New look to the house

Most people know that I am not a big fan of painting, and Sherrie knows that to get me to do it, she just needs to buy the paint and have it all ready to go. Here are some shots of the new color we are putting on. In the family room we painted one wall a red, which really turned out nice. The rest of the downstairs is a chocolate milk type color, which is darker than what we had. It is turning out nicely.




The kitchen has become the problem, we just can't decide what color to do, a red. a green, or a yellow. We have tried about 8 different sample colors and still haven't found the one.




Campbell likes to help as well, and he scaled the ladder all by himself while his deliquent dad watched. At least he is not on climbing up the cupboards, yet...

Cool cakes, lost teeth, muscles, and swimming

Sherrie loves to create cool cakes for birthdays. Maybe her husband needs to show a little more imagination.

Here is David's 'camp' birthday cake.


And Cole had a bowling party complete with this unique creation from Mom's kitchen.



Kell is finally losing some more teeth. He lost his two bottom teeth on the same day, and was pretty proud of himself.


Campbell now knows how to flex his 'guns' I have about 6 more shots of Cam's 'show me your muscles' shot! The expression on his face just makes me laugh.



The three big kids had swimming lessons this month. They had a great time and are progressing well.

Spring and Summertime

So, where to start... Maybe more frequent entries would be best!

Schools out, summer break

Soccer is over. Cole finished with 9 goals for the season (two hat-tricks), dad was 2-0 as head coach (the team was 2-5-1 overall).

One more game of baseball left in the season, Kell has had fun on the A's



Kell and Abigail are both off training wheels and racing on two wheelers



Kell had a birthday. Mom made a volcano cake, complete with dinosaurs and frosting lava.



Campbell is walking - We'll get some pics of him stumbling as he is getting the hang of it.

We did some camping at Ledges State Park



Iowa storms can be wet and wild! Yeah that is our neighbor's swing set blown across their yard into ours. We missed the excitement as we were in the basement waiting for the tornado sirens and warnings to expire...

Chungara!

I thought it would be good to share a couple pics of the beauty of Northern Chile. These two pictures are taken from a drive I took from the coast to the Altiplano in Northern Chile, the first is in a city called Putre (about 3600 m altitude), and the other is at the high mountain lake Chungara, and the (dormant) volcano Parinacota. I am holding the GPS unit that says >4500 meters (15,000) feet. It is up there a ways!

Happy Birthday

My tribute to our one year old failed to include some birthday pics, so here goes

The cake


The birthday haircut. Sitting in the sink is sure a good way to keep squirmy boys contained!


The presents. Campbell got a little walker, a 'old' style Fisher Price Farm, and magnetic farm that makes sounds. He was really most interested in the bows on the boxes!


And the celebration. Here he is ready to dig in. He was tired and consequently pretty crabby, so after a few bites of cake, he took a bath and went to bed while the rest of us enjoyed the treats.

What a difference a year makes

A Little Spring Break

We took a little trip to the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha on Friday. It is a great zoo. It was a little cold and windy, but we had a great time. Here are some pics of the trip.

There is a nice swamp exhibit with an albino alligator.


The tiger was watching us pretty closely.


Since they don't let you in the cages to pose with the living animals, we found some more cooperative subjects to take pictures with. Like the orangutan...


The rhino was particularly kind in letting us hang on him. This also has a great picture of a gray hoodie monkey. Can you see him?


And Mom and Dad with the gorilla family.