24th of July Celebrations

We have had one CRAZY week. It has been a lot of fun though.

Wednesday the kids and I spent the day at my sister's house in North Salt Lake. We went swimming, played on the waterslide, jumped on the trampoline, sat in the hot tub, watched movies... you name it we did it. Because all that other stuff wasn't enough to wear us out we then headed to the Bountiful City Parade (I'm so sad I didn't have my camera for this). The parade was fun for about the first hour (it was way too long and we ended up skipping out early). Ashlyn loved catching candy and seeing the floats. Tanner drew a crowd when he started dancing to the marching bands. It was a lot of fun and my sister is extremely patient doing anything with me and my two kiddos. Brad was glad he missed out on this event.

Thursday/Friday we headed up to the cabin. Ashlyn was having a moral dilema all day Thursday waiting for Brad to get home from work. She wasn't sure she wanted to wait for him to get home because she was so anxious to get to the cabin before Grandma and Grandpa left. I kept telling her they would still be there when we got there, but she wanted to make sure she got to hang out with them this trip. And hang out with them she did. She had my mom going 90 miles and hour all day. I kept hearing her say, "Grandma, what do you want to do with me now? I'll do whatever you want to do." My sweet mom did activities with her ALL day. They painted rocks, colored, played Bingo a million times, did puzzles, made bracelets and glasses, watched Dora, read books and made a hat. Ashlyn was in heaven. She felt like a little princess and loved all the attention.

Brad and my dad had a great time working on little projects. Brad has done most of the electrical work in the basement and they finished up a few things. The guys crack me up because we think we're going to the cabin to relax, but they can't handle sitting around "relaxing". They ALWAYS have some project or another to be working on (I think mostly it gets them out of kid duty).

I got to be on Tanner duty! He had a riot and actually started really walking up there. I think it helped to have all hard wood floors. He was so excited he could reach the light switches, something he only dreams of at home. He thought he was the one driving the 4-wheelers and got so excited every time we went for a ride. I had fun hanging out with him and trying to keep him out of trouble.

Saturday we went boating with my cousin Tammy and her family. Unfortunately this is the only picture I got of the whole morning because the rest of the time I was hanging my head off the side of the boat... pathetic I know. (I just have a weak stomach and NO I'm not pregnant!) Brad and I had a great time on the tube (we are by no means water skiiers). We couldn't ever talk Ashlyn into trying it out, but she had fun putting her feet in the water and playing on the shore while we were docking the boat. Tanner was a mess for the most part... surprise. He thought it was fun at first watching people being pulled behind the boat, but that lost its novelty and he decided crying was a better option. Next time (if there is a next time) we will leave the kids home and I'll be looking into some motion sickness medication.

Ashlyn holding hands with Kayla and Kylie so they don't fall out of the boat.

We were exhausted by Saturday night and had a great time hanging out with Brad's sister Lisa and her boyfriend Brandon (I'm afraid we weren't very exciting company though). It was a great weekend, and we loved that we got to spend so much time with our families. We feel so blessed to have them close by.

Girls Camp

Phew.... I made it through my first Girls Camp as a leader! I complained and complained and dreaded it up until the minute I left, but like most things, it wasn't as bad as I had worked it up in my mind to be. I was pleasantly surprised, and had a pretty good time.

We have some of the best Young Women in our ward. We have 10 YW and 9 came to camp. I'm not exaggerating when I say we had no problems with the girls. No fights, arguments, or even "clicks." All the girls got along and we had a great time. The bugs were out of control and it was hot, but we survived.... and had some fun and spiritual experiences along the way too.

All of my cute Young Women

Brad was great as usual and took care of everything here at home while I was gone. Ashlyn had a great time and could have cared less when I got home. Infact about an hour after I was home she was already begging me to call her friends to play (she didn't ask Brad once to call them, he had her so entertained). Tanner did really well with Brad while I was gone, but since I've been home.... that is a different story. He has some serious separation issues. It's like he's paranoid if I'm out of his sight now that I'll go missing for 4 days again. It has been a tough week. He cries anytime I leave a room without him, he stopped sleeping through the night and he has just been so clingy and whiney. I pray he gets over this soon!

Regardless of all the trouble Tanner gives me he is still the cutest thing ever! While I was gone he figured out how to take his shirt off, so we keep finding him in the mornings without a shirt... we are hoping it stops at the shirt.

Weekend Getaway

Since Brad and I decided traveling is pretty much impossible with little kids, we decided to have a "summer vaction" sticking close to home. We all probably enjoyed it more than anything else we could have come up with anyway.

We started Friday morning with a day at the zoo.

Ashlyn loved the LlamaAnd Tanner thought the train was pretty fun to climb on, he could have cared less about the animals we passed! After the zoo we headed to the cabin. On the drive to the cabin Ashlyn started telling us everything she was going to do with her Grandma when she got there. She was so disappointed when we told her Grandma wouldn't be there. Usually when we go to the cabin it is total chaos with so many people and kids, or Ashlyn gets to hang out with Grandma doing "crafty"things all day. Brad and I thought it would be nice to just have our little family at the cabin for once (we'd actually get some sleep). Ashlyn wasn't a huge fan of the idea at first, but when once we got there she had a great time even if it was just hanging out with boring mom and dad!

We went on 4-wheeler rides.

We roasted Hot Dogs over the campfire.

It took Ashlyn a few minutes to get brave enough to even sit by the fire. She is terrified of fire and getting burned after she fell on some dutch oven coals last year. Tanner LOVED the marshmallows- he didn't care if they were roasted or not as long as you kept them coming!

Tanner was obsessed with the singing fish. We had to buy more batteries because he pushed the button so many times he wore the old ones out. Tanner figured out how to go down the slide all by himself and loved playing outside.Ashlyn was a little monkey climbing all over the place.We took the kids on a little "hike"... okay it was more of a little walk (they are heavy to carry)!We spent an afternoon at Smith and Moorehouse Reservoir. It was beautiful, and the kids had a blast.
Tanner has to taste everything- including rocks and mud out of the lake. He didn't just taste one rock either, we had to keep taking them away from him. (Not the smartest thing he's done, he had diarrhea for the next two days)
Ashlyn is our water girl. She could careless how cold water is, she will always get in!
The weekend was a hit. We played at the zoo, enjoyed the beautiful mountains, went to Park City for the day too and got some shopping in (Brad was again more successful than I was at finding things) but most important we had fun being together as a family! It truly felt like a vaction.