Spectacular Summer Showing

Emily and I have been busy with our nightly gardening chores.

Emily will often go outside with me to "help".

But sometimes she prefers to hang out inside and watch "Phineas and Ferb" ...

Or "Zack and Cody".

When she comes out with me, I spend a lot of time telling her the names of all the plants ... such as these lovely "Little Grapette" daylilys.

And we talk about how some of the flowers are different than the others ..

Different colors ...

Different shapes ...

Different sizes ...

Different "visitors"

As you can see, we have LOTS of work to do in the evenings.

But it is SO worth it

To be outside enjoying the sunshine ...

Warmth ...

And God's beautiful creations.

Thank you, God, for all the beautiful flowers that You made for us to enjoy. Thank you for giving me a perfect hobby to share with my wonderful daughter. Please show me opportunities to teach her more about You.

In Jesus' name I pray.

Amen.

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Diet Coke Floats

After the birthday party last weekend, we had a big cooler of cokes (remember, I'm from Arkansas and it's always coke no matter what variety it may be) and bottled waters left over.

Did you notice anything in the picture? Well, I sure did! All the diet coke products (Diet Coke, Diet 7-up) were floating and the regular cokes (Pepsi, Dr. Pepper) were sunk to the bottom of the cooler.

Why does Diet Coke float?

Well, the answer to this question is related to density and water displacement. Density is the relationship of an object's mass to its volume. (Is it heavy or light? Big or small?) Water displacement describes how an object pushes aside a liquid when it's placed into the liquid. An object that is more dense will push aside more liquid and the object will sink. An object that is less dense will push aside less liquid and the object will float.

The regular coke contains ingredients that are more dense ... like sugar. The diet coke contains ingredients that are less dense ... like artificial sweetners. This is why regular coke sinks and diet coke floats.

Now you know.

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Berry Good

Last night when we got home, Emily and I went to check on all of our flowers. One of the "flowers" that we planted last year actually turned out to be a strawberry plant. I knew the plant looked familiar, but I couldn't place it at the time. I believe the plant tag said something about a geranium, but I knew what it was the instant I planted it.

So last night, we noticed that one of the stawberries was getting ripe and we decided to go ahead and pick it before the yard bunnies got it.

Emily was so excited. She picked it herself and we took it inside and washed it.

Then she ate it in tiny little bites.

All the way down to the stem. Nothing left but the green stem.

I don't like strawberries. At all. But I tried it anyway and I didn't think it was very sweet. Honestly, I'm not exactly sure if strawberries are supposed to be sweet or not. I can't get past all the little seeds.

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Every Day with Stephanie

Poor little Stephanie was a dirty girl. (Somehow) I convinced Emily to help me give her a bath today after lunch. Well, convincing her to help me with the bath was not hard. Convincing her to leave Stephanie in the tub while Emily went to take a nap was the hard part. In case you wanna know, I used Tide laundry detergent and Oxyclean and a lot of elbow grease.

And then after Emily got in bed for her nap, I put Stephanie in the washing machine with a load of bed sheets. And then after she was done spinning in the washer, I put her in the dryer on low. But she was making too much of a racket thumping around in there so I took her out and wrapped her in a towel.

When Emily got up from her nap, she immediately went to the sink to look for Stephanie. She was a little concerned about why I took her out of the bath and I said I took her out because she was crying. Why? Because she was not expecting her mama to take such a long nap.

Sweeter

Tonight, we were driving in the car and listening to Emily's current favorite song - Sweeter (aka Every Day with You Lord). Not familiar with that song? Here's a video.

Then after the song was over, Mike and Emily started making up their own silly verses and lauuuuuuuughing.

"Every day, every day with Stephanie ... Every day, Stephanie drinks a bottle!"

"Every day, every day with Stephanie ... Every day, Stephanie plays with Barbies!"

"Every day, every day with Stephanie ... Every day, Stephanie takes a shower!"

And on .. and on ... and on .. and on :)

Oh, to be four and imaginitive and silly!

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Did you hear about Six Flags?

Did you hear that Six Flags filed for bankruptcy?

Six Flags is such an icon in the theme park world. What does it mean that they filed for bankruptcy? Will all the Six Flags theme parks shut down?

I sure hope not. That would really be a big loss in the entertainment industry.

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Ride, Baby, Ride!

Last week for Emily's birthday, she received a bicycle from her Nanny and Pops. Pops put it together for her and she was ready to ride.

Now ... a couple years ago, she got a tricycle for her birthday but she never really got the hang of how to pedal the thing. I know that part of the problem was the tricycle itself. It was one of those with the push handle for the parents, but that made the pedals turn backward very easily.

So I was sorta expecting her to have a difficult time with the bike. But that was not to be. She hopped on and was off and going in no time.

She and Madison love to ride around the neighborhood. "Only on the sidewalk, not on the street!"

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Cruising Together

On Sunday, we went downtown to ride the Water Taxis on the Oklahoma City Bricktown Canal. We were the first customers at the water taxi stand and so we got a boat all to ourselves. Well, except for the driver/tour guide, of course.

One of a long group of bronze statues depicting the land run .. the boomers and the sooners.

Carter liked the boat ride too.

Largest waterfall in Oklahoma City ... or was it in Oklahoma? And the second largest waterfall is also on the Bricktown Canal.

The Devon Energy Mosaic .. thousands of little tiles

Emily and Grandmother checking out the sights

Heather caught me trying to take her picture

The fam

After we looked around Bricktown for a bit, we checked out Bass Pro Shop before we headed to lunch at Texas Roadhouse. I ordered a sirloin and loaded sweet potato ... caramel sauce and toasted marshmallows. Ohhh yum!

Then after a little more playing and a short nap for the littlest kid, everyone was on their way back home. And we were on our way to a nice long nap.

It was a busy weekend, but very fun. And now it's over ... at least until next year.

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Party Like You're Four!

After Emily's party on Saturday, we loaded up and headed out to our house with some of our family.

We got out the Power Wheels and rode around for a while.

We played on the swing set.

We ate some sand.

We ate some sloppy joes, baked beans, chips and dip, fruit, cookies, cake and more! Mike's Mom and Dad came over to hang out with us for a while. His mom brought a lot of goodies for us and even made some chocolate dipped strawberries. Yum! Thank you SO much, Wanda!

We flew kites.

We tossed around the football.

We visited.

And we just hung out!

And that's just what we did on Saturday. What did we do on Sunday? Well, you'll have to check back tomorrow to find out.

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Emily's 4th Birthday Party

On Saturday, we had Emily's 4th Birthday Party at a local bowling alley.

We had pizza and coke for lunch (I'm from Arkansas .. it's coke no matter what variety it might be. In Oklahoma, they're more likely to call it pop but it will always be coke to me.)

And after lunch we had the cake that Emily picked out. She said she wanted butterflies and flowers and a rainbow on her cake. I asked for "extra puffy" clouds on each end of the rainbow. Maybe a bit of an ulterior motive there because I love Love LOVE the buttercream frosting. We got the cake from Johnnies Bakery in case you're local and wondering. We have used them several times and they have always done a great job for us.

We also got a couple dozen sugar cookies with royal icing. I think I am more pleased with the way this batch of cookies looked than in years past. I like the colors and the unique pattern on each cookie.

Fortunately/unfortunately, the leftover cake and cookies came to our house. I was able to send quite a bit of it home with my out-of-town family though. That's a good thing because I nearly made myself sick on that yummy icing this afternoon.

All the kids and several of the adults played a few games of bowling while we were there. Emily and her friends had a good time bowling. Some of them used a ramp to roll the ball down the lane. Some of them rolled it down. Mason especially liked the bowling and didn't want to stop.

I'm not sure who won all the games, but I heard that Cornelia won one game and Daniel won one.

Heather, Stephen and Cornelia waiting for a turn.

Everyone sang "Happy Birthday" and Emily blew out her candles ... with a little help from Tyler.

Then Emily opened her presents. She got a lot of Barbie toys and clothes and accessories. She also got some coloring/fingerpainting/chalking stuff which she really enjoys. She has wanted to fingerpaint every day so far. She also got some roller skates and a Barbie bicycle and helmet and much more! Her Pops (Mike's Dad) told us today that he put her bike together so she'll be ready to ride tomorrow. The bicycle will probably stay over at Mike's parents so that she can ride it when she's over there with Madison. This will be my first experience teaching a little girl how to ride a bike. Do you have any advice that will help us get started?

Unfortunately, I didn't get to take many pictures with my camera at the party. Mike helped me out and took some pictures for me. I know that a lot of other people took pictures at the party so maybe they will send me some more.

After the party, we headed back out to our house with my Mom, Daniel and Cornelia and the boys, Heather and Stephen to play/rest and hang out. We had lots of fun activities for the kids and "kids at heart."

But more on that later ...

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My Sweet Emily

Happy 4th Birthday to my sweet Emily!

Emily,

I can't believe you are four years old today. You are just getting so big and so smart! It seems like just yesterday that your dad and I were bringing you home from the hospital. You were so tiny (5 lbs, 6 oz), but so strong and so feisty! Now you've grown into a beautiful little girl who is sweet and loving and very inquisitive. I love being your Mama! And I love you.

Love Always,

Mama

Birthday Party #1

Tonight after work, we went out to eat at Toby Keith's I Love this Bar and Grill for Emily's birthday. We brought some strawberry cupcakes with pink icing that Emily and I made the other night. They were soooooo good, but sooooo sweet. Somehow, I managed to not get a picture of them but they had swirly icing on top. (If anybody has more pictures from tonight that include the cupcakes, please email them to me and I'll post them on my blog.)

Emily is really getting into Barbie now so she got a couple Barbie toys. She's going to love playing with these! I remember having a Barbie horse or two when I was a girl ... but I also remember that one of my Barbie horses was missing a foot. No telling how that happened. Things always seemed to happen to Barbie and her friends.

Emily's "big" birthday party is Saturday afternoon at the bowling alley. Until then .. here are some pictures from tonight.

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Up!

This weekend, we went to see Up! at the theater with Nanny, Aunt Cherry, Madison and Mason. We got there a bit late and so we had to sit in the first and second row. As usual, Emily did really good in the theater. She was quiet and (mostly) stayed in her seat.


I thought the movie was okay, but not great. Mike seemed bored. Emily seemed to like it. And Madison said it was "a little scary."


Our local theater is having a "Summer Kids Series" this summer where they show different kids movies each week at a discounted price. If you're local (in the Oklahoma City area), you can check out this link to get more information. This week they are playing "Happy Feet."


And just because I can't stand it ... here's one more picture of one of my hibiscus flowers that bloomed today.

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What am I?

• I am originally from China.

• I am a happy spring bloomer.

• I am highly fragrant.

• I have gorgeous white flowers.

• I like lots of moisture and high humidity.

What am I?

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