School & Birthdays

It has been back to school this month! A BIG month for these kiddos. The school routine has hit us hard, ha. Not only that, but Collin is in 1st grade and at a new BIG school! This little fella and his momma have definitely had an adjustment period with a new school, friends, teachers, routines, etc but it didn't take long for him to start to love it all. He is reading up a storm and very happy with school. Except for the homework part.

Brantlee returned back to her preschool for K4. She has the same classroom and mostly the same friends, so not a whole lot changed for her. Not that it would have mattered ;) ;) She does have a new teacher this year, whom she LOVES. So all is well with Miss B. We are enjoying her last year of preschool before the "real world" starts for her and she starts BIG school next year. I can't believe I just typed that :(

Like July, we have quite a few birthdays in August in our family. Paw Paw Sumrall turned 80 this year, and that of course called for a big celebration. We had a family gathering at Mom and Dad's house.

The 4 children

The 5 grandchildren

8 of the 10 great grands. Poor Ty.

We also celebrated Lolly's 50th birthday!! We had a little surprise party for her that afternoon. I really think she was surprised! Or if she wasn't, she faked it really well, ha. She wasn't too fond of this particular birthday. But heck, she makes 50 look pretty darn glamorous if you ask me!

Our Lolly is one of kind. She'll never know what she means to all of us.

Ty is almost 14 months now. He pretty much lives in car line drop off and pick up. Bless. 

He is such a little stinker. ALL boy. His hobbies include playing with the dogs (yes, plural. another blog post), playing outside in the dirt, and eating. Seriously. That's what makes him happy! Just disregard the pink paci. We got down to the wire on our paci stash and it wasn't like we could do without at bed time. Actually, I should be more honest here. I think we've used this paci in public once. :D

More to come after a nice Labor Day weekend.

Family Beach Pictures

Finally getting around to posting our family beach pictures. And while they weren't easy AT ALL, they aren't too shabby for 5 little ones.

Glad we got some before the water was discovered!

A few more favorites from the week...

Back to the Beach

We had our annual Armstrong/Crager/Reid family beach trip a little early this year and went the last week in July. We stayed in Fort Morgan in a quiet community. It was super fun!! We enjoyed the beach, pools, and strolling thru the community. The kids would say the ice cream truck was the highlight of the trip! A couple of nights we dined out, but for the most part we kept it low key. We also did the water park one day. I think us ladies put on make up twice the whole week!! So thankful for these precious memories with family. 

More July Celebrations

What can I say... we celebrated a LOT in July! Here are a few pictures from 4th of July. We had lots of fun by the pool that day with some family that came in town.

And that night we popped fireworks. We had a competition with Poppy's neighbor Mr. Kevin. We didn't win :) But we surely enjoyed his fancy fireworks. Good times!

We celebrated Mee Maw turning 75. We ate at Charlies and had birthday cake and she opened gifts. She is such a spunky, special lady. She loves her family soooo much, and these great grandchildren are the apple of her eye. I think the feeling is mutual. We LOVE our Mee Maw!!

Couldn't help but share this picture of Ty in a choke hold. Tate was only trying to help!! ha!!

We have LOTS of July birthdays in this family. And not of one them can go unnoticed :)

After the gathering these monkeys had to stretch their legs.

Another day we celebrated one of my best college friends having baby #2! Brantlee and her sweet daughter Emory enjoyed the day too. Jessica was only 3 weeks from delivery in this picture. Baby Clayton made it here safe and sound last week. 

Collin attended soccer camp for 4 days last week. Here he is with his friends and coaches who were from England. Such a neat experience! We are so proud of this big boy. It was HOT and he was tough, never complained the whole time! 

Here we are celebrating our first ever watermelon from our garden. It was yummy!