Friday, October 28, 2011

Luckiest

My kids are so lucky. My mom and dad take them on sleepovers, one at a time, several times a year. And it's not just a 'come on over to granny's house and we'll have a boring sleepover' type of sleepover.

This time it was Jackson's turn. He headed down for the entire UEA weekend. My dad took 2 days off work and they went on many adventures! These are a couple of the pictures my mom texted me during those days. . .





They went shooting, visited Kennecott's mine, spent an entire day at Boondocks, went to a movie and had a blast going to Frightmares at Lagoon.

My kids come home with so many great memories of these times with their grandparents one on one. They get to do things that we don't get to do normally. They get to feel super important. They get really spoiled. They stay up way past bedtime and get lots of treats. They have lots of great conversations with their granny and grandpa. They know that they are loved.

I love that my kids have such a great relationship with both sets of their grandparents. We truly are the luckiest!

Friday, October 21, 2011

Pumpkin Pickin'



  • Stella loved crawling all over those pumpkins. . . she was only happy when left to do her own thing. Lots of energy was used by her 2 siblings in finding her a teeny pumpkin that wasn't green.
  • Lola chose the 1st pumpkin she saw. Then she changed her mind every 10 feet as we walked. At the end, she cried that everyone had a pumpkin but her. She decided that the only way she could be happy in life was if she could have her dads pumpkin.
  • Miles wandered through that patch acting as if choosing the perfect pumpkin was a decision he would have to live with the rest of his life. It was a very big deal to him. We made the rookie mistake of taking him to a VERY big pumpkin patch. We were the last car out of there at dark.
  • Jackson was off on an exciting UEA weekend adventure with my mom and dad. I'm sure doing much more awesome things than this!











Nate's least favorite Halloween activity has been officially checked off the list. Merry Halloween.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

September Birthday Extravaganza

Grandma+Grandpa and Lise+Mike came over to celebrate Jackson and Lola's birthday's with us this year. We had steak and mashed potatoes, Jackson's favorite dinner. I love these 2 birthday kiddos of mine. . . I can hardly believe they are 9 and 5. So grown up!



Jacks invited a few friends to the golf course for his birthday party. They had lots of fun 'putting for dollars', hitting range balls, and then finishing the night at Pizza Pie Cafe with all-you-can-eat pizza fun.



Lola and her best friend Kayte are 1 day apart and have been having their birthday party's together since they were 3 years old. This year they had a gymnastics party at the Sports Academy. They had so much fun running around the gymnastics room, going on a treasure hunt, eating cake and ice cream, opening presents and breaking open a pinata.



These back to back birthdays are lots of fun, but I always breathe a sigh of relief when I make it through September 27th!

Bear Lake

We went up to Bear Lake with my whole family over conference weekend. We had tons of fun times. . .

lots of cuddling with baby Asher. . .



the boys golfed, and the girls checked out the freezing, cold water. . .



and found ourselves a playground. . .












we surprised Tierra with a birthday celebration. . .



watched conference, ate yummy food, relaxed, stayed up way too late, and had so much fun being together.




Thanks Steve and Betty for letting us use the ever-beautiful cabin!

Monday, October 10, 2011

Monday, October 3, 2011

At the Beach


Wow. . . life will not slow down these days!
We have been keeping busy with vacation recovery, laundry, Jackson and Lola birthdays, homework catch-up, Bear Lake, chasing after a busy 10 month old and lots of life thrown in.
But we have been having lots of fun!

One day soon I'd like to write about our fabulously fun vacation to California. We had lots of good times, many cute pictures and such great memories made.

But. . . until I get around to that, I had to post these pictures of my cutest little monkeys at the beach. Is there anything quite like the beach? I think not. Of all the great things we did in California, our beach day stands out to me as impossible to top.

At the beach Miles is in a zone. He can be a little tricky to manage on vacation, but at the beach, I can relax knowing that he will be kept busy for hours. He makes mud balls (an art form he learned from his uncle Joe). He throws mud balls in the ocean. He buries himself in sand. He chases sea gulls. He plays with seaweed and searches for sand dollars. He runs. He does lots of digging and designing. He gets fabulously dirty. And he gets in the water from time to time.

At the beach Jackson spends hours in the ocean. He is drawn to the waves. He loves to go out as far as his mama will let him and try and ride the waves in. He is easy to spot from the shore because of his cute little skinny body. He stays in the freezing California water until his lips are blue and his body is shaking. He comes up where the sand is warm, covers himself in it and lays, content, until his body temperature is back up. Then he heads back to the ocean.


At the beach Lola becomes daring. She is happy to head out, hand in hand with cousin Izzy, and play in the water. Because of her short legs, she hangs back just a little from the rest of the kids. She runs, smiling, back to shore when the big waves start to come in. She searches for seashells and sand dollars. She makes a turtle nest with Izzy and Jackson in the warm sand. She is happy to lay on her towel and relax. She is so pretty standing against the colors of the water and the sand.

At the beach Stella gets to experience something brand new. I love seeing the beach through her eyes. She isn't sure about the sand when we first get there. She doesn't move off her towel. She likes the wet sand but isn't fond of the freezing water. She laughs and hollers at the seagulls. She crawls around for hours searching for treasures to put in her mouth. She is covered in sand by the end of the day and doesn't seem to mind it one bit. She puts a smile on my face as I watch her soak in this experience.