Let Freedom Ring!

4th of July is almost as big at our house as Christmas! We have been looking forward to this fun weekend for a long time! We started celebrating on the 3rd by taking our kids to a ballgame and watching fireworks...

On the 4th, I got up early and ran 3 miles, I would have liked to have gone further, but I was excited to get back to our family tradition of 4th of July waffles with red (raspberries), white (bananas and cream), and blue (berries). Our kids favorite way to kick off the day-of-fun!

 We had Braxton, Carissa, Chloe and Parker stay with us this weekend.  Our kids enjoyed having the cousins around, they rarely get to spend much time together! It was great to have them!

After a few hours of swimming, the kids took naps to prep for our huge family BBQ party and late-night fireworks. While they were napping, Brian and I decorated the backyard for our bash. We had balloons hanging from the trees, streamers, flags, stars, and lots of red, white and blue decorations adorning our back patio!

We braided Zoey's hair in a fun patriotic star! We all looked so good in our red, white and blue attire. I wish I had a family picture of us!

  We had tons of people at our house for the BBQ, hosting family and friends and people from out of state coming through. It was so fun. Over 20 kids and 15 adults. It was fun to be had by all. More good food than I could even try and surrounded by the good company of people from near and far...just a perfect way to celebrate the freedoms we enjoy!

 Brian did the grilling...he's the master at entertaining large parties with good food.

 We loved the nostalgic feel of old glass soda bottles kept in a tub of ice. It was a hit for the kids of course.

 All kiddos got a red, white and blue Popsicles for dessert....some got 2 or 3...it's a holiday!

 Grandpa Gray put on a mini firework starter show while we waited to see the big firework display in PG.

 Hanging out and waiting for the show to start was fun in itself. We had glow in the dark sticks, sparklers and cotton candy. It was fun to watch the kids running around without a care in the world and having the time of their lives.

Friends from Texas came to be with us. The firework show was the BEST! Calvin was amazed with them. He laid by my tummy on a blanket and just watched (laughing even once in a while). I enjoyed hearing all the ooh's and ahh's from the other kiddos, pointing out which ones were their favorites! It was such a delightful day. A true party from beginning to end. It couldn't have gone better!

In the words of Jackson...Hooray for the 4th of July!!

Horsing around

On Monday night for FHE, we visited the McCormicks in Ogden. Todd was a mission companion of Brian's in Chile and we get together with our families about once a year. They own some horses and one of their horses had a baby! The kids were so excited to see a two-week old colt. Zoey was a little afraid of the mom horse at first...

 But each had a chance to ride their own horse by themselves. It was a blast! Zoey kept kicking the side of her horse saying, "Go horsey! As fast as you can!"

 Jackson and Eli enjoyed feeling like real cowboys!

 Calvin got rocked to sleep!

It was a fun evening with friends, food, and fun times.

On the way home we were fortunate to narrowly escape a very scary accident! It was nearly 11pm, we were tired and wanted the kids to sleep in the car while we drove home...but our peaceful moment was interrupted! Luckily everyone had seat belts on!

A car a little ways in front of us was following a truck hauling a wooden crate box. The crate box wasn't secured properly, fell off, and hit the hood of the little white car behind it. The car spun of of control, hitting another vehicle and then the cement barrier. We swerved around the crate and slammed on our brakes just in time to avoid hitting any other vehicles and getting hit ourselves. The freeway was pitch black except for a few headlights, so it was extremely hard to see anything at all. Several vehicles were damaged by debris, including ours, so we had to stick around to fill out police reports. Brian hopped out to check the other vehicles to make sure the passengers were OK. Luckily, only minor injuries...a surprise by even the emergency responders! Several cars were totaled and the mangled mess looked like their could have been fatalities! I'm surprised it wasn't any worse.

I'm glad Brian was driving because his fast reactions saved our little family. It was a scary moment and the freeway was completely shut down for half an hour...all 4 lanes were blocked heading southbound. We finally made it home by mid-night, with tired kids and tired parents! BUT at least we arrived home!

When All the World is Green!

Ahh! Summertime!

Of course, our days aren't spent lazily dreaming by a stream watching the clouds go by....as nice as that sounds. We have been enjoying our summer days fun-filled with:

Saturday Soccer games! Jackson's team won the last game!

Summer BBQ'S and corn:

Riding the lift and hiking Sundance:

Some running and racing! I just prayed I wouldn't be dealing with morning sickness that day, but ran a good race...4th in my age division. 33rd Female and 64th overall -- out of 650 runners! Have to say I'm happy with that considering I am 14 weeks pregnant! 

Swim lessons!

Popsicle summer days...we love our sprinkler

We've had a ton of fun so far this summer and can't wait for the rest...hoping to get in some lazy days here and there too :)

Recently...

The challenge of May has been dealing with morning sickness and the desire to sleep the month away, but not having the privilege to do it! We've been busy as ever. None of these pictures deserves a full post on its own, but combined it shows what we've been up to. 

Jackson started soccer this year. We've enjoyed watching him play and learn the game. He got hit once in the face and came home with a bloody lip, but he kept up with it! 

 Jackson and Zoey both had graduation programs with their schools. They are both excited to be done for the year!!

 Zoey has so much sass, I love it! She has been begging to go to a dance class....which I think she'd really enjoy.

Brian sold his truck! It's been sitting in our driveway for the past few months and he finally cleaned it up and listed it for sale on Wednesday night. Within 5 minutes his phone was ringing off the hook! It was sold for full asking price by the morning. Bittersweet moment...

 We found an owl in our tree! A robin tipped me off when it started freaking out, so I thought another bird was trying to raid its nest. When I scoped out the situation, I first thought it was a cat, but realized it was an owl! So cool, I've only seen 2 in my life in natural settings. I'm glad I got this picture of it's eyes looking at me, because it was actually mid-day and the bird was lazy and sleepy and could care less that we were around.

This is our sweet News

A baby is coming! We are excited. I am feeling sick. We are hoping for a girl. The due date is December 18th, but hoping it comes sooner so that we separate the birthday/Christmas celebrations by a few more days :)

Arches Camping Trip

We arrived in Arches with decent weather, but within an hour, it started to look a little ominous. We spent the first night listening to lightning, thunder, heavy rain and lots of wind! The kids slept through it all, but I only got spotted sleep at best. The next morning was cold and rainy, and we had to prepare breakfast under a tarp and eat it in the Bell's trailer to stay warm. 

But by mid-morning, the rain had cleared and the sun came out. We took the kids on a few hikes around the park. We packed in lunch to double arch and had a picnic there, and then took a quick walk across the street to see the "windows" trail. Arches NP has over 2000 arches within the park, but these were the easiest and quickest hikes with the most arches that we thought the kids would enjoy.

We had 14 kids in our group! It was amazing trying to get everybody going in one direction, but they kept each other entertained and made the hiking a little more enjoyable by having buddies to play with along the way. He actually didn't hear too much complaining! And they loved the ham and cheese sandwiches, apples and grapes and goldfish crackers we had for lunch...I think hiking makes for hungry kids who aren't picky :)

The next night was better, but we did get hit with another rain storm. No thunder or lightning this time, which was good...I slept better! As the day before, it cleared out by mid-morning and we took the kids on a pretty difficult hike to delicate arch. It was 3 miles round trip, which is a big deal for these little legs. But they made it!

 Our final stay was in Goblin valley. The weather was much warmer and calmer. The night sleep was the best of the three tent-camping. We played around in the valley of the goblins, trying to make a destination to a cool cave, but our kids were just too wiped to complete it so we turned around to have lunch and pack-up camp.

We wore the kids out with activities. They loved the camping experience but they were equally excited to be back home!

Zoey is without training wheels!

I only have a video of her riding the bike (on her very first try) without her training wheels... so this picture of her daddy putting the wheels back on her bike will have to do.

 She did an awesome job...picked it right up and was squealing with delight! I was so worried she'd fall, but she did awesome!

A week or so ago, Brian took the training wheels and pedals off her bike so that she could learn to balance, coast, glide and turn. Zoey was sooooo angry with him and vowed to give up riding bikes for the rest of her life. Somehow he talked her back into trying it. I am amazed that so soon afterwards, the pedals went back on, and now she's riding on her own!  

Happy Birthday Calvin!

I can't believe it's been a year! He just started walking a couple weeks ago and is a bit wobbly on his feet still.  We were camping in Arches National Park on his birthday, so we did the best we could to provide him with a cake on his first birthday around the camp.

 I think he did the best at being the cleanest one-year-old-cake-eater I've ever seen! I should have used more frosting, but the frosting was cold and didn't want to stick to the soft cake. I think I made more of a mess trying to frost the cake than Calvin did in his attempt to eat it!

Happy Birthday Calvin! We're glad to have you as part of our family! You are amazing :) 

A camping party...

  Jackson wanted a camping themed party. It was really fun to put together, we already had most the props! I made fun signs that read "Camp Jackson" "Don't feed the bears" "Campers report here" and "campfire ahead" made out of cardboard shipping boxes we had on hand.  We had a ton of fun, so I guess it was all worth it :)

We started the evening with a hot dog dinner, complete with chips and juice box drinks! Boys love that kind of thing. I made a fruit tray and potato salad for the adults, who also enjoyed brats over dogs...I was worried about having a real fire and sending a boy to the ER, knowing how boys goof around, so we opted for balloons instead :) It was a hit!

The Grandpa's graced us with their talents of entertainment. Elmo played several fun songs on the harmonica. The boys thought it was cool we had the grandpas there. Grandpa Gray taught the youngsters some cub scout cheers, it was an entertaining dinner!

This was the cake:

 We played camping games like tin can toss, bear tracks (which is played like musical chairs, only I used paper cards with bear tracks in place of chairs), three legged-race, etc...

 The boys made pet rocks and thought it was so cool!

 We had a camp themed scavenger hunt where the boys raced to find items that also doubled as their goody bag treats. Some items were a whistle, a magnifying glass, a flashlights, a few plastic bugs, some treats and a s'more mix.

Jackson has a good group of friends and we had a blast entertaining them!