Lately, I have been in the kitchen a lot. Between some posts I’ve recently shared to a few that are upcoming, it’s been busy around here! That’s why it’s so nice when we get a break from the kitchen, both in terms of me working on new recipes and in terms of schoolwork, and head out of the house to have some fun. It was made even more perfect by an announcement on a nearby city’s parks and rec page that showed a brand new park.

This park had so many cool features, with this awesome rock wall being the first part that Jeffrey ran to.

Natural-looking rock formations for climbing and crawling through, stepping stone-style logs and toadstools, and a slide and climbing section really added to the fun, and they all allowed for some great photos of my favorite boys.

I so rarely get to share fun photos of my family that I really wanted to take this opportunity to share these photos with you!

Isn’t Zach just the cutest?

He’s even perfect in black and white! Look at those little curls!

To speed up the editing process with some of these, I used some actions from the Coffeeshop Blog and edited them to my liking. I love how her actions make editing go a lot more quickly, and can help me get through those step-by-step items without having to work quite so long at it. If you have Photoshop or PSE, definitely check out Coffeeshop’s blog and see all of the amazing actions she has! My favorite is Perfect Portrait 3… it’s so easy to customize it to my own tastes! And the best part? They’re all free. She just asks for a donation if you love her stuff. How awesome is she?

That orange thing there? It spins! That way you can stand on it and spin around and around until you feel sick.

I simply can’t pick a favorite picture out of this set… but I think the one above comes pretty close to favorite.

Of course, I love these adorable photos that feature both Jeffrey and Zach… seeing my two favorite boys together is the best!

Grandma helped Zach climb across the toadstools and rock.

I am so sad that none of the photos I took of Zach climbing the stairs to the slide turned out… he had so much fun climbing up the stairs, but as you can see by this photo, he wasn’t a fan of going back down the slide again… He’d scream all the way down the slide, then immediately crawl over to climb the stairs again.

Jeffrey had some fun standing on top of the rock formations as though he was the king of the mountain!

He even did a crazy-awesome superhero pose!

I also edited this really cool picture. I know it can use some work– it’s my first time trying an edit like this. I loved how much of their movement it captured while they played on the equipment.

 

If you’re ever in the Olathe area, you have to check out this brand new park not far from Ernie Miller Nature Park. It’s over at Harold and Iowa streets! It was plenty of fun for our kids from 16 months to 12 years!