chili, crisp weekend...

chili, crisp weekend: saturday morning brought in wet, chilly weather, so bobby and girls set in to make some delicious chili. Later in the afternoon the sun finally made an appearance, so we decided to make a stop at a local apple orchard for some honeycrisp apples. livia helping daddy chop the celery and helping herself to some as well...
sophia helping out daddy on her stool (livia trying to be the constant jester!)

sophia helping daddy chop

checking out the koi in the pond at the apple orchard

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sunday: sunday school and church

do you think they are related???

finally, a nice smile before church :)

lordy, lordy...

lordy, lordy: look who made it to forty...anniversaries that is! We celebrated my parents' 40th "ruby" anniversary today. It was a beautiful day for their anniversary, and we had a great time playing and eating! awww...
one of our presents to help them celebrate their 40th was a can of wd40...get it? 40? well, there were also instructions on the back to help them when they get into a "tight spot". hopefully it will aid in getting them to 50 years ;)

a little swedish golf (grandma won)

bocce ball (my dad and i won)

croquet (my mom won again...i think she conquered the lawn games)

some drinks on a nice sunday afternoon...the adults had some alcoholic beverages (almost as good as juicy juice!)

bobby made a shrimp and crab boil for supper...it was fantastic!

future hunter...

future hunter: in the evenings for the past week, the girls have enjoyed some "daddy/daughter time", while playing the game "big buck hunter pro". The object of the game is to shoot as many bucks in each round and then at the end, there are a variety of bonus games. Tonight Livia asked if she could play before bedtime. i thought grandpa would be proud of his future hunter... ready, aim...shoot!
look at those intense eyes...or is that just tiredness?

what a week...

what a week: the withers family had quite a week! tuesday was my first day back at school in third grade. wednesday was livia's first day of kindergarten, and thursday was sophia's first day going potty on the "big potty". There was definitely a variety and range of emotions this week. Phew! I am sure glad that this week is over! livia with her kindergarten teacher, mrs. keil, at orientation
claire, bryn, and livia ready for the bus (at daycare)

getting on the bus, heading for school

getting off the bus on the first day of school

after school on the bus with claire and bryn - we made it!

sophia with her congratulatory cake

a surprise phone call from dora for being a "big girl"...excelente!

my team (did you notice all their sports attire?)

this could be an interesting year... ;)

summer's last hurrah...

summer's last hurrah: bobby, livia, sophia and i met up with our friends (the girls' godparents), paul and laurie and their little boy, owen (our godson), at the mn zoo on saturday. It was a perfect day to see the animals and spend some time with the Mordorskis! owen (6 months), livia (5 years), and sophia (2 years)


that's a BIG pumpkin!

livia "posing" for the camera

livia made me go back and take a picture of her with a goat - how funny!

my wild and fun family
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summer's last hurrah: we visited the deer lake orchard on sunday afternoon. We fed some animals, took a wagon ride around the orchard, and ate some apples

(of course!).

can't get away from those adorable goats!

the three little piggies :)

livia - 2007

sophia - 2010

waiting for our wagon ride

feeling cheesy...

feeling cheesy: on monday we made a surprise visit to daddy in the cities. This was probably the last time we could do that for a little while, since school is starting soon. We decided to go to Chuck E. Cheese for some food and a little fun.

Check out some of our "fun"...

(julie, does this song remind you of anything?) tick-tock...
watch out, grandpa...there are some future hunters coming your way!

giddy up!

livia intently riding the "horse game"

i love sophia's face on this one!

don't "bug" me, i'm having a good time!

deck-tacular...

deck-tacular: it is official! we have finished staining and inlaying pavers into our deck. Here are some pictures so you can see the progress! this is what the "garden" and lawn looked like before we purchased the house in 2007
this is after we stained the fence and put in sand and a play set into the "garden"

these are the pavers that bobby inlayed in the deck where the hot tub used to be...
the hot tub never worked- :(
(1/2 stained deck)

oops! someone stepped in the stain! who could it be?

this is a picture of the backyard before we purchased the house

this is "after" we stained, put in the pavers, and placed rock around the deck

what a difference, huh?

you can actually see that the deck is still wet from the stain