Beating the Heat!

Well, it's definitely summer in Kansas! Yesterday and today both topped out at 107 degrees, so we are trying to stay as cool as we possibly can. Raegan has been chomping at the bit to get outside, so tonight Luke aired up our little pool. At first all she wanted to do was walk around in it, but soon she was sitting down and "swimming" like a little fish.

Another Trumpet Player!

Raegan loves getting the chance to play Zane's guitar, and one night he let her try out his trumpet. We were all just blown away when she could actually produce sound with it. There are kids Zane's age who can even produce sound because of how you have to hold your lips. I'm thinking we may have another musician on our hands! :)

Reading Mommy's Books

This is a daily occurance. Raegan will play for awhile after breakfast, then get out a bunch of her books and sit in the kitchen and tell stories while she flips through the pages. Over the last week or so, she's been getting out my books and sitting down and looking through them forever. Sometimes she'll point out letters in them, but most of the time she just tells stories about what she's reading.

After I finished taking this video and she finished flipping through the book, she said, "I'm not going to read it backwards anymore Mommy." Smart girl! :)

Random song

One of Raegan's favorite things to do right now is walk around the house singing random songs. It's hilarious!

Big Accomplishment

A big milestone that Raegan has met in the last couple weeks is being able to pedal her tricycle independently. Now she is OBSESSED with riding her trike and asks all day every day to go outside to ride. I took this video last week, when she was still having some trouble getting over cracks in the sidewalk. Since then, she's gotten to the point where she can pedal up and down the driveway with a little extra muscle, pretty smoothly.

More family fun

Had another family get together last weekend. This time we were getting together because Zac, Deeanna and the kids will be moving to Kansas City this coming weekend. It was another lovely evening of food, fellowship and PERFECT weather. 

This weekend's menu was tacos - yum!

Love this baby boy so much!

Snuck my mom in a picture! :)

I MADE THIS! It was a slow patient process, but isn't it pretty?!

Mmmm, cake!

As always, the trampoline was a big hit with the kids



Savings!

One of the things I've been doing to help with saving money is using my Old Navy rewards Visa. I posted about it last fall, and have continued to use it since then. Old Navy frequently offers promotions where you get 4 or 5 times the points for using your card in particular places (right now it's 3 times the points when you buy groceries and 5 times the points when you buy gasoline). Every 500 points is equal to a $5 gift certificate good at Old Navy, Gap or Banana Republic. I've only been using the credit card on things that we would normally be buying anyways (namely gas and groceries), and then I pull the money for those purchases directly out of our checking account. Every month I pay the balance off in full, so we don't ever pay interest on any of our purchases. It hasn't cost a penny to do this, and according to my account online, we've gotten $125 in gift certificates since the beginning of this year!

Here's some of my recent purchases:

A dress and a tank top for Raegan and a striped shirt for me. I got all of this at Gap for $2.54, after sales, a discount for using my Old Navy card on a Tuesday (10%) and a gift certificate!

A simple summer dress for me from the Gap Outlet in KC: $10.94 after sale and gift certificate.

I don't have a picture of this purchase, but my other big purchase recently was at Old Navy: two pairs of shorts for Zane (men's size - he's SO tall!), a pair of denim capris and sandals for Raegan (actual sandals, not flip flops). All of that was only $9.14!