Camping at Pine View

We have great friends in our neighborhood, and it feels like forever since we have seen them. This weekend a bunch of us got together for a quick camping trip. Friday night we loaded up and went to Pine View. Porter and Trace had a blast playing with all their friends, and Chad and I had fun laughing and talking all night. Saturday we woke up and headed down to the beach.

The boys on a Bat Hunt!

Mabey we are keeping Trace awake too late?? He was so tired.
Fun in the water and sun.


Ryan, one of our friends has this great paddle boat... The kids had a blast taking it out and back.

Lunch with Grandma and Grandpa Great

On Wednesday my Grandma invited me and the boys over for lunch. We love to go spend time with them! Grandma fixed some fry bread with the best homemade jams... Porter and Trace love to go see them because they always give us a thing of root beer and Porter some cheese. This time they fixed us up a few extra things... Rasberry Jam, Black Berry jam (which is the best thing we have ever had, infact, it is almost gone already), pudding, and yellow squash. It's good to have people you know love you no matter what!

CABIN

Okay, so i was a little camera happy this weekend... lots of fun, with way too many pictures.

My family all had this weekend planned to go up to Grandpa Lee's cabin. Last year we were all able to go up, but this year was a hard weekend. My brother Shayne's boys all are really busy with football, so they weren't able to come at all. Danny and Tash had to work so they missed out on most of the fun too. (Danny came up for a few hours on Friday before we got there) Dusty and Kelsey came and stayed the weekend with their dog Buela. Since we had such a small group, on our way up to the cabin we decided to invite our good friends, the Garners. Last min. they packed their bags and joined us Friday night!

The cabin is one of my favorite places to go in the summer, because it is beautiful, relaxing, and usually cooler. My boys love to spend time in the mountains. Add all of this with Grandma, Grandpa, and Uncle Dusty and Aunt Kelsey... They know they are in heaven.

As always, after the sun comes up in the morning it gets warm enough for a swim in the freezing river. Porter, Hunter, and Chad were the only ones willing to jump in from the bridge. Dusty and Trace taking a brake from all the tubing.
Porter loves playing with his Daddy. If Chad tells him something is cool, he is usually game. This trip they snorkeled under the bridge and saw some big fish.



Trace and Samantha playing by the river... I'm afraid this might be the beginning of a love story!!
Chad was able to sneak away a few times for some bow hunting. Most of the time Porter snuck along. They love being together!

Catching "Bowl Head" Fish. Porter said that they are called Bowl fish because they are small enough to fit in a bowl... Pretty clever!
Seriously, Trace LOVES his grandpa!! He is my dad's little shadow. If "Pa" goes outside, Trace goes outside. If Pa goes anywhere or does anything Trace follows. They are great buddies. They floated the river, looked for shooting stars, played by the river, built fires, roasted marshmallows, and played and played! Trace's Hat Show...

The only bummer of the trip were the HORNETS. They were everywhere. I've never seen so many in my life. Trace was the first to get stung. I felt so bad for him. He acted like he was so sad that they would hurt him... What did he do to them? (besides trying to catch them?...) Porter and i both got stung too, and I can't believe how much it hurt. In fact my sting is still bugging me. It made me feel even worse for both of them knowing how stinking much they hurt!


And after an exhausting weekend... Trace was pooped!

Trace...

My two year old is pretty hard to understand still... in fact, neither Chad or I can tell what he is saying unless we are looking at what he wants, but he is trying lots of new words. It's so fun hearing him try to put more than one of these "non-understandable" words together. On Sunday we were at my parents for dinner with my two brothers. Trace loves playing with both of them... He was trying to get Dusty's attention and I heard him say: "usty, mmm, on" (meaning: "Dusty, Come on."). Pretty clear for his usual ramblings. I smiled. Yet again a proud mom.
Today I got out some licorice treats for the boys and Trace started begging: "Trea-eat, Trea-eat". (all of his words have two syllables). I ask him if he wanted one or two, and he kept saying: "uh-unch". After about 22 times of him repeating the same thing over and over (which he does all the time, and gets very frustrated that we don't know what he is talking about) I realized that he was asking for a bunch! Laughed for at least 5 minutes.
Just before bed Porter and Trace were jumping from the couch onto the ottoman. Porter kept moving the ottoman farther and farther back. One time Trace jumped and landed just in front of the ottoman... pretty hard. He looked up at Chad and very surprised said, "O, mi-issed, aw-wh." I'm laughing about this one as I'm typing it. Kids are too much fun!

Family Reunion... Again.

Well I think this will be the last family reunion for the year. It seems like every Saturday we have been heading off to a family picnic... but who can complain when their family is so much fun to hang out with??


This weekend was Grandpa Lee's family so it was a little extra special. For those of you who don't know Grandpa Lee... Grandpa Lee is Chads mom's Dad ( did you follow?). He passed away this past spring, and we will always miss his hugs, smiles, and all the fun times we had with him. Anyway, we had a good time, with lots of good food. Do I talk about food all the time?? I do more than just eat -PROMISE! One of Grandpa's brothers has this tradition of filling big inner tubes full of water until they pop. Both my boys were a little hesitant about playing on it, and even though i knew they weren't going to be happy when it popped and they got soaked with cold water, I kept talking them into playing on it. I know, I'm probably the meanest mom around. I felt bad when, just as I predicted, they both were crying and scared to death. Here are a few of the pictures.

Janet was in charge of the kids games this year... The kids always have fun playing with all of grandma's toys. She had them playing bunny tails, tug of war, Frisbee's, and even playing with a parachute. Over all it was a great reunion.

Wild Girls

Maybe a little too wild.

Every summer/fall Chads sister and sister in laws, and his dad's side girl cousins, all get together for some fun girl time in Park City. When I say fun "girl" time, I mean it. We all act like we are in Jr. High School... but we have soooo much fun.

This year we ate at a small pizza place that was really good. I think the name of it is the red banjo pizza. After dinner we went for a ride on the Alpine Slide... In the dark. Before we headed down the lady working said that they are much faster when it is cold, ( and it was a little chilly) so to be careful. I asked if any one had fallen off that night, and she said, "not tonight, but there were a few during the day!" Yikes... I started to think that a pregnant girl probably shouldn't be doing this, but to late for that. It was a blast.

That evening we played games, ate treats, and laughed our heads off! It was 3:30 in the morning before we decided to call it a night... and we all know I'm usually not the best night owl.

Saturday morning we ate breakfast at McDonalds (looks like the starting of a tradition). Then we went shopping at the outlets for the kids. It was such a fun weekend.

Chad was off trying to shoot a big buck with his bow, so my mom kept the boys. They had a blast as always. Chad didn't get one, so lucky for me, there will be more hunting to look forward too... wish him luck!

Swimming Lessons

Porter finished his swimming lessons on Friday. We put him in private lessons that lasted one week. It was so good for him to be in the water everyday. Two of the days we even swam after swim lessons. He is awesome. This week they worked on his front and back arrow, front and back crawl (which he is getting pretty good at), back floats (he floated on his back with out help for 1 1/2 min!), and they even started teaching him the breast stroke. I loved watching him get more confidence as the week went on.

Chinese Chickens

The other night we were watching the Olympics, and the girls were diving. When the Chinese team was up, Chad said: "Des, look how small these Chinese chicks are."

Today we went to lunch with my mom, and she was asking Porter about all the different parts of the Olympics... Gymnastics, Swimming, Volleyball, and Diving. Porter said: "Grandma, can you believe those Chinese chickens? They are sooo little... and they can do flips and twists."

I laughed.

Tiff's Party

Our friend Tiff always throws the most fun summer party, and this year was no exception. She does everything up so cute, and leaves out nothing. We had a fun Bar-B-Q that was so yummy with home made onion rings! Then we went swimming... I love to watch Porter swim. He has turned into such a little fish this summer. He jumped off the diving board and went down the slide (without his life jacket on). He just swims all over. After the swimming, the kids had fun with a pinata. Lots of treats. Thanks Tiff for the best summer party ever.





Oh, and did I forget to mention ICE CREAM??

Father/Son Camp Out

Friday night was our stakes Father/Son's Camp out. I've decided that having all boys will have many advantages! Chad took both boys with him, and lucky for him, my Dad went up with them too... The boys had tons of fun playing with Dad and Grampa. I spent the day Friday getting everything they could possibly need ready for the night... but some how forgot the most important thing of all. THE BINKY!! They survived a long night without it, and still had fun. As for me, I enjoyed an evening alone! I finished reading "Breaking Dawn"... Loved it!

Karate

While we were in Pirates cove, we missed Porters belt test. Friday was the make up test... and Port was so ready for it. He is now a GREEN belt. He's getting so good... I can't believe him!

HOT, HOT, HOT!

and still more HEAT, but...

was sooo much fun!!!

Friday was stake Lagoon day... so we decided to endure the heat and have some summer fun. We were so excited that the Miles wanted to have some fun too! Porter, Preslie, Trace and Mayci, all had such a great time. After the first couple hours we headed to Lagoon-a-beach to cool off. It was a little bit of a disappointment, but it sure did cool us off!

We spent the whole day playing and riding rides. After we rode all the rides in kiddy land, we headed off to Pioneer Village. Trace and I could even ride some of the BIG rides. We rode rattle snake rapids, the log ride, and the Tidal Wave. Porter and Chad rode a few of the REALLY BIG rides too. White Roller coaster, and the Bat. The bat is still Porters favorite! We couldn't talk him in to Wicked or Collosus this year... Maybe next year!

It was also mine and Chads seven year anniversary! I love you honey. Thanks for the best 7 years of my life! It's Crazy to think of how much we have been blessed with over the past years. I love our family so much.

On Saturday night we got away from the kiddos for a couple hours to watch the Hulk. It is really good. I love spending time together... Thanks again for such a fun weekend.

Cherry Hill

with...
GraNdpA and the BiG BoyS!!
Does life get any better than this?? I've got to say that I have the coolest Dad in the world. On Sunday night he had all the boys over for a sleepover. Even Trace didn't miss out on the action. They all slept out side under the stars. Porter loves being with the big boys, and can't get enough of them. They are all so cute with both my boys. They just play, play and play some more.
On Monday morning they all headed off for Cherry Hill. Before this, when we would go to Cherry Hill, we would just play on the little kids stuff. But not with the big boys! They must have gone down those slides 50 times! Porter kept asking for one more, one more... We played all day long in the water. Trace left a little early with Grandpa, but Porter played most the day!