My kids crack me up...

They have to eat messy snacks outside.  For obvious reasons.  I mean, they are boys.  This is the faces I get when they want to come back inside...

 

 

As you can see from the messy door, they do this often.

What I love about summer.  I send them outside and say 'don't come back inside until dinner's ready!'

Not really.  But kinda.  But, like, nicely at least.

I love summer.

Swimming and Pet Turtles

Happy Tuesday everyone!

I have felt a little out of it lately because of everything that happened with my cousin.  There is just a full range of emotions that are seriously draining.  But thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers.  He isn't out of the woods yet, but he is making progress.  God still is good and He still has a plan.  Praise the Lord for that.

So I thought I would share some pictures of what our summer days have been looking like.  Full of love and pools and friends.  I love it.  I am looking forward to school when I can get a little bit more time to myself, but I am truly enjoying our summer. 

Since we can't really have a dog {traveling too much}, my dad thought they needed some kind of animal to take care of.  So one day my dad came home from work with two baby turtles.  Can I just tell you, my boys were excited.

Well, we had just woke up puffy eyes and all...

The boys have been loving the sandbox. 

And playing in the pool with friends, a must have.

And if you follow me on Twitter you would know that I just bought myself a new Cannon Rebel T2i camera!  I am so excited about it and learning more about what it can do.  I just love having good photos!  If you have any tips for me, send them my way, I always wanting to learn more!

Have a great day!

Summer Lovin' Photo Contest Finalists!

First I want to say, thank you all for participating!  It was super fun to see all your pictures of what summer means to you.  You guys took some beautiful pictures!

Now it's time for the finalists!!  Drum roll pleeeaaasssseee......

In no particular order, first up we have sweet little Aveline.  Gina over at Oaxacaborn submitted this photo of her beautiful daughter and her infectious smile. 

Here's how Gina describes summer: "It’s summer. I can smell it in the fresh air blowing in through the open French doors as I sit drinking my coffee out of a cobalt mug. I can see it in the wind that blows through Sierra’s long silky fur, and I can taste it in the tender lettuce greens heaped high on my plate."

Photo #1 ~ Sweet Aveline

Then we have Liene from Femme au Foyer.  She is a Latvian expat living in France! We live about an hour and a half from each other, what a small world!

"Sometimes you remove the seeds. Other times, you eat them first."  Super cute!!

Photo #2 ~ Lovin the seeds!

And lastly, we have Lesley from Fabulously Flawed.  I love her photo because it is a different take on summer.  Here is what Lesly had to say about what summer means to her:

"This is summer to me.  We live out in the country.  In summer our front field blooms with a million wildflowers. It's really so lovely.  My daughter and I gather up cookies and tea and have sunset picnics.  It's really one of my favorite things about life, let alone summer."

Photo #3 ~ A Country Summer

Now for voting!  Just leave a comment saying "I am voting for Photo #..." with the number of the picture you will be voting for!  You can also cast your vote on my Facebook Page by leaving the same message "voting for photo #..."  Super simple! {maybe not for me later... :)}  Finalist, make sure you share with your friends and family on Facebook, Twitter, blog, or wherever else you want to share!  Get those people voting!  The winner will be announced toward the end of the week!

Congrats to the finalists!!  Beautiful pictures!!

Summer Lovin' Photo Contest

Okay, it's time! Got those pictures ready?  I am so excited to see them!  First of all, let me show you mine.  This has to be one of my favorite pictures of the summer.  I brought out the camera when Tae was swimming and started snapping some pictures of him doing all his awesome jumps.  Here is his best karate move.

Don't you love it?  This is summer to us.  We spend almost all day outside in the pool or hanging with friends.  Tae is a fish and Eli is loving it just as much.  So this picture represents our summer so well. 

So now it's time!  What picture represents your summer?  To enter the contest check the deets posted earlier today.  Enter your post and make sure you click on some of the others that you think might like!  By clicking you are voting and the top three will be finalists!  No cheating and clicking your own a million times, people, girl scout's honor!!  Feel free to become a follower of my blog to stay updated, but it isn't a part of the rules! :)  But please grab a button to put with your post or on your side bar!  Thanks!



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Can't wait to see all the photos!!

Summer Lovin' Photo Contest Deets

Are you ready??  Tomorrow is the big contest!  I can't wait to see everyone's pictures!  I also have one of my own that I am pretty excited about!  I thought I would give you some deets today so that you can be ready to link up in the morning.  Here's the 'rules':

For the pictures:

• Have the picture represent summer to you.  You have to have taken the picture.  It can be of whatever subject you want, your mom, dad, kids, husband, dog, whatever.  But what embodies summer to you?
• Link up a post with one picture in the post.  This is how we are going to vote, so it needs to be specific.
• You can link up to 3 photos, but they have to each be in separate blog posts.  See point above... :)
• Make sure you have the button in the blog post you linked up.  Use the button code below and paste it in the edit HTML section of your blog post.

For the linking:

• After you link, check out some of the others that look good to you.  The top 3 links with the most clicks will be the finalists.
• Don't cheat!  Scouts honor here, kids!  Click if you think the picture looks interesting, don't click your own picture a million times.
• Feel free to tweet, Facebook, or blog about your link.  Once you link up, you can see the number link you are and send your friends and family to your link.

That's it!  I will feature each link on my Facebook and twitter accounts one time for equal opportunity.  After that, it's all you!  I will reveal the top three finalists next week!  If you have any other questions, feel free to e-mail me at manouvellemode{at}gmail{dot}com.

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I can't wait to see all your pictures!

A day in Our Life

Gussy Sews is having a link up party today and I thought it would be fun to join.  It is a day in our life.  Now we don't have a very exciting life or anything, just lots of playing, but I thought I would link up anyway.

I didn't have a picture of me just waking up, although you have seen me with no makeup before.  One of the first things I do is make breakfast.  If I am being a good girl, I get up early before my boys and do some devotions and read a little, but unfortunately lately the boys are my alarm clock.  Something I really need to work on!

My husband eats 8 to 12 pancakes, 3 eggs with a slice of meat.  And the boys are miniature daddy's and can pull their weight in the eating department.  Needless to say, if I don't feed them well in the mornings, it's gonna be a long day...

After breakfast, we usually go outside and play.  I try to keep my kids outside as much as possible because when we are in France the weather doesn't stay as beautiful all year round like Southern California.  So Eli likes to mow the lawn...

They like to play in boxes...

They like to play basketball with daddy.

And they definitely like to swim.  Sometimes we swim all day.  Sometimes we'll be swimming at 8:00 at night.  They are little fish, and I love it.  Here is Tae practicing his umping off the rocks.  He likes to be creative with his karate moves.

Then when we wind down at the end of the day, maybe watch a little Wipeout (Tae loves that show), maybe ride bikes, we go upstairs, take a bath, read a book, maybe sing a song and go to bed.  I try to put my kids to bed a little earlier than most, like 8:00 or 8:30 depending on the night, because ya know, momma needs some time too.  But it's summer, so I'm not that strict about it. 

And that is it!  I have been loving every minute of summer and doing all kinds of fun stuff to keep the kids {and me} busy and happy!  What does your day look like?

I am linking up with Gussy Sews.

Don't forget the photo contest tomorrow! I can't wait to see all your summer photos!!

Sand Pudding

***I've moved my blog to Wordpress! If you're stopping by from Pinterest, I'd love for you to come and see me there! Thank you for visiting!***

When I was younger, my mom would make this pudding.  She called it sand pudding.  It was sooooo good.  Every time she brought it somewhere it was finished.

Well, the other night I was looking for something to bring to church bible study group and my mom recommended this!  Perfect!  It is the prefect little dessert for your summer picnic and your kids will love it.  You'll see.

You start by blending some Vanilla Wafers and just a couple of Oreos in a food processor.  Like a whole bag of Vanillas to 3 Oreos.  Unless you are looking for black sand, then add more Oreos.  Blend them up real nice and this is what you should have:

SAND!  Now you see where the name comes in.  The you could just put in regular pudding in between sand layers, but that just wouldn't be as yummy.  So we pimp out the pudding. 

You have regular vanilla pudding and you add cool whip, cream cheese, powdered sugar, oh man, my sugar tooth is kickin' in just thinking about it.  Once you have it all blended up, you start the layers.

And of course, it is only appropriate to do it in a bucket! 

And Voila, that easy!  You just layer it up, sand, pudding, sand, pudding (I wonder where the name came from?) and stick a shovel in it for serving and you are good to go!  Look how creative you are with such little effort!

I think someone else found the pudding...

Yep, I left to get something else ready only to come back and find the little man grabbin' a shovel.  And of course like the good mother I am, I waited for him to grab the spoon so I could snap a picture before I took it away.  Don't worry, he got some later!  Here is the full recipe

1 pkg Vanilla Wafers
3 or 4 Oreos
8 oz Cream Cheese
1/4 C Butter
2/3 C powdered sugar
2 small pkgs French Vanilla pudding mix
2 3/4 C Milk
12 oz Cool Whip

Crush Oreos and Vanilla Wafers in a food processor.  In a separate bowl, cream together softened 8 oz cream cheese, butter, and powdered sugar. In another bowl, mix pudding with milk.  Add to cream cheese mixture.  Fold in cool whip.  Layer into buckets with sand, pudding, sand etc.


Hope you all enjoy and try this at your next summer picnic!  I am gonna link it up to as many linky parties as I can remember to.  Which basically means the next two days at the most...

Don't forget to get those photos ready for Friday!  Summer Photo Contest!

Have a great day!