Fun July filled with LOTS of friends!!
Bell Family Update–July 2020
Tag Archives: birthday party
Bell Family Update–November, December, January, February 2019-2020
Clearly, I’ve not stayed on top of these… So here goes! Four months of pictures of our crazy lives.
Bell Family Update–July 2018
This month went by fabulously slow! I think it was because instead of having full calendars, we just got to be together as a family more. I’ll take more months like this, please!!!
Bill takes pics like this all the time because it’s so reflective of daily life. This little man always, ALWAYS, finds his way beside me on walks so he can hold my hand. I will miss that maybe more than anything else as we leave the littles season of our lives.
Liam and I played mini-golf one day and this mama duck with her ducklings was literally right beside the green. Never flinched at all!
Love love love how much the kids still enjoy picture books, no matter the age.
Lots of July 4th fun!!! Making patriotic strawberries and a cake.
Hanging with these fun friends, Olan Mills photo and all.
Loved this pic of the three littles sitting side by side entranced by the fireworks.
Nine of our kids were at camp at the Children’s Museum for four weeks, which meant Bill and I got some sweet time with our teenager. 
Twins!!!
Canoeing with the boy
Creek stomping!!!
Ice cream for relief from the heat!
We got a new couch that actually sits all the kids, along with their prettiest faces.
Rex greeting our kids at the Children’s Museum!
Camp Celebration!
Mr. Andrew has been in charge of camp since we started, but he’s moving to a different position for next year. We’ll miss his energy every day!!!
We did a 5K as a family for the ministry we work with, Active Grace. They had a kid run at the end, and they all had so much fun!!!
Will never have enough sleeping kid pictures.
This sweet baby’s mama and I are developing a beautiful friendship. And this little cutie is becoming my Sunday baby! Those eyes!!!
We are robots from the planet Boxtox.
Best buddies always planning to wear their Cars outfits on the same day.
Leg wrestling. I won’t say who the family champ is, but it’s me.
Searching for four-leaf clovers.
Feeding ducks
Picking new glasses!!!
We did a video scavenger hunt around town. Since it was video, we didn’t get many pics, but here they are all fitting in a shopping cart.
We watch a little friend once a week and draw a rocket for him so he knows how long it will be before Mommy picks him up. Josiah drew the rocket this day and spelled “Mommy” perfectly.
Family Olympics! Finding a specific family member by following their voice while blindfolded. 
Who can hula hoop the longest?
Be the first to fill the bucket relay
Drop the tennis ball in the hula hoop by carrying it between your knees.
How many bugles can you throw onto the whipped cream? And then how many can you eat from the ground?
Who can keep the feather in the air the longest by blowing it?
Transfer jelly beans to bowls with straws
Hand-clapping games
Well-child visits with a sister is way better!
Cheyanne and I had a sweet weekend trip together to Lafayette!!! Here we are at a cute little zoo they have.
And getting tickled during a pedicure.
Team fort-building!
These girls hauled rocks and bricks at one of our favorite parks to make this cool fairy path!!!
Checking out one of our sweet neighbor’s garden in her backyard
Decorating cookies for fun
Out to lunch with my friend and my Sunday baby!!
Liam had his first interview!!! He applied for the Children’s Museum Apprenticeship Program. He worked so hard for it.
Our three ten-year-olds had a joint birthday party with a detective theme!! Twelve friends came to celebrate them, along with other friends and family who came to help.
Bell Family Update-July 2017
I feel like I say this a lot these days, but I really have no idea where July went. Like <blink> and it was gone! But it was a fun month, with some beautiful weather and a lot of time spent outside getting used to being a family of twelve. And that’s what we’ve been since July 3rd, when Malcolm and Cheyanne became official residents of the Bell home. It’s been wild and hard and amazing and hard and wonderful and hard. God’s kindness has been evident, because we’ve found so much common ground with a new family composition. But please do continue to pray, because just like anytime you add a new kid (or kids!) to a family–whether through birth or adoption–the transition always takes a lot of work and getting used to.
Anyhoos, here’s our July 2017:
Courtney on a date with our sweet Essie, seeing some ducklings on the canal.
The Vernons from our church were camping one weekend and invited us all to join them for our gathering. Here we are listening to Dan remind us of the good news of King Jesus right before eating some grilled hot dogs.
Pool fun!
Making ginormous bubbles.
Celebrating Independence Day with some Patriotic Strawberries.
We also stayed up to watch the fireworks together a few blocks down from our house.
Brother-Sister bonding time?
Ariana reading to her siblings.
Enjoying a beautiful day at Coxhall Gardens.
Another Mom date, this time with Miriam…
…and this one with Josiah.
Brothers!
Just hanging around at the Children’s Museum.
Five of our kids got to participate in the summer StarPoint camp at the Children’s Museum. That place has been such a blessing to our family!
Josiah attempting (and failing) to be asleep in our bed.
Since Aiden and Josiah both turned five, we decided to have their big birthday party together. The theme this year? Mario Bros! Ariana was our photographer for the party and took something like a thousand pictures, which were totally awesome. Here’s a very small sample, starting with some of the decorations.
Mario (Josiah)
Luigi (Aiden)
Mustached Princess Peach??? (Victoria, the only sibling guest at the party–though all the older siblings were awesome helpers)
Part of the party was a scavenger hunt with notes from some of the Mario characters. Here’s Courtney, being the usual animated thespian.
The party craft (and just because Leia has to make it into most of our family updates).
Throwing ice balls at Bowser. (And by the way, this is how awesome I would look with an epic ‘stache.)
The actual Yoshi egg game is in the back, but for some reason Liam is getting some air time. No idea why, but I think it looks cool.
“Bowser” (me) throwing fireballs at Mario and Luigi.
Just two of the food items.
These two little guys had their annual check-ups together. While they were waiting, Victoria read to Josiah (how sweet!).
I now find myself facing off against ten children in our family wrestling matches…
…which then later just turned into the kids getting turns with me throwing them onto the couch.
Liam in reflection. Oil on canvas. 🙂
We took a day trip over to Loogootee, Indiana, for a civil war reenactment. Unfortunately, we found out after we arrived that some storms early that morning had waterlogged just about everything, so most folks were packing up by the time we got there. But there were still a few things around, so we explored what we could.
One group stuck around to fire the cannon a few times. They were spectacular and shot a few extra blanks for us, then taking questions. It was a really cool joy.
We finished our month off with a day trip up to the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. It was super windy with some crazy current stuff, so the waves were incredible (though we never got very deep at all).
The ‘rents enjoying some time together while the kids played in the sand and water.
Esther made her own castle, complete with moat.
These five made this “building” together.
And a good time was had by all…
The Bell Family 