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It's good to be home. Sleeping in our own beds in our own little house. Enjoying some lazy summer days in own backyard. Catching up on a little weeding and mowing. Playing with our lonely Fred and Duce. Filling up our empty fridge with a trip to the grocery store. And of course time to look through all the pictures from the last few months. Lots and lots of pictures of a very fun-cram-it-all-in summer. We have really enjoyed the places we've seen and friends and family we've spent time with. Now hold on to your hats and glasses 'cause this here the wildest ride in the wilderness...that means lots and lots of pictures.:)

 

Last trip to the Bean Museum before they close it to remodel. In the mean time I'm sure we will all be missing this little guy...

 

Mom let the kids each pick out a little something from the gift shop, this took a good half hour, it seemed to be one of the most important decisions those kids would ever make in their lives.:) Ava ended up with a very beloved lion named Lie and Luke has now framed his own very cool sand dollar. Afterwards we stopped by the BYU creamery for ice cream and fries. It was a really fun afternoon together.

 

Tractor rides!:)

 

I can't tell you how much I love these pictures.

Swimming party at the Heaton's pool.

 

A trip to the Carter Creek cabins before Papa John had to head back to Virginia.

Such fun memories there. I just loved being all together enjoying that cool mountain air and beautiful scenery.

 

First stop was the beautiful Provo Falls for lunch and family pictures.

 

Hiking the loop by the cabins and finding tiny little wild strawberries...oh and getting the crap scared out of me by dad! I was really stupid and watched a creepy Bear Attack documentary with Jeremy the day before we left for the cabins. Bears might have been on my mind when I stumbled upon dad hiding out behind a tree. Unfortunately we didn't get to see any wildlife on that hike because I'm sure my ear piercing scream scared anything away for miles. But we did find some cool tracks.

 

Papa John made the kids snap grass necklaces (or what was that grass called mom? ;)) and the girls looked just lovely in their twig headbands.

 

We played Skip-Bo while dinner cooked. And now that is Luke and Ava's most favorite game ever and it is played at our house after dinner on most nights.

 

We enjoyed a big beautiful full moon on a night hike. 

Jeremy and Luke fishing at Mirror Lake and Papa John and Brittany and a few of the kids out in the canoe. They had pretty good luck this trip, we ate fish two nights in a row.

Ruthy loved Brittany and I love the "little old lady" look Ruthy has in this picture as she holds on tight to those wild flowers.:)

 

 

Hanging out in the camper playing games, watching movies and eating crap.

I stink at throwing horse shoes but Sarah and I did come pretty close to beating Scott and Dad.

 

Happy 4th of July! We had a BBQ with the Barker Family and then came over to to watch Papa John and Uncle Scotty light off the canon and other cool artillery things and the kids battled some tanks.

Ruthy kept track of the matches and didn't mind Papa John holding her for the 10 seconds it took to snap a few photos.

holding cool stuff

Jeep ride with Grandma Barker before the firework show.
... keep holding those hats because there are sooo many more pictures to come.:)

One of My Favorites

I love this picture of the kids with their Papa John on his new pride and joy, an old Ford tractor. Man o man has that Papa John been missed around here...it has been 6 months since his last visit. This time we got some tractor rides in, lots of talk about rocks and rock polishing, a trip to the cabins, canoeing on the lake, lots of fishing and even shooting off the canon on the 4th of July. More pictures to come!

9 months old

I took Ruth in for her 9 month check up yesterday. I really really cannot believe she is 9 months already. I think she seems so little still because she isn't crawling yet. Her doctor said that he's not worried about it, that she'll figure it out when she's good and ready. She just would rather scoot and reach and hover in crawling position but no crawling. She has two cute little bottom teeth now and loves loves loves to eat big people food and her favorite baby food is squash.  She now weighs 16lbs 2oz (I think most of her weight is still in those cheeks of hers.) She loves her Gary the horse, swinging, over the moon, crunching up papers with her hands, going for walks in her stroller, mowing the lawn with mom or dad in her backpack, and looking for Duce and Fred. She says Vvvv (the V sound) for Ava, momma, dadda, and babba. AND I am so happy to report that as of a few weeks ago she is now sleeping through the night! Thanks to some tough love...it only took one weekend and she only cried a couple of times for no longer than 10 minutes each. Why I didn't do it sooner is a very good question...maybe I was too tired to think about it.:) I love when I hear her talking to herself in the morning and I get to peek over her crib and see her little face light up with a big smile. That is one thing I remember about all 3 of my kids, that feeling of excitement to hold them,  like it's Christmas every morning.

Lavender Fields

We took a trip down south to Young Living Farms to visit the beautiful lavender fields last week with some friends. It was amazing to see an ocean of purple and green smack in the middle of the brown desert and it smelled amazing as well. My friend took a few pictures of the kids and then we played around the farm for a little while. We fed ducks and played on the swings and looked at all the animals, they have camels, elk, bison, deer and ponies. It's a pretty cool place. On the way home we stopped at a big red barn and bought fresh cherries and squeaky cheese.

Best Day Ever...again!

 We are starting to see that every day is a "Best Day EVER" kind of day for Ava. It drives Jeremy crazy when she shouts this at the top of her lungs. I think it's pretty darn cute. How would it be to love life as much as this girl does. So here we are biking down the canyon. I wish I had a video but I don't, so you just have to imagine Ava peddling as fast as her little tiny legs will go, on her now too small of a bike, and "Best day ever!" is echoing off the canyon walls.:)

Ruthy enjoyed the ride so much that it relaxed her right into a nap.:)

Best Day Ever!

The words written on the back of our dusty car pretty much say it all.  Our trip out Geode hunting was the best day ever... wait... accept for our blown out tire on the way home...oh and the time Ruth started choking and I finger swiped her mouth and pulled out a big ol' grasshopper wing, which probably belonged to the same grasshopper that owned the leg we found in Ruth's fist earlier during our picnic lunch at Simpon Springs...poor grasshopper never stood a chance...we never did find the body...eeew! Anyway back to the best day ever...we grabbed donuts for our breakfast and filled up the cooler with lots of water and ice and our picnic and our "picks aaand uuumm shovels and rrrrakes":) and headed out.  We followed the old Pony Express road heading west out into the Utah desert, is was a beautiful drive.     Simpson Springs   Cute little Rockhounds  The kids had a great time finding these magical little egg rocks. They filled up their rock bags made by Papa John and Grandma Patsy that they got a few years back for Christmas. It was really fun and definitely worth the drive out.

These are a few of the whole Geodes that we took home and used the tile saw to cut open.

Those sweet little big things

Cute little things like the way Ruthy chews on her toes... ...or how Ava pulls out this little white lawn chair anytime Jeremy is doing any kind of work outside like mowing the lawn or sanding garage doors. She just sits herself down and watches (takes after good ol' Bompy).  ...or the time Luke came home from school with a traced pair of these glasses just for Ava and she was so excited. He is always thinking of her.   ...or when Luke fell asleep in the shopping cart. ...and how Jeremy now has to haul "3 kids" to bed. Luke and Ava used to say "2 kids?" and that meant they wanted dad to carry them both to bed. I'm wondering how long he's going to be able to keep this up.:)   ..or how I can look out the window to see Duce sitting in the yard while Fred speeds by wanting to play and all Duce does is bite at the air as Fred passes in front of him. ... or sweet moments like these...dancing and hanging out with Uncle Scotty.  ...or looking in my rear view mirror to see this. I love them and I already feel the time I have with them as little kids is quickly slipping away. I want it all to just slow down a bit. I could keep going and going. I just never want to forget these little things. I think I started getting a little sentimental one night while we were reading before bed. I was scratching Luke's back and Ava was pulling..err..doing my hair.  It made me think back to when my mom would read 'Little House on the Prairie' to my sisters and I while we did her hair and scratched each others backs. It just doesn't seem all that long ago and I loved those times. Then one evening I was reading 'Stone Fox' to the kids...and we all know how horribly that book ends... I remembered it was sad, but oh my heck, I couldn't even finish the book! I had to pass it off to Jeremy. Ava and Luke just stared at me as I laughed and tried to wipe away my tears. Again it reminded me of my mom reading this one extremely sad horse book to us. We always picked it for her to read and she hated it because it always made her cry and we always laughed at her. I don't even remember what it was called, but I do remember a colt falling down a waterfall because it didn't listen to it's mom and it turned into a unicorn at the end. (Do you remember that book mom?) Anyway, I loved those times we read together and did hair :) and I love it now with my own kids. Right now we are finishing up the book 'Henry Huggins' and it is just the cutest book ever. We call Fred, Ribsy now because of it. Reading together is just the best. It may be just a little thing now, but looking back it's for sure one of those big things. There is one other little thing that is turning into a big thing for me. These stupid white boxes at the end of all my posts!!! They are driving me crazy and I can't figure out what they are or how to get rid of them! HELP!?!