ketchup day!

Don't get me wrong.  I love trees.
But there is a large cottonwood tree near our home.  And that thing has been dumping cotton fluffies and all kinds of garbage on us lately.  Alli and Ruby loved watching the "snow" float down in big white tufts.  At times it seemed like a summer blizzard.  They loved running through the drifts on our sidewalk.
I tried to keep the screen door shut and keep shoes wiped off, but somehow we ended up with cottony piles tumbling through our kitchen.  I haven't looked under the couch yet, but I'm sure the dust bunnies are more like dust mammoths at this point.
The cottonwood snow was followed with a bit of rain, so all those tiny seeds are sprouting in the darndest places... in our garden shed, on a glove left outside, in the sill of the window, between the windshield and the wiper...


There was a sidewalk chalk festival at our park a week ago.  We met some friends there and had a picnic lunch.  We watched the artists and Alli took lots of pictures. 
Unfortunately, it rained shortly after the festival, so the art didn't last very long.


Alli is done with preschool!  We celebrated with her class at a picnic in the park.  Alli surprised her teachers on the last day by reading some pretty big words.  She is getting to be a great reader.  She amazes us everyday!


The water playground opened up for the summer!  Alli jumped right in and got totally wet.  Ruby stayed dry and played in the warmer puddles near the fence.  It took her a long time to get into the spraying water.


June liked watching all the water action.  She rolled over all the way yesterday!  She is very chatty and loves to "talk" to whoever will listen.


The bead has been removed from Ruby's ear!  She had an appointment last Wednesday afternoon.  The tricky thing was that she couldn't eat for six hours before her appointment... and her appointment was at 1:45 pm!  So we kept her up late the night before and fed her lots of snacks... five chicken nuggets at 11:30pm.  She slept in until 10:40am, and then we played and kept busy until her appointment.  The doctor strapped her into a papoose board (as is standard for this sort of thing).  Ruby instantly got totally relaxed and closed her eyes and held perfectly still.  The doctor used a teeny tiny vacuum to get the bead out.  She didn't even flinch.  Afterwards I told her I would get her anything to eat: tacos, pizza, sandwich, hotdog... and she said, "I want to eat them all!"  So we stopped at the first place and she ravenously devoured her entire meal!

Grandma Utah is in town!  We are getting our house ready to sell... more on that later.

And now, you are caught up... but I hear the girls waking up, so stay tuned for more action!