Friday, August 26, 2011

2011 Iowa State Fair!

No summer is complete without a trip to the Iowa State Fair and last week we did just that! The past couple of years we have parked at the capitol and taken the bus to the fairgrounds, I would highly recommend this mode of transportation, it works out really nicely! Anyway, our first stop was at the Family Center to check out the cakes...and look at this one, this cake basically is the fair! It has the sky glide, the butter cow, a pig, a cow...everything one would want to see! Heather was amazed!
Outside the building, I was amazed by the hydrangeas, we just planted two of these bushes in our front yard, but they are no where near the size of ones at the fair...again I was amazed! Inside the 4-H building we found a soda cow, not exactly the butter cow, but I am sure it took some work putting this one together.


Of course, we made a stop in the horse barn, one of our favorite stops, to see the Percheron horses.

We went from big horses to the big bull!

...and then the big boar, Tiny weighing in at 1,196lbs, he is a purebred hampshire from Postville, IA!

...and then we walked through the cattle barn...watch wear you step!

We swung through the Agriculture Center to see the famous butter cow!

...and out to the Grand Concourse for a little people watching.

This year, with baby on board, we jumped on the sky glide and took it to the top of the hill!

At Pioneer Hall, this quartet was playing...on the left, the banjo, then the fiddle, the washtub bass and the guitar, yes that is a washtub bass, awesome!

This years sand sculpture was a tribute to the butter cow!

As the day was winding down for us, we stopped in the Pavilion to watch the dog show...it was awesome!

We, of course, loved the beagle!

As we were getting ready to leave, we made a stop at the giant slide!

Who doesn't love the giant slide!

We had a great time at this years Iowa State Fair, we saw a ton and we left with soar feet, so I take that as a successful year!

Thursday, August 25, 2011

BBQ Fest

A few weekends ago, Heather and I hosted our annual BBQ fest. I woke up about 6:00am Sunday morning and got the smoker started. We smoked brisket, grilled ribs and chicken legs. For some added fun, I cut out some vinyl moustaches to put on all our glasses!
In both black and brown...and in four different styles!

Like I said, I started the smoker nice and early and got the red needle to "ideal"! The brisket was on there for 12 hours and it turned out wonderfully!

Our friends came over around 6:30 that evening and we enjoyed the spread!

Showing off the moustaches!

The gals liked the moustache glasses...

...and they were a big hit for the guys too!

We had a great evening, good company, plenty of good food and moustaches for everyone!


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Curb Appeal

This past weekend we did a little landscaping to the front of our house. We have a ton of hostas. I love hostas, don't get me wrong, they are hearty and good ground cover, but we have way too many in the front of our house...too much of the same green color. Here is the "before" picture.
So we pulled out this bed of hostas...

...and planted two Limelight Hydrandea bushes. We also planted some flame grass that is supposed to turn red/purple in the fall! We did add a few of the hostas back in the front of the bed to fill it out. The rest of the hostas we moved to the side of the house to help hid some down spouts.

We have been reading up on hydrangeas, but are definitely new to the hydrangea world, so hopefully these guys last a long time! I really like the way this project turned out!


Any suggestions on how to care for our hydrangeas?

Balloons 2011

No summer would be complete, for me, without a trip down to Indianola for the National Balloon Classic. This year, we didn't make it down till the very last night, but it was worth it.
Not too much wind and depending on how high the balloons were, the wind was changing direction, so balloons were taking off from all sides of the field and flying in, it was a lot of fun to watch!



Lots of balloons dotting the skyline!

New this year was the Panda Shaped balloon

...and there was a bald eagle shaped balloon too!


It kind of feels like a family reunion going out to the balloon field, most of my actual family is there and then lots of people (who feel like family) that I have gotten to know throughout the years are there too, so it is always fun to catch up on how everyone is doing. We had a great time watching the balloons fly, as always.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Big 5 for Nathan

Last week our nephew Nathan turned 5 years old! Heather and I were at her Grandma's in Monroe, I was mowing the yard and Heather and Grandma were making corn to freeze. We met the Pella VL's at Jersey Freeze for some ice cream cones!
The ice cream was melting fast on a hot day but it sure was good!

All smiles for Nate-dog turning 5 years old!

Happy Birthday Nathan!

Monday, August 1, 2011

Pool Party!

The past two years, we have rented a pontoon boat at the end of the summer to spend a day out a Big Creek Lake, but this year 2 of the 4 girls are pregnant and wouldn't be able to get in the water at a lake, so instead we headed to a pool for an afternoon of fun!
The girls really enjoyed the rafts and relaxing in the water...

...and the boys enjoyed plenty of shenanigans!
Aaron with the flying suplex/belly flop onto the floating blue mat
Derek pulls the six-gun shooter salute!



...flying smile, over Derek and the fountain!

Heather and Dawn enjoying the water!

Then the guys started to get creative. In this photo, Aaron is catching the football in mid-air and then flipping it to Derek as he is also jumping into the pool!

Heather and I are all smiles on a beautiful day!

This one is more complicated...Derek started with the football in corner, threw it to me as I jumped in the water, I tossed it to Aaron, Aaron to John and John back to Derek...the 4 pass hand off without the football hitting the water...simply amazing!

...another one of my favorite pictures or Derek jumping in the water!

After the pool we had some pizza and celebrated the two birthday girls, Heather and Kim!

...and the whole crew!


A day well spent at the pool!

Weekend with Girls from the OC

Last weekend, Heather and I got to spend the weekend with our nieces and had a blast. We picked them up Friday evening and hung out with them till Sunday. Saturday evening, after a fun filled day, we headed to the park up the street to check out the playground equipment. Addy loved the twirly slide!
...Gracie did too!

The girls even got Auntie Heather to climb up!

Karys and Gracie made it across the monkey bars!

Sunday rolled around and so did the clouds, we were hoping to go to the pool but with the cloudy conditions, we decided to set up the sprinkler in the front yard...that was a big hit!

Addy loved it, she kept coming over to us to tell us how wet she was getting!

...this is one of my favorite pictures...summer fun!

No better way to end a summer day than with popsicles!

We had a lot of fun hanging out with the girls for the weekend! They did awesome and I am pretty sure they had fun too!