the zoo-redeemed

most of my memories of the kansas city zoo end with me saying i will never go back-i remember the trip with the my mom, becky and all 5 kids where we walked all the way to africa and maybe saw one 'african hunting dog'. the kids were hot and unimpressed and we still had to walk ALL the way back. the kids were fighting over the ice pack we had in the cooler-holding to there faces. it was bad.

however, last fall on a day bobby was going to working on the house all day, i took the kids and we had a blast. i bought a membership-since it was going to be equal in price to us going to the zoo 2-3 times. and the platinum membership included unlimited rides on the sky safari that would open the summer of 2011. i thought we would go back again soon. well-it took us awhile-but we did go back. last week when the forecast said 80 degrees and sunny for 3 days straight-i knew we needed to get it in gear. once a month the zoo is open in the evening (only africa). they have meal specials, african drumming and the sky safari would be open this time. it was meant to be. however, on the way back from lawrence with all 3 kids bobby had a flat tire in the prius. he called and i thought the zoo trip would be scrapped. but he is bobby-and he fixed that flat and we met up and drove to the zoo on the donut. it was worth it. beautiful weather, the quiet and ingenious sky safari, the bat eared fox was awake as was the bush baby. it was all the kids could do to contain their enthusiasm.

summer-

it felt like summer would never get here-but it was worth the wait. 

emily's shoes finally arrived-they were worth the wait too!

grant is on 2 ball teams-the t-bones have been playing together for 3 seasons-they are all kids who go to sunflower. but since grant is transferring to piper this fall-we decided a ball team would be a great place to meet some of the new kids. it is busy...but he seems to enjoy it. bobby is a coach on each of the teams.

the girls are really loving having grant home to play-

for father's day bobby decided he wanted to go to lunch at T-Rex ("because the kids are a pretty big part of me being a dad"he said)

this is the famous-turtle face

the garden is growing like crazy-we have about 50 tomato plants-but i'm still not sure if we will have enough to can. the way the kids eat them off the vine-i'm not even sure we will have enough to bring inside :) the other pictures are of the new club. "snobigumbe" it is in the dog pen. they go out there and work. grant's job is to dig holes and the girls make nests. they created it all on their own-sign and all.

we finally added some swings to the sycamore tree-

we took a trip down to muskogee to see amanda and her 3 kids. it was so good to spend time with old friends and see how much the twins have grown.

i love this picture-classic summer...

rebecca invited us over to swim-and now whenever we get together we love talking photography. she has started to take pictures professionally as well-and we could spend hours talking about all things related to photography business. thanks becca for taking pictures that have me in them-i love getting to prove that i actually do play-not just take pictures :)

 and then there is becky-i rave about her all the time-but she deserves it-
everyone needs an aunt becky!

i love this-
happy father's day to greg-3 kids under 3-now that is a big job-and he and amanda are doing a Beautiful job :)

 this one cracks me up-

 ryan told roy that if learned how to play 'waltz across texas' and sing it-that he would buy him a cow. i made roy a country cd for his birthday that included willie's version of the song-and then bobby set out to teach him how to play it.

 everyone needs a dad that can throw them so high in the air that their head gets cut off in the picture :)

 this was part of bobby's father day gift-

 this was at a neighbor's house on memorial day-they have a full size court in their driveway-
loved getting to watch them play-soon grant will be able to join the big boys game :)