GS convention

The National Girl Scout convention was close by so I took my troop. It was quite a day! I also volunteered a couple days ahead of time, very educational...

 

The bathrooms had special signs for the weekend. 

The national Field Hockey team was there and Mimi showed her stuff. 

At this funny both the tablets had a variety of ways to show make-up. 

Mimi looked awesome as a goth.

One more

Lots of robotics and many other fun stuff!

Girl Scouts of America bought necklaces made in Uganda to be the lanyards for all the convention-goes.  They were so pretty, us volunteers added an AT&T bead to each one, there were 1000's!  There was one for each presenter, delegate, sponsor, speaker, attendee, etc.  

It was fascinating to see all the behind the scenes logistics going on.  

(you can see one of the lanyards on the guy in the photo above this one)  

Apple picking!

It's been a while, something always gets in the way, but we FINALLY went apple picking for the first time in years. 

 See Mimi in that tree? 

 A little ice cream afterwards... except me, no more ice cream for my tummy. 

Salads

While chopping veggies for his salads, Greg dropped some beets on the floor
...I couldn't resist

Me, "you dropped the beat/beet!"

I started laughing before I finished the sentence (laughing at my own joke!)

State Fair

 At the GS booth

 Testing out the Virtual Reality

 Fair food!

 We always look for the trains!

 Check out Mimi's crazy face :)

 Check out Greg's happy face :)

 Butter cow...

And meeting Smoky the Bear

Mimi and Science

6th grade Science. Pressure...egg in a bottle! #ItsWorthit #myohioclassroom pic.twitter.com/pBN9TLTBAb

— Worthington Park (@WoParkSharks) September 8, 2017

Video from the School's Twitter feed. Mimi with a priceless reaction.

First Day 2017

My last year with having 2 in elementary school...

 Mimi: sort of ready for 6th grade...

 Yoda: so ready for 2nd grade. 

 Now she looks a little more ready

 Parker: gone before the sun and off to HIGH SCHOOL! 

We still bike or walk whenever we can.  
Check out Mimi's giant bike.  It was a Costco purchase a few months ago, it's the first time she has had her own, not a hand-me-down.  She loves it. 

 Because we took out the basketball hoop, we sometimes remember to water the grass seed and therefor the hose was out when the kiddos came home from school.  I looked away for a minute and suddenly they were wet and muddy!  Good thing I spent hours cleaning and mopping the house! 

Basketball no more

We had high hopes, but no one really played basketball in our driveway with the hoop that's been there for almost 30 years.  A few years ago, I spray-painted it to make it look nice, but the slant of the driveway make it annoying to play.  

Everyday while backing up out of the garage, I avoided hitting it, then one day I begged Greg to tear it out.  We finally did it!  

Before...

First we dug around the base. 

 Then, using a sledge hammer, we loosened the cement from the ground. 

Then we wiggled it a little and... 

boom, it tipped right over.  

Although there was a wide swath of cement, thankfully it didn't go deeper then 12 inches.  Yoda measured with his hand.  

We hoped it would just have a little cement up the pole, nope.  It was completely full of cement.  We tried cutting the pole with the saw, no dice... After cutting and swinging with the sledgehammer, we got the pole free from the cement.  (We borrowed and then broke the first sledge hammer and had to buy a new one.)

The backboard was taken away by the city's bulk trash, but now we have a pile of cement and a cement filled pole that we don't know what to do with.  But at least I'm not going to hit the pole as I back up anymore! 

Now to grow some grass...

Hammock Camping

Greg really wanted to take the kiddos camping, but something always comes up.  So we camped in the back yard.  Super convenient and easy to get to!

 Parker took charge and set up the hammocks for him and Mimi.

 I got hot dogs and s'mores for everyone to eat. 

Yoda wasn't interested in actually sleeping in the tent, but before bedtime he tried it out just for fun.  He and Greg slept in a normal tent on the ground.  (um, I slept in the house)

The long trip home...

On our way home we stopped in on our friends in Iowa!

 Lots of movies! 

 And we stopped in Little America, first an ice cream cone, THEN lunch! 

 We even saw some friends from OHIO!  Weird! 

 Swimming at the hotel

 A quilt themed rest stop deserved a few photos.

We got in LATE!  But it was all worth it.