Cheap labor

FRESH fruit

Wes has always had a garden that produced some pretty impressive vegetables. Well this year seems to be the year for fruit. Our peach trees that we usually get nothing from produced a massive amount of peaches and Wes's first attempt at watermelons has produced more than our watermelon loving kids can handle. We even got a few cantelope, too bad nobody in this household likes those.

Rollin' on the River

So I said I'd give a report about our trip down the river with the kids.... here goes. From the beginning of the trip, it wasn't a matter of "if" the kids would go float down the river with us, it was a matter of "how". There are many parents out there who would not even consider putting their kids in the flowing and sometimes deep water, but we knew we could handle it. Wes bought a raft a few weeks before our trip thinking that would be their means of transportation down the river. It was a good thought, but truth is it served better as a storage vessel for empty cans and other "stuff."

As we put in our tubes at the beginning of the route, Caleb decided he did not want to wear his life jacket. Can't say I blamed him since it shoved up into his neck a bit when he sat down. This meant he was in the tube with Wes from the very start. About 20 minutes into the float, Austin and Avery decided they shouldn't have to wear lifejackets either. I know, I know, you cautious parents out there are saying "make them wear the jackets." Well, that was our feelings but we preferred not to hear constant whining and protesting for the next 2 hours. We were with a big group and needed to make it as enjoyable as possible. They also thought it would be better to ride with someone in a tube. Having them in a tube wasn't so bad except that they had no desire to sit still. As we let the water take us down the river, Avery enjoyed herself less and less. In fact on the 3 1/2 hour float, which was an hour longer than we intially thought, she cried at least 2 of the hours. At first I thought she was tired, but unlike Caleb, even the endless tears wouldn't put her to sleep. The last hour I had both her and Austin on my lap. I tried telling stories and singing songs and at times the sobbing would stop but only for a few short minutes. Wes had Caleb on his lap over half the float and at the end Caleb was able to take a little snooze, but this meant that whenever we came to a shallower part, we had to remain in our tubes and rely on others to pull us along. As we came to our final desitnation, there was a sense of relief.... from both the kids and the parents. Avery's attiditude totally changed as we headed home for the house and she was the first one in the pool.
Needless to say, the next day was a kidless float. A HUGE Thank You to Aunt Dorothy for staying back with 5 kids.

The Maurers on va-ca

Here are a few more pics from our Maurer trip to the Frio. Our group shot was right before we left for our first float so we are all looking like river rats.

Game On!

We shared lots of good times on the volleyball court. We played until the sun went down.... literally. We were reminded that we aren't quite as agile as we once were.

Copper Cantina

Maurer's in Concan

We just returned from 4 days at the Frio River with the entire Maurer clan - that's right there were 22 of us under one roof and we all survived. For years we've talked about doing a big family trip but it's just never panned out. This year Aunt Dorothy did some looking around and found a great house for us all in Concan by the Frio River at the Frio Country Resort and sent us the "save the date." The house set up was great - 5 bedrooms, game room, our own swimming pool, and volleyball court. We were a quick drive to where we put in our tubes and an even quicker drive from where we had to get out. We ate and drank all day, laughed until our sides hurt, and most important, made many special memories.
It was interesting to see how A, A, & C interacted with everyone. Avery was attached to Cousin Jamie who came in from Ohio, Caleb preferred to hang out with Aunt Dorothy, and Austin played so well with Kennedy. Then there was the attempt to take 4 toddlers under the age of 4 tubing down the river. I will save that story for my next post, but lets just say it wound up being about as fun as taking all 3 kids to the skating rink solo.... (pics to come as well)

Last minute change of venue

If you are looking to read something funny or news worthy in this post, sorry... maybe next time. In fact this post is going to discuss the always exciting -pretend you are having fun -family reunion... in this case, the Naumann family reunion. My dad's mom, Elcie, was a Naumann "from home" and she was one of 7 - 5 girls and 2 boys. I have childhood memories of getting together with this side of the family around Christmas time and the thing that sticks out in my head the most is all the sisters in the kitchen laughing, ok not laughing - cackling (sp?). It went on for hours... and you could hear it throughout the entire house. Good times.

Let me get back to why this reunion is blog worthy.... the Naumann side of the family has not gotten together in over 10 years. Sure there have been weddings and funerals, but nothing laid back for the family to sit and enjoy visiting with each other. A few months ago, my dad and a few cousins set up a reunion for Sunday, July 10th at Gun & Rod - club house with bbq lunch, swimming and fishing for the kids. Well Friday night - 2 days before the reunion - we were all at Gun & Rod swimming and realized that the wrong date had been booked for the reunion. They had it on the books for Saturday, not Sunday and it was booked for someone else that Sunday. Panic!!! It was too hot to ask everyone to stay outside and the date couldn't be changed. What to do?!? Pretty sure someone/thing overtook my body when I blurted out "we can have it at our house."

It took a few last minute phones calls, and that is just what we did and man what a great day we all had - seriously. The adults all congregated in different areas in the house and in the back yard. The kids had plenty of play options and our family from Houston and their 7 kids loved the country outdoors. We had a huge lunch and since we provided our house... I didn't have to cook! That's worth it right there to me. Everyone had such a good time, we didn't see our last guests leave until 6:00pm. Seriously, it was a fun and rewarding day for us all and I am thankful that our home is inviting for get togethers like this. We must pace ourselves though... only so much family at one time :-)

8 of the 9 Naumann cousins.

Letters

Avery has a new favorite past time, writing letters/names. She has learned to spell most of our names including - Toppe, Grandpa, Mimi & Popo. She does pretty good on all the letters, just needs a little help with the letter "s". Give her a pen and paper and she's happy. Austin on the other hand has no interest in sitting and writing letters or his name. He'd rather be catching bugs!

Too many monkeys sleeping in our bed!

This picture was taken at 5:45am one morning this week before Wes left for work. Overnight we magically wound up with 3 "monkeys" in our bed. We sat down for the heart to heart talk of staying in our own beds the next night. That talk usually works for about month....

Kitchen helpers

All three kids have become very interested in helping out in the kitchen. I will be in the middle of getting supper ready and I hear someone chime "mama, can I help?" I can't say "no", but sometimes that would save a lot less clean up! They also love setting the table, but aren't so crazy about clean up.













Baking a few fries.

Burger night! Burgers are one thing that we can pretty much guarantee will be eaten by eveyone. The boys like helping daddy smash the patties.

Dropping in blackberries for a cobbler.

Baby Quail

These are a couple of the new baby quail Wes just hatched out. No he hasn't been sitting on a nest... though the thought makes me laugh! When we first moved out to our property, Wes had the idea of raising quail... not for food or even to sell. His intentions have been to raise quail to a certain age and then let them go to see if they will raise wild around here. They use to be very common in this area, but thanks to fire ants and other wild things, they are a rare find. Wes built a pen for them and there are a few that we keep in there to lay eggs. The eggs go in an incubator and then wa-la... baby quail.

the 4th of July.... show me some love!

Thought these were worth sharing.