Sherry-Ann has an amazing camera that she uses to take pictures of her life so she can scrapbook. I am amazed at the brilliant colors and how wonderful everything looks. I’ve also been feeling bad for not posting for a long time so I’m going to make up for that absence by posting pictures that Sherry-Ann took of my kids at her house. Prepare to be amazed!

We had a great time in Sherry-Ann and Kurt’s backyard pool. Some of the kids felt more comfortable in the little pool until they realized that life jackets actually work!

These next couple of pictures are from our trip to the Ellis Bird Farm. We did a scavenger hunt to find items related to birds and their habitat and then bought some birdhouses that we assembled, painted and then put up around the property.

This statue shows the kids how their arm span compares with a birds wing span. It was really cool!

There weren’t just birds at the bird farm. There was also these sheep and a couple goats. They were very friendly and the kids loved being so close to them!

The kids used nets to fish in the water, pull out the nets and dump them into a clear tub so they could see closer all the insects and living things that call the pond home. There was a giant board with pictures and names for all the creatures. The kids loved finding all the creatures that they could.

Everyone made friends while on the farm!

There has been a lot of rain on the farms near Sherry-Ann so we went on a wet walk. Loaded into rain gear we went running through giant puddles and hunted for worms to feed to the chickens.

This cowboy hat was a little small for David but he was thrilled to look like a real cowboy. We made a fire to roast hot dogs and marshmallows one night.

This is a picture of how Laurelyn loved on her big cousin Isabelle. It was so cute we had to get a picture!

Jason was wanting to learn how to use stick matches.

Colton and Jocelyn found a ton of green caterpillars in one of the trees.

I planted a couple of different seeds into my garden and in my humble opinion my garden is anything but an eye sore!

My beets are getting taller!

Jason is cutting lettuce for a lunchtime salad.

Sugar snap peas have finally flowered!

I had planted different herbs in this area but they didn’t come up so my friend gave me some onion bulbs that I planted two weeks ago.

I love these flowers under my basement window. I want to add more flowering plants to my backyard but it will have to wait for next year.

Carrot tops are just starting to get us excited about fresh garden carrots.

It was a holiday Monday so we invited the missionaries to come on a hike with us. We took them out to breakfast and then hiked one of our favorite trails, Grassi Lakes.

This is the way we traveled while we were there. Nothing cooler than driving around in a 15 passenger van full of small children!

Men building bird houses. What better way to flex the muscles!

Each of the kids got to paint their bird houses. We mounted them at the farm and Sherry-Ann will be taking pictures of the birds that make their homes in them.

Jocelyn painting her birdhouse.

Sherry-Ann’s daughter Belle brought home a baby kitten. I think this little baby will be a great addition to the dog, 4 cats and 6 chickens.

We explored the hotel, went on a boat tour of Lake Minnewanka, went shopping and ate ourselves into larger pants. Lucky for you we took pictures of almost the entire weekend!

I wish this was the car we drove in but it was the car parked next to our dirty old van.

We went on a boat tour of Lake Minnewanka with the kids. It was a lot of fun to be on a super fast boat barreling through the water while gorgeous views whiz past.

A bald eagle in one of the trees near the shore.

Jocey fell asleep while the boat rocked and slept through the entire boat tour!

After being on the water we played in the hills near the water. The kids love hiking as deep as they can into the trees.

After playing on the water and then running through the mountains we needed to relax in the hotel pool. There’s an indoor pool and an outdoor pool so we took turns between both of them.

My beautiful kids in the elevator to the pool.

The girls and I are in our white fluffy robes ready to hit the spa for pedicures. It didn’t turn out the way we thought though.

Laurelyn crawled into Daddy’s arms and promptly fell asleep so deeply that I couldn’t wake her so Jocelyn and I had our pedicures without her.

On our last day we played a bunch of lawn games and had a good time with badminton, ladder ball, crochet and bocce ball.

We ended our weekend with dinner at Nourish, a vegetarian place that Chuck and I love. The kids scarfed down some vegetarian nachos, king kong noodles, a burrito and some delicious mushroom raviolis. YUM!

It was one of our best vacations ever and now I’m home and exhausted. I’m going to bed!