Kennedy heard the fireworks tonight and said, "Well, there it is.  We missed the Fourth of July."

Got to love it!!!

A few updates...

• We have had several people look at our house, but no offers yet.  We had another person look today so hopefully someone will make an offer soon.
• We are trying to work something out on a house in MN.  We haven't put an offer, officially, in yet, but probably will soon.
• Carter has his 2 weeks check-up last week and everything is good.  No fluid and the swelling in completely gone! 
• Kennedy has her last tball game on Wednesday and she couldn't be happier!  She liked hitting, but fielding was not her thing!!!
• Carter loves playing golf and Tony has a subscription to Golf Digest.  Here is a pic of Carter reading the magazine one morning last week.  Yes, he is sitting on the coffee table in his pjs.  :)

 Alaskan Cruise!

Tony and I went on a cruise for the annual Gradient trip.  We had a great time, but it was 7 days too long from the kids!  Here are a few pics!



We left from Seattle.  Here is a pic of the city from the ship.

Space Needle

The first stop was Juneau, AL.  Tony and I went on a rafting excursion.  It was so beautiful and we saw so many bald eagles.  The only bad part was that the water was so cold, there were chunks of ice in it!  You can see Tony waving in the white hat on the right side.  I am hiding behind the big guy in front on the right side.  It was fun!

The rive we rafted.  Looks really busy from here...it wasn't that wild!  More of a float trip than rafting really.  :)

2nd stop was Skagway, AL.  It was really a stop for the ship to make money on the dumb tourists!  There was a cool train!

....Skagway again.

We went thru Tracy Arm Fjord.  There is a glacier that we saw and it was crazy to see all of the huge pieces of ice in the water.

Very cool waterfalls!!!

Lots of seals!

We hung out in one of the agent's rooms drinking mimosas while we saw the awesome glaciers!

Ice chunks off the side of the boat and a seal trying to get on the ship!

The glacier had this amazing blue color. 

Our last stop was Victoria, BC, Canada.  It was beautiful there!  The weather was so nice and Tony and I actually had sometime together alone.  It was wonderful!!  After being on the ship with so many people (we had 200 in our group), it was really great to have some down time!

The Fisherman's Wharf

In Victoria, we saw this amazing hotel where they still have high tea.  This it, The Empress.  It was gorgeous!

I am happy to report that Carter is doing well.  He has recovered completely.  He had a sore throat because they had to put a tube in to help him breath (standard operating procedure) and he had to sleep the last couple of days with his mouth open.  Today as he was napping I was watching (because I am a weirdo) and I could hardly hear him breathing.  He had his mouth closed and was not snoring!!!  Never seen that before! 

Butterfly garden!!!

If you have seen on TV the advertisement for Live Butterfly Garden and you have kids, or just like butterflys, get it.  It is pretty cool.  They send you 5 very small caterpillars (10 if you order in the next 10 minutes. :) ) and within in about a month you have butterflys.  They come in a container that has the food and you can watch the little critters get really fat, form their cocoons and emerge into butterflys.  It is really cool.  Both kids were entertained by them every day.  Carter really liked them!!!  Here is a picture of Kennedy and Carter releasing the 2nd batch of them.  5 were ready one day and the next we released 5 more. 

You can see in the middle of Kennedy and Carter's hands is the butterfly.  They must have liked the kids because they were able to hold the butterflys as they were released.  Pretty cool!!!

Tubes and Adnoids

Carter's surgery went well.  The doctor said his adnoids were huge.  He said they were almost completely blocking his nasal passage.  No wonder the kid sounds like darth vadar when he is breathing!  They took him back and he didn't even cry!  Afterwards was a different story.  It took awhile for him to wake up but he is doing good now.  Thanks for all the prayers.  He is peacefully taking a nap as I type!  Here are a few pics of before.