Dinner laughs....

We took the girls to Ruths Chris for dinner tonight. Maggie has been asking if we could go out for a "fancy" steak dinner for awhile. Maggie loves being a kid in a grown-up restaurant. She asks lots of questions and takes great pride in using her manners. I often note how ornery Grace is, so I'll take a minute to say that she did great. She had to be reminded not to talk so loud a couple of times, but otherwise she was really really good.

We had a lovely dinner, and just as we were getting ready to leave the restaurant the girls and I made a stop in the restroom. (we couldn't possible visit any establishment without checking out the facilities :)) Anyway, Maggie was using the bathroom and Grace was waiting...Gracie says loudly, "Maggie, you poopy yet? my turn? you poopy yet?" Maggie looks at her very sternly and says in one of those hushed yell mom voices, "THIS IS NOT the kind of restaurant where we talk like that!" I'm not exactly sure what kind of restaurants they are used to :)

Once Maggie finished up, she was out washing her hands, while I helped Gracie. When we came out she said, "this soap is really different? and it smells." I looked around and realized she was washing her hands with mouth wash :) She went to bed still smelling minty fresh.

Other then our trip out for supper, today was a pretty quiet day around here. Maggie rode Shakira again this morning and we spent lots of time in the pool. Grace is working hard at swimming, actually swimming! She's never been very comfortable in the water, so I was worried it would take us a lot longer to teach her to swim, but she's really making progress and she's definitely more comfortable. I'll post a video soon.

Here are a few new pictures....

Grace won't go ANYWHERE without her tennis shoes all of the sudden. She wears them with dresses, to the pool, it doesn't matter....when we go to put her shoes on, she insists on "tenna shoes".



Together again...

Maggie and Shakira are back together again. It took about 6 seconds for their friendship to be rekindled :)

Our flights were pretty uneventful (thankfully!) Gracie refused to sleep at all, but at least she was pretty good. She spent most of the first flight standing in front of her chair taking care of her baby....

Since we arrived, there has been lots of swimming, sun and fun. It's HOT here. Even hotter then I remember from our other summer trips, but we stay close to water and try and find some shade.



This HUGE lizard is out sunning by the pool all the time. Every time we go out he runs away, but then he comes
right back. He probably wonders why we are bothering his house.

On vacation, anything goes...even cupcakes for brunch :) yum, yum!

It's only about a 15 minute drive from brunch to home, but after a hot horse lesson and all the traveling yesterday
the girls were worn out!

She has to get every drop....that's my girl!!!

Gracie REALLY likes her goggles all of the sudden.

Gracie wanted to go see the waves, she changed her mind about half way down the beach.

Before we left...



Before we left on vacation we had a couple more nights of Bible School. The last 2 nights the kids packed backpacks for me, I now have 1000 bags ready to go for when school starts in the fall! YAH!!

 

The last nights theme was glow in the dark. Maggie and I made a tshirt and headband with glow and the dark paint.

We had about 150 kids most of the nights. Maggie's already asking when Bible School will start again.

Now that's a look!

We gave all the kids glow sticks, I wish you could hear how loud they were singing :)

 

We also stopped in to the School Foundation office so Maggie could make her donation to the Grandma Margaret Scholarship. Maggie didn't understand why I wouldn't just let her go in alone. "Mom, I can do it. Just tell me which door is Sarah's office. You don't need to come." I wonder where she gets that sense of independence??

The girls picked all the vegetables from the garden that were ready. We took them to Grandma and Uncle Deem. Sounds like Uncle Deem will polish them off quickly!

Friday we got to spend most of the day at Aunt Debbie and Uncle Mike's house playing with Hailie and Connor....I didn't take a single pictures of all the kids!! I finally took Gracie home at about 9pm (Maggie was still going strong). She didn't even make it out of their neighborhood. I knew 4am was going to come early, but she was having such a good time playing, I hated to make her leave.

We also had a frantic last minute search for Arnie's passport. Thankfully he found it in his office...and as a result of the search I have clean junk drawers, kitchen cabinets, under beds, nightstands, closet, desk, file cabinet and laundry room. :)

Adventure....

If you ask Gracie, she'd tell you that today she went on and "avvennture". Maggie, Gracie and Grandma Betti took a road trip to Lincoln to visit Grandma Lea and Papa. Maggie was really excited to leave me behind :) They must of had a great time, they came home all wound-up and ready for another night of Bible School.

Gracie got fancy for her road trip.

Of course, Papa had all kinds of treasures for the girls.

Only at Grandma Lea and Papa's :)

They went out for Chinese food for lunch and got to see Aunt Lori and Emma.

Gracie has trouble with a fork....I can only imagine how chopsticks went!
 

Thanks for a fun day Grandma.

Bible School

Maggie has been really enjoying Bible School this week. We've both spent a lot of time there getting ready and it's been fun to see the kids experience it. Gracie has spent a couple of evenings in the nursery, because she wants to go to "church school" too. Monday night we had over 160 kids!!! It's been a fun week. I'm grateful to have found a church that we love so much and that truly embraces my kids and loves them.
The next 2 nights the kids will be stuffing backpacks for me, so I won't have as much time to take pictures.... (I'm not following her around all night, just in case you're wondering. I've taken 100's of pictures of all the kids, just picked a few of Maggie to share....I don't get to take any of Gracie, because if I go in her room she cries when I leave.)

Last night was "wear your team colors" night. BUT before we left on Sunday night, Kristi said "Don't forget to
dress like your flag tomorrow!" Miss Literal, was really worried about how she was going to dress like her flag (a purple bandanna). So, we went to work. She was happy with the result :)

We've had some missionaries from Africa working with us this week. Maggie got to
have a conversation in Lele with him.

Tonight was "Wacky Hair" night! Once again, I think we succeeded.

Another note about Maggie....I've been working on establishing a new Scholarship at the high school. We're putting Grandma Margaret's name on it. Tonight when we were headed to church Maggie asked what my meeting was about today. We talked about the scholarship again and who all was contributing to make it happen and how scholarships work. A few minutes later she said, "Mom, I want to give some money too." I told her that that was very nice and that I appreciated her help, but that I thought we had it covered, so she could keep her allowance money. She was ready quickly with an answer, she said, "No mom, I want to help. Grandma Margaret would want you to let me.".....Grandma Margaret (and all of the rest of us) would also be so very proud of her little namesake!  As her daddy said today, she's one of a kind :)