June in Review (Which Means the Year is Half Over Already?!)

Watching Veggietales while we older ones set up Emmi's party, because distraught toddlers need distraction from the fact that they didn't get to leave the house with the birthday girl, haha.

Emmi suspected what her birthday theme would be and apparently told Peter, "If I have a Care Bear birthday, set up all the Care Bears by the door so I will know." Nobody else knew that she had charged him with this task, but I had literally not even finished locking the door behind them before he was dragging the bin out!

I've been having some fun trying to do a bit of handlettering :). I'm willing to unveil this one here because I'm not happy with it yet, haha ;). I'll show the finished project on my shop blog/page later!

That, my dear readers, was found in a bag of baby carrots. I had to cut it in fourths.
And our favorite recipe site has been taken down, so we had to guess how to make the roasted root veggies, and I had to write down two recipes that I had memorized so that I'm not the sole holder of their yumminess,  and I'm trying to remember if all the other recipes were printed off or not... (Nope. We don't have our crouton recipe...)

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"Popcorn is so much work to make."
*Spontaneously makes cookies instead*
"I mean... not that this isn't work. But I got excited."

Noah, after Andrew tapped the bottom of Noah's cup while he was drinking: "I saw your noise."

*everybody coughing*
*Noah, who is not sick, coughs too*
Tori: "Feeling left out, Noah?"
Noah: "Sometimes."

Joey: " Where is that book, Mommy?"
Mama: "Over here."
"IN YOUR EAR?!?!?!"

Josiah: "Can we listen to Piano Guys?"
*Tori and Joey watch some piano tutorials*
Tori telling us the story later: "He asked for the tutorials I watch and he liked them, but eventually he got bored, and then he went, 'Tori, you know what would be really funny? If we watched what I actually asked for first.' I should have laughed the whole time we watch Piano Guys and told him he was right, this was funny."

Noah: "I not a see bug, I not a see bug!"

Noah at the zoo:
Looking at the crocodiles: "It's a crocodino, it's a crocodino!"
Looking at the ostriches: "It's a big duckie!"
After getting off the merry-go-round (which he was slightly intimidated by, but enjoyed nevertheless!): "Yay!!! That was amazing!!!"
Hearing some children in the aquarium squealing about the fish: *joins their family* *Squeals along with them*

Some guy after watching me and Noah in the aquarium for a minute, to Noah: "Hi there!"
To me: "You can TELL he's your's! He looks just like you."
Er... um... thanks?... but...
Hahahahaha. For you older sisters of large families DO you get mistaken for your sibs mothers? And what do you say? Because I always feel rude and flat saying "Actually, he/she is my brother/sister/these are my siblings", but... there is nothing else to say.

Me: "I need to grab my name tag so they don't lock the church down when I get there."
Mama: "That would almost be funny..."
Me: *leaves my name tag in the van and doesn't realize it until Mama gets out of the parking lot*
At least I noticed it before I went in, haha...

Mama randomly told me I make pretty taco salads, and after my comment about a salad being a work of art last month (which Mama had neither heard nor read yet), I had to laugh!

Tori said Josiah fluffed his hair like Mama does to Noah's, in an attempt to bring out the curls he doesn't have, and when he saw the result, regretted it and smoothed it immediately, haha!

Mama: *reorganizes all the books, fitting each one perfectly onto the shelves*
Mama: *pulls out her chair to sit down for supper, and finds the biggest book we own sitting on it*

Andrew is standing beside me with a grin on his face.
I reach over and push down on his shoulders to get him off his tip toes.
I laugh uncontrollably as I realize... he's not ON his tip toes.

*Noah and Mama talking about Baby*
*Noah has a sudden revelation*
"That not Baby Bear! That a ball!!!"

Josiah, sneaking, sneaking around the house, when I look up at him:
*giggles* "That was a bad part of the spy. You saw me."

Noah, whenever he doesn't want to do something: "Oh, I so sick!"

Noah, when Tori asked him to do something: "I have a scratch!"
"Where?"
"I have bruises!"
"Where?"
"I soooooo sick!"
"No you aren't."
"Oh. ...I sooooooo tired!"

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-June started with Emmi's birthday! Our baby sister is 8 now. It's so odd to realize we don't have a "little" girl anymore, after the family was mostly girls for so long! She took Mama and Daddy and Abbi to the zoo, and they rode ponies and had ice cream and enjoyed all that fun zoo busyness. Abbi and Emmi truly fill their birthdays to the brim. It was so late when they got home, and we still had gifts and cake to do afterwards. And then she stayed up after that... haha! She was so exhausted by the time it was all over.

-Our church held a lady's yarn fellowship, and Bethi (who has not shown any interest in crocheting or knitting for about 6 years now) and I went. It was fun, there was all kinds of yarn and all kinds of projects there that the ladies had brought as examples or inspiration or to finish. And some of the ladies were learning, and some were teaching, and some were just there for the company, and we had a salad buffet for lunch. One sweet lady there (she's one of ten children, so she has really taken our family in!) taught me how to make granny squares. It's not hard, but I have never taken the time to learn the science behind it, so when she asked if I knew how, I responded no. She told me she'd teach me, then. I sat down and picked up a crochet hook, to which she asked if I wanted a larger one, because that was more of a professional sized one and would be harder to use. I told her I was good. She showed me how to make a granny square, and then started showing me all the baby items she crochets. They were gorgeous, and as we were talking, I showed her a picture of the baby set I made for Noah... which, when she saw, caused her to promptly asked WHY she had just shown me how to crochet granny squares if I could already do something like that. "You asked, and I hadn't ever made one before!", I tried to explain, but she waved me off and told me that next time I need to be one of those teaching. Yes ma'am... haha! I think I got off easy with her, though, because I had been working with Bethi ;). Who CAN crochet. She just won't if it's not social, I guess...

-We went for our annual summer blueberry picking. Unfortunately it was really hot and several people were down right miserable by the time we finished, with half the blueberries we usually get. But we had lots of yummy berries for eating, plain or with strawberries and whipped cream, and making muffins and blueberry crisp, with some left in the freezer now. Noah was sooooo cute; he was very careful to only pick the blue ones (and sticks, but hey, he's a two year old boy, what could you expect? Sticks are all the rage), and about twenty minutes in, he apparently told Mama, out of the blue; "I happy!" Too cute <3!

How was your June :)? Two things that really stood out to you during the month? And how was your 4th of July :)?

Rejoicing in Hope,
Bri <3