Thurs. Aug. 1, 2013 - picnic season

 A balloon snail at the Georgia Pacific Company picnic (it was actually last week, I forgot to download some photos)

 Micaela made her own version of octopus ring toss, finding a reason to splash in the water

 She got a ring on the peg!

 One of their more creative games: throw the Quilted Northern in the potty (too late I realized this is really not something we need to teach Micaela)

 Running around the park

 Riley and I won some good prizes at Bingo

 Appleton Parks and Rec "Kids in the Kitchen"

 They made "sushi" with fruit roll-ups and flattened rice krispy treats

 Forming her roll

 Delicious!

 Very proud of her fruit skewer

 Chef Riley

Chef Daddy trying out his new pizza stone; sliding it onto the stone...

 ...10 minutes later carefully pulling it off the grill

A margarita pizza: perfection!

 Our food critic loved it

 I didn't press the olive oil or make the mozzarella but the rest of this delicious lunch came from our garden

 I caught one of my bigger predators scoping out my produce

 "Here Mom, I picked handfuls of green cherry tomatoes for you!"

 While Daddy hung out with movie stars in LA (not kidding, he was technical support for a commercial) we went to the Menasha city carnival

 Anything big sister does, little sister must do

 We got to pet animals including tortoises 

Micaela's favorite was a bunny

After 3 weddings in 8 days we had a very low-key week. Last week Georgia Pacific held their annual company picnic in a park. The girls had fun playing games and running around with other kids. Riley played Bingo for the first time. She's still learning her numbers and had fun trying. While she was disappointed by the prizes which included paper plates, toilet paper, plastic silverware and other GP products, Mommy was thrilled. 

This weekend Chad tried out his pizza stone and it was great! The crust was crispy, the pizza was flavorful and we had a lot of fun eating it outside on the patio as the pizzas came off the grill. However, I may not have thought this gift all the way through. Someone has to make the dough and the sauce, prep the toppings then roll out the crust, assemble the pizza and bring it out to the grillmaster. 

Our garden is thriving and we're enjoying fresh vegetables every day. Even the girls who, like many kids, are picky about their veggies, like picking and eating them. Riley ate an entire plate of green beans for a snack one day, I was very impressed. Micaela loves helping harvest and always walks down to the beds to look for strawberries. Lately she's been sampling green tomatoes (she can't reach the red ones yet). I love her enthusiasm but we need to keep working on picking our vegetables at the proper time.

Its definitely fair season in WI, there are county fairs every week. I took the girls to a small carnival in Menasha and they loved playing the games and picking out prizes; necklaces and pencils can be very exciting. They also had a nice little petting pen that the girls wanted to stay in forever. Its so great to spend our days outside enjoying life in our little town.