The Fathers Day Post

Fathers Day weekend was really great. Friday we got to spend time with Jon's little brother Jared who we don't get to spend much time with. We were so happy to see him and catch up.

The family hasn't all been together for over 11 years.

Sunday we had Jon's parents over for breakfast. The girls really love their Papa.

We had my Dad over for dinner. They sure love their Grandpa Gary.

We got a little crafty (surprise, surprise) with fathers day gifts. We Made t-shirts for the Grandpas and their dad.

We also made stepping stones for my dad to put in his garden, my dad has quite the green thumb. We did hand and foot prints of all the grand kids. They were a lot of fun to make.

So I know everyone says it, but Jon truly is such a great dad. He is always such a great help and never has to be told to help me out with them. They are Daddy's girls for sure. He puts them to bed every night and sings them Daddy Hum Hum. He is so great with every one's kids, all the nieces and nephews and neighborhood kids love Jon. I'm truly a lucky girl to have such a great husband and father. I love you Jon! You're the best!

Swimming!

We managed to go swimming in between rain storms last week. The kids had so much fun. The got to go swimming at our cousins house.


There were lots of cousins to play with and even their great aunt Sherrie.


My girls are part fish.

Too Cute!

I love the next series of pictures. We are really having a great time with our new camera.

Hopefully it will stop raining so we can do this again soon.

How does this happen

This is a plant growing out of the wall in my living room. The thing is, is that this is in the middle of my house. It's not near an exterior wall it is smack in the middle of the house.



I think it's best not to think too hard about how this happens it makes me very scared about the construction of our house.

I can't believe it's been 10 years!

Ten years ago today Jon and I became first time home owners.

The plan when we first bought our house was to only be here for a few years and to fix our house up and buy something bigger and better. Well, we have done a lot to fix up our house and some where along the way we fell in love with our little house.


I don't think the original owners would even recognize their house now. About a year after we bought it a wind storm blew the siding off the chimney at the time we didn't have the money to reside the whole house so we put rock on the chimney instead. About a year later we were able to replace the siding to a much nicer color. We've also replaced the roof and planted many trees. We have done a ton of work on the inside. When we moved into our house we called it the amazing technicolor dream house. Every single room was a different color. We had a Sunshine yellow room (carpet and all), a pink room and mint room, a rust room, a blue room, a peach room and the main floor was a lovely shade of hospital green. Slowly we have redone almost every room in the house including the Kitchen, all the bathrooms (which all were carpeted.)

The best part of our house is of course the location. It is close to everything but still on a rather quiet street. And our neighbors are the best. Any night of the week we can walk out and talk to any of our neighbors. There is always someone to borrow any egg from, help move furniture and we all just generally look out for each other and we have made some really great friends over the years. I don't know how we could ever leave our little house now and I hope we don't have to.
It truly is Home Sweet Home.

Some more horse pictures

I'm sure everyone is sick of seeing pictures of Bri's riding lessons but since I got my new camera I just can't resist posting a few more.

I was talking with a man in our neighborhood who has horses and he told me that horse crazy girls are a good thing because they are so crazy about their horse that they forget about boys. I hope she forgets about boys because we are in big trouble with Miss Bri when the boys start going crazy for her. Honestly, I don't know how I got such a beautiful daughter.

This summer Bri has started taking group lessons. I really love the group lesson. I feel like she gets a lot more out of being in a group.

She just loves being on a horse. The horse she currently rides is named Taffy. She is such a sweet horse. Most all the horses at the stable she rides at are rescued. When they got Taffy last summer she was very very malnourished. The horses at the stable she was living at wouldn't let her eat and you could see every bone in her body. She is looking great now and really is such a sweet horse.

The man behind her is Mike. He is one of her teachers and is so great with all the kids. We are so lucky to have found such a great place for her to ride. My favorite part of this picture is Bri's face. You can she just how happy she is to be out there.

She now rides with out using the pommel. Right now they are working with her on being able to stear the horse with her reigns and to speed up and slow down. She can get her up to a trot and wants to get her up to a canter soon. She really is getting quite good.

I know every kid does it, but.......

I was still so mad!

Carly decided to give herself a haircut Friday night.

My Neighbor Marci came to our rescue and fixed it.

Well sort of. There wasn't a whole lot she could do. So now Carly is sporting a super short page boy look. It's a good thing she is so darn cute.

BFF

When I was 3 years old my family moved from California to Utah. Shortly after we moved in a little girl named Rachel came to our door and asked if there were any little girls her age she could play with.(Or so I've been told) several months later another little girl named Tiffany moved in a few houses away and the three of us have been friends ever since. I have known Rachel and Tiffany for as long as I can remember. Some of my best memories are with them. Hours spent playing Barbies, Playing house between the 3 trees in Tiffany's front yard, making cookies together, almost wrecking my mom's car at the age of 6 when we accidentally put it in neutral and it rolled down the drive way. Late nights playing kick the can or sardines. Hanging out listening to music and wondering what the lyrics "like a virgin" meant. As we got older we all ended up going to different high schools and haven't always kept in touch like we should but whenever we do find our way back into each other's lives we pick up right where we left off.


We were 16 or 17 when this was taken.

Last Summer at Liberty Park.

Tonight my 2 life long friends and I got to spend some time together. Tiffany is living in Arizona and is a wife and mom of one cute little boy. Rachel will soon be moving to California and is a wife and mother of 3 beautiful girls she is also a school teacher. It is so neat to see the different paths our lives have taken and what great women they have become. I'm so luck to have these 2 great ladies in my life. I know that no matter what we will always be Best Friends Forever.

Weekend Fun

Memorial day weekend was always fun when I was young. We didn't go camping or anything like that, but we always made our way down to Spanish Fork to decorate graves. This may not sound like much fun, but some how it was. This year with the recent passing of my Grandma Faye, I felt like I needed to go down there again. We recently purchased a new camera so I had a lot of fun playing around with it and got some really great pictures of my girls.
The cemetery there has always displayed a flag for each veteran buried there.



As a child we would always want to be the first to find the name with my Grandpa's name on it.


They have recently added a War Memorial with each name listed on a wall of honor.

My Grandpa Jack's flag.

Carly and her Grandpa Gary.

After visiting the cemetery we got lunch at our favorite drive in called Glade's. It has been around forever and is a very important part of the tradition. We ate at the local park and the kids had a great time playing with some of their cousins.

I love this one of Bri and her Uncle Rob.

Monday we spent the day at home getting stuff done around the yard. Carly's teacher gave her a Slip and Slid and they had a blast playing in the water.

I'm so glad we bought this camera. It is amazing the pictures you can get with a great camera. And I happen to have some beautiful things to take pictures of.

The Graduate

Last week Carly had her preschool graduation. We are so lucky to have found Miss Marla. She puts on a great little program.

This is all the kids reciting the pledge of allegiance.

The kids preformed several other songs and poems, and for each one they had a different prop to put on. they were so darn cute and they knew it.

This is Miss Marla and the class of 2009. Carly actually has another year of preschool.

Marla asked all the kids what they wanted to be when they grew up and to my horror Carly's answer was, Hanna Tanna. No more Disney channel at our house.

We really are so lucky to have found Miss Marla. She was also Brianna's teacher and we love her so much. She truly loves everyone of the kids she teaches. She seems to have endless patience and I know she loves what she does.
Thanks Marla! We can't wait to come back next year.

Lunch date

Once you have kids it often gets pretty hard to get any alone time with your honey, and Jon and I aren't always very good about getting date nights in. This year, kind of by accident, we started going on a weekly lunch date. Jon works really close to our house and has always come home for lunch, which is something we all love. Carly's Preschool starts at 12:30 so this year, at least once a week, we drop Carly a school and then we go out to lunch. We don't go anywhere fancy. Our favorite place is Taco Time, but it is so nice to eat a meal with out ever having to tell anyone to sit down or beg them to just eat one bite. Sadly today is the last day of preschool so it's also our last lunch date. We'll have to find another time to sneak away.