It's a ............

Giant zucchini.
We started harvesting from our garden this week. Our biggest crop right now would be the zucchini and yellow squash. I checked on them one day and they weren't quite ready yet, two days later this guy appeared.









Ally liked snapping the green beans. She didn't really like eating them raw though.












We've also got some corn plants that I bought by accident. The old saying of my grandfather's, "knee high by the 4th of July" doesn't work around here. This picture was taken probably around the 11th of July and they are way more than knee high.











In other news, Ally got her big girl bed this week. She's pretty excited about sleeping in it, but here's how we found her the first morning.










And our final piece of news for the week, Karen had an ultrasound yesterday and we found out that we're having another girl. Ally's excited, I really don't think she wanted a brother. Over the past month she'd been talking a lot about having a little sister so she can put her in a basket. Ally seems to be getting her wish although, right now, she keeps referring to Baby Hoffman #2 as an alien, a scary baby monster, and an octopus.

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

We haven't been quite as busy this summer with road trips around the area as we were last year. Karen keeps using the excuse of a growing baby making her sick to get out of the trips. And all the stress of taking care of Karen and Ally (either that or walking to work in bad shoes) has caused a fracture in my left foot that has resulted in me having to wear a nice heavy boot for a few weeks in the middle of July. So we haven't had as many updates for you all to read. But we did make it all the way to Pasco for the 4th of July parade last week.

Karen and Ally waiting for the parade to start.



















Ally's favorite part of the parade was seeing the "princesses" and having the cars throw candy. She doesn't quite have the hang of picking up the candy before the bigger kids take it yet, but she still gets excited just seeing the candy.














Karen's favorite part of the parade was the paleta (popsicle) man. He gave us one for free last year because he didn't have change for a $20, so this year we paid him double.



















My favorite part of the parade was seeing that the mullet boy is still around. He was sporting a sweet mullet in the parade last year. It looks like he's still got one, it's just kept quiet under his hat.



















And now if you're tired from reading that, here's Ally to sing you a nice lullaby and trying to snap her fingers while doing her version of the Hot Dog Dance from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.