A Hartzheim Gathering to Commemorate 50 years!

This past week we were supposed to be celebrating Hellmut and Ursula's 50th anniversary on July 25, 2020 in Germany. Since Covid is spreading through the world, we were unable to travel and be there with them to celebrate. I was really sad we couldn't go and mark this big occasion with them and have a big celebration. In effort to still have us somehow get together, the sisters in Europe went to be with Ursula and Hellmut and the sisters in the United States came to our house for a couple days to be together. We had a good visit being together as best as we could, but we do hope we get a chance to celebrate in person with everyone sooner than later!

Happy 50th anniversary to Ursula and Hellmut. Here is a picture of them on their wedding day, and a picture of them now. Ursula is wearing her wedding dress from 50 years ago which I think is pretty amazing! That is a long life of commitment and love for one another!

Sandra flew in from Utah to New Orleans and she and Daphne drove to our house on Sunday to be with us. We had sacrament meeting together, had a BBQ, and they taught Ella and Cavin to play Settlers of Catan. They now say they really like the game! 

The kids even played again later. 

We enjoyed hamburgers and games! 

Monday Ragnar, Jonas, and Sandra went to Nasa and then walked along the Galveston beach.  

Afterward we met them at BrainFreeze to try their yummy treats! 

Some of the desserts were pretty impressive. Our kids were pretty modest in what they picked, so they didn't get anything grand, but the ones that did were pretty cool.  

That afternoon we got dinner and played more games.  

Channing and her aunts showing off their yoga and flexibility skills!
The siblings toasted with MezzoMix that is their favorite German drink.  

We had a nice time catching up and saying hi for a couple days. Hopefully next time we will be all together in Germany!

A Trip to Baton Rouge Lousiana

This week we were supposed to be leaving to Germany for our summer trip. Due to the corona virus and much of the world being shut down, we were unable to go. We are super disappointed to not be there to celebrate Ragnar's parents 50th anniversary. We were really looking forward to going. We decided to at least go on a little outing and visit Daphne in Baton Rouge as a small getaway. We always enjoy visiting her and Cortex.
She had a lot of fun activities planned for us. We started by making a sprinkler water toy for Cortex and the kids to play in. Cavin was a great engineer in figuring out a design, the measurements, and then executing it. 

He was excited to see if it worked. 

Drilling was a boys dream! 

It was a success and they had fun trying it out! Cortex wasn't as sure of it though. 

Our next project was making bottle cars. The boys both made one and raced them.  

Then we did marble art with shaving cream and their papers they made were pretty neat.  

We also did Elephant Toothpaste! 

It was a fun chemistry experiment.  

It was fun to watch it explode. 

We also put eggs in vinegar and waited a couple days and the shell dissolved and it was almost rubbery and the eggs would bounce until you dropped them from higher.

The boys were obviously excited about this one! Silly kids! 

They also made a few different treats like fruit ice cream and a German dessert that Cavin loved. Then they made lava lamps.  

These ones were my favorite ones to watch! So many fun activities that Daphne had for them and they loved it! 

On Wednesday we decided to try and do an outing and went to New Orleans to Mardi Gras World. It was basically just us there, so it was not hard to social distance.  

Pretty amazing how they construct all the decorations for the floats. 

Each of the kids picked their favorite thing to take a picture by. 

Naturally we were excited to see a German float in the making! 

God bless Texas! 

Deacon couldn't decide.

If only this hamburger was real!! So delicious!!

It was a fun outing and it started pouring before we walked to the car, so we got drenched. The kids thought that was the highlight of the day ;) haha 

We watched a couple movies and the kids each took several turns trying out her new treadmill and loved that. Ragnar and I even went for a nice run.  

Channing loves being with Daphne and enjoyed her yoga trapeze in her room!

We had to get beignets for breakfast one morning, and they are as delicious as always! 

Channing took an early morning walk with Daphne and Cortex. We had a great time visiting and being with Daphne for a couple days. We wish we were all in Germany together, but we did the best we could!

A Visit From The Scharman's and Summer Olympics!

The past couple weeks we were lucky enough to have my sister Marisa and her family come visit from Arkansas. After being quarantined for so long, it was so nice to have something different to do and someone to see!! The kids haven't been able to be around anyone but my parents, sister, and brother's family, so they were thrilled to have even more cousins to hang out with.

We had a kind family (Divalls) who let us use their pool while they were on vacation and we had a fun time playing and cooling off! 

 

Fun with grandma in the pool!

My sisters and I! 

The kids made us breakfast which was sweet. We didn't see the Scharmans every day, so we had some other fun as well. 

The girls and I did manicures and even got me to do one which I haven't done since my wedding! 

We ate smores over the stove as well! Just as yummy! :) 

We celebrated Liam on his birthday. On July 4th the kids played with water balloons and water guns and had a fun time. 

That evening we went home and watched fireworks from our driveway. The boys didn't want to be outside. Deacon had fallen asleep on the way home from my parents and slept through it all, and Cavin hates how loud they are, so the girls joined Ragnar and I and there was quite a show in the neighborhood. I am so grateful for the freedoms of America and the country we live in. It may be going through a lot right now, but I am so grateful to live here and the rights and freedoms we enjoy.  God bless America.

We got to go to the park with cousins and Grandpa taught us how to play pickleball.  

Then on the last day together we had our annual Summer Olympics which the kids love each year.  

They started with a 1/2 mile race, then archery, frisbee toss, football and javelin throw, a pickleball rally, and a soccer ball dribbling exercise.  

We then headed to the pool and cooled off and did our last few events of a lap race, floating challenge, and a jumping contest.  

We finished with an obstacle course which the kids thought was fun.  

The kids did great and tried hard. Ella won the floating contest and the Frisbee in the hole. Cavin won the Obstacle course and Football throw. Channing won the pool jumping contest with a cool split, and Deacon was the Junior division all around athlete as he placed in the top 3 in almost every event. I am grateful my mom puts it on every year and I think this was the 10th year to do it. 

We had a great time visiting my sister and her family and having the Speers cousins as well all join in together. I wish we had Corey's kids, but maybe next time. It was nice to do something as I am super sad our trip to Germany next week got cancelled. :(