What's going on in our "neck of the woods"?

This post is a little random, but we are living a little randomly these days as we soak up these last few weeks of summer vacation.  Most days we spend our mornings at the pool, and if I am being perfectly honest I only wear makeup, roll my hair, and wear something other than "around the house clothes" about 2-3 times a week.  :)  It's liberating to be free from schedules, but to a type A person like me it can be maddening at times when I know I waste time on random projects!

Mark is in the process of ending the final CWE for 2010 and Turner and I couldn't be happier!  We will have a large party this Friday night at our house to celebrate, so the rest of this week will be focused on pulling off a Mexican fiesta for 20 people.  Tonight we enjoyed the last pep rally, but I am including a few pics from last week also.

Turner looks a little nutty here, but check out the sky from last week.

Earlier in the summer Mark took Turner to the parent dinner and she got to eat this chocolate pie.  It's quite yummy.  So, last week he surprised her with a piece at the pep rally.  After she polished off over half of it, he had to hide it to get her to stop!

This is where Turner likes to be during the pep rallies...with her Daddy, alone.  :)

Tonight, everyone was in a particularly festive mood!

And Turner took her turn at actually doing a few cheers on the field - she does a mean version of "Botta Getta" and sings "Glory" complete with an AUBURN spell out!  I have them on video and plan to post them closer to football season.

Jumping topics here...sort of.  These are the sunflowers and zinnias I gathered out of our garden last Friday night.  This year our sunflowers have been bigger and better than ever, and I was so sure I'd have lots of full bouquets for the big party this Friday...but this was the last big cutting.  :(  I will have a few...but nothing like this. 

Last Friday night, Mark and I attended a dinner honoring the CWE staff who served this summer in the College of Science and Math.  While we were out, Turner visited with the Rooker twins and had a fabulous fun time playing with their many toys!  We decided to bake some cupcakes to have after their dinner, and Turner was quite the helper in the kitchen.  She loves to sit on the counter and help me stir and pour, and this time she did the sprinkles all by herself!  After we finished, she said, "Mommy, take my picture with the cupcakes!"  I guess she's programmed to know we take pictures of things we make - she was SO proud. 

And on Monday night of this week, Turner FINALLY got to pick our first cantaloupe out of our garden.  She has been begging every time we head that direction, and Monday night I think she wasn't going to take "no" for an answer.  Thankfully, it had ripened perfectly and as you'll see below it looked and tasted quite yummy!  We have about 6 other cantaloupes that will ripen over the next few weeks, and we counted around 15 watermelons for which we are anxiously awaiting harvesting day!

And check out those pink fingernails - this week was the first time she asked me to paint them too!  She loves getting her nails done, and she really enjoyed her second trip to the pedicure salon yesterday.  I so wish I had my camera with me, since she finally stuck her feet into the warm water bath and decided she liked that a whole bunch!  Last week, here at home, she put some socks on her hands and declared herself "the pedicure girl"...she came over and started rubbing on my calves and feet.  Then she "pretend polished" my toes!  It was hilarious....so you can imagine the kick we all got yesterday out of her sitting in the little chair, laying out her towel, and pretending (while acting it all out) to be "the pedicure girl" in the salon yesterday.  She even "accidentally" really turned on the water in the foot spa!  It was priceless.

And finally, this is a picture of our "sewing room/office/playroom" floor tonight. I had been in there sewing new covers on my patio cushions this afternoon and after Turner woke up she came in there to join me while I finished.  I remember hearing her dump out Mark's blue cup full of change...but I didn't pay much attention to what she was doing with it.  Tonight, I heard the familiar sound of jingling change and found her shuffling her feet and walking back and forth over these coins.  About this time I also noticed her piggy bank on the floor.  I asked what she had been doing, and she explained, "I was just trying to put these big ones in my bank, but they won't fit!"  She tried at least 5 coins (half dollars, money chips from Las Vegas, etc.)  while I stood there and laughed!!  Never mind that she gets "paid" for helping take out the trash on Tuesday nights and she always chooses two dimes rather than one quarter.  And never mind that there were lots of pennies/dimes/quarters on the floor that WOULD have fit into her bank.  She wanted the BIG ones.  :)   

As I said...this would be random!  :)  But, you can see we are fully enjoying our good old summertime!