A Care Free Day

Today was officially the last day of summer for the Sterling girls!  They start Kindergarten tomorrow.  It's very exciting! They came over to hang out with us today and get in one last day of play before heading off to big school! The kids and I had a blast!

We had a little indoor picnic for lunch! McDonald's is giving out new toys and they rock!

Tyler's Birthday Weekend!

This weekend we celebrated Tyler's birthday!  He'd had a pretty unpleasant week at work and I knew that the following week was going to be tremulous as well so I wanted this weekend to be the Island of calm in the midst of a stormy sea.  After all, when our house operates on Island Time, we are all much happier!  We kicked off the weekend with a treasure hunt for Tyler's present!  I had let the kids pick out his gift and they chose a remote control monster truck.  Tanner even drew a little map for him to use to find it! He loved his present and the kids were just beside themselves with excitement to give it to him too!

Daddy with the kids and Monster truck!

Later on that evening the wonderful Amanda showed up to take over kid duty and we went to dinner at On The Border (one of our favorite places to eat) and a movie that included popcorn with lots of butter, candy & soda.  It was wonderful and relaxing and so nice to have the babysitter put the kids to bed! We also have the best babysitter this side of the Mississippi too!

On Saturday, we had a few friends and family over for a BBQ.  It was a blast!

 Tanner, Kristin & Inara doing the water slide!

 Some of the girls eating dinner!

 My beautiful sister and my beautiful daughter!

 Chloe enjoying a Gem Pack Burger!

 Tyler with the bacon wallet from my Grandma!

 Adrienne, Aunt Kat, Grandma,Cammie, Mom & Hadley

 Chloe, Inara, Tanner, Addy & Orion

 Me, Grandma, Cammie, Mom & Hadley

 Orion, Carter, Inara, Addy & Tanner!

 Hadley the little bag lady!

 Chloe going down the water slide!

 Tanner & Chloe on the swings!

 Bbqing!

 Sweet little Inara!

 Orion and Carter stayed in the pool until almost 9 PM Saturday night!

 On Sunday afternoon Kris, Brent, Jill, Cameron, Caden and Eloise came over to celebrate both Tyler and Jill's birthday!  It was fun! We had pizza and cake and ice cream!

 Hadley, Tyler & Jill with the birthday cake!

 Everyone took part in blowing out the candles!

 W tried to get a  5 of the kids together for a picture.  It didn't happen at all!  Poor little Eloise is crying on Caden's lap and Hadley was off crying on the floor! 

The boys having cake!

It was a fun weekend!  We seriously have the best friends and family I think I could ever even imagine having! We are looking forward to next weekend-it's a 3 day weekend and I'm sure it will be filled with lots of food and friends!

Painting!

I decided to do it!  I went ahead and painted the area where the kitchen table sits and the little wall into our bedroom.  I love the way it turned out! 

 The last time I painted, we didn't have kids.  I forgot to take into account that 3 kids running around might slow down the painting process just a bit and make it a little more challenging! So, instead of fighting it, I let them help!

 Hadley was more into the finger painting method!

 The boys each got their own rollers and loved painting! They did a great job too!  The only mishap was when I put them outside to paint their "spaceship" (AKA Amazon.com box) and Tanner started painting the house.  Luckily I caught it in time to wash it off.  I do want the house a different color someday, but I am pretty certain Tanner will not be who I hire!

 Tanner painting away!

 Carter getting the job done and the finished wall! 

 The finished kitchen area!

I love the way it turned out!

Live Stock Auction

Last night we went to the Western Idaho Fair for the Live Stock Auction.  Tyler was there representing Gem Pack and buying animals and it was great fun to watch him in bidding action! Aunt Kat, My mom, our neighbor Dave, Chris and Cam all came to have some fun too! It was also very nice to eat fair food for dinner!

 Cam, Chris, Aunt Kat & Mom

 The auction in action!

 Tyler bidding! It was pretty sexy I must say! I hope I wasn't too embarrassing taking pictures! It sure was fun to see him doing this and meet some of the people he does business with.

 More auction!

 Tyler buying a steer.

Chris and Cam and baby in belly! 

Fun Weekend!

We had another really fun weekend up at Cascade again!  Mom even came up for the day on Saturday to play with us!  We even got her out on the tube and everything!  It was so much fun!

Mimi and Hadley

 Tanner jumping in the lake off the boat to Daddy!

He is the king of cannon balls!

 Mimi and Tanner in the tube!

 Carter!

 Hadley!

 Tanner!

 Daddy, Tanner & Mommy jumping in the lake off the boat!

 Daddy and the brothers doing s'mores!

To paint or not to paint...

I want to put some paint up on a few of the walls in this house.  I think.  I'm pretty sure I want to do this.  Having some accent colors around the house will make it look a little more homey to me.  I hope.  Anyway, here is what I am thinking...

I took the fabric from the curtains that hang in the kitchen, family room and entry way to Lowe's and picked out color swatches of what looked nice next to the fabric.  Here's what I came home with.  Mostly browns and golds.

 I want to paint the room where the kitchen table is.

 I would stop at the right side of the back door and not wrap around into the actual kitchen.

 It would just be three walls basically.

 Then, on the opposite side of the house I'd like to paint inside this little alcove that leads into our bedroom to kind of set it apart a little bit more.  The wall that the 3 little plaques hang vertically on. 

Then, if it wouldn't be too much, I might even paint the wall that is under the stairs.  I'm not sure about this wall.  I'm fairly sure about the other walls,but this one I'm still wondering about.  It might be too much to paint this and might not look good.  But it's a thought, I'm thinking about it!