Here is Abby proudly showing off the sign her mom made her to show it's really her first day of first grade.
Getting a great hug from little brother during the picture taking time.
Have to have one with the old lady in it...........
And those grandma melting eyes.Holy mackerel, is he his mother's son or what!
Here is the beautiful yarns that came in today from New York for the Icelandic Shawl!!!! Aren't they beautiful? I've never worked with high end yarn before so this should be double fun. OK, this means I'm committed! Now to figure out the graphs and junk on the actual pattern. :) We'll give it the old college try for sure.
p.s. Tuesday is Abby's first day of school as a FIRST GRADER @ LCS!!!!! YIKES!
This is the 15 year project written about earlier. The yarn should hopefully arrive from New York in the next day or two, and I spent the money to have good needles sent in, too. All in all, it's still around half of what I had envisioned it to cost even counting all the shipping and whatnot. Both my sisters had awesome input on this, even Bill did. So as soon as it all comes in and I get something visible done I'll update you all with the real thing.
This doll/baby project is just a fun one that I found through a friend on Facebook. The woman I met does incredible work and was very inspiring that I could do one, too. If it doesn't go to some grandchild (if there are more) it will look wonderful on my own baby doll that Donna used in a high school play to play the baby Jesus (minus the mustache that got drawn on her). Doing this in yellow, because I had it on hand, so we'll call it lemon meringue.
Here is #4. Just couldn't wait for the August mid-month pattern to come out today, so just HAD to start one last night. This was from April, diamonds ya know. :) Got the first clue (9 rows) done on the one released today. I have to say, it's looking fancy already!
Going to start actually attending (in person) the Lincoln Knitting Guild, and not just watching everything go by on the internet. Meeting is Saturday at noon and I will even get to learn something new, a technique I've read about, but never knew how to even attempt it. So no pressure here, huh? New group, new people, new technique, all by myself.......... hmmmmmmmmm. Gotta live up to my motto I guess. Try something new every day (if possible).
And I've taken the plunge on a 15 year goal, Lord willing I live that long to finish it. After showing my sister the pattern this week, and just getting the right amount of encouragement AND a price for materials I could NOT pass up, I am now committed to it. I will share once everything arrives and a good start has been made. Just know for me, this is huge. Not just a square dishcloth. More to come on this topic hopefully in September.
And who says turtles can't be trained? Here are Bill's three turtles (finally) doing a pyramid. Poor things will probably never have names, but they can sure do some fancy maneuvers.
Bill's just being silly. But they got a clean tank out of all the hard work they did for the camera. 
A lot of fun had by all - thank you so very very much.
Can you tell this is a dolphin? Bill guessed it was a beaver - go figure. :)
p.s. Bill isn't happy the turtles didn't make it onto the blog. :( I don't see him taking their pictures either!
Here is Bill with his pride and joy, Soapy. Soapy is a Blue-Tongued Australian Skink. This critter has grown so much in the last three months, I should have recorded it better.
Soapy (Raegan named this one)
As we go up the stairs and into the naturally lit world, we come to the two parakeets, Blade and Sky. These are absolutely beautiful birds and I love 'em. Sky is the blue one (duh) and the noisiest of the two. We sit and make fun of them talking to each other because they sound like an old married couple.
Next we wander outside to the back yard and find the pond full of koi, none of which are named. This photo doesn't do them justice as there are some rather large ones in there, but we couldn't lure them out with food for this shot, just the littler ones.
And of course, what's better than a nap on the bank, or anywhere for that matter on a Sunday afternoon.
There you have it, the 'Zant Zoo.
Leave it to "Lola" to know the heart of a craft-a-holic. And also, isn't Vanna White brilliant to be 50 years old and just NOW start her own line of yarn? I guess there is hope for us yet. :)
A little fun was needed Friday evening and my pastor's wife came to the rescue. She invited me to go with her to Pinewood Bowl at Pioneers Park to see this Gershwin musical. I hadn't been to Pinewood Bowl since 1969 when The Unsinkable Molly Brown was being presented. And I remember that play like it was yesterday - LOVED it! This was very good also with some songs we all know and love, like "Someone to Watch Over Me". *sigh* It was very well done and was a great time for Gayle and I just to sit and have fun, no bothers or worries for the evening for either of us. 
Along the way Raegan found treasures galore!!!
After having a little brunch, we made it over to the beach area for a couple hours of swimming and sand action.
It was terribly hot - here's Raegan melting a sandy ice cube on her back. Now THAT had to feel wonderful!
Best part of the day was when Captain Jim came to take us all out on the boat again, only this time it was to try some tubing! The night before he came down to get us all out on his boat and see if the kids even wanted to try tubing the next day. They didn't want to go fast at first, but within 5 minutes of riding, they wanted to go REALLY fast! We had so much fun that night. So tubing on Saturday was on! But when the real thing was going to happen, Dylan wanted no part of it. He chickened out, so Raegan and Shawna took a spin and they had a great time. Raegan made more faces during her ride that we've seen in a long time - she was hilarious. By the time we all got back from boating, everyone was pretty wiped out, so our trip back to Lincoln to take the kids to their dad was very quiet, they fell asleep pretty much before we even were out of the campground. What a marvelous day we had. 
Bill and I ran into a few people we knew by accident at our campground, so after Bill got done having no luck fishing, we went and crashed one of their campsites like they did to us during 'happy hour'. I got a chance to see inside one of their rigs this time and a person could just live in that thing - holy cow! Very cool, like a house. But by the time we got back to our campsite, we were absolutely too tired to even eat (even after preparing the fire pit before we left). Guess we aren't as young as we used to be, huh. :)
Every camping trip should definitely have a ghost handy to help in telling scary stories! This ghost was a little bit classier and wore a flowered sheet for cover. Believe me, there were tons of giggles under that ghostly sheet.
And to top off the night what could be better than roasting marshmallows for s'mores. These two had done it before and were very careful, even though they really don't like the charred parts of marshmallows. Just the goooey parts.
