Busy Day

Today we were non-stop busy! We left the house at 7:45am and drove to Lawrence for a basketball tournament. We played and won the first game.

Then we drove to Olathe for football registration.

We had a nice lunch at the Sunset Grill.

Then we drove back to Lawrence and stopped by Allen Fieldhouse and drove through the KU campus.

Dylan was comparing his hand to Cole Aldrich.

We also stopped and looked at the KU football field.

Before going to the last game we ate dinner at Paddy O'Quigleys. It was not very good. We won game two and three.

We arrived back home at 9pm. Tomorrow we go back to Lawrence to play in the championship game!

Learners Permit

Cass has been studying for a couple of weeks so she could take the test to get a learners permit.

She passed her test today!

Now the fun begins!

Basswood Resort

We love to go camping at Basswood Resort. This was the first time we let both kids invite a friend to go camping with us and they all really enjoyed themselves. Michael and I had fun with our friends Willie and Lucinda who we met at Basswood a few months ago and we also had fun with our new friends Bryan and Macey.

The kids spent a lot of time riding their bikes and

swimming!

Joshua and Dylan

On Saturday we took a quick trip into Weston and saw some of the flooding from the Missouri River.

Finding a good fishing spot

Cass and Alisa went on a wagon ride

Joshua and Dylan caught a turtle and then let it go back into the pond.

Last night we had a nice little meal with our new camping friends. Michael smoked pork butt and we also had coleslaw and chips. Macey made a delicious peach dump cake in her dutch oven for dessert. What a fun time!

Joshua ended the weekend by catching a large catfish. He was so excited!

Oh, I made strawberry infused vodka last week. It was a huge hit!

Today Dylan has been busy lighting firecrackers. One of his favorite things to do is put a firecracker in a marshmallow and watch it go but this year he is wrapping it with duct tape. Who knows!!!

Of course he wears his eye and ear protection!

We are getting ready to eat our stuffed jalapenos (yes, we eat them quite often), grilled steak and mashed potatoes. We also have yummy gooey Twix cookies for dessert.
Cass and I will spend the rest of the evening watching the boys light off the fireworks. Wow, the three day weekend flew by!!!

Roller Coasters, Railroad Experience, Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory and Rainforest Exhibit

Apparently we were studying the letter "R" today in our family! Dylan is really into roller coasters so I took him to Union Station because they had a little display of the old Worlds of Fun coasters. They even had the original blueprints for them.

Then we walked through the railroad experience and looked at the model trains.

Yummy chocolate at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory

We walked over to Crown Center and went to the Rainforest Exhibit. There was not much there but Dylan wanted his picture taken with my favorite animal. I love gorillas!

The rest of the day we were LAZY because it was hot outside! Tomorrow we will be packing for our camping trip since I have to work all day on Friday!

I Love Weekends

What a fun weekend!!!!! Saturday morning we enjoyed a family outing to the movies. We saw Cars 2. Michael does not like going to the movies as much as the rest of us but he said we could not go see it without him. We were excited that he wanted to join us. He is the one who also wanted to see the movie in 3D. All of us really enjoyed the movie.

We had a nice relaxing day after the movie. Michael smoked ribs and we also had stuffed jalapenos with goat cheese and wrapped in rib eye steak. I also enjoyed having a fresh strawberry mojito. YUMMY!!

This morning I got up and made breakfast for my family. As much as I love to cook and bake I rarely fix breakfast. Everyone was pleased with the brown butter waffles.

I usually bake something for my office mates so they can have a treat on Monday morning so today I made Rolo brownies and this is what they looked like before I put the batter on top.

finished product

I had some Rolos left over so I also made Rolo dream bars.

Tonight Michael grilled us delicious bacon and ranch cajun cheeseburgers. Now we are just sitting around waiting because Dylan has a basketball game tonight at 8pm and we hope it is a great game to end a great weekend.

Caspian Bistro

Tonight we went to Caspian Bistro with Ann and Ricky! Caspian Bistro serves Mediterranean food and I had no idea if I would even like it but I did! The chicken was so good!!!!!!

We had a cheese platter and hummus for our appetizers.

I am so proud of myself for trying something new!

A Wonderful Day Off!!

Wow! I slept till 8am today! I had to start my day off with a Starbucks and then I actually did some laundry today. After Dylan got home from football camp I took the kids to go see "Mr. Popper's Penguins". I thought it was going to be horrible but it was a cute family movie.

Dylan was being silly in this picture!

Dylan was busy this afternoon building a roller coaster out of straws and...

a roller coaster outside with wood and bricks.

Wheeeee!!!!

With my family there is always one person who does not like what I fix for dinner (unless it is tacos or spaghetti) but tonight all four of us LOVED this meal. I made ranch house crock pot pork chops with parmesan garlic mashed potatoes.

Cass trying the caramel creme toffee cookies!

Back to work tomorrow!!