~~ODNEAL FAMILY BLOG~~Port of Readlyn, Iowa

My Mother-In-Law Joey sent this picture to me (or maybe Jr. did) so just had to share. This is what she found on top of their houseboat Monday morning. There is a nice grassy area that they keep up in the marina and have plants, bird feeders, etc. Anyways, when we see people not cleaning up after their dogs we usually nicely ask them to please do so. Well one lady didn't appreciate it and got in Joey's face about it. Then they find this on their boat. Kind of obvious who put it there don't you think? Bruce found the other two signs that were missing floating in the river. Some people are just childish, ignorant people. We are going to make sure everyone knows about what happened, too. I don't think they will have too many friends in the marina! How rude!!!! Hope you don't mind I posted this picture Joey!

Yeah this is the time of year I'm afraid I will bore some of you with pictures of my garden produce and flowers in the yard. Didn't make V8 juice last night. Decided to wait until Tuesday as I will have a ton more ripe tomatoes. Spread out the ones I've picked and put them in the basement so they don't get yucky by Tuesday.

Got home from work yesterday afternoon and found Tyler and Gizmo napping in the living room together so had to take a couple pictures. Ty had 6:45 AM football practice so it must have worn him out. Neither one flinched or stirred when I was taking them.

  Finally got to play in the dirt (work in my garden) last night and pulled some weeds and picked tomatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, jalapenos, banana peppers, etc. Yes we had BLT's again last night for supper. Bet we will have them plenty more before the tomatoes are done. The kids tell me they'll never get sick of them so I guess it is a pretty easy supper. Planning on canning some V-8 juice tonight before the long weekend that I'm sure will turn more tomatoes red for canning next week.

Kyle & Bruce were outside last night and yelled for me to hurry up and come outside to see something. Well Bruce had left his windows down and there was Gizmo's cute little face looking out at us from inside the car. It was so funny. She must have thought it looked like a good place to relax at.

Just a picture of Kyle & Tyler last night each studying their football plays. Kyle must be explaining something or showing something to Tyler. They just love it when I snap pictures for no real apparent reason other than to irritate them!

Tyler's picture on the first day of school (8th grade this year-Kyle is a senior). Didn't take it until after school since I leave for work before they are even up. Didn't get one of Kyle. Tyler thought I was "gay" for wanting his picture so had to embarass him and put it on the blog! I'm going to send it in to KWWL, too for their first day of school photos.

Just a few shots of Cole & Kyle throwing the football around the yard Saturday. There always seems to be a football or basketball game going at our house!

Miniature rose bush outside my house. It blooms several times a year. Yep, was wandering around with my camera once again. I know, I'm a dork!

Yep, our high school football players got new uniforms this year. Kyle has always been #7 and of course we had it on shirts, sweatshirts, his coat, and he even has a necklace charm that is the number 7 from his girlfriend. But, his coach for some reason failed to order a #7 so for his senior year he will be #14. Which kind of sucks I think but he is okay with it. His attitude is new year, new number. He's got enough stuff on his mind I'm sure quarterbacking for last years state championship team. Go Wapsie!!!!!!

  We don't get dressed up to go anywhere very often anymore but last Saturday was my co-worker and friend Vicki's daughters wedding. I had Tyler take a couple pictures of how well we do clean up when we need to! It was a beautiful ceremony and the bride looked gorgeous!

  I was walking around the house Saturday and didn't know I had these blooming (so of course I had to take a picture!). I think they are some my sister in law Helen gave me to plant. She gave me some different things in the spring/early summer and I just planted them around the house! They are pretty but I don't know what they are.

This could definitely be Bruce and Gizmo minus the claws! Way too funny. Had to share!!!

This is the end (I think) of any pictures from our wonderful 9 days at the river/houseboat and the Dells. Didn't get any of all of us riding the go carts for the two days that we did since I had to ride everytime also! They are so much fun. And noone even got an "X" this year for bumping and or running into people! Right Ty?

  A couple of years ago when we took the kids to the Dells we ate here at Marley's and celebrated both boys birthdays. They gave the kids strange hats (a chicken & I can't remember the other one) and gave them a picture to keep. We didn't do that this year because it was much later than the last time when we went on Kyle's birthday. We had good food once again though and the place is just cool.

The first day we were in the Dells on vacation (August 4th) there was a storm that moved through and they shut down the rides because of lightning. So once the rain lit up we went and checked into our hotel and grabbed some lunch at this cool place. Taylor suggested it because she had been there before and it was very good. The burgers were way too huge though! These pictures were taken while we were waiting for our table. Tyler and Kyle held the door for about a million people coming in and out while we waited. They were amazed at how many people did not say "thank you" to them. Oh well!

  Yep took in my other digital camera yesterday and got the pictures off onto a CD. Did not know these pictures were on there. These are from the last Chiefs game that we went to with our friends Mark & Kim Rottinghaus and John & Dawn McMahon. We used to go every year together to a game and last year we skipped for some reason. One might be the fact that my Chiefs sucked! We always have a great time tailgating and watching the game. Maybe we can work in a game again this year!

Here are some more photos from our week at the river. I have a ton of pictures on my smaller digital camera that I took to the Dells, but cannot find the cord to transfer them so going to have to take my card in and get a cd made of them so I can post the ones from Mt. Olympus. Wish we could have one whole week at the river every month in the summer. I just love being there!

There-this is much better than those little pictures from Picasa. These are some pictures from the Shrimp Boil that you can actually see!

We always have 5-6 people do the bread. It started out as just making garlic/french bread but somehow (yep I think it was me) it turned into a major competition on "presentation" (who cares what it tastes like as long as it looks good, right?). Here is our cheesy bread with fresh herbs sprinkled on top. It was very good. Courtney came up with our presentation of using the sand cutouts to make fish and crab shapes to set beside it! Ours looked cute and tasted good. More than I can say for some of the others!!!! Just kidding. They were all pretty good and unique.

Here are some pictures of the food and people at the shrimp boil. Everything was awesome. I even peeled my own shrimp for a change! Usually Bruce does it for me. And I only had 9 pieces of sweetcorn this year and then 4 more on Sunday! Everything was excellent. Great job Helen and everyone that helped!!!!

Had our first BLT's of the summer at home last night. Yum, yum. Of course Ty has already picked off his cherry tomato plant and eats them right from the garden. It was a very yummy supper!

Haven't had any time at work since getting back to get all my pictures posted and such. Here is a start. We had our "Annual Shrimp Boil" the first weekend in August and here is some pictures from around the campfire Saturday night. I am not very good with Picasso yet so do not like this collage. Need some lessons I think! I will post more from vacation later.

Our lovely houseboat will be "home" for the next 9 days. Yep, we are leaving this afternoon on vacation and spending 9 days on the river relaxing and having fun. We are taking the kids to the Dells for a couple days (Mt. Olympus) next week and then they will come back home Wednesday so Bruce and I plan on taking a nice long trip by ourselves up river. It will be a great time and we are really looking forward to it. So nothing will be added to the blog while we are gone I don't think unless I take time out of my "relaxing" mode to post. Doubtful though! I'll have lots of pictures to post after I am sure.