July

We went camping at a local campground with several families in our ward over the July 4th weekend.  It was a miserably hot weekend, so thank goodness the campground had a pool!  And you can always count on Germans to have some random fun playgrounds and slides everywhere you go.  Since we just stayed one night, and we were back and showered in time for the festivities on base the next day, so we decided to brave the crowds.  The kids got their faces painted, begged and whined for treats and rides, and we ended up carrying half of them back to the car kicking and screaming.  Haha.  Honestly, that's how those types of things typically go anyways.  But at least we have some pictures of us doing something 'fun' on the 4th!  And it was nice to have a little bit of America over here in Germany on such a holiday.  

Of course Nate brought along some awesome contraption that he made to help the kids have fun--giant bubble maker

We also made it down to Heidelberg for their annual wine festival.  Had a lot of fun, found a park that the kids loved towards the end of the night, had to hold Isla down during the fireworks as she tried frantically to climb 'away' from the fireworks (aka, up the hill and into the street).  

Sometimes, when you are riding your tricycle in your pajamas, you just need an ax

Ice Cream with Hagelslaag (chocolate sprinkles from the Netherlands)

I actually planted some bulbs this year!  And they grew!

Kids will be kids I guess

During the summer months, we enrolled Sawyer in karate again, and Violet tried out Gymnastics.  Both were cut a little short due to visitors, traveling, and then our spontaneous trip to the States in August, but they had fun.  Sawyer actually does pretty well with karate, and I think he enjoys it the most out of all the sports he's tried so far.  But we decided to keep it just to the summer, since he would be doing soccer and everything else during the school year.  

The kids were so proud that they had dressed Isla up like a rockstar, lol

My cousin, Jerai, has a little boy named Brewer that was born with a serious heart condition.  He was scheduled to have his 3rd heart surgery and we all wore shirts to show our support.  And--the shirts were designed by my sister, Sydney!  We love our Brew Crew shirts and are happy to say that the surgery went well and Brewer is in good health!

 Last thing to mention--but certainly not the least--Nate checked Scout Camp off of his eternal to-do list!  Wahoo!  He put a lot of hard work and preparation into camp this year, and it all went pretty well!  He even headed up a 50 mile bike ride for boys as they rode their bikes all the way to the camp (and back!!).  Despite a lot of worried (and underconfident) moms, the boys did great!

Yes that is Nate pushing two bikes up a hill--the hills were brutal at times