Busy summer days

There is always so much to do in the summer! Long, warm evenings, activity packed weekends, trips to the beach, VBS and other events for the kids... So it's been a while since I've posted. Here are some highlights:

We've started harvesting from our garden. Most of the lettuce is bitter (or gets eaten by gophers), but we've enjoyed beans, cucumbers, peas, and LOTS of zuchinni. Jenetta has been getting really creative in her use of this vegetable. It has found its way into muffins, applesauce blends, and salads, but my favorite is breaded and fried with ranch dressing :) Our surviving corn should be ready soon, and it looks like we will end up with about a thousand tomatoes (I planted way too much of that).

I'm noticing how old this photo is already. The watermelon plants in the foreground now completely fill the front box and are growing down the sides, and the tomatoes in the far back to the left are 2 feet taller now! Wow!

The girls are doing well. They are enjoying their summer and playing with friends outside more. Grandma Joy has been on her summer break, so they've been able to spend some fun times with her. We got to go to a makeup Padres game as a family, and that was fun - a 5:30 Saturday start time makes for a much better evening (not to mention avoiding the ER!) L's owie on her face healed nicely, but she will have a pretty noticeable scar by her eye. (Just fitting in with the Penners, I guess..)

O is swimming without floaties and has ridden with me on her tummy on my surfboard a few times. She likes flopping on the boogie board and riding in the shallow whitewater. I think next year I will get her a softtop surfboard of her own.


We got free passes to the county fair, so that was a lot of fun for the girls. We did a few rides, but to keep the cost down, we mainly took advantage of the many, many fun free things you can do at the fair. The girls had a blast (and took a two hour nap when we got back home)!

But probably the biggest new thing that has happened is that last weekend the girls' paternal grandmother arranged for our kids to play with their siblings whom they have not seen for almost two years. The oldest is 7, and the first thing he asked O was if she remembered that she used to bite him. :) That sounds like our O! He is a half-brother, and O really enjoyed running and playing with him. They also have a younger sister who is around 2.5. She had fun, too, but she is so young that she didn't engage much with our two - mostly she just played with the wood chips at the park :) We played together for a few hours and then went to Lakeshore Learning Center for all four of them to do free crafts.

It was a good time, and there really hasn't been any negative repercussions of the get-together. It was just kids having fun playing together. From what we have heard, it meant a great deal to the boy - he misses his sisters. O was a little bit depressed or low the day after the get-together, but she's been normal ever since.

We certainly don't want to hide anything from our girls, but it will be interesting seeing how these relationships develop over the years. It seems clear that our girls will have a drastically different childhood experiences.

God is good. He has taken care of the needs of our family. We are in a place of living day to day and enjoying the good things He has provided for us.