sun, fun & friends

A perfect summer day at the pool with the Oosting's, Heethuis' and McCallum's...the kids swam and swam and we ate and ate and then we finished the day off with a campfire and s'more's. Does life get any better??

beating the heat

This is what the last couple of days have looked like for us...how have you been keeping cool?

Macker

Another summer, another basketball-filled weekend in Ludington, another trophy (or two) for the mantle.

Nothing says summer like the Ludington Macker. For us, it's evolved from "I'm going to watch my boyfriend play" to young married couples hanging out for the weekend to fun for the whole family, including lots of little kiddos running around. The weather was perfect and the guys had a nice little run although those games still make me nervous - it's better if I don't watch the end of them when they're close. Matt's team ended up with second place and also the sportsmanship trophy (their Gusbuster was very attached to them). I'm physically exhausted today and I can't figure out how Matt must be feeling since he's the one who was actually playing basketball for two days.

strawberries!

Today was strawberry day! We went and picked at DeLange's this morning - I think it's a little early in the season but the picking was still pretty good and the berries are really big this year (if you haven't gone yet, it sounds like later this week and early next week are good times to go). We got a lot of jam done before lunch and then we finished up with some whole and mashed berries for the freezer in the afternoon. Ella was in fruit heaven - she is our little fruit eater.

Ella and Katie (aka Uncle Chad's girlfriend) with a GIANT strawberry.
My jam! I am so happy to have the freezer restocked and I'm hoping this will get us through until next summer since PB&J's are a staple around here!

our favorite

"Daddy is my favorite because he can climb trees and jump off of swings." ~Dylan, 4 1/2 years old

small group love

I'd like to use a post to give a public shout out to our small group...I love our annual group shots and this one is a couple months old but I'm just getting around to posting it. There are a couple of things we are good at...1) eating - it's required that every small group activity involve some form of food, and 2) reproducing - that would be eight kids in 5 1/2 years and three more coming later this year for a grand total of 11!! Oh, and we're good at loving each other too.

If you have people like this in your life already, you're all set. If you don't...stop reading my blog and go find yourself some!!

Introducing...

Lucy Michelle Jen! We are finally getting closer to meeting our new little niece/little cousin (mom and dad are my brother and sister-in-law). Kyle and Michelle started the adoption process almost three years ago and they received their referral a few weeks ago. They are finishing up some paperwork and then they will wait for their travel announcement, hop on a plane to China about a week later, and bring home their little girl (hopefully sometime in July). We are so excited for them and glad the wait is (almost) over. And seriously, how cute is she??

#3

I realized that I've hardly mentioned Baby #3 since announcing our pregnancy on my blog. There's not too much to report, but here's a little update. I am 17 weeks today. The morning/all day long sickness started wearing off around 14 weeks and I am very grateful for that. Since then, the weeks have flown by. I think I have felt a few little kicks but its always hard to tell this early on. It took me a long time to feel Ella kick (after 20 weeks sometime...yes, I was totally freaked out) so I'm not really sure what to expect with this one. I had to pull out the maternity shirts last week and I'm thinking about the pregger pants too (if you haven't seen me lately, here's a tidbit...my neighbor asked me the other night if I had about three more months to go...how about FIVE more?!) We have our ultrasound scheduled for July 2, and I cannot wait to find out if we're having a baby boy or a baby girl. We haven't talked about names too much yet because I like to wait until we find out the gender...cuts the amount of brain power I need to use in half. I fully expect to go into full nesting mode at that point since I'm also waiting to start thinking about Baby's room. Still trying to decide if I'm going to turn our spare bedroom into the nursery or move Ella to the spare bedroom and turn her old room into the nursery (she'll probably stay if we're having a girl but move if it's a boy...its all very complicated...we can discuss it over an iced coffee sometime if you'd like). Anyway, I think that's all for now. Did I miss anything?

Then & Now

Same table, same kids, different year. I honestly don't remember Ella being quite that bald last summer, but photos don't lie!

Xavier, Ella, Dylan & Jalen

beach girl

A couple more photos to catch up from Memorial Day. I'm realizing for the third post in a row, I'm putting up pictures that I didn't actually take myself. Pretty good system I've got going here! Much better to let other people do the photo-taking work :). These ones were taken by "Unca Chad's giwl-fwend" Katie (also known as K3 because it does get a little confusing around here). It was cool night at the beach but we still had to stop Ella from taking all her clothes off and wading into chilly Lake Michigan.

Daddy

My brother Kyle took this picture Memorial Day weekend during a family walk on the beach and I absolutely love it. I not only married a man who is an amazing husband, but he's an amazing daddy too. I gave Matt a frame last year for Father's Day that says "Daddy - A son's first hero. A daughter's first love." That couldn't be more true in our family. Tonight I was driving in the van with kids and Ella said "Daddy crazy 'bout me." That couldn't be more true either. We love you Matt-Daddy!

Sunday

Yesterday after church, we went to Wedgewood Park with five other families and enjoyed a beautiful day together eating and playing. I counted them up afterwards and we had 14 kids 5 and under (and even more amazing, we managed not to lose any of them). We all stuffed our faces, the kids fed the ducks, the boys played football, and the moms pulled off a complete picnic lunch (ever have one of those moments where you look around for your mom and then realize, "Wait a minute, we ARE the grown-ups!") Theresa did a great job taking pictures and now I'm stealing them from her to post on my blog :)