The Omaha zoo is awesome.  I don't take a lot of animal pics because, you know, I could find better ones online.  No one wants to see the pics I take at a zoo, including myself.  Unless my kids are in it.  But I was so fascinated with the jelly fish this time.  I always love the penguins and sharks too.

 When you go back home to Lincoln, you just have to stop at Topper Popper for soft ice cream cones. 

 

Miss Thing's birthday.  She wanted an Angry Birds party.  And yes, Pinterest moms, I bought cupcakes from Walmart.  I'm not even ashamed.

Lovin' her birthday "darks"

Lincoln also has a fun children's museum.  Dan makes a good criminal.  I think it's the beard. :)

 This is our second year having a garden.  It's a big job.  I made the kids do a little weeding most mornings before they played.

 Our Chinese exchange students were "Cici" and "Dora" this year.  They were so very different from each other.  Cici was excited about dancing and swimming, and Dora liked drawing and roller skating.  Cici had never learned how to ride a bike, so she learned here!

 I'll tell you one thing.  Newton, Utah really knows how to party on the 24th of July.  It's their pioneer heritage celebration.  They have a parade complete with airplane and of course candy and such, a pancake breakfast (You want it, you need it, so come and eat it! Dan's favorite thing to say now- but you have to use the right voice).  They have cotton candy, snow cones, and lunch.  AND they have a mud obstacle course, followed by foam and water from fire hoses.  I was so surprised to see the girls participate in all of it.  This doesn't even include the dinner and dance the night before.  The pic below is in an original pioneer cabin my aunt restored.

                                         visit to the temple where Dan and I were married

 After a trip, this is always my favorite thing to come home to

 And we got another authentic Chinese dinner

                                             Here is a from our Salt Lake City fake-cation

And these are more Nebraska pics but it's too difficult to put them in the right order!  Trains with Grandpa.

 

 And we took the kids to the sunken gardens, where Dan proposed many, many years ago.

 And I finally let the kids do a lemonade stand.  It was super hot when they started, and a crazy storm when they had to stop shortly after.

 Those were the highlights of our summer!  Of course we had some s'mores, fun at the drive in, barbeques, and stuff like that.  Sad to see it end, but mostly I'm happy to be on a schedule again.  The kids are pretty happy to be back in school too, I think.  My biggest challenge now is that Ellis is the only kid home during the day.  It was the same last year, but she napped a little better last year.  We have a preschool day with friends one day a week, the YMCA and such, but I'm going to have to figure out how to entertain her.  I'm not so good at playing My Little Ponies at 7 am.