Summer Leftovers

The girls learned to ride their bikes this summer. PK2 learned very quickly.  She was motivated, fearless and confident.  A few weeks later, after a great deal of fussing and protesting... PK1 learned too.  When she finally got it she said, "HOW am I doing this?" PD and I breathed a huge sigh of relief to have two girls on two wheels. We even ventured out to the bike paths a few times by the end of the summer.

We actually had a few days over 100 here.  Pretty rare for Ohio.

Towards the very end of August, we realized we hadn't been to our favorite Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream even once all summer! Since it was raining, we decided to go to the North Market Jeni's.  We each tried two flavors.  Some of us even branched out and tried something new.

I promise they were happier about the ice cream than they were about this picture.

PD got a new car this summer!  He finally got rid of his 1992 Camry and bought a 2006!

One weekend we had surprise house guests! Gram and Cincinnati cousin (and his parents) stayed with us because there was no AC at Gram's house.  It was lots of fun to hang out, stay cool and enjoy family time. The cousins played and played:

We took the summer off from our nursing home ministry, but when we got back there was a special cowboy theme day.  These were the four cutest cowboys.

A couple  years ago we started grilling out almost every Saturday and Sunday. PD comes home too late to eat together during the week, but we have weekend grilling down to a science.  We always have meat (pork loin, pork chops, chicken, steak or salmon) garden veggies (grilled or a big salad) and either potatoes cooked in foil with onion, rice or bread.  You can come up with lots of options with those. These pictures are actually from last year, but you get the point: 

We also like to have this:

And we even started grilling peaches with our pork.  Here is the recipe and it is amazing.  Pork and Peaches

Last grill out this year though, PD was caught in a complete downpour.  He was really soaked even with the umbrella.

One night after a late party for PD's work, Gram and Papa had mercy on me and kept the girls over night.  They have only stayed over at Gram's a couple of times, but every time they come home with bad bed head, MacDonald's breakfast on their face and very very happy! Thank you for the "sleep night over" Gram!

I will close out with a few fun pictures from the pool.  The last weekend it was open was cold and I felt cheated of our "last swim".  I can't believe another summer is gone.