Saturday Snapshots 8/2/14

Well, my summer break has been over since Tuesday. Yes, sad, but it was nice to be back with my friends, I miss them during the summer!
Being back to school meant this was a very long week. Really long because I was at school before the sun rose and on a few days left as the sun was setting. 
Since I spent my summer days with my boys, I had to work hard to get my room ready in only 2 days. Open house (meet the teacher) was on the 3rd day of our pre-planning week. Yes, that was stressful! 
I managed to be ready, and it was a great open house day, one of the best ever, especially since I have a few siblings of former students and I heard a lot of, "I am so glad you will be his/her/my teacher this year." 
Because I was so busy that I did not snap any pictures of my classroom except for these three...

Yes, my shoes and feet were aqua blue!

Tuesday morning, during my 5:30 am Wal-Mart run, on the way to school, I decided I was going to paint my corkboard. Wow, I learned a lot about spray painting inside of my classroom. I will save that post for another day, but I was seriously concerned that I made a big mistake when I saw my feet and the hint of blue on my recently cleaned carpets! I promise everything turned out great, and it looks fabulous! I have received a lot of compliments and the color is so relaxing. Stressful, but worth it! 
Next week, I plan to snap some pictures in my room, and I will share them. 
Tonight, I helped my husband with some photos for his Dad's 70th birthday. It was fun flipping through the pictures from our summer, it helped me remember the great times I had with the boys. Photos really are a great way to reminisce, relax, and spark memories.
Here are some of the pictures from the end of our summer break together.

Thank you to the wonderful Run! Miss Nelson's Got the Camera for the opportunity to share some snapshots and always hosting this fun, motivational, and inspirational party! 
Disc Golf

Playing at the Park

Chalk Drawings
I have a friend, an art teacher, who did some amazing chalk drawings this summer. You have probably seen some floating around on Facebook and/or Pinterest. Well, I attempted it, and it did not go well! 
My boys were not too keen on laying on the hot driveway to snap the pictures. Here is my feeble attempt.

They did enjoy drawing on the driveway to welcome my sister, niece, and niece's boyfriend when they visited us. Since my niece and her boyfriend are in the Army, they both attend West Point, the boys drew guns, swords, and grenades, so yes, those are guns in the bottom right picture. 

The Perfect Family
There is one thing I know I am not, and that is perfect. I also do not have perfect children nor am I a perfect mother nor a perfect teacher. I try my best and love my wonderful children with all of my heart. What we are is perfectly normal!
Hence you can imagine, we probably do not have all perfect family photos. 
It is actually difficult to get all 3 boys to smile at one time, and to get all 5 of us in a picture. 
Well, I could pretend that everything is perfect, but I think you have learned, I don't hide the truth. I could only share perfect snapshots, but instead, I am going to share some snapshots that are full of life, therefore are perfect shots! 

My PERFECT Family

That is my awesome sister - I love how much we look alike, aside from our hair color!

Our sweet Bandit - the rescued lab

Isn't that tongue surreal?

I think he might be part giraffe and he is a happy licker! 

Why does he have a tie on? Well the boys thought it would be fun to dress him up for a pcture for their Papa, who we are celebrating 70 years of life with tomorrow. I guess they felt Bandit needed to be a little more formal for such a wonderful occasion! Too bad he thought the tie was for chewing!
Thanks for taking the stroll through my memories with me. We had a great summer playing, spending tie with family, and growing closer - it probably was close to perfect!

Hope you have been creating perfect memories and snapshots yourself!

Cheers to all of my friends-

Saturday Snapshots, Splish-Splashing and Smiling #Saturdaysnapshots #Saturdaysnapshotswithmissnelson

I am having a blast snapping photos of my boys!
If they ever complain that they had a boring summer, I have pictures to prove them wrong! Ha!

Hopefully you are not getting bored with my snapshots of my boys, but if you are, have  no fear. There are other great snapshots to adore at Run! Miss Nelson Got the Camera.

Ok, so to start this week's roundup of snapshots I have a picture of our sweet rescue dog, Bandit. He is kind and patient with the boys, but barks like crazy at strangers and neighbors. He is trying to protect us and is still skid-dish of people not living in our home.

It is tough to get great photos of Bandit since he is a little scared of the camera. Guess he was never photographed by the previous (neglectful) owner. 
While we were swimming, the boys paused to admire the airplane in the sky. In a "Treasure Island" manner they were pointing and telling me, "The plane, the plane!" That included the big kid in the crew! See if you can find the airplane in this photo. 

Shortly after snapping this photo the sky turned totally black, I wish I would have captured a picture to show you a before and after. We had intense lightning, thunder, and rain about 40 minutes after this moment was captured. 
Alright, on to my favorite models, my boys. 
I was really excited that all 3 were happy and allowed me to capture them in their play. 

Can't you hear him saying, "Hi, Mom!"?

Of course, there was lots of jumping and cannonballs. 

Sean had a little wreck on his scooter this week, I hate the scrapes, but I love how this photo will remind of us his tough days when he forgot to apply the brake! Boy scars!

Notice, how eloquently he is spitting out the water? 

We were alone at the pool this afternoon, so the boys dominated the slide and worked on flips, tricks, and trains! 

Love the emotions I captured in that picture. They are definitely related! 

A great time was had by all! I really wish I had my timer with me, it would have been fun to be a part of the slide action! 

It was fun to splash, snap, and smile! I am thankful to have these snapshots as reminders to the fun we are having, since time flies so fast! 

Smile-

Saturday Snapshots 7/5 & Summer Stock Up Sale

Happy Saturday to all of my friends! 
I am excited about linking up again with Run! Miss Nelson's Got the Camera! for Saturday Snapshots. The time off and this linky party has really helped me stop, look, and click to collect some great images of my summer. 
Each week, I captured an image that I fell in love with and see a little bit more of the love I am surrounded by. 
As always, I am going to feature some shots of my boys, but I also tried to capture some of the natural beauty in my world. 

For the 4th, we spent the day swimming with a friend and their boys. We spent 7 hours at their pool, I was amazed my kids were still awake because I was exhausted. I captured some of the fun they had flipping, diving, and being their silly selves! 

I still love yelling, Cannonball! It was funny because I heard other adults saying it too. Ah , the memories of belly flops and cannonballs as a kid!

I love the facial expressions I captured in my oldest's face! My heart flipped watching his do his stunts, luckily no one suffered any injuries on the diving board.

The dudes were flying through the air all day long!
They also spent many minutes on the water slide. When I set up this shot, I was not expecting this view, it made me chuckle, and I loved seeing his smile after he emerged from the water. 

Here is the view, I really love!

 Do you think he was having fun?

Here are some pictures of a crow that kept visiting our area and the trees surrounding us. You cannot see it, but there is a lake on the other side, absolutely gorgeous! 

My middle son's nickname is "Little Professor" because he loves learning and teaching about animals and anything science related. In the following pictures he is in his element with one of his favorite critters, frogs!

He rescued this {huge} frog who was trapped in one of the skating pools at the local park.

I am telling you the frog was HUGE! 

My son feels such a strong connection to animals. Each night he goes out to find the frog who has adopted him. He is convinced it is the same frog, that he likes him and comes to visit every night. You can see the love in Ry's eyes. 

One of his favorite things to do at his grandparents is to find frogs and lizards. Every time we go he catches at least a few and spends some time visiting and observing them. During the visit last Sunday he found 2 frogs, and a Hercule beetle. 

Ry's brothers love to see what he finds and he always shares his love of the critters and his knowledge. 

In this picture you can almost hear Ry telling Col all about the frogs. 

I planned to capture my oldest on his scooter, but the weather had other plans for us. Instead you get the picture of the tree with the dark clouds that opened up minutes after I clicked this shot. 

I have certainly captured the small moments and the fun moments of our week! 

Thank you for indulging me and letting me share some of my loves with you! 

Life moves too quickly, I am enjoying preserving those memories and looking back for those little things I might have missed while I was in the moment. 

Since it is Saturday, it is also time for the 3 items available for $1 as part of my weekly Summer Stock Up Sale.   

Multiplication Fluency Matching cards with arrays

Synonym Antonym match up cards

Multiplying & Dividing Fractions 

I hope you have a wonderful weekend! May it be full of memorable moments!