A New Adventure - Hiking

On morning, we decided to go up a few trails and hike.  My uncle is an experienced hiker, meaning he's done it quite a few times.  Me, and my family, not so much.  But, with 2 strollers, a wagon, and a bunch of little ones, we started out!!

After a little ways, Jason and Jaxon decided to go back, since Maggie was asleep, and well, they were tired of hiking.  The rest of us went on....higher.....

Karter was a champ, and just walked and climbed, and kept going.  We saw a little water fall. 

Here we are a the top of this really tall sloping hill thing. I think I would call it a small mountain. Karter, Kannon, Kylee, and Lexi were the kids that made it to the top.  But, Kylee was hating it and wanted to go back. :) But, she toughed it out. 

Heading back down.

That evening we went to the fishing pond, and Brianne and the kids hunted for frogs and some of the kids caught some fish.  The landscape was beautiful!

It's Vacation - You can do whatever you want to do!!

We had a great time at the Lazy Hills Retreat for our Ruffin Reunion.  This is our second time to get together, and we all really enjoyed it.  Especially the kids.  I love them getting to be around the family, and then mentioning them and asking about them when we get home!!

The kids love swimming so we did lots of it!! Poor Chelsea had a hurt foot!!

Having fun with Paw-Paw!! 

The first time in the baby pool, Maggie just walked straight in and went right under the water. Crazy girl!! So someone had to walk behind her the whole time.  :)

Night swimming!!

Hanging out is fun too!! And Steven brought his remote control car to race on an really cool racing course!!

Silly picture all dressed in purple!!

We all showed up wearing purple to celebrate my cousin getting the head basketball coach at Abilene Wylie!! Go Coach Ruffin!!

Memories Made

We are back from our Family Reunion/Get Together!! I will post more pictures whenever I can get my hands on some of Kylee doing the ZIPLINE!!

We had a really great time, and the kids were great, except for one time. I'll share that too, later!! 

Her Giraffe!!

Maggie and her Giraffe!! How did my baby get so big??!

I started thinking the other day, I see less and less "baby" stuff around our house!! :(

Seven

It's been 7 years since we said "I do."  

I got a new pair of shoes!!

And Jason got nothing, 

but that makes him happy too!!!

Thankful for him, and blessed to spend this life with him!!

Redresser Redo

After finally convincing Jason to even get the dresser out of the barn, I had a really good time refinishing it!! My grandmother gave this to me when we first got married, and we haven't used it in nearly 5 years. 

After Jaxon climbed on top of Kylee's white dresser, it came tumbling to the ground, and breaking things that were on top of it. So, the drawers were broken too.  

I wanted to re-stain it darker, so I had to sand it.  It had a pretty heavy coat of the shiny clear stuff on it.  

I used 100 grit sand paper for all of it, but I was changing papers out A LOT.  It probably would have gone faster with 60 or 80 grit, but we didn't have any, and I was to impatient. :)

Sanding the drawers and around all the drawers was the most tedious part. It probably was close to 5 hours of just sanding, which I did over 2 days. 

I bought new hardware from Lowes, which was basically the only expensive for the dresser.  I thought about spray painting the old with the antique bronze, but I wanted some of those dome shaped looking handles!! :)

On the 3rd day, I used Minwax Dark Walnut stain and applied it with a sock.  I only had to do one coat.  Then I finished it with a Minwax Finishing Wax.  It has a really nice finish.

I am happy how it turned out!!

This is Summer!!

My sunshine girl: tan, sweaty, sunglasses, big smiles!!

Summer is fun!!