Our Summer 2013 (photo dump)

Wow. Summer is coming to an end. As I'm typing this, the big boys have left to go to Papa and Grammy's for one more fun hurrah before school starts (in one week!!!). They will be gone tonight and tomorrow night and will be back on Saturday. Nicholas is taking a nap, so I have a few minutes to tell about our summer.

It was great! We didn't go on any "big" trips, but we did a lot of fun things. I'll go month by month and tell some of the highlights...

May:
1. We went to the Renissaince Festival with Aunt Allyson and Uncle Frank! Beautiful day and so much fun. We took Noah and Nate and Grandmama kept Nicholas. The big boys had a blast. We ate great food and saw some fun shows. We enjoy seeing all the costumes too.  The boys especially loved their caramel apple and chocolate ice cream treats.

Nate and Uncle Frank

Add caption

Noah and his caramel apple. 

Nate loved his ice cream!

June:

1. Meeting friends for dinner and going and getting late night ice cream at Bobbie's Dairy Dip!

Ashley and Noah (Josh, Chris M and Chris C behind)

Happy Nathanael :)

Nicholas loves Amira!

2.  We went to see the Lights at Cheekwood on Family Night. This was definitely a highlight of the summer. It was an evening to remember. We went with Ashley and Matthew, George, and MJ, Kathryn and Amira. They had music outside and we had a picnic dinner. We enjoyed our dinner and George treated the boys to ice cream. The boys had the best time running around a playing outside. Again, the weather was amazing! It was so cool..it felt like the summers we would spend in VT. When it started to get dark the lights came on in the garden. There really aren't words to describe it..it was breathtaking. The boys were amazed. I had the best time just walking around with Noah and Nathanael and talking to them and enjoying ourselves. My favorite was probably these water bottles filled with water with lights inside them. They would change colors and there was music set to them. Amazing!! 

Picnicing with Mr. George

Cheekwood Lights! Woohoo!

3. Playdates with Cole! One week Nicholas and I met Kristi and Cole at the zoo. It was so much fun. The boys had a great time playing and seeing all the animals. The next week,  Kristi and Cole came over and we had fun watching the boys play in the sprinkler and catching up. I love that we've stayed friends all these years and it's so fun now watching our kiddos play together :)

Zoo playdate!

Sprinkler fun!

4.

Nathanael lost his first tooth!!

And, he was so excited about it! He lost his first tooth earlier than Noah did (but, he cut his teeth earlier too). The tooth fairy brought him a dollar :) My baby is growing up! :(

5. Trip to Beech Bend park (Bowling Green, KY):

This year we decided to take Noah and Nate to their first amusement park. We thought it would be best to leave Nicholas with Grandmama and Granddaddy this year. It was so much fun! Although, Josh called it "The trailer park of amusement parks" haha. It really isn't that bad..it's just an older park. Several of the rides weren't working. But, the boys had fun regardless! And, it wasn't very crowded which was nice. No lines on rides. The boys (and Josh and I) especially enjoyed the Splash Lagoon. Going down the lazy river was a highlight. Noah rode in a tube with Josh and Nate was with me. The wave pool was a lot of fun too. After we left, we ate at Cheddar's. Super fun day. 

Waiting on a funnel cake. They were excited!

The boys liked the funnel cake. Although, Noah kept asking  why it "tasted like chicken". ha

Riding the bumble bee!

bumper cars!

Petting zoo..kind of..all it had was goats. Tons of them. haha

July:

1. We went to PaPa and Grammy's new house in Lawrenceburg, TN. Josh was scheduled to speak at their summer series on Wed. night. So, we went down on Tue and stayed until Friday. It was great. The boys had a great time exploring their new house. They enjoyed playing on the swing set in the backyard and the play room upstairs. Wednesday we had the best time at Davy Crockett state park. We brought a picnic lunch and the boys played on the playground there. Then, we went and explored some trails and went through a tour of the Davy Crockett museum. It was really interesting and the boys enjoyed it! That night Josh spoke at their church and did a wonderful job (as usual). :)  Thursday was July 4th. We wanted to go to Little Bear lake on PaPa's boat, but it rained all.day.long. So, we just had a lazy day hanging out at the house. Keith did grill out burgers and hotdogs and then we took the boys to McDonald's to get ice cream and run off some energy at the play place. It was a fun trip!

Nicholas playing toys in PaPa and Grammy's playroom. 

The boys swinging with PaPa on the screened in back porch :)

My big boy and I on the way to McDonald's. 

2. Hanging out around the house:

The boys watching Dad start the grill. 

Noah got a new bed (to match Nate's)..you can see him lying in it :)

And, Nicholas got Noah's old bed! He's now in a big boy bed and is doing great. He loves it!

Noah enjoying his bike

We saw a cool Luna moth on our back porch. Gotta love the summer critters/bugs:)

Nicholas was wanting to get up in the tree in our back yard. The other day he finally did. 

3. The Cumberland Park!

This place was great. Nicholas and I met Cole and Kristi for another play date and the boys loved it. It had a great splash pad. I thought it was so cool that we went back 2 days later and took the big boys with us! They loved it too! Fun place. 

4. Chuck E Cheese. "Where a kid can be a kid!"

We met some friends from Nate's preschool at the Cool Springs Chuck E Cheese. The boys had a great time playing with friends, the games and the rides. 

These are a some of the highlights of our summer. We also went to three great VBS's ..Goodlettsville's , Western Hills, and Josh was the adult class speaker for Charlotte Heights. The boys loved going to those! And, we just had our VBS this past week and it went great. I was in charge of the 2-4 year olds. Let's just say I am worn out! But, it was fun. :)

We had such a fun summer and I can't believe it's practically over! School starts ONE WEEK from today. Noah will be in 2nd grade and my sweet baby Nathanael will start kindergarten!!!! Waaaaaa. :( Nicholas and I will miss them so much while they're at school. But, I'm excited for them!