Monday, July 28, 2014

Pioneer Day

We're not big at celebrating Pioneer Day around our house. For the past five years we have gone to Tammy and Bruce's cabin for the weekend, but this year they had other plans, so we had to come up with our own plans. Since we hadn't seen fireworks yet this year we wanted to take the kids somewhere with them. Luckily West Jordan was having their celebration, so we went there. 

We took the kids on a pony ride. Makayla was really excited, but Caden was pretty terrified, as you can tell from the looks on their faces. 



 They had a small petting zoo, so the kids got to see some animals.

 And when the kids are being good, I make them pose in positions that look like they really love each other! (They really are best friends, but sometimes they get on each other's nerves.)

Then we got settled in to watch fireworks. They took a while to get started, but when it was finally going, they were pretty good. I think all of us thoroughly enjoyed our night together as a family. 





 Caden said the fireworks were "too noisy."
Happy Pioneer Day!

Monday, July 21, 2014

When It's Hot Outside...

Just give the kids a sprinkler and they can entertain themselves for hours!



 Then gush over how cute their naked bums are...

That's what summers and private backyards are for, right? :)

Sunday, July 20, 2014

Caden's Big Boy Bed

Since we have less than two months left until new baby arrives, we decided Caden needed an eviction notice from the crib. We took the side rail off the crib a few weeks ago, and he was doing really well (he only fell out of the bed once), so we decided to upgrade him to his very own big boy bed! We took him shopping and he got to pick out his very own sheets. He had so many choices, but finally decided on Elmo sheets. We set up his bed, and Caden was so proud! I just love this picture of my handsome little boy. He is just looking so grown up these days. 



 That night we got Caden snuggled in his Elmo sheets and read him books. He was so excited to go to bed.


Caden loves to tell anyone who will listen about his "big boy bed." If you come over to our house, he will probably take you to his room to show it off. Love my little guy, but I wish he would stop growing up so fast!

Monday, July 14, 2014

Oneida Narrows

Only two days after our trip to the cabin we started packing up for our yearly trip to Oneida Narrows for my dad's birthday. We borrowed Terry and Craig's trailer again and were off. It is always stressful wondering if we are going to get a good spot, or even if we will get a spot at all, but we really lucked out again and got three spots all together. We got up there on Wednesday and got our trailer all set up. It was our night to cook dinner, so we spent Wednesday night getting that ready while the kids played.

The kids each had their own bed in the trailer, and they thought it was pretty cool to go to sleep every night. 


 Thursday we spent the entire day at the lake. All the kids went in together and got my dad a new two person tube. I think all the kids had a blast going on it. Tyler was brave and took Makayla for her first ride on a tube. You can barely see her little head sticking out in this picture.
 Makayla LOVED it! She kept talking about how grandpa pulled her behind the boat. I'm glad she had fun because I was terrified the entire time (since having kids, I am really anxious about the boat, water, drowning, etc. All the kids get a good lecture about wearing their life jackets at all times!)

 Caden hung out with me in the boat while Makayla was in the tube.
 But he just fell asleep after a few minutes.
 All of the kids had so much fun riding on the new tube, and the grown ups had fun water skiing and wake boarding. I wasn't on the boat when everyone else was skiing, so I didn't get any pictures of that, but here's some cute pics of the kids... Hannah was being brave and going without holding on.


 One of the kids' favorite things to do was to play in the sand box and dirt. They could entertain themselves for hours just moving dirt from one section to another. We had to give the kids baths every night because they were so dirty.
 See? Their faces were covered in dirt.


 No, Caden does not have a missing tooth... he just ate too much dirt. Makes me laugh every time I look at it!
 And even though it may look like Makayla is growing a mustache, she isn't.
 On Friday we went to town for dinner for my dad's birthday. Makayla got stickers in her kids meal and decided to put them all on her leg on the way back to our camping spot.

 She was so proud of herself and asked us to take a picture of her.
 We had dutch oven cobbler instead of cake that night, but made sure we still sang happy birthday to my dad.

 My mom was still on crutches after having her bunion surgery about a month ago. She had to spend most of the trip sitting in a chair. We got to spend a lot of time together because I couldn't do much either being 7 months preggo. Hopefully next year we'll be able to go down the river and waterskii with the rest of them again.
 Here's my cute mom and dad with most of their grand kids.
 Not really sure why I took a picture of Darren holding up his pants, but it is a good picture to use as blackmail someday.
 Tyler helped the kids build a fort. They spent hours there just hanging out. I just love that the cousins all play so well together and love hanging out. I'm sure this yearly trip is something they will all remember when they get older.

Some of the other highlights of our trip this year included going down the river, sitting around the campfire, and playing poker with the neighbor campers. Despite getting into a fight with the drunk campers next to us on Thursday night and four dead batteries in our trailer, we had a great trip. It is so fun to spend time with our family every year! We love this tradition and look forward to going again next year... with three kids (I better start mentally preparing myself now!)