Painting the Garage

Those of you who have seen our garage out back know that it is...ummmm....tired. Now that we've gotten the house pretty much how we like it, we've been spending most of our free time (okay, not most of our free time. just enough free time to make us feel like we're working really hard) fixing it up. Now we can walk into the garage without kicking things out of the way and actually find stuff (we had a camper in there! who knew?!). Richard replaced the outside door, since the old one was, quite literally, falling apart- he's standing on the remains. And today we painted the outside of the garage. Well, the front of the outside. One coat. We had to stop sooner than we planned, because Sam was using all the paint on himself. Hannah and sam each have a small tupperware and a watercolor paintbrush. They were a BIG HELP!!!

Magnolia wings

This evening Hannah took to flight. She grabbed a handful of Magnolia leaves and announced that she was going to fly right now! I don't think the tree begrudged her the leaves too much- she's just too cute!

(I think this is a cool shot because I kept a relatively long shutter speed to capture all the movement from her flight- but I also let off a burst of flash to freeze her expression as well. It was my first try at this)

Hannah's Haircut

Hannah got her second real haircut today (sniff sniff). She had gotten tired of having beautiful, luxurious, flowing long hair because it would get so tangled. So she told me she wanted her hair short like mine. And she looks great! I got in trouble with Jennifer (the stylist) for doing such a mediocre job cutting her hair in the past, so I am officially fired. But...that's probably for the best, since I don't know what I'm doing! Hannah loved being the princesss and center of attention.

Mud Island

Today was playgroup and we went to Mud Island. For those of you who don't know what Mud Island is, or for those of you who have heard of it but never bothered to go (shame on you)...Mud Island is a rare gem in Memphis, that is, a really cool place to go if you're under 10. And, incidentally, free, if you know how to get there without using the monorail (which debuts in such John Grisham movies as.......um....one of them...). Mud Island is a concrete scale replica of the mighty Mississippi River, complete with running water, and if your parents are cool (and Catherine and I are sooo cool) they will let you walk in the river, climb over small bridges and under large ones. Chandler, Hannah and Sam walked the Mississippi from Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico, undaunted by spooky bridges with trolls. We had a blast.

Tuesday in the Backyard

This summer the only thing our backyard lacked was its own personal swimming pool. So I grabbed one at wal-mart and inflated the whole thing by myself. The kids had a blast. sam is right to cringe. That hose water is COLD! We didn't even get the pool half filled before the kids were cold and wanted to go inside. He's got his plans for getting even, though. Just as soon as he figures out how to make it shoot.