Baptism day!

Today we celebrated Timothy's baptism day.  He was pretty excited about it.  And we are happy to make being a child of God a big deal!  I made some donuts for breakfast and we did his blessing prayer then since we planned a dinner out.  Teresa was feeling a bit jealous and had to be coaxed to join us.  She wondered if we celebrated her baptism day.  (So I had to look it up on the blog and report to her what we did!)

After lunch we went to Flora pool with Timothy's friend Sam and friend Anna.  The day was overcast and not super warm, but that just made for a less crowded pool.  The kids all had a good couple hours of fun!

For dinner Timothy chose to go to Culver's.  But instead of dessert there, he wanted to do root beer floats again with friends.  We did that last year.  So Timothy invited over a bunch of neighbor kids and enjoyed a summer treat in honor of his baptism!  And that was followed up with a game of ball tag.  A perfect ending to a wonderful day for one special child of God!!

Bike Rider!

Timothy learned how to ride a bike pretty young.  But he did have the advantage of living in a place that was flat and had sidewalks--both a help for learning.  For Teresa, she has lived in a hilly land in her prime learning years.  She also has different interests than Timothy.  But now as she approaches 7, I wondered if this might be the summer to learn.

Two night ago, she had some interest, so I got down the little bike and told her to practice scooting.  It is a little awkward to scoot with the pedals on, but she tried.  I said if she practiced all summer I thought she could master the bike.

So last night she practiced again.  This time she was trying to pedal but running out of room on the driveway to really get going.  So we moved to the street.  She figured out how to get going and, well, off she went down the street.  That's it--2 nights and she mastered the bike!  Way to go Teresa!

Today she moved on the the slightly bigger bike and after about 10 minutes was cruising on that too!

Father's day

I did not have grand plans to celebrate Troy on Father's Day, but I think it was a pretty good day.  Before church he got a special reading time with Teresa.  She loves to read to people these days!  After church we went to do some new activities and make memories.

We started with mini golf.  To make it more fun we did not keep score.  The kids did pretty good for their first times of golfing.  Troy got two holes in one and I got one as well.  They were excited to see what each new hole would be like.

Our next part of the adventure was hitting balls at the driving range.  Timothy had hit balls once before, Teresa never, and Troy and I had not hit any for years.  But all of us were successful and managed to hit a few balls without too much frustration.



In the evening we attended Teresa's soccer game.  Troy got to cook steaks for dinner and the kids and I made dessert--cookie ice cream sandwiches!  The after dinner activity was a game of catch with the kids and Troy and our neighbor and her dad.  I was glad it was a fun day for a great guy.  Troy is an amazing father and our kids are lucky to have him!

MN Vacation!

Teresa, Timothy, and I made a visit to the cities shortly after school got out to visit my family.  We had a blast!  We had all kinds of fun things to do and lots of quality cousin time.
While waiting for an afternoon play date with the cousins, I took the kids to a fun park.  It had a new zip line that they loved and other unique structures that we do not often see.  We had a great 30 minutes until 3 buses of school kids showed up.  They there were lines everywhere and we decided to go home.

Teresa on the zip line.  Look at that happy face!

Posing for a pic.

Timothy on the zip line.

Timothy testing out Grandpa's skateboard swing.

 At grandma and grandpa's house there was lots of time for outdoor play.  The weather was not too hot, but sunny and warm.  They played on the swings, and in the water and just had lots of fun being together.


Timothy and Broder, and Teresa and Fiona got to have a special outing to Como town as well.  They girls rode on the car ride--a sort of tradition for them.  They also drove bumper cars solo for the first time.  The boys also rode the bumper cars and the roller coaster and they all loved the frog hopper!


Teresa was especially sad at the thought of leaving, so I let her take some pictures.  She took the one of Grandpa.  And I took the one of Teresa and Grandma.  This was the silly pose.  The really nice one turned out blurry of course!  We are so thankful for chances to be together with family!!

Last day of school

The last day has come and gone.  It was a good school year for both kids.  They both found out their new teachers and were mostly happy with who they got.  Teresa just wishes she could be with Sophie again.

The last week of school was a fun one.  Troy and I took advantage of school and went for a lunch out in Potosi for our anniversary.  We had a nice afternoon and great food!  On Wednesday, Troy and I got to join Teresa for lunch and some activities in her classroom.  It was fun to see some of her work and memories from the past year.  Timothy went on a trolley ride around Dubuque on Wednesday.

anniversary lunch

just a cute picture of Timothy and his spiked hair!

Teresa at her desk.

Last day of school!

The bus stop crew!!

To honor the last day, we had a family pizza party with Casey's pizza and a yummy cookie ice cream cake.  We had some kickball after dinner and stayed up a little later.  (The late night has made the first day of summer a little grumpier, but hopefully that is only temporary.)

We are proud of our kiddos and their completion of 1st and 3rd!