Jack high by the 4th of July

We headed west for the holiday weekend so Jack could check his popcorn at the berry farm. It was doing great and I was trying to figure out how we were going to package it all to share with our friends...it has since blown down and we don't know what we'll get from the crop.

I guess that wasn't our only reason to go through Holdrege though. That evening after Jack's bath, we showed Rod and Phyllis Jack's "lake shirt." It happened to be a shirt that says "Greatest BIG Brother." Phyllis had already mistakenly figured out that I was pregnant, and Rod wondered why we were being so "squirley about a darn shirt." Jack just wanted to get back to his toys.

As I mentioned above, that was Jack's lake shirt, the one we planned on him wearing to the cabin to announce the news to the rest of the family as the Butz 6, Steph, Cori, and Bonar's plus the California Gurls were at the cabin.
Jack wore his shirt, but I made the mistake of preparing really awesome food (with TONS of help from Jess and Phyllis). Everyone was so impressed by the T-Rex watermelon and chocolate sushi (delicious but camera shy) to notice what Jack was wearing.

We kept quietly telling Jack to have Grammy look at his shirt, finally she did, but she kept her lips zipped except to us. Jack then went off to show Papa, but it took a while for him to notice too. Finally I commented that no one was paying attention to Jack and Stephanie thought my feelings were hurt... she soon got over her sympathetic nature and helped spread the word.

After all that was settled, we were able to get back to the food. Bill had the AMAZING idea of doing a crab boil for the evening he was in charge of supper. He and Jess cooked potatoes, corn, shrimp, king crab legs, mussels, and scallops in a huge pot over a fire outside. It was one of the most fun meals we've ever had at the cabin.
It was also really great because most of the cooking was done outside, so there was very little cooking mess to clean up, just shrimp tails and crab shells.

Cori, Caitie, Steph, and I went fishing on day two before Barwicks had to go. We had a bit of luck, I even caught a few on Caitie's homemade fishing pole. She and Bill had attached a long piece of line to a pop can and then wrapped the line around the can. You hold the end of the can and swing the bait out underhand allowing the line to come off the can.


The rest of the weekend, we did a ton more eating, because that is the best thing to do at the cabin, especially when you are in my delicate condition and cannot waterskii! We had an excellent rib dinner with Ina's Mable Baked Beans both cooked by Jess. It was delicious and messy!!

Bill and Jess (once again) tried to start a big fire. This year the chances of that were increased exponentially because we had a paper lantern thingy that has been waiting in our garage for two years to be used and the wheat was ready for harvest.

Perhaps it was a bit windy and I didn't get a picture of the lantern once it was floating free, but luckily we have not heard of any crops lost. We all decided it was best that Dad was walking the dogs during that moment.


Mom and Jack watched as they tried to start other smaller fires, in a more controlled atmosphere. After the dangerous events of last year, this year was highly successful. I am pretty sure that Uncle Book was disappointed that there were no major fires, he and Jackie provided fireworks for a great pre-show on the third and enhanced ours for the Fourth.

Jack and Caitie had so much fun together (as far as I know Caitie had fun and didn't feel like the perpetual babysitter). Jack is still talking about being an actual Jack-in-the-box.
The most fun the kids had was with the giant package of cups from Sam's Club. Caitie is into speed stacking cups and that is how this whole idea came about; somehow it turned into 250 cups stacked to the ceiling.
It was a wonderful weekend that ended with several cars stuck and in ditches. Luckily, Jess was able to push Book and Jackie out of their sticky situation and they had no more trouble getting out. Bill had to wait a bit for some of his friends to get pulled out of the ditch before he could make his attempt with the camper. He had no trouble getting out and they were soon behind us in Holdrege. It was so much fun getting to spend so much time with so much family, a weekend I'll remember fondly forever.

Zoom, zoom, zumma, zoom!

(A side note about the title of this post... when I was little Stephanie sang and did fun things, I have now learned that these fun things are from children's shows before my time)


Over the summer, zooming has been a recurring theme. We've done lots of flying and outer space related activities and Jess has zoomed through a couple of races.

Jess did a triathlon in Norfolk in early June. We had to detour getting there because the highway was closed due to flooding, but we did manage to make it to our hotel finally.
That is Jess diving in for the swimming portion. Jack was really excited to see daddy do his "big race."

Jack was really into watching Dad and cheering him on.

The biking portion was the longest wait for Jack and I, also the longest portion of the race for Jess.
At one point I told Jack he could climb a tree and he ran over to it and said "eggs!" There was a nest in the tree so he didn't get to climb.
Jess did a great job and it was a lot of fun to be able to see him cross the finish line. This is the first time I've watched him on all three portions of a race.

We also made a trip to SAC museum. It is amazing to see the size of the different planes. Jack loved that the planes had lots of "neutrals," his name for all gear shifters.

This was Jack's favorite plane.

We also went to infinity and beyond!

We took Jack to his first movie at the theater. He loved getting to eat popcorn and see Buzz Lightyear and Woody. I liked getting to eat good movie theater popcorn, Jess loved eating popcorn too...so much so that he got sick later, whoops!

I was very busy studying most of July so Jess was challenged to keep Jack entertained. One evening he and Jack made a Buzz Lightyear space helmet out of a box. Jack colored the paper covering the box and Jess constructed it.

They both did quite a bit of zooming.

Jess also did the Thunder Run which was sponsored by the National Guard. It was a 5k run on the runway at the airport. Following the race the runners and their families were allowed to look into a transport plane and other vehicles including a helicopter.

Jess also did a really cool triathlon at Branched Oak lake. It was an Exterra race so the swim was an open water swim with the bike and run on off-road trails. It was by far the best one for us to go watch. We got there in time to see Jess finish the bike portion and the run.

While Jess was on the run portion Jack and I were able to play in the sand and go swimming. We swam until we could see Jess coming in to finish. Jess said this was the toughest race he has done so far, but also the most fun. I hope to be able to do the race with him some day. After Jess had a chance to cool down we had a picnic. It made for a fun day at the lake and an awesome race for Jess.

Our lives have settled down considerably following the bar exam and I feel like we are doing a lot less zooming.

Nonnie's visit

Sadly my step-grandpa Burt passed away at the beginning of the summer. Luckily we were able to get to spend lots of time with Nonnie and there was a loving tribute for Burt in Omaha. It was nice to see Burt's family and to spend time with them also.
When Nonnie got to Nebraska Jack and I went to stay in Hastings for a couple days so we could spend some time with Nonnie before we were all in Omaha. We spent the afternoon at John and Cathy's playing outdoors.

First it was just Jack and Nonnie.

Then our Cori girl showed up (and Steph B. too).

Then Steph P., Saylor, and Tagg arrived (eventually followed by John and Matt). It was fun to get to see Steph and the kids before they headed out for their mammoth vacation. (read more about their trip at http://www.stephaniepershing.blogspot.com/ )

Then Jack and Cori got to play in Steph's fun convertible.

We had a fun dinner at Val's and lots of playing with Cori that evening. In the morning Steph made an awesome waffle, sausage, and bacon breakfast! We then took a tour of the parks of Juniata. It was a very fun couple of days before I was consumed with bar exam studies. I've now finished my test and await my results in September. I've been taking it pretty easy since I've been done but now I'm on a mission to organize/de-clutter our house. Wish me luck!

Finally, I'm sorry I've been so lax about posting but it just was not at the top of my priority list prior to the bar and Sookie Stackhouse has been taking up a lot of my free time since then. Hopefully I'll be on the ball from now on.