Hanging out with our Buddy

We had the pleasure of "babysitting" Colby again yesterday, 

(I put quotations on the word babysitting because having one more little boy around 
hardly qualifies as babysitting... he blends right into our little life!),

and all we do is have FUN!

His favorite activity of the day turned out to be playing with the hose...
well, anything that had to do with water actually... water is his favorite thing!

Everyone taking turns on the cell phone camera.

We headed toward the backyard for some more exploring...

Colby understands the importance of the phrase
"stop and smell the roses"...

...or daisies... or whatever flower you might find!

And I mean reeeeaaaallllly smell them!!!! :)

Sawyer and Colby are two months apart in age.

Lots of new adventures to be found in our backyard, 

and Colby was not going to leave any territory uncharted!

Two year olds on the loose!!!

(Also of note, Colby's mom ran track in college... and Colby definitely takes after his mama in the regard of running... and running FAST!)

It was a really nice morning while we enjoyed a little relief from the smoke as we played outside... that is until the wind picked up BIG time, and started blowing heavy smoke and ash and blackened/burned tree parts straight in our direction... at that point in time things got a little unnerving and we hunkered down inside and closed all the windows and prayed and starting discussing what we would do if the evacuation warnings reached Chewelah.  Having a 64,000+ acre wildfire 15 miles away from your home is certainly scary, but I can't imagine what the people are going through who have already lost their homes or people who have evacuated and don't know what the fate will be of their homes or their livelihood.  Such a sad and uncertain time in the northwestern part of the country right now.  Everyone is praying for rain right now (which we actually got, finally, but not enough!), but I have started praying for snow.  LOTS of snow.  I'm pretty sure a foot of snow would put out ALL THE FIRES!!!!!!  Who's with me?! 

Some of our indoor activities.

A little gaming... some snacking... and bath time of course!

All of a sudden we got a small shot of rain and the smoke seemed to disappear, 

so of course we bolted outside again to enjoy the clear air while we could!

 It was still pretty windy, but the wind had shifted and the fire was no longer being blown in our direction.  Good news for us, but we're still not out of the woods as far as these fires go... no one here is. They are everywhere.  Literally, everywhere... as of today (August 30th) there are said to be 39 "large active fires" burning in Washington and Oregon.

Click this link for a good visual of the fires in our area.

Going with a little diddy from "Finding Nemo" here, just changed one word...

Just keep praying, Just keep praying, Just keep praying!!!

 A couple other random pictures from the day.

The twins, they live in our backyard.  

They (and their mama) ate the pumpkins I planted but I still think they are so sweet!

(P.S. Check out our "grass"... Any wonder why Washington is on fire?)

We ended the evening with a lovely (and completely impromptu but surprisingly successful) dinner when Colby's mom and dad arrived to pick him up.  Erik and I are blessed with the friendship we have found in Brad and Bekah, and our sons with the friendship of sweet Colby James.

"I give thanks to my God always for you..."

1 Corinthians 1:4