Jumping Storm Clouds

Sunday night we had an awesome lightning storm. Our power even went out for a few hours and every time lightning struck near us the lightbulb flickered with the lightning. After the bulk of the storm blew over we ventured out to look at the clouds. We were not disappointed.

Leah was the first one to take a look. She called me to come take pictures. As soon as I stepped outside I understood why.

These kind of clouds are not really that rare in Nebraska, but also not ones we see every day. The sky was so full of many variations of them, it was just incredible.

Yes, we serve an awesome God!!

We discovered we could take some pretty cool pictures in this lighting.

And had some fun with it.

The best part was gathering around the camera afterwards to see what we actually got. Oh, and dancing like maniacs because of the mosquitoes...

In which Timo gives a quick refresher lesson in jumping....

Which was most successful!

With only about 40 hours at home this week I feel very blessed to have them filled to the brim with the people I love, memories and fun times. Love you guys!!

Brownie's Calf

We have been waiting for our milk cow Brownie to freshen for over 6 weeks. For those of you who don't know, freshen means have a baby calf and we were waiting so we could drink the milk. :) She finally did so on Sunday, most conveniently when we were all at church.

Trina milks Brownie and made sure she was all taken care of and comfortable.

In the mean time, Dad and Benjamin made sure the calf got a good meal in its belly. Sometimes at the beginning this is a two person job.

But eventually the little kids will be able to feed the calf by themselves.

Benjamin carried the calf to the front yard where it took up temporary residence while it gets its feet under it.

Contrary to what this picture looks like, John is not in fact afraid of the calf. He was just showing me his amazing climbing skills and the calf wanted to check them out.

Thank you, Lord for the blessing of a healthy calf and all the milk we can drink!

Hanscom Park

For Father's Day Dad took us to Hanscom Park for the afternoon. We remembered enjoying our time there when we accidentally found it last fall, but we had rather conflicting memories of where it was. Dad was right, and he found it in spite of all my 'helpful' directions.

The picnic tables were just a little too hard, so we took to the grass. :D

Two may be better than one, but 9 is the best. That way everyone can have a pillow...

Chocolate milk. I don't feel the need to say anything more.

Leah.

The pond had a few ducks but no other life, at least not the kind you can see without a microscope.

The kids remembered this park as one with some really fun play structures. They were not disappointed.

In the mean time we big people sat on the benches...

...and chilled. Thanks for another lovely afternoon!!

Chillin' With Bob

We love having Bob.

We love that he has this uber cool back hatch that we can open up for air when we have to stop in a parking lot for something.

We love that we can all sit next to each other... Yes, guys, we do love this. Trust me on this one.

Memories in the making here people. So much better than all the memories we can make with BlueRay disks...

We love that most of the windows go down and back up. :)

But most of all, we love that we can chill in Bob together. Hanging all our appendages out the windows. And making memories.

Becca and Rosie Dancing

The other day Becca and Rosie begged me to put on my dancing music so they could dance. Although they were somewhat influenced by having recently watched swing dancing, they put plenty of their original freestyle into it as well.

Including the newly invented kangaroo hop move...

Your hair is your greatest accessory.

John and Leah joined in for a song. I just love the way my camera captures action pictures. :)

And yes, like all real dancers they are now on youtube! For some reason, when taking long videos my camera will occasionally slow every thing down for a few seconds. Hence, the amazing slow motion effects are not on purpose, although I personally think they were timed very well.

Painting at Michael and Sarah's

Last Sunday Becca and I went down to Michael and Sarah's for a few days to help Sarah paint. On the way out of Omaha we stopped at Cabela's. It takes very little imagination to keep from being bored at Cabela's. There are so many cool things to look at, try on, etc...

We decided that the men's hat selection is much more interesting than the women's hat selection.

However, not all hats are created equal...

Yeah, I guess one could say we kind of have a thing for hats. Please note the streak of blue hair peeking out here in this picture.

Like I said, there is no shortage of things to look at, or try on.

Someday, Sarah, you are going to have one of these!

On to painting. Caroline's room was two shades of blue and one shade of brown when we got started. In the end it was a lovely butter-cream yellow color. In the middle it was a very nasty greenish, primer color. This picture was taking during the middle stage...

Becca took great care of Caroline. They had a blast together.

Kids, do not sit on the top step at of the ladder. Especially when you have been painting for 7 hours and are a little, shall we say, not exactly steady on your feet. Unless of course, you can't reach the ceiling any other way...

Thanks for having us, Michael and Sarah!! So glad we got to be a part of making your house more beautiful!

Typical Summer

Summer is in full swing here. Well, almost. We have not bought Popsicles yet... Please enjoy some random snapshots of the last week or two.

Yes, Timothy can do a handspring. Or several in a row. Yes, it looks even more impressive in real life.

Time for summer attire...

In which Benjamin is an amazing little brother and not only stops his project to help me wash the filthy Alejandro, but also refrains from spraying me with the pressure washer the whole time. Pretty much...

Read four books over the summer. I think Rosie had that covered during the first week of summer and she is still at it. :)

Last summer the kids made an enormous amount of hay. A lot of it was sold over the winter, but there was still some left with new stuff coming in a few weeks. Everyone pitched in to re-bale some of it and God sent customers. It is almost completely gone now, praise the Lord!

Working as a team to get the job done.

Benjamin bucking some of the first bales of the season. There will be a lot more of that before the summer is over!

And the ever present management crew presiding over the whole operation. Thank you, Lord, for summer, for work and play and people I love to spend it with!

Washing Windows

The other day Leah decided to gainfully employ the little people by doing a much needed job...

...washing the windows. Becca took pictures for me and she got so many good ones I had to post them.

They made good use of the Windex, and the opportunity to spray it at each other without fear of getting in trouble.

Like I said with the last picture...

John had been asking to wash the windows for weeks. He throughly enjoyed himself.

As did Rosie...

Half the fun was getting to climb up and down the ladder.

Window washing of this sort is kind of a social affair. It attracted pretty much everyone to stop what they were doing and hang around admiring the amazingly clean windows in progress.

Team work!

Thanks again, guys for doing such a great job! I love looking out now that I can actually see what I am looking at!! You guys rock!