The First Annual Cardboard Boat Fishing Contest

Our family has been anticipating this day for almost two months! My brother-in-law, Scott came up with the fantastic idea for a family cardboard boat and fishing contest. He provided all of the cardboard, plastic and duct tape, and it was up to us to do the rest. The goal was to stay afloat for 20 minutes and catch the biggest fish from our homemade craft. Following are tons of pictures from our crazy day! I only hope this becomes an annual contest . . . this was too much fun!

Danny and Michael planning out their craft

Lookin good Danny!

Tom and Sara crafting the S.S. Sassy

Joy, Maddie and Faith trying out the bench seat in the Leenstra craft

This group was not beyond using power tools to get the job done!



How many kids can you fit in a cardboard boat?

Time for launch!

The S.S. Poopdeck - a seaworthy craft? We shall soon find out!

Tom and Sara's Sassy - can it match up to the Poopdeck?

Loading up

The swarthy Poopdeck crew

Michael, looking a little unsure about the Pirates of the Pond craft

Danny looking equally unsure

The official launch of the S.S. Poopdeck - the beginning of the end!

The official launch of the Pirates of the Pond

The mighty fleet!

We're still floating!

Our hosts on their seaworthy craft

Bunsers in the boat Faith built

Bunsers and Sylvia joining in the fun!

Faith and Bella

Max and Faith

Can you guess what word I'm saying in this picture? I was just about to fall while exiting our not-so-sea-worthy-craft

Nice paddle!

Ah Ha! Here's our problem . . . we tore a hole in our boat upon launch! No wonder we were taking on water!

Tom - the winner of the best boat and the biggest fish!

Swimming in May . . . in Michigan!

This weekend we went up to the cottage to get things cleaned up and prepped for the Memorial Day weekend festivities. As soon as we got there, the girls put on their life-jackets, grabbed their fishing poles and a piece of cheese (in lieu of worms for bait), and went on the dock to fish.



After we ate dinner, Bella snuck upstairs and put her bathing suit on!


Before I knew it, she was jumping off the dock into the water! Mind you, this was at 7:00 at night and it was about 55 degrees outside . . . who knows how cold the water was . . . crazy girl!


It was cold, but she didn't seem to mind!


Hopefully next time we go up north it'll be a little bit warmer . . . both the air and the water!

Pioneer Girl - Part 2

Our Newest Additions . . .

Lucy meets her new friends . . . and is not so sure about it.

Welcome to your new home, pigs! We hope you get big and fat here!

Faith and Hammy

Two girls and their pigs.

Bella trying to feed the pigs straw.

Faith and Bacon

Those snouts can really move some earth!

Tail ends.

Ohhhhh! Ahhhh! It feels so good to scratch the buns on this tree!

Faith is loving her new pigs!

Pioneer Girl - Part 1

Faith has been studying the Pioneers in school over the last few weeks. She has learned about how they lived, how they worked, how they raised their own food, how they ate, and how they did school. She's made her own tin-pail lunch box, crushed walnuts to make ink, and even plucked a turkey to and make a quill from the feathers!

Today she and her classmates are headed to a one-room school house to experience what it was like to go to school during the Pioneer Days. As part of the fun, she was encouraged to dress up like a little Pioneer girl, and pack a little Pioneer lunch in her little Pioneer tin-pail lunch box.

I get to head to the one-room school house this afternoon to check it out and take more pictures! I'll post more then, but for now, here's my little Pioneer girl!

Is it Laura Ingalls? No! It's Faith!

Doesn't she look cute?

Here's a picture of the lunch I packed for her. I baked a little loaf of brown whole-wheat bread and wrapped it in parchment paper and twine. She also had some "real" carrots packed in there with a hard-boiled egg. She also had raspberries and tomatoes wrapped in cloth and twine. There were no Twinkies, or Gladwear containers back then . . .

Cinderella Lucy

Wow-wee-dow! It has been a very long time since I've blogged! Life has been so full of important things, that stuff like blogging . . . and laundry . . . have taken a back seat! I've been busy taking two graduate courses this spring, which has left me little time for anything but reading lots of "heady" stuff and writing lots of "heady" papers. But, that's done now! Yeah!

Anyway, I felt it was high time to get back into it for the sake of my mom and sister especially!

The fun part about blogging is keeping track of the day to day things that we usually pass by and forget later. Cinderella Lucy was just such an occasion.



Bella has Lucy dressed up in a baby jumper. Here she's tying the last of three booties on her feet (because Cinderella loses one of her slippers . . . duh!)


Lucy made her feelings about this very clear!


So did Bella . . .

Turkey Day!

If anyone knows my daughter, Faith, at all! You will know that she is amazingly creative! She gets an idea, and will spend hours perfecting it!

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Faith was home from school with the stomach flu. She was bored and needed a project, so I suggested she make name cards for everyone that was coming to our house for Thanksgiving. We had 22 people coming the next day. I wrote down all of their names, and then Faith was off to the basement to work on her creations!

Here's my creative girl! Notice how she has everything laid out and organized! Tracings of her hand, toilet paper rolls cut in thirds and pinecones! She came up with this all on her own!

A bunch of turkeys! Very representative of the Mike's family . . . ha ha ha! (Just kidding, guys! You know I love you!)

A close up of her amazing work! She added name labels to the cardboard base after this picture was taken. Complete with polka-dot letters!

Mike's wonderful family! (and mine too). Back row: Matt, Levi, me, Mike, Mom and Dad, Marc. Front row: Reuben, Olivia, Bella, Faith, Lori and Lydia.