Pickles

I forgot to mention that Joel and I canned 12 pints of pickles a couple weekends ago. It was a lot of fun...and SO much easier than I thought it was going to be. We just combined a few recipes from the internet and I called my mom about 4 times.

Evan's Imagination

Evan's imagination amazes me every day. He's always coming up with something new to pretend.

He loves to pretend that he is fishing. He first did this in Illinois at my friend Margie's house. He sat inside the circle of a hula-hoop and starting fishing. After this incident my dad gave him a real fishing lesson:


Since then he's been fishing out of the laundry basket, catching "big fish" and then eating them. I finally made him some paper fish to catch!

One day last week, Evan took a place mat off of the table and put it on the floor. He then put his cereal bowl and milk on the place mat. He said, "mommy picnic?" Who could resist that? I have no idea where he came up with the idea but it sure was cute!


He has also created his own water spout. He sees me get water out of the spout in the fridge so one day he went over to a safety lock on a cupboard and made a water sound while holding his cup under the lock. Now when we have picnics he knows where to go to get the pretend-water.


On Sunday morning Evan was playing with a little rubber Easter Bunny who's arms and legs move all around. He put the bunny on the couch and told him "hold still, change diaper."

Who knows what he'll come up with next!

Coupons

I've really been paying attention to all the deals you can get with coupons and combining them with sale items. It amazes me when I see a story about some lady using a zillion coupons for $100 worth of groceries and she ends up paying $25 (or less!). I want to BE that lady.

This morning Evan and I went to Albertson's. I had looked at the store flyer online and had my coupons ready.

I bought $50.37 worth of groceries and with coupons, sales, and BOGO's, I only paid $23.89!!!

Anyone have any good coupon advice for me?! I would love to hear it!

Evan's Prayer

Evan didn't want to pray with Joel and I when we prayed before supper last night. However, towards the end of his supper he decided he wanted to pray by himself. Here is how it went...

Evan: Dear God, Thank you for big kids.
Joel: Who else do you want to pray for?
Evan: a lot of big kids
Joel: anyone else?
Evan: more big kids
Joel: anyone else?
Evan: Dear God Thank you all the people. Amen

Joel: Where are all the people?
Evan: Go Bye Bye in Jeep.

(insert- lots of laughing and confusion from us because we don't even have our jeep anymore!)

Evan: Pray Again. Dear God Thank you chicken.

(We had fish for supper.)

Playing with Pax

My sister's little boy, Paxson, is growing up SO fast! He turned 11 months old last week and has been walking for more than 2 weeks! I helped mom babysit him a few times last week...he's such a sweetheart!

The O'Malleys in front of the new house they are renting...


Evan playing with Uncle David's golf clubs...


Paxson braved the bathtub with Evan. He survived...


The boys ate their snack on Grandma's couch...


Paxson loved the swing at the gradeschool. (And "the house across from the swingset" is still there :)


Evan and Pax also had a good time opening and shutting the door and the playground...


We're looking forward to seeing Pax again in a couple of months!

Evan and Cameron

Joel, Evan, and I flew up to Chicago last weekend to go to his cousin, Jason's wedding. Unfortunately we didn't get any great pictures that evening but the wedding was very pretty and we had a good time visiting with family at the reception. They were all disappointed that we had taken Evan to stay at Jake and Melissa's house for the night. But he had a better time with them than he would have at the wedding!

Joel had to leave for Lexington, KY on Sunday but I was able to visit my friend, Valla, for the afternoon before I headed back to Jake and Melissa's for a couple days.

Chach & Valla's new house...


A few pictures from our time with Jake, Melissa, and Cameron...

Johson Visit: Part II

I know I'm really late doing this blog but I wanted to at least put up some pictures of the weekend Aaron and Shauna spent with us!

We went to Satchel's for yummy pizza and fun playtime at Lightnin' Salvage:



We spent a couple hours at Paynes Prairie and saw wild horses:




AND we can't have visitors without going to the beach:




We love you Johnsons and can't wait to see you again!