Picture Dump

Since I need to use my phone as my primary camera for a few weeks, I have been figuring out how it works. And I found that I had quite a few pictures hidden on there. I previously had no idea how to take them off my phone, so they were trapped there, in limbo. Now, they are outdated and not related to anything in particular....perfect for a post of their own.

So, I give you, in mostly sequential order, pictures taken on my phone in the past two months. (Duh, duh, duh.)

First picture EVER taken on my phone was at book group, right after Mother's Day. These are my peeps. I love this group. Sadly, Aubry was already gone and Jessica was on her way out. Boo. But we have added some new fabulous women in the meantime.

Back row: Tricia, Keri, McKenzie, Julie, Jessica, Becca
Front row: Cindy, Maleen, Kari, Trudy

Then the phone was useful to keep kids busy at the doctor's office. My babysitter (June) had some of the kids, so it was just Robyn, Daisy, and me.

Ah yes...good times here. Tyler took me out on a hot date....Dumpster diving. But in case you going to move, DO NOT BUY BOXES. Visit your local retail stores and find the large recycling dumpsters in the back. They are full of gold. Packing gold, that is.

I forgot my camera at the piano recital and Tyler reminded me that I had a phone on my camera. Nifty little thing. All the girls played beautifully.

We will really miss their teacher. She decided to take a break from teaching for a while to focus on her family.

That really means that the kids have been off the hook for the summer, but we will have to get things rolling again when school starts. Know any great piano teachers out there?

One night we took the kids on a walk to see some swallow nests. This pictures does not do it justice. All along under the freeway overpass, there were dozens and dozens of nests. The swallows would fly in and out and sore over the river collecting bugs for the youngins. Amazingly, there are no hovering swallows in this picture.

Here is Pearl at the splash pad. She is just too cute. (At that moment.)

Someone keeps losing teeth. Sheesh. Good thing new ones grow in. I love how ghoulish June looks in this picture.

Oh, and here is Ivory's mother day gift to me. I prayed that I would not kill it (don't die, don't die, don't die)...well, look at this beast.

Of course, it is still planted at the old house and so runs the risk of being pulled out for other landscaping, but I stopped by the neighborhood to pick up something and had to snap a picture. I think there are 16 blooms on it. Crazy.

And that ends our tour of my neglected pictures. I'll see you again soon.

Pioneer Day

Pioneer day is a bonus holiday in Utah; that my husband does not get off from work. I'm not complaining, because obviously lots of people still work on holidays, but I find it ironic that he works for banks and banks ALWAYS get the holidays off. Of course, he works for banks outside of Utah as well, and they are at work today.....so, really, I'll just get over it.

I just like to include Tyler in our family adventures and that doesn't always happen. In this case, there was a new 5K event started this year that will most likely become an annual event. It was called the Temple to Temple Race and the course started at the Provo Temple and ended at the new City Center Temple. (I say new because it is announced, but it is far from finished, as you will see from the picture.)

I thought this would be great practice for the girls since we have Trek coming up in two weeks. And I will not name names, but I think one little girl in particular definitely needs some practice walking around without whining.

We arrived near the race with only minutes to spare. And we didn't even make it up the hill to the start before the people were racing past up. We finally gave up and just entered the flow of traffic. I do not feel badly about this, because I didn't buy a timing chip, so there was no need to pass through the gate. And we let all the fast runners go by. But there were thousands of people and I wasn't going to sit there and wait for everyone to pass. Here is a shot from the sidelines. (See, you can see the starting line up there. Almost.)

And I had this idea that I would take a picture of the kids in front of each temple, but that went out the window in the crazed throng of people. This is the best I got. (Be impressed. I am still getting used to taking pictures with my phone, since the camera is still in ID.)

We walked the whole time since I was strolling the littles. All the volunteers were missionaries so we waved as we went. There were landmarks they posted along the way, like Council Bluffs, and Fort Something or Other, but I didn't stop to read the signs. McKenzie and Adi came with us, so we had a good time chatting along the way. The weather was perfect, all overcast and cool. Seriously, it was a very nice walk. I'm a little worried for my wussy child who was struggling.

We crossed the finish line at 56:00. I turned around to snap a picture of the finish line.

And then we got the after picture. Kind of. You can see the unfinished temple in the background. The spires aren't on yet.

Then it was mandatory to go get Jamba Juice, because we all deserved it. (Some of us more than others.) Delish.

See, there is Miss Adi.

And don't forget these gorgeous ladies.

We had a great time hanging out. I love going out with the girls.

 And it is fun to have friends along as well. Love a gaggle of girls.

Happy Pioneer day. We plan to finish the evening with ice cream, friends, and fireworks. It is a good day to remember those who came before, and celebrate.

Missed the Blogoversary....AGAIN

Yep, still terribly behind on everything. But I have a good reason. Sort of.

See, that HUGE news I was going to share last time?? Well, we are moving. Again. This is a great thing. We found a new place to call home and it should fit our family quite nicely for many years to come. But that means that instead of things settling down, they are right back to being ultra busy. We have inspections, and appraisals. We are on the other end of these procedures this time, but there is still time and energy required.

Then I have to take quick trips up to Idaho to appease the unrequited love of a girl for her dog. We just got back from a jaunt up there, in which we gorged ourselves on delicious raspberries from Grandma's garden, loved on Moxy until she was about to pop, and then promptly forgot my camera up there. So...no pictures. Yet. And I will be forced to figure out how to download pictures from my phone if I want to keep up at all.

But because I am so behind on everything, there are plenty of pictures in the vault that need to be documented. And since we won't be staying in the cat pee house for much longer, I should probably get pictures of the rental on here pronto. Of course, I only have pictures of the kitchen/dining area, so that is what you get today.

Kitchen: Much smaller than my last kitchen. I don't mind the layout...I just miss all my cupboards.

Dining Area:

The Space between them: Also known as the home of my computer. It is handy to have it right there.

View from the Front Door: The light wasn't right, but this is taken from the sitting room, by the front door. Sorry I don't have pictures of the sitting room.

Oh, and my awesome silverware clock that Deanne got me. It is perfect for the kitchen.

The rest of the rental will have to be documented later.

And to answer some questions that may be swimming in your heads:

-We will move at the end of August, but not before school starts.
-The new house will be in the same school district as before and the kids won't even have to move schools. Huzzah!!
-The new place is about 3800 square feet. Plenty of space, so we won't be crawling all over each other.
-Only five bedrooms, so two will still share. But sharing is good.
-Big kitchen, small yard. I am happy with both.

If I didn't answer the question that is foremost on your mind, let me know. I'm happy to send more info your way.

Visitors

This last week was so fun. And busy. I have some HUGE news that I'm not going to tell you right now. Because I am mean like that.

Instead, I'm going to post some pics of some people I love.

I got to hang out with Sarah again, happily. And sadly, because she is moving. But even living near her for a moment was great. And because of her, I got to meet all her great sisters somewhere along the way. Including Abby who was in town visiting this last week. I feel like I have accomplished something great getting to know these ladies a bit more.

p.s. That picture reminds me of snakes, but you had to be there.

And the kids had a good time too. I love this huge web creation. Ivory is pretty proud of herself up there at the top.

And Sarah introduced us to a place in American Fork whose main course is Grilled Cheese. Possibly the first restaurant ever where none of the kids complained about what was on the menu.

We had some other visitors this week as well. Camille and Eric came back to visit and stayed with us. I now have a new definition of friendship. True friends are those that come stay with you in a house that smells like cat pee. When you are just walking around, it isn't too bad, but after the first night, in which they slept in the family room that houses quite a stench, Camille got up in the morning and said, "Yeah, you really can smell that."

I felt so bad that they had to endure that, but at least their boys slept in a clean room. They brought their littles with them, and although it was a little squashed in the house, I wouldn't have it any other way. We barbequed and played at the splash park. We had a great evening chatting with the girls at GNI, and we bought Eric a new game for his birthday (King of Toyko) that we played many times.

The boys were so cute. Pearl was quite smitten with Carter. (She adores babies.) She tried to be soft, but some of her affections just knocked him over. Literally.

Cannon was one busy little guy. He emptied cupboards and kept us busy. He said 'thank you' in the cutest way. And even June had a hard time capturing him.

She was taking pictures for us the last day. Check out these of Carter.

And then we got the whole gang....minus some kids of course. We miss you guys already.

Tyler just downloaded pictures from his phone of the splash park, and I am way too lazy to go put them back where they belong in the text. So you can see them here at the end. It is such a fun park. The kids love it. And it is conveniently just a few minutes from our rental. See, something good about the rental. I knew there was something.
 

Cul De Sac of FIRE!!

It just so happens that the neighborhood we moved into goes all out for the Fourth of July. (Actually, they might for the other holidays as well and we just don't know.) We were warned invited in advance, and since the festivities were just down from our house and the fireworks were practically on our front lawn, we figured we should go.

I gathered that some guy named AJ organized the whole thing, but clearly a LOT of people had helped and donated to the cause. There was a soccer game going, and giant twister which you can see here. (But I never did see anyone play that.)

There were hot dogs and drinks and pot luck side dishes. My kids are always excited for have a soda. (Their mom is so boring about drinks.)

Kids were everywhere riding bikes and scootering around. Robyn is still digging her rollerblades, and she isn't too bad on them. Although I still make her wear the gear.

The best part, I thought, was the side walk chalk art. I heard families could claim their own section and draw art. I'm surprised more people didn't participate, but my kids sure did. Robyn made a winking panda and a skateboard above.

Ivory made a flower (which Dad missed photographing). Daisy helped me with this heart.

I also made a 'Cazier Turtle'. We call ourselves that in our family sometimes to let the kids know that we take home with us. My drawing actually inspired Tyler to make a really cute design for a T-shirt. I hope it prints some out for the kids.

June was pretty serious about the chalk art.

She had three pieces:

And it was nice to see that there was another guy who was pretty serious as well. I believe Cory was the first guy there working on his piece nice and early. This was his second one....Wolverine.

But my favorite was his Native American Batman. So cool.

Pearl helped a bit, but she was easily distracted by things like bugs.

Oh, they also had face painting, but I have rules about what kind of paint is acceptable. Robyn was the first one to ask. I surveyed the selection and it was all craft paint. So, we skipped it. I didn't feel like peeling off the peach fuzz on their faces later.

You can tell from this picture that they waited until it was nice and dusky before starting. Daisy's bike does have some issues, but she might get a new one for her birthday. (Don't tell.)

The guys built a fireworks arena. They had two large shields and they would alternate lighting fireworks.There was hardly any delay between bursts.

Most people lined up on one side of the neighborhood away from our house. We naturally sat in our front yard. However, the wind was blowing our direction so all the shrapnel came down on us. It wasn't too bad. Just the occasional debris falling on our heads. The fireworks were literally bursting right above us. I have never been so close.

Pearl unfortunately got a chunk in the face. It was some of the clay insulation from the fireworks, but really it was like a rock falling out of the sky. It scraped her cheek a bit, and she was done with the show. It was past her bedtime, so I took her inside and we watched explosions from her window until she fell asleep. Then, we took two more to bed before the show finished. (Convenient that we were right there.)

The show lasted for almost an hour. It was the craziest thing ever. I have never seen a neighborhood put on something like this. I'm glad we went. Although it would have been hard to ignore even had we been inside.

Tyler tried his hand at taking pictures again. They are less blurry than last year, but still not quite what he wanted. But I enjoy naming them and displaying my favorites. Here are the winners this year.

Lightbulb Blossom

Fiend Without a Face (That's for you Dad)

Dandelion Explosion

Cosmic Sunburst

Confetti

Green Lantern

All in all, a fabulous celebration. We are still cleaning up the yard and finding debris in random places. But I'm not complaining. It isn't everyday you have Stadium of Fire in your Cul de Sac.