Motivational thought

This is my favorite picture of Noah finishing the race last month.  It is also Joel's favorite picture, but he used photoshop to add the message at the top.

Aubrey's birthday

 Aubrey had a birthday a few weeks ago.  Savanna was a nice sister and used her Cricut to make these Batman accessories for Aubrey to wear, and a cake topper.

 Beatles chord book for Aubrey's guitar skills.

 Angel food cake makes Zachary happy.

Backyard camping trip

We made a trip to the great outdoors for a camping trip.  But we wanted Abram to go with us, and he is a working man without days off.  So we camped in our backyard.

It was awesome.  Fast to pack up and get ready, easy to cook, plenty of seating, a perfect firepit, and clean restrooms.  So convenient!


 Joel entertained the neighbors with his ukulele skills.  They came out and told him he was giving them a headache.  I told Joel to play louder.

We cooked dinner on the coals.

 We set up four tents.

 I cooked some delicious cornbread.

 Noah cooks one s'more while he eats another.

Best camping trip ever!

Catching up

No, I did not have another baby.  But I got to hold this cute little bundle today and he was so cute I had to post a picture.  Our friends had their first baby a couple of days ago, and Mark went to the hospital to take some newborn pictures for them.  He is the best at taking pictures of babies in the hospital.  He has had a lot of practice.

We have had a very crazy month.  I helped Aubrey make a quilt out of denim squares, and am now in the process of hurrying to put one together for Abram to take to college in a couple of weeks.  Boys have been at scout camp, I have been sorting and organizing and sewing.

Here are some random pictures from earlier this summer.

Foot Traffic Flat pictures

In case you didn't know who the cutest little runner in the world is, here you go:

 Noah is the cutest little runner ever.  He had a great 5k for his very first race ever.  I love the picture of him surrounded by all big people.  And I also love the second picture where he is sprinting for the finish.  He ran the 5k with all of his little heart, and beat lots and lots of big people.

Joel is a pretty cute runner, but he is adult-sized, so not as cute as little Noah mixed in with all the biggies.

Below is the most handsome runner I know.  A tangent: Some of the teenage girls from church were talking about what hair color they find the most attractive.  They laughed when I told them that guys with grey hair were the best.  I happen to love Mark's grey hair.  Anyway, this picture shows how happy Mark was to have reached his goal of a 1:27 in the half-marathon.

This runner below was not having such a great day, did not look cute at all.  My knee was hurting so bad, but I pushed through it the last mile and ran to the finish line.  You can see on my face that I wasn't super happy with my race.  But I did it.  Mark made me buy a photo for historical purposes.

Happy Anniversary! A slideshow

This morning I woke up to a crazy thunder/lighting/rain storm.  In my life, that's a good omen.  And not just because I have always been obsessed with the weather.

20 years ago I woke up to the same thing!  I knew when Mark and I got engaged that we could not count on an outdoor reception because whatever day we picked it would rain.  And it did.

Mark is at scout camp with 2 of our sons until tomorrow.  I'm missing him, so I pulled out the photo albums and made this video for him--hopefully they have 4G or wifi at camp!

20th anniversary look back at 1992 from Jill Dorrough on Vimeo.

It's been an amazing 20 years.  7 kids and lots of happy memories.  I'd do it all again.

When we were 2

Savanna and Aubrey found their 2-year-old pictures in a box this morning.  They were both so adorable!  I never realized how much they looked alike.

So then we had to see what I looked like as a 2-year-old.