July 2016.

July started off with a little surgery for me: a uterine polyp removal which actually turned out to be not a polyp but leftover conceptual tissue from my latest miscarriage. Fun times! It was really not bad at all, and Rick got an amazing video of me coming out of surgery and acting really loopy. We all still quote some of the funny things I said in the video and get pretty good laughs out of it.

Took a little weekend trip up to Austin.

Lovely Sunday photo.

It is way too hot in Texas to be outside in July. This didn't last long.

Unless you're near water, that is. This lake we went to with the Hales was great! I was really surprised that Everett, Faye and even Isla were brave enough to jump off the overhang into the water. Carson opted not to. :)

I really really love when Everett draws. (Except that now Pokemon has taken over the world and that's all he will draw.) This is just a little detail of one of his pictures that I loved.

Faye takes great pride in the fact that she is losing teeth at a much younger age than her brothers did. (She and Everett have both lost two now.) She was desperate to pull this first one out. She had a string tied around the front door's knob and was begging me to tie the other end around her tooth and slam the door. Well, our good friend Melissa Brown came to the rescue with her amazing tooth-pulling skills and ripped that thing out with a twisted up napkin one night at Everett's basketball practice. Afterwards she told me it did hurt a lot, but she didn't tell Melissa it was hurting so she would keep trying to yank it out. Brave girl!

 Ready to go to the pool.

Fruit stand! We learned a thing or two from last year that made this year's fruit stand a big success. We made sure we did it on a good week, when there were killer deals at the produce depot downtown. (We got organic strawberries for $.50 a pound!) We made bigger signs and had coolers out to keep the produce cold. They discovered that offering free samples helped. And I spent hours cutting up fruit to make cute little fruit cups that they sold for a couple of dollars each. After paying me (their lender) back for supplies and the fruit, they made a couple hundred dollars! I accepted, as my payment for cutting all the fruit, the leftover merchandise. I hope they are learning good business skills!

Second Sunday in July.

Rinsing beans, or as she was calling them, her "little babies."

 Mackenzie and Beau came to visit! Everett was really, really sad to see Uncle Beau go.

One of our favorite days of the year.

 Carson's first scout day camp. I volunteered one day and helped make the team flag. (Thank goodness it was only one day, 100 degrees and outside the entire time!)

Summer means lots of reading and math at our house!

And sports.

Third Sunday in July.

Faye or Isla in my bed one morning. (Seriously, which one??)

The boys loooove bowling.

Rick began his final and chief year of residency!!! His schedule is way better! Like, I no longer feel like a single parent. It's amazing. With the exception of this weekend when he was on call and ended up not coming home for three days and nights straight. When he finally made it home, his legs were puffy with edema from not laying down for three days straight.

Gaga ball at kids' club at the YMCA.

 Just before our big road trip, I had the van checked out, and it needed a repair. While we waited, the kids and I walked (105 degrees) to a shopping center to kill the time. It was seriously so hot I was going to buy them some ice cream on the way back, but alas, the ice cream store we walked by was closed.

Summer hair cuts.

Behold: grass in our backyard! Rick spent hours and hours loading up squares of sod into the back of the van and laying them down in the yard. And now diligently waters it every night. (And occasionally the girls too.)