How did you take those photos?

My sis in law told me today that she went on our blog to check up on us because she knows how busy we get and she wanted an update. She figured we must have been extra busy lately because the blog wasn't recently updated.
Well, here it is.
My friend Noel thought it would be fun to go to Forest Park Zoo. It is a super small zoo, but they do have some exotic animals. Always important is that the kids enjoy it so much.
So below, we have some type of primate:

Here the kids are facinated because the leopard is eating baby ducks. They sounded very crunchy,
An armadillo who needs his blankey washed,
Caleb is posing with a nasty snake,
Melisa is showing Caleb how fun it is to feed the animals... he is sliding it under his mouth,

Zach.....ary is taking a nap,
Noel is also showing her son Holden how much fun it is to feed the goats. Yes, she is wrestling Holden there a little,
Melisa attemps to wrestle Aalyia as well but, Aalyia outsmarted her and threw her cracker at the alpaca. Yes, the alpaca has stepped back and Aalyia feels she has done her part. It's not her fault if the alpaca doesn't know how to dive,
Group photo,
Here is Bobby going for the last swim with the chitlins' before closing the pool. It was a sad summer because it didn't really get used until late July, August.



I can't believe I put two of the same photos here!!!! That's okay, Bobby likes the attention,

Last but not least, is little Zach......ary. He's about 10 pounds now. How cute!!!!!!!!!!! We are loving him up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So there is our update. Oh by the way, I forgot to share that all these photos were taken with my new digital camera that my amazing hubby bought for me! Finally! I am digital.

Gluttoney at the Ackerman house

Mercedes favorite food in the whole world is breakfast. Anything breakfast. Anytime, anywhere. French toast and bacon are on the top of the list.
A few years ago we had the missionaries over for dinner and I decided to make french toast because it would go a long way. Elders Walker and Bueler were over and we commented on how Mercedes eats many slices in one shot. We are not talking about the sad, thin slices of sandwich bread. We are talking Texas toast. Thick and big. The elders challenged her to an informal contest. Mercedes ate 9 slices with toppings, bacon and eggs. They were very impressed. She was tied at 9.
Fast forward to today and Mercedes can still eat. Elder Mower and Kreutzer were over for dinner a few weeks ago and we again had French toast. Mercedes was at Six Flags that night with her aunt and cousin so she missed Elder Mower breaking her record at 10 with hashbrowns, bacon, scrambled eggs,and toppings. Oh, and about a gallon of orange juice. Well, Mercedes was impressed but she didn't take the news laying down. I told her she had to reclaim her title and we set up a French toast challenge for the 12th. My sister and her family joined us that evening along with the Flowers.
The following pictures chronicle the evening. I'm sorry the pictures are out of order, but it is hard to organize them once they are here... unless there's a way I'm not familiar with(I'm sure there is.)












I thought it would be fun to offer a prize, shake things up a bit since we had such an interest. We got a $20 gift card to Golden Corral as the grand prize. Even the little ones got in on the fun. Aalyia and Kaleigh tied at 4 slices each. They beat out Laura Flowers at a whopping 2 slices. Brice was done at 5, Bobby at 6, Roci at 7! The top 3 runner ups were Eli and Mercedes at 11, Elder Mower at 12 and Elder Kreutzer at an unbelievable 15! Mind you there were roasted potatoes, quiche, thick bacon, stawberries and drinks that everyone had to eat as well. No one threw up, though Eli was close when he tried for 12.
The video was much more entertaining, but it's not digital. Sorry. Who would have thought you could have so much fun with food??? By the way, I made 95 slices of French toast for this contest. Elder Kreutzer ate a whole loaf himself.
My sister made four quiches. We had 2 packages of thick sliced bacon, 2 quarts of strawberries and 5.5 lbs. of potatoes. Holy cow.

Feeling dumb

I went on a date with my hubby last night to see 'All about Steve'. It was funny. Rental funny.( That's how I rate my movies. Whether they are worth the $10 or if they would have been better enjoyed at home for a $1 or better yet for free from the library.)I put my phone on vibrate during the movie and forgot to take it off. No big deal right? Wrong!
Never have your phone on vibrate when you are watching someone's house. My friend asked me to check on her house while they are out of town. 'No problem', I say, 'I can watch your house for you!'
Apparently, my friend's alarm went off at 4:00am. Her FIRE alarm. So there I am snoozing away, clueless to the fact that ADT has been trying to reach me and so has she!
The first thing I do every morning before getting out of bed is check the weather on my phone. You can imagine my shock when I see missed phone calls and missed messages on my phone. As I'm scrolling through them I start to panic. Oh great, I think, some friend I am.
I jump out of bed and dress very quickly debating on whether to call her before or after I get back from checking her house. I mean, man, talk about feeling dumb!!!!
"OH no problem, I can watch your house for you!"
So, I race out of the house and by then I've mustered the courage to call her and explain what happen. She tells me that she gave the fire department the code for her house so they could get in through her garage and they've checked it out and it was a false alarm. She said she did appreciate that I was going over to check and if I could reset everything while I'm there. She did also say she was happy that I was able to sleep since it was a false alarm. Hmmm...
In the meantime I'm thinking, what a loser I am. What if it hadn't been a false alarm? What if she hadn't been able to let them in the house? What if they had to smash the front door or windows to get in? Of course, none of that happened but I like to torture myself with the what if's. Growing up, that's what we focused on. Not the good outcome, but the horrid images of what COULD have gone wrong. We'd spend days and weeks, 'What if...?'It was like an olympic event.
SO! That was my Saturday morning. Wondering if I am as good of a friend as I'd like to think I am. "Oh don't worry, you can count on me, I'll watch your house, NO PROBLEM!"