Garbage Can Potatoes

I tried to grow "Garbage Can Potatoes this year. It was pretty much a dismal failure. Here are the boys "digging potatoes"





This is the biggest one we found.
Well, instead of a hundred pounds of potatoes this is my whole crop from one can. I haven't even had the heart to dump out the other can because it seems silly to make such a mess for a handful of potatoes. I have some ideas on how to do it different next year. I had a bug eating my plants and I think they got to wet. So, more drainage in the bottom next year and some sort of organic bug killer. I also am going to use potting soil to get it started and then us sand from my parents house to finish filling the can.

Birthday Party

It has been several weeks since our birthday, but here are the pictures. We went down to the restaurant to party so that Ron and Dena could be there with us. It was cowboy weekend, so everyone put on their cowboy garb. We had Jake and Steph, Ron and Dena, my Grandma and Grandpa Ferguson, and my parents there to help us out. Plus the staff at The Country House. So here is my family:



My grandparents
Me with my new baby wrap.
Cliff had Grandma Taylor make him a banana cream pie for his birthday. Stephanie made a cake for Nate, they put Bionicles on the cake for a picture. My mom brought a carrot cake for my cake.
Phyllis helping Ryan Hokie Pokie

Ryan
Nate the somber 11 year old
Cliff also pretty somber at 11 years old. Look how broad his shoulders are.




My four boys


Daddy and Lane

Boating Fun

Ron and Dena have been so busy with the restaruant this summer that they have not gotten to take the boat out very much. We took it out with just our family one Sunday after church as kind of a pre birthday party for the boys. We had a lot of fun!

Ryan tried out the tube, but he didn't want to stay in it more than a few minutes before he said, "Mommy, I back in boat!" So we let his big brothers climb back in the tube and off we went again. They like it to be rough and wet, so Josh was mostly doing circles. Yes, we are THOSE people. Ryan really did not like it when the boat banked and he was getting really close to the water.
Despite getting his cheeks pinched by his life jacket Lane did take a nap.



We put the canopy on so that the little kids (and secretly Mommy) didn't get sunburned. Here is Josh.
Lane
Cliff
Nate
Ryan

Josh's Birthday

It has been over a month since Josh's Birthday, but here are the pictures of him blowing out his candles. Ron and Dena, Jake and Steph and my parents all came up for the Sunday afternoon celebration!

My best Birthday Present!

Eleven years ago on my birthday I had the best present in the whole world. Nate and Cliff were born and they changed my life forever. From irresponsible party girl to mother of twins in an instant. How far we have all come from there, I am walking so much closer to God than I was back then. And, while some may disagree, I think I have grown up into a responsible woman.
Nate and Cliff are no longer the little boys you see below, but becoming more like men every day. While it makes me sad sometimes, it makes me proud too.
This year on my birthday I got another fantastic gift.....my nephew Conner Mark. Isn't he adorable! I can't wait until we can go visit him and I can snuggle him up. Congratulations to Jason and Kim on their new beautiful boy! It appears that he is already well loved and adored.

Family Time

My Great Aunt Edna had a birthday a few weeks ago that prompted a large family get together. Here are all of my favorite guys in one spot. Nate, Dad, Lane, Cliff, Josh, and Ryan.

Dad and Lane

Aunt Edna and her kids

Visit to the farm

We have spent a couple of weekends at my parents this summer. One of them the guys took down a huge tree in the back yard. If you need firewood this winter talk to my dad.



Grandma got some fancy lawn chairs for her birthday, we fight over who gets to sit in them. Here is Grandma and Lane.
4th of July we had a bon fire before we lit fireworks. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows.

Silly Lane Pictures

Nate likes to take silly pictures of his brothers. This morning while I was finishing up lunch he had Lane on his back because he was fussy. Ryan wanted up to, so Nate picked him up. (only long enough for the picture mind you, and I do it often..lol)

Lane fell asleep in a funny position in the swing one day so I captured him. He was really tired that day.
Nate posed him with the Dr Pepper one day and took this.

Young Wedding

The end of June Josh and I left the three older boys with my parents and we headed for Rawlins Wyoming. Steven and Nancy had a beautiful wedding there. Steve stood up with Josh at our wedding and braved a blizzard to do it, so it was the least we could do to go in good weather. ;-) Steve's family has always claimed Josh as one of their own, so they opened up their arms and included us as their own for the weekend. Lane got lots of snuggles from "Grandpa Steve and Grandma Karen".
The get away vehicle was this truck.
Aunt Shanny with Lane and Grandma Karen in the back ground.
My hansom men in their wedding garb!
It was so nice to get away for a couple of days! We needed some time without kids (except baby) to just be together. I hope we can make it more of a habit! We had a great time with the Young's and hope to get back to visit again some time soon with the kids.

Catching up

Wow! A lot has happened since I posted last on April 30. I will try to get you caught up.

The first thing is that Lane has grown and grown! Look at all of his little rolls, aren't they cute?!?

Josh and Ryan mowed the lawn. More than once, but I took a picture this time and thought it was cute.
We also had Lane dedicated on Memorial weekend, but the pictures were terrible! They were either fuzzy or dark and you really can't see anything in them.

Ron and Dena had the grand opening for their restaurant on Memorial weekend as well. I have been waiting tables there this summer a couple of evenings a week, or all day on Saturdays. That has taken a big chunk out of my free time. Tomorrow night is my last night on the schedule at the restaurant. I will be able to fill in as needed, but not be tied down so much as I have been all summer.

The screen printing shop has been very busy this summer also. We finally got all of the shirts moved around and put away for the most part. Most of them are in the shop on shelves. But, I have one hanging rack downstairs. We moved my office downstairs and got a new computer and printer. That has been fantastic!

We had a yard sale the first weekend in June and my sister-in-law came down with a lot of her stuff also. It went really well, and we made enough money to pay for some expenses that were pressing on us.

We sold my little Nissan Altima and used the money to tag my new car, a Ford Freestyle. We traded in our suburban when we decided that I would work at the restaurant. We really like it and the twins say that they have as much leg room as they had in the suburban. It gets much better fuel economy.

I will follow up with some posts with pictures of some of the highlights of our summer.

7 week pictures

I wanted to add some pictures of Lane real quick before I forgot! He got a beautiful blanket from my best friend Rachel, so we decided to take a few pictures with it.

He hung out in the screen printing shop with me one day. He slept all morning, but in the afternoon he was sucking his thumb. I didn't quite catch it, but it was close.