6.26.16

We spent this past week at Bear Lake for a family reunion. I love getting together with family. I love the fun memories that we make together. I love the late summer nights. I love the game nights and late night laughs together. We have a Taylor family one coming up soon, and next year a Carlson one...I'm so excited for them!

first s'more

sliding way down in her sleeping bag

paddle boarding together

cute cousins

view from our deck

first french braid

swimming time...which included her jumping in for the first time ever!

riding a bike cart thingy

All of us before we're a hot, sweaty mess

 helping dad make mom birthday cupcakes

likely the cheesiest smile we've gotten yet

6.19.16

This post is just a week in pictures...sorry...time. I need more time in the day :)

We have been working on scissor skills. She was pretty proud of herself for doing those zigzag cuts :)

Rain. We love the rain! I love that S loves to play in the rain. That was likely her favorite part of the day. I love watching her dance out in the rain! 

Brett's company had a night at Boondock's as their work party this year. It was fantastic! S had so much fun climbing and jumping in the play area, golfing, playing arcade games, and everything else they had to offer :) It was a pretty perfect family work party. 

jumping

golfing

arcade games

water bumper boats

I love how S just loves to do things with me. This night she was helping me make dinner. She is so much fun!

cooking

I love how much this kid loves letters! In the bath one evening, S totally found the letters to her name and put them all up on the wall on her own! I love how we have taken those opportunities in the bath to do letter games too and make words out of words :)

crazy hair in the tub

My mom had one extra grandkid for a week, plus watched my sister's 3 kids for a few days so we all got together at the Museum of Natural Curiostiy for some fun time together. I love that we have a pass there. It is hours and hours of fun! 

After playing at the museum this cute girl this cutie says to me, "Mom, I want to go to a special eating place with just you can me." How do you say no to that?! I couldn't, so we ended up going out to Costa Vida. 

S has become our photographer on Sunday mornings. I love that Brett caught this picture of her!

S

us

all of us

6.12.16

S loves to call dad on the phone and just talk to him during the day. One morning she found a highlighter that she knows Brett uses to do his work. I love how excited she was! She called him and told him all about it, and was so proud to show it to him when he came home that night.

Brett has talked for ages about wanting a bike. I wanted him to have something that he would love. We have looked, and I have looked on my own. Brett has really short legs so it's a tad tricky trying to find a bike that would work for him. I found what I thought would be the perfect fit based on his height. S was almost as excited as Brett was to unpack this bike. Needless to say she was up a bit past her bedtime helping dad put together a bike. 

Potty training this kid has been quite the long road. We have only put a diaper on her at bedtime and nap time since September. She hasn't really had any accidents since then, but also has refused to go poop in the toilet. She just waits until nap time or bedtime when she has a diaper on....and I am SO over it! So, a few weeks ago we started leaving her in underwear and majorly pushing a sticker chart with lots of treats and rewards involved! This week was huge for her. When she earned that final sticker we immediately went to the store to find the toy she's been pining over. Complete happiness right there, people!

I was cutting up a watermelon the other day and I was excited to share with S one of my favorite memories that my dad did with me growing up. I gave her the end to eat right out of like a bowl. She was in love! Yum!

Brett had to go on a scout camp out on Friday night, so we went to spend some time with my sister, Jessica, and her family. We grilled dinner, the kids played outside, and we had a good chat. S is really lucky to have cousins a bit older than her that are happy to help her with things. They pushed her around in a car, pushed her on a swing, and just had lots and lots of giggles together. 

Jessica and James

coming home from cousins

I love seeing the relationship between these two. I love how she just snuggles in. She places his hand exactly where she wants it. They are such good buddies, it just warms my heart! 

Last, but not least, our weekly family picture. Not too shabby for a photo at the end of church...S's hair was still somewhat intact, which I'll consider a minor miracle!

6.5.16

We ended up having my sister's family come over for a barbeque on Memorial Day. It would've been perfect if the wind had been a little less. Multiple plates were blown over by the wind. With some of our diet restrictions I've had lately we went out on a limb making a non-dairy, no sugar chocolate ice cream. It was SO good. I think we'll have to make it again soon. Scarlett was a fan!

chocolate ice cream

We had some friends invite us to join them going up in the canyon for dinner one evening. It was SO nice. They are new friends to the neighborhood, and it was good to get to know them better...too bad I forgot to pull out a camera.

We took a spur of the moment trip on Friday to go see grandma and grandpa. It was an added bonus that we got to see cousins while we were there too. I feel like we had a picture like this not too long ago with these 4 cute kids. I love that she has so many cousins close to her age!

Avery, Corbin, Scarlett, Maci

Scarlett loves grandpa. It was fun to see them just snuggling together watching a show. They chose to watch Minions. Scarlett really likes that one...largely because Scarlett is a character in it. I, however, am not in love with it for that same reason...I don't want her to love the villain. Maybe that's wrong, but it's just kind of my sentiment.

We ended up going out to dinner for Thai food with my sister and one of her kids. Scarlett and James loved the Satay chicken. What a fun dinner date! The kids had fun together, and it was also some nice adult time!

showing off her chicken

playing with their chicken sticks

We went shopping together for flowers to plant together on Saturday morning. We all helped to pick things out. I love how Scarlett took charge of that wagon and took it everywhere we needed. She's such a good little helper. I love this kid!

And...we can't leave out our weekly family photo!

5.29.16

I need to much better schedule to help me be able to blog regularly. We have had some really busy weekends, and little time to blog, but I am hoping to get better at something regular.

We had these two cans of fun silly string that Brett got S and me for Christmas. We had a lot of fun all playing together and chasing one another with it. S didn't want to spray it so much, but more wanted to play with it once it was out of the container and on the ground :)

S has a huge love of books and had quite a great time reading lots of hers during her nap time. I had to wake her up from a nap one day and was SO surprised to see that she had slept with all of these!

We have taken quite a bit of time the past few weeks getting our garden put in. S loves tomatoes and was so excited to help plant some tomato plants. We can hardly wait the few months that it will take for the garden to be harvested.

While our weather has been nice we have been taking advantage and spending time in the park. We will have to do that more in the mornings so that it is cool enough to enjoy it. 

We wanted to have some fun family time together. Over the Memorial Day weekend we chose to pitch a tent in our backyard. S found it quite fun. We brought out a laptop and watched Toy Story. It didn't end until 10, and S suddenly said, "I sleep in my bed!" We tried to convince her that it would be fun to sleep in her sleeping bag, but she wasn't having it. We gave in, and all went to sleep inside.

pitching the tent

our favorite guy

enjoying our tent

For a family fun time we all went to the Farm at Thanksgiving Point. It was fun to get to see Brett and S enjoy it together. We don't get to go all together often, and really savored our time together there.

riding a pony

wagon ride

 snuggles

my favorite girl

our little blurry family pic taken by S

clear, but silly family pic