Father's Day weekend at the lake

One of my great girlfriends from college, Sara, invited us to her family's lakehouse.  They have been asking us for years, but we haven't planned early enough to make our schedules work out.  

Well, 2017 was the year!

We went to Lake of the Ozarks on Friday afternoon of Father's day weekend and stayed thru Sunday.

The kids immediately starting having so much fun.  Sara and John have 2 kids, Mackenzie (9) and Chase (7).  Mackenzie is a fantastic swimmer and athlete, and Chase has a love for fishing.

Everybody was getting fitted with their lifejackets

Colin immediately took to fishing.  He has gone a couple times at our neighborhood lake since we've been back.  He loves it!

Getting everything just right...

He caught one!

They had almost every toy imaginable down there.

We went out on their boat the first night and got some drinks at a nearby bar.

The kids had so much fun together!

The pool at the bar was pretty neat!

One of the only pics I got with Sara.

Such a great friend!

Mac really helped Maggie

Oh those boys!

John let everyone 'drive' the boat for a bit, even Eli

We had so much fun together!

Maggie's turn to drive

Such good drivers!  :)

Eli had a blast out on the water

He even went paddle boating with Sara

Another one of Colin's many catches!

They had this really awesome lily pad float that the kids played on for hours!

We rode the wave runners too!

Maggie smiled the entire weekend, she was worn out!

Kids everywhere...

Cheese!

The kids even got to go tubing

We stuck Eli in a bucket with some plastic cups.  He sat in there for hours.

The boys fishin'

The kids loved the wave runners (Brian went much faster than I did on there, I think my max speed was 20 mph) :)

John's sister's family came on Saturday afternoon, so we had lots of kids running around

The girls tubing!

Love this pic of Eli and Brian.

Eli carried around that water gun almost the entire weekend.

The boys turn tubing

Brian took the littles out there on the tube

Everyone loved watching them on the tube

The lily pad was a hit all weekend

We left on Sunday morning and headed off to a water park called 'big surf'.
Sara's family has season passes and it just so happened that Sunday was one free admission for every season pass holder.  We played around at the water park until about 1 pm and made our way back to KC.  

We stopped by on our way home to see Granddad and wish him a Happy Father's Day.

Then let Brian open his presents when we got home.

He got a KC Royals grill cover, a KC royals garden flag, and a Mizzou T-shirt.

We are so blessed to have such a wonderful Father in our lives.

Brian takes good care of us all and sets a great example for the kids.

It was a fantastic Father's Day weekend!

Fun with friends

We've had a lot of fun things planned the past few weeks.

Olivia had her birthday party at a great gymnastics place.  

One of my best friends growing up stopped through on their way to Branson.  Erin and her husband Matt live in Minnesota now, so we don't get to see each other near enough.

Erin and I

The kids - they had so much fun playing together (Eli was napping)

Maggie saved up her coins on her Vivofit watch to get a mani/pedi.

She is definitely my girly-girl.  She loves it!

She thought the sugar scrub on her legs tickled!

We use our neighbors trampoline pretty much every night.

The kids have a blast just running and jumping around.

Selfies with Mom!

Maggie thought she was hilarious putting on her 'lipstick' while she was eating her frozen yogurt.

The kids are LOVING swim team.

Maggie is continuing to improve each week and Colin has qualified for Conference in almost every event!

Swimming is such a great activity for the kids this summer!

Dance recitals, conferences, and random summer happenings

Maggie had her dance recital the first weekend in June.

She LOVES doing dance and I can see her sticking with it for some time.

We were at her dance rehearsal  - she's in the middle of the 2nd row

During the last week of May, I snuck away to Denver for our annual ACSM conference.

So much fun.

Learned a lot, had fun with my friends from undergrad and graduate school.

I got to see Michael Phelps speak at the conference.  

He's a great role model for kids!

Sent this picture to the kids back home - they thought he looked like "an old dad".  

HA!

I presented some research at the conference. 

Had quite a few people stop and ask questions, that was nice!

There was a 5k Fun Run at the conference, it was a beautiful morning in Denver!

I got this cute collage of pictures from our daycare provider.

Eli always has so much fun at daycare!

I made it back from Denver in time for Maggie's dance recital.

She did fantastic and loved it!

Maggie and her dance buddies from school

They came back out and danced to "hard knock life" from Annie at the end.

Maggie is in the 2nd row up there - middle of the bunch

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Tiff and Chad came up to watch Maggie dance

Arleigh enjoyed some time with Colin

We hit the pool up for a bit 

I think Arleigh is adorable with her thumb in her mouth

We made it out for some ice cream at a local yogurt shop

The kids chose not to sit with us - probably won't be the last time for that :)

Eli found a frog to sit on!

Eli is loving life with all the swimming pool time

Colin and cousin Olivia had ball games at the same fields the other week.

I thought this was a pretty cute picture of the 2 of them!

Maggie is teaching Eli the art of 'selfies'

Love those two!

Eli wants to do EVERYTHING Colin and Maggie do.

This includes wearing goggles and playing with light sabers!

He is such a ham!

Summer is off to a great start!