Tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers, oh my!

Well as many of you know, our garden has been quite prolific. Noah has enjoyed our garden so much that all of the weeding was worth it just to see him get excited about a "wed" -red- tomato or a "bee" -big- green pepper. These are the hauls from the last few days.

Just as a reference, that is a yard stick. The largest cuke is about 18 inches long. They filled a 5 gallon bucket with one or two across the top and a few sticking out.


These are the tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, green and jalapeño peppers Noah and I picked the day after Matt's 5 gallon cucumber haul.


These are the 2 peppers Noah picked that day, but they didn't make it back to the house.

Noah loves fresh green peppers and doesn't even mind a little dirt!

James and Nicole are married!

Last weekend Matt's little brother married his beautiful bride Nicole. Prior to the wedding, Noah and Dan had some work to do...

Dan wrote a song for Nicole and James and he sang it at their wedding reception. The first line and last line is "James Adlai and Nicole Marie, Noah and I wrote this song for thee."

The following day was the ceremony. James and Nicole waited to see each other until she walked down the isle. Noah was the ring bearer and did an amazing job at it! A little M n M goes a long way to get a 2yr old down the isle.

Can't live without sweet corn here in Iowa

Well, I guess I am becoming more like the local folk around here because I now refer to corn on the cob as "sweet corn" which is what everyone up here calls it...weird I know...but forgive them they are yankees;) -lol. This video pretty much says it all.

Daniel visits Iowa

When we arrived home from Gatlinburg, my friend Daniel Herman came up from FL. We had a great time hanging out and eating and hiking...and Daniel and I had a wonderful time quizzing each other on forestry stuff. We went to the Mississippi and Iowa's Pike's Peak. It was mine and Daniel's first time there. They had a bunch of humming bird feeders hung just outside of the park building and there were tons of birds at them. It was so neat because I have never seen a humming bird up so close!

The birds...

The river...

The trees...

The water fall on the hike...

Jenna washes off her feet after slipping and sliding in the mud.

Clarksville Parade- Youth center float.

Romeo and Noah look at the maps

Asher and Noah ride in the wagon before bible study starts. The look related don't they???

Other events prior to Gatlinburg...

Well many random pictures...

First, the beautiful peppers picked from our garden. They are on a salad plate, not a dinner plate.

Becky takes her first birthday bite...

she later gets frosting all over...hmmm I wonder if that has anything to do with the guys sitting behind her....?

Noah being goofy with his tiger...

Noah enjoys his first ever lollipop with the neighbor grandkids

Noah getting a push from the girls

Noah shows off his "big boy underpants" and the football that is on them. We haven't changed completely to them, but the first day he ever wore them he had no accidents all day! We have used them a few other times and have been relatively successful.

WOW I am behind!!!

Well I just loaded the pictures up from our camera and realized how far behind in the posting I am. On July 26th, we headed out to Gatlinburg, Tn to meet my mom for a little vacation.

The first day we were there, we rode this cable trolley thing to the top of the mountain. It was really neat except everytime we went over one of the big things that held the cable it dipped really quickly. I tended to squat down at that point and take cover! Noah seemed to enjoy himself though.

On the way up the mountain...

Noah stops to play in the fountain at the shops on top of the mountain...

On our way back down...

Great sleep after a long day!

The following day we had to go listen to a timeshare schpeel. The one good thing we got out of it was that the guy told us about a local BBQ restaurant that was the BEST BBQ beef I have ever had and some of the best BBQ sauce too. If you are ever in Gatlinburg and want good BBQ hit up the Flyin' Pig and you won't be disappointed. Just off the main drag, downtown Gatlinburg. Wish I would have thought to take a picture there...too bad, maybe next time.

The same afternoon, Baga took Noah down to the stream for a little dip. He had so much fun picking up rocks and throwing them into the stream. It was "hold wa-er" which translates to "Cold water" in Noahnese. And every rock he picked up, saw in the stream, or saw from the car while driving down the road were announced on volume 10- "Be wok" which once again translated is big rocks.

We also drove into the National Park and had a great time looking at the scenery, enjoyed a picnic lunch, and a few more beautiful mountain streams.

The last night we headed to a restaurant that had karoke and I got to sing three songs, I think. One of the songs didn't work so I cannot remember if I sang 2 or three. There were several VERY good singers there that night which always makes it harder to get up there, but it was a very friendly crowd to sing for so that was really fun.

Since I did not keep a journal, or do this close enought to the trip, I know there are good details I am leaving out, but with Matt gone for training and my mom in FL I don't have any way to retrieve those memories at this time.

For Katie

Well I know it has been a while since I have posted, but I am more in favor of real human interaction- ie: two way communication- as apposed to the one way communication that a blog provides. I had really been feeling isolated up here in corn country, but have had some great conversations with some friends this week which has been really nice! Katie wanted some new pics of Noah and I realized talking to her that we never posted Noah's 2 yr pics. So here they are...