Brothers and sisters

breezeway transformation

Taken from inside the former "breezeway" after walls taken out and painted white - thanks to Gramma Shell!

Outside the breezeway when the walls were still up and the trim and posts were still blue.

Bedroom/bathroom renovation

before...

This is not our furniture. These pictures were taken during the househunting process.

Wierd, open bathroom.

during...after...

Curb Appeal - "Before" picture at bottom of post

Michele, Max's mom, stripped and sanded the door, hours of work, and painted the entryway and the trim of the house. Huge improvement.

A friendlier entry-way.

For some reason there is a garden patch in the middle of the sidewalk, so we planted pansies there.

I think this picture was taken back in April when before we bought the house. God allowed the blue trim in order to save the house for us. Can you believe someone painted over the beautiful cedar door?

Baby Evelyn!

JB holding her the day we got home from the hospital.

Gloria looking at her new sister in the hospital, the day Evelyn was born, 2:40 in the morning on Monday, August 31st. This is the same day just much later, around 12:30pm.

The kids and Gramma Shell checking out Evelyn Victoria Bremer.

Mommy holding new baby. I have been blessed with quick, relatively easy, no-complications labor. I think the hard part is bringing them home and getting adjusted as well as being sleep deprived. Painful in different ways. Evelyn is a wonderful baby, sweet disposition, still wakes up a lot at night (every 1-2 hours...ugh!), a beautiful baby girl. Max would tell you that every newborn is ugly, but on the scale of ugliness, Evelyn is a pretty cute one, at least I think so. In fact, I don't think she's ugly at all. Maybe a little scrunched with gooey stuff on them at first, but they get better with each passing day...

At the Rodeo

Gloria and I got new cowgirl hats! Gloria went to the rodeo as a cowgirl princess.

JB went as JB

Bull, what bull?

Oh, that bull!

More pics at the cattle drive on base

Cattle Drive Through the Base

JB found a horse with his name on it.

Max, Benaiah, and the base commander, Col Thomas, as well as Gloria peeking through.

Gloria was sooooooo happy to have her picture taken with the Rodeo Queen.

And even more ecstatic to sit on her horse!

We were surrounded by longhorns where we had parked ourselves to watch the cattle drive on base because they stopped at our corner for grazing and so that the cowboys and commanders could mingle with the crowd and get in an interview for the paper. This was right outside Max's office and we had no idea they were going to stop there. The long horns were amazing and surprisingly docile.

The boot

Oh it's a boot, but where's the other one? Aunt Kristin and Gramma Shell each bought Gloria a pink John Deere boot...wrapped separately. She was a bit perplexed that she only found one boot in the box, but when Daddy was filming her she said "thank you Aunt Kristin for the boot...please send me the other one." She was very sweet about it and accepting of it.

Her next to last present, a boot-shaped package. She was relieved to have both of them. I guess she's big enough to handle practical jokes, being a big 5-year-old. Overall, I think she had fun at her princess, swimming birthday party. Mommy was relieved when it was over, but thought it was fun too and glad we did it. Tomorrow is her actual birthday and she has a couple of presents left to unwrap and a promised helium balloon coming to her.

Opening presents

Reading her card and receiving her money - $10!

Studying a very artistic card from her friend.

Can you tell it was a pool party?

Did you notice the balloon under my shirt?

Gloria at her Birthday Party

We celebrated Gloria's birthday on Saturday (although her b-day is not until Tuesday, which is my due date for the next baby) and had three families over for swimming, lunch, cake, and opening of presents. This is the cake portion of her birthday celebration. Her face isn't so clean for the pictures, but it's her birthday, she can be messy if she wants to, right?

We all go a little crazy in front of the camera sometimes...

JB mowing

A good way to get out some of his energy and get the lawn mowed even if the lawn does end up with mohawks...that's how it looked when I first mowed the lawn at age 20!

Neighbor Cows

This is to show that the cows really are almost in our front yard. I'm not sure how good we are for the cows though, the other day I saw one with one of our big pieces of packing paper in its mouth that had blown away when we still had boxes of paper in our driveway. She looked like she was trying to eat it.

Here is a calf playing with a ball that blew over the fence last night in a storm. One of our inflatable boats that we used in the pool also blew over to the barbwire fence where it met its fate...

It was fun seeing the calf play with the ball this morning...

Homeschooling with JB

Does JB look interested in reading? Normally it's like pulling teeth getting him to read to me lately, but I think I may have had a breakthrough and I hope it sticks! The other day I had him read to me while I was fixing dinner. He did so much better when I wasn't sitting there with him, prodding him along. He read faster and stayed focused when I only occasionally came over if he needed a little help. This would be great if it works like that every time because I could get something done while listening to him read and wouldn't have to get frustrated trying to keep him focused all the time. We'll see if it works...