What do you do when it's 71* in Texas in June and everything is wet from DAYS of rain and the mosquitoes are everywhere, and the sun isn't shining, and your mom won't take you to the library or clean out the pool?

Draw, color, and just look cute!

The Second-Annual Father's Day Water Fight

The kids had been looking forward to this day since last year's impromptu water fight, which the girls lost. They decided that it needed to be an annual tradition. The boys had a title to defend. The girls made their own water balloons (with mom's ziploc bags...) and even filled up some pots from mom's pantry... But alas, the girls came up empty-handed once again. How can we even begin to compete...when DAD has the HOSE!!!

Everson is the fastest double-water-gun shooter in the west...and he even has sound effects!

Can you tell that Emma is NOT pleased with the outcome of this event...

Rain rain go away.

In case you were wondering...
We only received about an inch of rain last night here at the edge of the desert. The extreme weather occurred to the east of us by a few hours. Tho we live at the edge of the desert, we are above our annual rainfall total of, I think 18", and my mom tells me that she hasn't seen things this green, lush and tropical here for 20 years...and THIS is the summer I pick to be pregnant in W.TX!!!

Not too much to report...

A lingering cold is making it's way through our house. Started w/Emma, moved to Everson, then I woke up this am feeling congested w/a sore throat...

Ran a race benefitting the local Children's Miracle Network yesterday am. Naturally, Doug, Emma and I wore our "Team Armstrong" shirts. People thought it was funny - our own racing team shirts...was quite a privilege to say WE were running for our nephew, Wonderwill. Uncle Doug ran his fastest race...6:44...for the MILE! I was quite proud of him. I think the Team Armstrong shirt made him run faster.

Been fighting with our pool all week. We got it last summer from our neighbor for $25...so we're trying to make it last as LONG as possible. Has a BIG hole in the blow-up-floating-ring-thing. Been trying to patch and patch and duct tape over the hole a-l-l w-e-e-k l-o-n-g, not wanting to get rid of the pool, and not really wanting to spend the $$ on a new one. TODAY, Doug bought some epoxy and worked his magic...seems to be holding up. Yippee!!!!

No major baby news to report. Only 16lbs gained to date...5 in the last 2 weeks...mostly h2o though. My ankles have completely disappeared, I can barely fit into my sneakers, and am stuck wearing flip flops most of the day. You can actually press your finger into the top of my foot...pick it up...and watch the indentation slowly fill back up with fluid. It's really really strange...5th pregnancy and the 1st for this experience!

Emma is off to see the Nancy Drew movie with a friend this afternoon, Ev and Doug just returned from an errand, and I need to get dinner going.

A RECORD-BREAKING DAY!
This is one of those days I wish I had my camera with me. We had a road race this morning. Everson and I sat this one out, so it was just Doug and the older 3 kids running. Doug ran with Emma and Erik. Erik has been trying so hard to break 7 minutes and this race was his fastest yet. In fact, all 4 runners on Team Armstrong had personal best times...

Drum roll.....

Doug 7:00 (he says he still wasn't working hard...)
Erik 7:13 (down from a 7:30)
Emma 7:43 (down from 8:12)
Ellie 11:31 (somewhere around 12:00)

I'm quite proud of my runners! On Tuesday night, Emma and Erik competed in the Hershey's Youth Track Meet. We took them, simply for the experience of racing on a track. They each ran a 400-meter race, one lap around the track. Erik came in at 1:33 and Emma ran a 1:25. I agree with our running coach...they get this from their FATHER ;-)

CAN I HAVE A RIDE?

On the weekends when Doug has errands to run, I often say, "Who are you taking with you?" Usually, I get to run errands a-l-o-n-e ;-) These opportunities even extend to our own yard with lawnmower rides... When Everson heard the mower start up and ramble around the yard, he ran to the driveway and in his little 3 year old voice said over and over and over again, "Daddy, can I have a ride with you?" I was busy cleaning the pool, and Doug was mowing. It might have taken 5 minutes for us to realize that he wanted a ride...then Ellie appeared at the edge of the yard with the same chant for her turn. I'm wondering if they'll be this enthusiastic about the lawnmower when they are 14 and it's their JOB to mow the lawn...of course, by then, little Elvis will want to ride along with THEM...

Garage Sale giddies!!!

This week we are working on cleaning out dresser drawers. Emma has taken it a step further by cleaning out her 'toy cubbies' in her closet...and filling a box with items she is planning on selling in our garage sale.

Garage sale? What garage sale? Who said we were having a garage sale? My last garage sale was just about 2 years ago...right before we moved from NY to TX. I'm NOT a fan of having garage sales - especially while pregnant.

HOWEVER, I'm NOT ABOUT to tell the kids that tidbit ;-) If they want to scale down...by all means scale down ;-)

Just this morning I received an email from our homeschool assoc about a fundraiser. There is a group of our h.s. teens raising money to attend Worldview Camp (www.worldview.org). It seems that the camp has a week in the fall, here in TX, for homeschool students. I've looked at it and would love to send my own kiddos there...when they're old enough.

Anyhow, the teens are asking for items to be donated to their garage sale to go towards their fees for camp. Guess what I told my kids....

I took their eagerness to get rid of STUFF and paired it with their eagerness to HELP OTHERS, and suggested that they DONATE their stuff to the teens...it also came with the news that I was NOT having a garage sale before next summer...well then, let's give it to the teens so they can go to camp! As I type, the girls are in the boys room...going through their toys and putting things they want to get rid of into a box.

Erik's only request..."Mom, as a reward for giving our stuff away, can we go to the sale with, like, $5 to spend? Maybe I'll find some legos..." Ahhh, let's get rid of stuff, so we can get more stuff...

On Saturday, our running group had the first race of the summer. Doug and all 4 kids competed. Here are Ev and Doug before the race began. Over Doug's shoulder is Anton...a high school runner who comes to our races and some practices. He's one of the fastest kids around and Everson talks about beating Anton all the time. He boasts at home about how he's faster than Anton. In this particular race, Everson did in fact beat Anton. Ev ran 1 mile, and Anton ran 3...
"Here I am turning it on and burning the last part of my race," says Erik. Far behind him is Anna, with whom Erik runs...until the last bit of the race, when he 'turns it on." Erik's time for this race was 7:45.
Here come Everson and his dad for their 12:39 mile! This time could have been faster if Ev hadn't fallen and walked for a minute or 2. He crossed the line with much cheering!
At the end of each race, medals are awarded. Our coach put Everson on the table and asked him to tell everyone how old he was...Everson replied, "Thirteen." Coach is trying to show Everson how many fingers he needs to hold up. We're quite proud of our little runner. The coach proclaimed to the crowd that the running genes definately came from his FATHER. ;-)

I've been told that I need to put more pictures of the boys on the blog...so here we are. We put up our pool last weekend, and here is the first swim. Everson is quite fearless...he has NO PROBLEM putting his ENTIRE HEAD under the water. NOTHING like his older siblings when they were 3 years old.
Erik is helping make a whirlpool. A fun activity that all 4 kids get into.
Everson is not too happy with me in this picture. I had just woken him up from his afternoon nap. I think he wanted to sleep longer.
I HAD to take a picture of this lego spaceship. Can you guess which of my 4 children made it? Everson made it. He even pointed out the "shooter things" and "de place where de fire comes out".