So Long Summer!

The kids are well into their school routine, Labor Day has come and gone, and we are at the baseball field several nights a week.  I think I can happily declare summer as officially over, especially considering that we had record breaking heat with 62+ days over 100 degrees.  Very nice at the neighborhood pool, but that's about the only place to be.  So, here are a few (or a lot of) snapshots of our favorite summer memories from 2011.


Last day of school!

Driving range at Lake Hefner.  Lots of fun for a $3 bucket of balls!
 

The kids set up a lemonade stand with neighbor friends.  I especially like Emily's name tag.  "Hello!  My name is Emily!  Can I help you?" (hand made and stuck on with masking tape) 

They spent several nights sleeping on a pallet on the floor...by their own choice...fun times?
 

Ray & I celebrated our 17th Anniversary with a trip to Kansas City.  Beautiful place!

 

Caleb found a large turtle at our neighborhood park.  We were on our bikes, so Emily kindly gave him a lift home in her basket.  After a few days, we gave him to a neighbor friend and a few days after that the turtle laid eggs in their back yard!  We're expecting baby turtles any day now, and all the kids have already decided on joint ownership.

 

Bethany 4th of July Parade.  A tradition with my family every year.

 We were very blessed to be able to go to Disneyworld this summer.  Our extremely kind friends asked us to tag along with them again.  This is our third trip and the kids love it more every time!

We went with two other families who have been our friends since college.  Fourteen of us altogether, all lined up on the Jungle Cruise boat.
 

 

 We were so thrilled that our friend found Mickey and Minnie TOGETHER, and we only had to wait about 3 minutes to see them because everyone else was outside watching the Electrical Parade.  We caught the later parade and didn't miss a thing.  Always keep your eyes open at Disneyworld, there are surprises all around!

All 8 children at Old Key West waiting at our bus stop.
 

After a week in the parks, we drove south to Disney's Vero Beach Resort.  This was the first time for our children to see the ocean.  It was such a fantastic trip and reminder of God's majesty and beautiful creation...the part that we don't get to experience very often.

Back to school!  Caleb is a 5th grader and Emily is a 3rd grader.

We wrapped up the summer with a drive-in movie over Labor Day weekend.  There is a great theater here in OKC that we had actually never been to!  We went with good friends that we had also vacationed at Disney with and everyone had an enjoyable evening.

The kids had waited and waited for it to cool off enough to set up the tent and camp out.  Can't beat the back yard for a campsite!  There's power to plug in movies, food right inside, and they take every advantage of loading up all of their stuffed animals and bringing them out with them.  

So that's our Summer wrap up.  I hope you enjoyed every bit of yours!