Summer Games...

I love when my kids invent games to play. The kids found a pair of walkie talkies and have invented a spy game. When I walked into the living room after about an hour, Maxine was dressed like this:

I asked if she was a ninja but she said she was just a regular spy. I heard them saying things like, "Get back to HQ! We have to get the bad guy!" Rock on summer.

Flying high for #12

For our 12th anniversary, we decided to go on a helicopter ride! A place opened up in our little town that offers helicopter rides for $29! It was probably 5 minutes but so cool! If we hadn't taken all the kids, we could've gone for longer but it was totally worth it! Julie and Jack were pretty scared at first but both said it was fun. Maxine said it was the most amazing thing she's ever done!

Merril and Jack taking off!

View from the helicopter while I was riding with Maxine and Juliet.

Family pic in front of the helicopter!

We figured we better hurry because we just don't see a business like that staying around long term. They take off right from state street! How nuts is that!? Wahoo, we had a great time!

Juliet's 5th birthday!

Father's Day was epic because it was also our 12th wedding anniversary and Juliet's 5th birthday!

I love Juliet, she has so much cute personality. I can't believe it's time for her to start Kindergarten.

It was her year for a family party. She also went out to breakfast with Merril this morning because she couldn't go out for breakfast yesterday (Sunday).

I also arranged the pictures differently to accommodate Mikayla's picture. I'm loving it.

Swim team!

Maxine joined our local swim team this summer and swims every day for an hour and 15 minutes. She loves it! We had a swim meet on Saturday. Here she is in the bull pen, waiting to race.
She competed in the 50 meter backstroke.

She also did the 50 meter freestyle and the 200 meter medley relay.

We cheered her on from the side!

Mikayla was a good girl the whole time! She played and then fell asleep without a fuss.

While waiting between races, we got bored.

Merril went early to set up our shade tent, which was awesome. While we were there, this girl that I don't know set her chair under our shade tent, sat down without a word, and proceeded to text for 2 hours. So weird. She sat in between me and my friend Sara G., so I was talking over her to have a conversation with Sara. When my friend Val showed up, Sara had the courage to politely ask her to move, which she did indifferently. (She moved her chair under another shade tent that didn't belong to her. I saw the people move her chair out when she wasn't sitting in it.) The whole thing seemed surreal. We still had fun!

Down by the river...

Hey, we went to the river today! It was close to the house and reminded me why I love the river! I remember ditching school and floating down the canal.

Maxine swam against the current a lot and basically stayed in the same place the whole time.

Juliet didn't get in the water a ton because it was hard for her to get on the sand bar. Maxine had to piggyback her to the sand bar, which she did repeatedly.

I wore the wrong outfit but didn't think I'd be in the water that much. I was wrong. My jeans were wet up to mid-thigh. Juliet wanted me to get her to the sandbar but I stopped, worried I'd get my phone wet. Maxine took over for me.

Mikayla spent most of the time under this FABULOUS tree, asleep in a chair covered with towels.

Jack drove cars in the sand and splashed in the mud. He drank Kool-Aid and acquired one of those red mustaches that takes a week to disappear.

Wahoo summer!

Getting stuff done on a Saturday...

I was working on a sewing project this morning and when I checked on Mikayla, she was asleep. She tends to fall asleep without a fuss. One minute she'll be awake and the next she'll be zonked out. She was chewing on this red fabric until she fell asleep. She likes to sleep on her side.

I could eat those cheeks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

While I was sewing, Merril was pulling apart a little dirt bike engine. Apparently an engine running at optimum performance doesn't leave all that black stuff on the piston. A new piston is on the way.

End of school!

Jack had his Kindergarten program. He sang cute songs and graduated from a grade that's not required for a diploma. Wahoo!

Maxine did really good on her end of level testing and won an iPod. She's ecstatic!

We've been loving summer so far but I'm committed to an established reading and writing time every day. Jack's penmanship could use some polish. Wahoo!

Cool Solar Eclipse!

Yesterday was the annular solar eclipse. Thanks to my sister-in-law Emily, we had cool solar eclipse glasses that made the eclipse look like this:

Our area was perfect for viewing the eclipse! We saw a perfect ring in the sky! FYI: Annular comes from a latin word meaning "little ring." I kept looking through the glasses and thinking, "That's so cool!" The kids thought it was awesome too. It was dim outside even though the sun was high in the sky. The eclipse started around 6:30 p.m. and peaked around 7:45 p.m. We watched it until the moon had moved off again. I thought it would mainly impress the kids but I found myself really excited too! I guess you're never too old to think celestial events are cool.

Breaking stuff...

So last week our freezer door broke. Not the actual huge door of the freezer but the little door that closes after the ice comes shooting out of the ice maker. It wouldn't stay in place because of this:
This happy monkey (reusable ice pack) caused the demise of my little ice door. Instead of being returned to its shelf in the freezer, just above the ice chute, it fell into the chute.

Not knowing this, the next time we got ice, it built up behind the monkey and pushed so hard on the ice door that it broke.

Things like this bother me. I think to myself, maybe it's something dumb that I can fix. So I pulled it apart. A plastic clip that holds the ice door in place had busted and they don't sell a replacement part for it anywhere. Urg.

So Merril stepped in and engineered a new way for the ice door to work. He had to drill a hole and used a longer screw and some nuts and voila!

Wahoo! Ice door works again! Now my kids can get ice and water without my assistance again!!

This is my other project! A dresser for Maxine. I've sanded the whole thing. It's not a nice dresser, just one of those fake wood types. But it had been painted over and then attacked by little kids with a million stickers. (Not my kids, the dresser was given to us.) So I sanded it down to the fake wood and found new pulls on Ebay for $1.50 a piece! (That's a super triumph because the holes on the drawers aren't a standard size and special sizes can be very expensive!)

The light under our microwave/hood exploded and messed up the control board on the microwave. So no more light under there. I checked and a new board is $200! I'd rather just turn on my overhead lights in the kitchen. The microwave still functions perfectly, just no extra light underneath.

Wow! Can you believe what sleeping all night long can do for a person!? LoViNg iT!

Out at the sand dunes...

So we decided to go roast marshmallows out at the sand dunes on Saturday. We took off in the Scout and the Tahoe. We took the slow way, up a rock crawling trail called the West Rim. Mikayla was really good, as long as the Tahoe was moving. When we stopped, she wasn't interested in staying in her carseat. It was super windy and we tried to find a place that was protected to build a fire. We sort of found one but it was still windy. Here's Merril, goofing around in the Scout.

Mikayla was wrapped up and carried around by the kids.

Juliet played in the sand.

Jack played with his friend James, not pictured.

We stayed until the moon came up.

And even though it was windy, we had fun! (Juliet is so blurry in this one.)

We had fun until it was time to go. We took the sand dunes home and I had sooooo much air in the tires that it made it difficult to get the Tahoe to climb sandy hills. I got stuck at one point and we let some air out. Tried again to get out and still couldn't manage it. We tried to tow the Tahoe out with the Scout and that didn't work either. After about a half hour of attempts, I tossed Merril a tire gauge and said, "Can you check the tires, they seem like they've still got way too much air." He checked them and said, "We still have 45 lbs! I thought we were way lower than that!" So we let out more air until there was 15-20 lbs of air in the tires and drove right out. I feel bad for our friends in the open air Jeep because it was windy, cold and 11:15 p.m. by then. We were all ready to be home in bed.

Is it weird that I still thought it was a good time?

Piano recital...

It was time for the Spring piano recital and Maxine did great! Soon she'll be better than me. She already knows way more about theory than I do.


Here she is with her amazing teacher, Sara!


I want to take some pictures of Mikayla this week because she's 3 months old! I was testing the lighting in this shot. I can't believe how the time has flown!

She loves fans...

I was hoping not to post another picture of Mikayla because I feel like that's all I've done lately but here she is again. She's looking up at the fans. Ceiling fans really make her happy. :) She'll smile and laugh at them. She coos and talks all the time too. If I never get anything done, it's because I'm making silly faces at my baby all day, trying to get her to talk to me.

On another note, she's continued to sleep all night long. I thought that she didn't make it this morning. 6 a.m. looked a lot like 2 a.m. After checking the clock and noting the time, I gladly got up to feed her and go back to bed. We all slept until 9 a.m. after that.

Mikayla's been so good lately, we even went to the temple last night. We just did sealings and Grandma C. watched the kids for us. It was good times.

Boxes of clothes...

Okay, I'm not a hoarder but I like to hang onto my kids' clothes when they grow out of them. Maybe it's because they represent a sizable investment, who knows? I've just pulled out clothes that don't fit my 4 kids. Mikayla has grown out of practically all her pjs and I looked for a new box of clothes. I have a box of girl 0-6 month and it was depressingly empty. So I figured I'd have to go get some new pjs for her. As I was moving the boxes of clothes downstairs to the clothes storage room (it'll be the downstairs laundry/hvac room someday), I found a box marked "girl 3-9 month." It was STUFFED full of cute baby girl pajamas and outfits for the summer and winter. It feels like a huge blessing. I love free clothes for my kids.

All Night Long!!!

Last night, Mikayla slept from 9:30 p.m. to 6:45 a.m! I fed her and she went right back to sleep. It's 9:45 and she's still sleeping. Wahoo! She's taken the longest to sleep through the night at 2 3/4 months old. It feels wonderful for me! I got up and got the kids off to school and had a shower before 8:30 a.m! Then I did the dishes and even have time to blog about it! Wow, I forgot what it feels like to be productive. :)

I pulled this picture off my camera the other day and kind of like it. Not sure why. It feels like being in a dream or sleeping in late on Saturday, very peaceful. Sometimes botched photos are my favorites.

Falling behind...

I used to be pretty vigilant about posting to my blog right as things happen.  Now it seems I can barely drag my camera to events to even take the pictures because I'm back to hauling strollers and diaper bags.  I want to start carrying my little point and shoot Canon around again so I stop missing things.  I need some new rechargeable batteries first.

Luckily, I can post date things so they still appear in chronological order, something very important to me.  Something that has also fallen by the wayside is my garden.  It has become taken over by a morning glory-type weed called bindweed.  I've sprayed them 3 times and they just won't die  Urg.  So I've decided to abandon my big garden and just use my small North-side grow box for veggies this year until I can get the weed eradicated.  Maybe I'll be able to do a Fall garden.  Other than that, we're just looking forward to summer!  Can't you feel it coming?!?

We've turned a corner...

Things have been running smoothly in regards to Mikayla!   She's 2 1/2 months old.  I took her off the Zantac because I didn't feel like it made any difference and she's really seemed so mello lately.  She's happy and content!  Wahoo!  She smiles and coos and still has crazy hair!

She's sleeping better at night too!  She'll go from 9:30 p.m. until 4:00 a.m., eat and go right back to sleep.  It's not all night but it's enough to make me feel human again.  She's hardly slept in her swing the last few weeks and will sleep in her crib fine.  Yeah!  We love her so much!

Juliet can ride her bike!

I went to Walmart the other day to get some buns for dinner.  I was gone maybe 10 minutes.  Before I left, Merril was putting new tires on Juliet's bike.  When I got back, Merril was running up the street behind Juliet.  They'd taken the training wheels off her bike and away she went!  (Don't you love the super protective gear she's in?  To contrast, Maxine had a helmet, gloves, good shoes, and pants when she learned to ride.)

Merril said he ran behind her and held onto the seat for 10 feet and she sped off.  He tried to catch up but she already knew what she was doing and didn't need him anymore.

The kids have been riding bikes like crazy ever since!

She's learned faster than any of the other kids but she's more adventurous than they are.  Always has been.  Afterwards, we went to the lake.  :)

Splendid breakfast and my 2 month old...

This morning I thawed some pancakes, poured some blueberries over the top and and added a little cool whip (because it's dairy free) and some syrup. I sat by the window and ate my breakfast and looked outside at the beautiful morning. Breakfast was wonderful. I read an article in a magazine yesterday regarding things in life that are worth the time. Taking time for a great breakfast was one of them. I love breakfast and often eat it looking out the window but decided to really spruce it up this week.

And Mikayla is 2 months old today! She sleeps in the swing a lot. She still doesn't seem all that comfortable, even though she's on Prevacid and Zantac. Oh well. And her face broke out like crazy a week and a half ago but is starting to clear up.