Chillin' at Home with Friends

I told friends today that I was too tired to go anywhere or do anything tonight but laze in the pool and relax on the deck and told them all they were more than welcome to come join us in being lazy for the evening. I guess that must have sounded appealing because they all came over. Even dinner was easy...Marty built a fire and we roasted hot dogs (we seem to do that a lot in the summer don't we??) It is so nice to have friends who don't care if the house isn't perfect or if the dinner is just hot dogs, who just enjoy relaxing and chatting the evening away! The kids had a blast playing in the pool! And kids always like roasting hot dogs. It's probably one of the few times it's ok for them to "play in the fire!" Or maybe, like me, they just know that marshmallows usually follow hot dogs!

As soon as the kids all got in the pool they noticed the 3 baby deer that are always nearby were watching them from the edge of the woods. I love this photo of Riley as she watches the deer, captivated.

Lana and her girls usually bring their bright yellow beach balls with them and all the kids (adults too) love playing with them!

Riley:

Erica and Lana

It is so neat to watch the budding friendship between Riley and Holly.

Holly and Riley

You think Ashley is just a little excited to be here to play in the pool?

Cameron and Heather playing volleyball:

Holly, Ashley and Riley

Time to dry off! We all gathered around the fire Marty was building.

We all enjoyed sitting around the fire and swapping stories.

From the left:

Bill, Denise, Dave, Ashley, Lana, Holly, Erica and Heather

Typical Erica and Heather behavior! Ashley looks like she doesn't know what to think of it but she'll get used to them soon enough! :0)

I know I sure enjoyed my relaxing evening with friends!!!

Why I Love Him So

I was trying to figure out what I'd post about tonight, or whether I even had anything new to post. We've been home from church barely an hour and I already have new pictures to post, thanks to my wonderful, sweet husband!!! Our plan for the rest of this week was that we'd relax last night, attend church tonight, and continue yard work tomorrow night. We'd been discussing the wheres, hows, and ins and outs of having a fire pit for a while now, especially since our trip browsing through the camping section of Cabela's. After enjoying Erica's fire pit, we've been discussing our own fire pit even more. I really like her use of logs as seats around the fire and had expressed interest in doing the same thing here. Marty told me last night he already had an idea for our seating and for the pit itself and how he'd like to build it. As soon as we arrived home from church he changed his clothes and went outside to cut down one more tree (that we'd planned to take care of tomorrow). He had it down and piled up so fast! The next time I looked out to see what he was up to, I grabbed the camera and headed outside for a closer look.

We've started a pile of logs, ready for the fire pit, when it gets built:

Marty, hard at work stacking more logs on the pile:

I'm soooo excited!!! Here is one of the benches Marty engineered for seating around our fire pit. I love it! He had the tree cut, the logs stacked, and 2 benches built in less than an hour! (I (who never likes him to cut down trees!) then asked him if he could cut down one more for 2 more benches)

Relaxing with Missy:

My hero!

Pyromaniacs?

Last night we took a break from the yard work and just relaxed with friends, watched tv, and roasted marshmallows on a new fire ring Erica and the kids built yesterday. Now I want one!

Cameron enjoying the efforts of his labor:

This was so cute. Riley had no idea I was snapping her picture when she was trying to take a self portrait:

Everyone just hanging out around the fire...before the mosquitos carried us away!

I think this is my favorite picture I took last night: