One thing we can always count on is that the Cope and Robinson kids play well outside. Sunday night we had a wonderful and celebratory picnic at New Town. While the builder/developer is not a client of mine, I have to honestly say this is a great place for young families with kids. These are a few photos of our beautiful kiddos. I will use this as a public forum to congratulate Jonah and Grace's Dad on his promotion. Of course behind every accomplishment within a marriage is a spouse that has to be pat on the back as well. We love you guys.

Photo Workshop

213 pictures taken....2 worth posting. The great thing about taking classes is to expose your weaknesses for improvements, learn new ideas/concepts and get to know other people with similar interests. Mission accomplished. The photo of the model is altered using Lightroom 2. The photo of Karl is pretty self explanatory. He's a goofy nut with a good photographic eye.

FIrst Day

Armed with his Lightning McQueen backpack and a smile, Benny stepped up in the car, buckled his seat belt and headed out to his first day of Pre-School. His teacher is Mrs. Jaschik. I do not envy her since the class consists of 10 energized boys. Every day she will pick kids to help her out. Benny was chosen to be the Door Holder. On the way to school I told him that this is the first day of what should be at least 16 years of schooling. All he cared about was making sure we remembered going to McDonalds after his first day of school.

Geri and I had a rare date night and stumbled on the Clayton Art Festival on the way to the restaurant (Oceano). After dinner we took a stroll through the festival. As Geri ducked into an estate jewelry store, I spied this flag just outside the shop and took this picture with my camera phone.

Benny is obsessed with storm drains. After Benny finished staring down this hole, I shot this at Eckert Farms.

FUN WITH THE ROBINSONS

Here are a few pictures that Geri picked out. I really marvel at how pretty our kids (and my wife) are. Things are good at our house. We are going apple picking in Illinois this weekend and am looking forward to taking some pics of the kiddos.

On the last 2 pictures, the seeds on Everlie's nose were not "planted" (sorry for the pun).

More Pics

Last week we went back to Colorado. It was wonderful. As usual we stayed with the Shaffers for a few days, before heading up to Keystone where Geri had a conference Sunday-Tuesday. Marsha and Harry were amazing and hosted a small get together in Everlie's honor (if you call @ 25 adults and 15 kids small). Marsha was awesome. She even made candy bar wrappers with Everlie's picture as snacks. Thank you Shaffers, we love you! It was wonderful seeing many friends and meeting new kiddos for the first time. We will be sending thank-you's out, but I wanted to specifically mention Jenna and her Mom for making an amazing blanket for Everlie.

On Sunday we went to Golden Church of Christ. This is where Geri and I first went after moving to Colorado. It was great to rekindle old friendships. It wasn't even too bad when Jenna stepped on Benny's hand at lunch...with her high heels :). He only cried in Everlie's new blanket for hours..just kidding.

We had such a great time in the mountains...I hope Benny grows to appreciate them as much as I do. I recently bought a new camera, so it was a nice place to get off a few shots to get used to the ins and outs of it.

This time last year we were outside Detroit with Jason and Amanda. They live in a great neighborhood where their neighbor always makes a Labor Day feast with pancakes and the works. We also met the Carter's in Colorado. The nice thing about moving is that you take the good memories with you, but keep the wonderful friends along your life's journey. This attitude makes coming back to old places all that much sweeter.

By the way, I am on Facebook and will try to figure out how to post more pictures there going forward.

Here are still some random pictures from Grand Cayman. I like the picture of Benny in his preferred state of leisure with pretty girls surrounding him. I recently purchased a Canon 5D and and am waiting for lenses to arrive to start snapping pics. We are going to be gone for a few days and I appreciate Karl letting me use one of his lenses to test out the camera. One picture is of a young lady named Cara holding Everlie. Cara is a sweet girl from Scotland whose traveled with her parents on the Diversification Trip.

Benny continues to be ornery but is sweet. Everlie is walking around for the most part. She is so much like Geri it's funny. Both are very determined, strong and not afraid to voice how they feel. Of course both are beautiful. Keeping note of Everlie's personality, she still crys if you leave the room without saying goodbye, she has a very soft little blanket that she uses to rub her eyes before going to bed. She holds your finger tight when being fed (or rubs her eyes with blanket). She automatically dances when you put music on. Like her brother, she LOVES music.

Here are a few more pictures from Grand Cayman. Everlie has had a rough go with a cold, since getting back. She is finally feeling better, but has been miserable.

We had 6 trees cut down in our yard this weekend, and Benny is enthralled with the whole process. After church we were out playing, observing the trees being fed into the chipper, and drawing with chalk on the driveway. He looked up and exclaimed he wanted to be a Tree Guy when he grows up.