August

We did get some use of our Adventureland season passes, which is always fun! It is nice that they can ride most of these rides together without one of us! Piper is getting braver and braver....she even rode the Dragon this year. I was SO nervous for her but she LOVED it.

We braved the Iowa State Fair this year with the girls. Normally they SUCK at the fair so I'm not sure why we keep trying but we do. This year they were much better and actually had fun!

Piper loves all the pigs! Every where you look!

We stayed and saw Maddie Poppe sing a couple songs, our friend Baird was playing at one of the stages so we stopped there which is where Piper scored this sloth from a random guy who was basically just looking for someone to take it so he didn't have to carry it around. She was in heaven!

Also in August is when we lost our nephew Austin in a motorcycle crash. This was the hardest thing I had dealt with in a long time! I haven't seen most of Steve's family cry and this tragic situation brought his family so close together. So hard and I can't even express how hard this was. The honor walk they did for Austin's organ donation was the hardest, saddest and most powerful thing I have witnessed. Organ donation is such an amazing gift that Austin was able to give to so many others!

In August there was a shocking sighting of the girls getting along with each other for a split second too.

Presley went to cousin Mary's birthday party so Piper and I had a date night at Adventureland! I love having this one on one time with them!

The girls and I had our annual girls day before the first day of school. We enjoyed the nice weather and just ran errands, went to a couple parks and got ice cream.

The first day of school!!! Presley going into 5th grade and Piper going into 1st grade! Presley was excited about her teacher Ms. McCune and Piper was NOT so excited about her teacher Ms. Mulholland (who Presley had also and she can be very strict).

They had never taken the bus before but we knew that this year they would probably start so we figured the first day of school was the perfect chance to start! They actually really like riding the bus, so they have been taking it more than we thought they would. Presley was riding the bus home every afternoon and then staying at home by herself until Steve got there.....which was usually about 20-30 minutes, so it was good for her to have this responsibility. Having to come home, remember to text me, do her homework, get a snack and chill until he got home.

July

I am going to try to do a quick fast recap of the year and continue along my merry way with this blog. I'm bummed I have let this go but we pick up and keep on moving. So July was mainly filled with our normal Okoboji trip. The 4th of July we were lucky enough to get invited to Presley's Bff's house and enjoy their pool. It was really nice and so much fun to hang out with them.

We spent a day at the ninja gym....the girls love it and get braver every time we go. Piper will climb the warp wall 300 times just to the sam wall as her sister....and she got it. It is awesome that she doesn't give up and to see that smile on her face when she makes it up, makes me happy!

 We spent an evening at Smash Park, they girls loves the foosball table!

 Then Spirit Lake, we spent Saturday thru Wednesday there b/c Steve was so busy at work that he couldn't get away for the whole week, but we had a great time and did so many things.

We had a surprise 80th birthday party for Jerry! So much thought and planning went into this party and he was happy, shocked and also even shed a few tears when he got his present of 2 tickets to go to New York in September for him and Kathy, to see Steve's half sister Diane. He was blown away and really moved! It was very nice to see!

 Jerry has a really bad tattoo of his name on his arm from when he was in the Army, so everyone else decided to 'tattoo' their names on their arms also!

 This smile. Little did I know that this would be the last picture that I took of our nephew Austin.

 The whole Goodrich gang!

 The Goodrich grandkids.

Ava and Presley always want to do a 'scavenger hunt', well this year it included one of them holding a frog. I knew Presley would never do it but Ava sucked it up and crossed it off their list!

 We usually spend a couple hours at the splash park, which they love!

We decided to have 'white trash' day...OMG. It was SO much fun! Definitely something different that we all enjoyed...we all headed to the Barefoot Bar this way also!

After Okoboji Presley spent a week doing Living History Farms camp. This was her 2nd year doing it and she does have fun learning about different things, so I'm glad she has enjoyed it.
Then after that she spent a week with her Bff Zoey in the Ozarks. It was SO hard to have her gone for a whole week. It was her first time being away from us that long. Zoey's family is very good to her and I think they push her to try new things and have fun!! She had her phone so she was able to text and call us when she wanted/needed. And her parents sent us so many pictures and videos of them tubing and jumping off of cliffs.....so fun for her!

I have so many pictures that I was going to download onto this...but baby steps. I just need to be happy that I have a July post at all!

I got lost.

Over the last 5-6 months I got lost. Really lost......in more ways than you could imagine! I'm finding my way back. Slowly but surely. I am hoping to starting updating this blog again! I will go back and get caught up...maybe a month by month review, so I can jot down our memories and have our pictures stored here. The updates will definitely be a roller coaster ride of the ups and downs over the last 5 months. I will apologize now if I repeat myself, leave stuff out or skip around and make no sense whatsoever. Welcome to my current life!

Shawn Mendes

The girls know we love concerts and always want to join us. I finally broke down and bought tickets to Shawn Mendes, which really weren't that expensive so it worked out. Saturday night we all got dressed up and ready to go on a family date to the concert. We talked to them long and hard about getting along, having good attitudes in hopes that we would all have a good time.

We went to Mullets for dinner and Piper had this super shitty attitude. Really sad, not talking and crying about everything. I took her outside and told her grandma was going to pick her up if she couldn't decide to have fun.....about 10 minutes later, all was good and we were on our way. We were able to buzz into Buzzard Billy's (and get a parking spot there) and then walk to up the Well.

I love this picture of me and my baby girl! I think she looks tall but she really isn't.

 I just think she is so beautiful. Biased, maybe!

 Finally Piper was in a good, funny mood!

The concert was REALLY good! The girls really enjoyed it and were good for 95% of it and they are ready to go to their next show. Exposing them to the fun of concerts is going to cost us way too much $$! :)