Friday and Saturday

Friday was our anniversary, but still part of our family vacation, so during the day we took the kids to the living aquarium in Sandy. We LOVED it! It was so neat! The exhibits were awesome! We watched them feed the jelly fish (which are just weird creatures if you ask me) and Brian and I got to touch a sting ray, but Jackson was too afraid to put his hand in the water. But he enjoyed everything else. He even saw a 'nemo' fish in real life! He loved the sharks and the eels and...just about everything. As typical for a toddler, it's hard to keep Jackson's attention on something for long, but at the aquarium, WE were the ones who were trying to pull him away from each display. He just loved to watch, and didn't realize there were other things to look at just a few steps away. It was fun.

Brian took me out to a fancy shmancy restaurant and a movie for our anniversary, and he wrote me a very nice poem (which I won't share because it will embarrass him, although you have to trust me it's super cute). I married a great guy and and very happy to have him in my life these past years.




We intended on going out with a big bang and taking the Heber Creeper Train Ride through Heber on Saturday. It started out as a windy, rainy, cold day so we quickly changed our minds and decided to save that adventure for another day. As the day progressed, it turned out to be pretty nice, so still wanting to do something fun, we took Jackson to get outfitted for a bike. He loves his helmet and wouldn't take it off from the time we put it on in the store until nearly the time we bathed him for bed. So far he just likes to "walk" his bike, but he'll get the hang of it! Especially with Brian showing him the ropes!

Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday

So this week has flown by super fast! I can't believe our vacation is almost over! Today happens to be our five year anniversary (My sister and her husband's sixth anniversary as well- so happy anniversary Carissa and Braxton)! I couldn't have asked for a better gift than to have Brian stay at home and play with us all week long. We just love his company and can't get enough! Although we'll celebrate in style tonight, here is an update of what we have been up to all week:


Tuesday we went to the museum of ancient life (dinosaur exhibit). Thanksgiving Point is doing a promo in August called $2 Tuesdays. The regularly high priced tickets are dramatically reduced to only $2! We thought this would be a great idea....so did everyone else in Utah! Take a look at the line we waited in to get into the museum! (Brian is in the blue shirt by the stroller with our kids on the corner of the building). The line literally wrapped around the building! It went considerably fast, but you can imagine that all those people who were waiting outside, were now inside the venue! It was completely crowded and hard to move around with the stroller inside without bumping into someone, and the kids had very little patience. Although it was a cool idea and fun to do, I'm glad we didn't pay more than 2 bucks! Since we waited in line longer than we had expected, the kids were hungry half-way through the exhibit and so we rushed the second half just so we could get them some lunch and home for naps! We ended up eating a picnic out by the car under some shade trees and headed home.

That afternoon we visited the pool and wore the kids out for bed time. Jackson is becoming quite a good little swimmer and is very daring. He's been experimenting how long he can hold hes breath under water which makes me nervous. But he'll swim to the bottom of the wading pool area and look up and wave at us. He's just so cute! Later, Brian and I went out on date and caught a movie (left the kids with a babysitter of course)!




Wednesday, Brian hiked with some of his buddies up Timpanogos to find a time capsule they buried 14 years ago. Surprisingly (to me) they found it and enjoyed a trip down memory lane, added a few more items and re-buried it to dig up again in another 10 years or so. That afternoon we went back to the pool and had some friends over for a BBQ.






Thursday, we went to library story time and let Jackson pick out some books to bring home. The we headed to the park and had a picnic lunch and played on the playground. Afterwards, we just hung around the house and had a low-key afternoon to recoup from all of our running around.

Today, we are headed to the aquarium and later we'll celebrate our anniversary..so we'll keep you posted!

"Stay"cation

Most families take a summer vacation. This summer, we are taking a "stay"cation. Brian is taking a whole week off of work, which means a whole week to play! With as much as Brian travels, being at home is more of a vacation then going someplace. Plus, we decided it would work out better for our kids to see some close-to-home sights rather than ware them out with long travel plans and must-see's of a trip anywhere else.

We kicked it off with a fun date night up to Sundance with some friends on Friday night. We saw the outdoor Broadway musical, "The Fantastiks," and enjoyed a BBQ but mostly snuggling close together in a big fleece blanket. Although it is August, it felt like Fall...being in the mountains with cooler weather, it was down right chilly!

Yesterday, we had a perfectly fun day! We went out to breakfast with the kids, shopped for picnic items for our lunch, and then took them up to Sundance to ride the lift. At the top we took a short hike to find a beautiful picnic spot underneath some Mountain pines. It was son fun. Zoey was kicking and squealing with excitement the whole time and Jackson could hardly sit still for even a minute to eat. They loved it! Afterwards, we fed some fish in a pond (with potato chips of all things)!We fed a whole school of rainbow trout, which Jackson thought was pretty cool. After a long afternoon nap, we went to the park and had Hamburgers. Jackson stayed up late to watch a movie with us, and we get to do it all again today!

We'll keep you posted on our adventures this week! We have a fun schedule planned for the kids and we are looking forward to doing these things with them too! The best part is that it's all in our "own back yard" so we get to work around nap schedules and things. Everyone's happy about that!

Sumertime

The summer is almost over. We have been busy with the typical summertime activities. Pool. Park. Fireworks. I can't beleive it's already August. It's gone by way to fast!

Here's a little catch-up:

The pool and park:































































Celebrating the 24th of July with my parents:






























































































Brian's Trip to Zion with the Young Men:






























































BBQ with my high school girlfriends...the close group is growing with husbands and children (now 11 children in the group! Zoey is not in the picture):