The Six Pack

We have been crazy busy since we returned home from vacation.  Mortgage rates dropped even further, and we decided this is our chance to give the boys a little more room to roam !  Our days have been jam packed looking for potential new homes and getting our home in the condition to sell.  Finally we are pleased to report that we have a contract on our dream home, which happens to sit on five acres in the country!  Our current house is officially on the market, but we still have some clutter to hide before our first showing comes along!  Heaven, help us... I'm hoping that once this craziness subsides I'll have some time for a long, catch-up update.  But until then, I leave you with a look at our first day of school. Those are three handsome dudes, if I do say so myself!

Tomorrow morning Baby S., who I mentioned a couple weeks ago, will undergo his first open-heart surgery.  Colton Allen was born on August 2 to an old friend and fellow alumni of my high school.  He is up at the same hospital where Zachary had his surgeries, and he needs your prayers. Please pray for this precious baby, his family, and friends.  Keep them in your special intentions tomorrow and over the next several weeks of his recovery.  And please stop by Colton's CarePage here to offer your support and words of encouragement to his frightened parents.  I know we can count on Zachy's prayer warriors to lift up Colton's family and bring them through a difficult situation.

Did you know... what an incredible little traveler our Joseph has become?  During our second-shift seat configuration coming home from Colorado today, Joseph was in the middle row next to Zachary and Sammy.  The middle row is a sweet spot, where our stores of road trip snacks remain within easy reach.  So somewhere between The Middle of Nowhere, Colorado and The Middle of Nowhere, Kansas Joseph decided he was hungry.  And I soon heard the crinkle of a plastic bag and the smacking of salty lips.  After my fifth request for him to stow the potato chips, (which was about the same time the bag became empty,) Joseph finally closed it up and found himself covered in crumbs.  No sooner had I realized his snacking was over than I heard the back window roll down.  I turned around to ask him to close the window just in time to watch his t-shirt fly down the interstate at 75 miles per hour.  "Joseph!"  I hollered.  "You threw your shirt out the win...

We are currently on the road to Boulder, heading back east to Kansas, heading home.  As is the case every time I leave the mountains, I feel a twinge of sadness to say goodbye to such beauty and grandeur.  But I am glad to be getting home, to be back on the open plain where the sun lingers on the horizon and the roads are straight and wide. The trip went much better than I expected.  We definitely had our "moments" when the boys required a stern "talking to," or when they felt homesick and broke down in tears, asking to go home.  But compared to previous long road trips, this one earns five stars!  It certainly did help to have extra space in our new van, and we could shuffle kids around or even sit in the back seat ourselves to suppress the chaos. We arrived at our cabin Sunday night and set out to explore Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP) Monday morning.  We soon found that the boys had the most fun simply climbing and exploring, and will never forget ...

We are having the time of our lives up here in the mountains!  We have been so busy I haven't had time to update, but we are starting home today so I'll have plenty of time to write on the road.  In the meantime, you can check out our adventures at our online picture album (which is also a work in progress.)

For more pictures of our first day of vacation, click here .

This is the REAL test. The test of traveling in our new minivan--long distance. The test for taking ALL FIVE boys on a big vacation. If we conquer this, I feel much better about our plans to visit Steve's folks in North Dakota later this fall. Today we are heading west, to the Colorado Rockies. We plan to make the nine-hour trip in one day, and we got an early start to allow for plenty of stops. So far, so good! We were all packed and ready last night. Steve and I had trouble getting to sleep--the adrenaline was really pumping--but still we set a new family record and were on the road by 7 am! The boys are still being friendly to each other, staying busy with movies, books, and McDonald's breakfast biscuits. The last time we visited Colorado, Sammy was just six months old. The boys had the time of their lives hiking, digging for gems, playing in the mountain streams, feeding chipmunks, and taking in the beauty and grandeur of the Rockies. We have longed to return, but...