Chad's Torture Chamber

Last Wednesday night, Chad was in the garage working on a bike rack he was building. All of a sudden I hear him kicking on the door to the house. I run and open the door and I see him holding a bloody thumb and he says..."Band aid...Big one!!!" I go and get the first aid kit and lay everything out to fix him up. I asked what he did. He said he was using the drill to screw in one of the feet on the bottom of the rack. He was pushing hard when the drill slipped off of the screw and into his thumb. Well under his thumb nail to be exact. His thumb nail was pretty much floating on his thumb. He tried letting go of his thumb with his other hand but some of the blood had dried leaving his thumbs stuck together. So I had to hold his torn off thumb nail down while he pulled his other thumb off and let go. I wrapped it up tight and told him to elevate it while I called the emergency room. I got some little info from the ER nurse and decided that he would probably be ok waiting until the next morning. So with his thumb throbbing in pain he went to bed. The next day he went to the doctor where they removed the thumb nail and put four stitches in his nail bed where the drill bit went in and then they put his nail back on to protect it and put a stitch in both sides to hold it on. He's doing better now and it is healing well. I am on the look out for some steel tipped gloves so he can finish the projects I need him to do with no further injuries.

Wrapped up from the doctor.

Here's the damage. Keep in mind that the nail is only held on by two stitches. He gets to take the nail off in a couple of days and then I'll be able to see the real damage.

Chuck E Cheese Baby!!

This year Cami chose to go to Chuck E Cheese's for her birthday dinner. We invited Andrew and Jenny and Tanner to come with us. We ate pizza and played games and had tons of fun. Cami had a blast earning tickets and using her tickets to buy goodies at the counter. Our kids LOVE Chuck E Cheese....and I don't hate it either.

Cami rockin her new clothes. She's so cute.

Riley and Paityn getting ready to go play some games.

Trev and Cam playing in the climbing toy.This was the most loved spot.

Brother and sister taking a ride together.

Sisters spending the tokens.

Riley trying to beat mom at wac-a-mole.

Does it look like she's having fun?

Me DOMINATING at wac-a-mole

Me and Ri playing. I scored BIG TIME tickets on this game!!

CHEESE!

Trying to get a little family picture but there was just way too much to see.

After Chuck E Cheese we went to Paces and all got an ice cream cone. Cami loves being 5. She thinks it's so much different then 4.

Chad and Ri and Cam enjoying their cones.

Cami's Birthday Party

Cami was so excited for her birthday party. She wanted a Hannah Montana party. So a Hannah Montana party was what she got. We decorated with purples and pinks and got a Hannah tablecloth. We had purple streamers and balloons. It was so much fun. While we were waiting for all the guests to arrive Cami and her friends watched the Hannah Montana movie. When everyone arrived we all went outside for a scavenger hunt. I had previously went and hid clues and a map and Chard buried the treasure over at the park. So I gave the girls their first clue and off they went. Angie and I tried keeping up but we didn't do a very good job. After the scavenger hunt, we all got our treasure and came back to the house. We had cupcakes and opened presents and played outside until it was time to go home. Cami go cute presents and I think she had a really good time.Happy birthday Cami jam.

Getting ready for the scavenger hunt

Found all the clues and pieces to the map...trying to figure out where the treasure is.

Digging up the treasure...There are some extra kids in the pictures that we don't know who they are. They came over and tried to steal our treasure. We stopped them though.

Ta-da!! Found it!

Everyone with their treasures. It was so fun.

Here's the treasure map they had to find and put together.

Cami blowing out her candles

Harvest Time

The other day we decided that our vegetable garden was in great need of picking. So we all went out and harvested our crop. We all picked and Trev organized everything. When we were all done and all the ripe goodies were off the vines, we turned around and this is what we saw...

Trev had organized all the tomatoes and peppers and squash into their own little piles. What a smart kid.

We loved our garden this year. We were able to make so much good stuff from it. We made new recipes and old recipes. Everything was so good. Home grown food is the best. Hooray for gardens.

Cami is One Year Older and Wiser Too

Cami is FIVE today!!! Usually I'd say I can't believe it, but in this case I can. Cami is so mature for her age that I always treat her as if she's older then she really is. She is such a good helper around the house and has made a TON of friends here in our new neighborhood.She is so friendly and easy to love.
We love you Cami and we hope that this year you continue to grow and develop those talents that you have inside of you. Learn to laugh more at yourself. We love your laugh. Keep being a big help to your brother and sisters. We love how generous you are with everything you have. Continue sharing with others. We love you you little five year old. Happy birthday.

Love, Mom and Dad

Camden June was born September 21, 2005 at 3 in the morning. She was such a cute baby and had tons of red hair.

Cami at age one


At age two


At age three... looking very beautiful

At age four

And at age five...What a darling girl!!

It's Finally Happened!!

Ever since before I got married to Chad, I knew that when I had kids I wanted them to be athletic and love sports. Mostly I wanted them to love basketball. Marrying Chad sure did give me a better chance of having kids who would love sports and basketball. Riley has always loved soccer. She's good at it too. She is a kid who doesn't really like to try new things because she won't know how to do it perfect the first time. So she has stuck to soccer because she knows how to do it. Then we convinced her to try softball and she liked that after she got over her shyness of it all. But every year when that flyer telling us that youth basketball was going to start came around, Riley would tell us she doesn't want to play. Crushed, we would pick up the pieces of our hearts and say "we'll try again next year." Well last night it actually happened. Riley came to us and said "hey next year instead of baseball I want to play basketball." I was taken aback. I was excited to hear that she finally wanted to try it. She said that she would only play if Chad was her coach. Done deal! Thank you Riley for making my dreams come true.

Almost Forgot About Carter Creek

I have to warn you this is going to be a long post. Last year we went to a place called Carter Creek and camped with a very good friend of mine, Eden, and her kiddos. We had so much fun that Chad and I decided to go again this year. We got a bigger cabin this time and it was perfect for all of us. We got there on a Thursday and it was sunny but cool. Then the rain came. It let up every now and then giving us just enough time for some adventure hikes or scavenger hunts and then it was back into the cabin when the rain came again. The following two days were the same as far as weather goes. We had to get creative with things to do in the cabin. We told stories and colored and acted out more stories and played hot potato and played with play dough. It was so much fun being together. All the kids were awesome. Everyone did really good. We had so much fun. We can't wait til next year to visit again. Hopefully we'll have better weather.

The first morning there. Making pancakes in the kitchen. Now that's camping!

Dad's turn to tell stories. These cabins are awesome. There were enough beds t sleep all of us and then some.

This is how we spent a lot of our time. We played inside a lot and had to come up with new games to play. This is me telling the kids a story. Probably the three little pigs. It was cramped but fun.

I LOVE this picture. My cute girls. They're so happy!!

This is right at the start of the hike. This bridge is right next to the fire pit and about 50 yards away from our cabin.

Pretty Pait borrowing her brother's sweatshirt because we forgot hers


This is all of the fam (minus me) at the beaver dam...it's only a small portion of the dam you see in the picture.

My kiddos found some cool mushrooms on the trail

This place is seriously so pretty...even in the rain

Almost done with the hike

This is one of a few bridges they have built that crosses over the stream at the camp

All of us after trying to go on a walk around the trails between storms. We ended up getting poured on

Chad and Trev FINALLY able to roast some marshmallows after the sun stayed out long enough to stay dry. The wood was wet and so was the paper. Luckily we had boy scout Chad with us and he was able to coax some flames out of the soggy mess.

Cami and Riley enjoying their smores

Yeah for smores!!

This was on the second day when the sun came out for a bit we were able to go on a hike on the trail by the cabins. It's a cute little hike and the kiddos loved it. We did this hike three or four times while we were there. There's a huge beaver dam at the turn around point so that is really fun to get to and look at.

Me and Chad and Pait on the hike...remember we were camping so I am not wearing any makeup

Trev and Cam picking flowers on the hike

Beautiful Riley

Me sitting on a log. I was dangling over a little stream about five or six feet over it.