Sunday, August 31

Today was a big day. First, we taught our 5th Sunday lesson to the whole ward. It was scary and intimidating but I think overall it went well. Second, it's the last day of the month and my AWESOME Scentsy hostess (Alissa Goldhardt) had a fabulous party so I spent much of my evening entering the orders so they made it in before they were discontinued. Third, I couldn't help but take a break and go outside to watch Ry do the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. It was funny. I won't do it...I'm a baby! But everyone else looks like they're having fun. :)

 

 

Saturday, August 30

My daddy bought us tickets to one of the best concerts I've ever been to - Keith Urban. He's amazingly talented, energetic, a great entertainer, and not so hard to look at! ;) It was so nice to have a date night (Dave & Viv watched the kids. We owe them majorly!) and the concert was wonderful! Dad even bought each couple a large Diet Coke (not in a Styrofoam cup) to share. What an awesome night!

 

Friday, August 29

Mom doesn't work at Virginia's on Fridays so after working at Warnell's, she came out my way. We had "brunch" at Kneader's then went back to my house and I did her nails. It was so fun to hang out and visit with mom for a couple of hours. I kinda wish she didn't work and we could do this all the time. :) By the way, Zacky ate breakfast at home so he got a cookie instead of real food.

 

 

Thursday, August 28

This little ray of sunshine had her 2-month well-check at Dr. Jackson's today. She weighs 12 lbs 8 oz and is 24.5" long. She is in the 78th percentile for weight and off the charts (more than 99th percentile) for height. She got shot. Twice! She was a little grumpy for the rest of the day. We went to lunch at Francesco's with Gma Sharon & Gpa Jim, checked out the new wood store - Wood Creations - in West Valley, then had Activity Days at our house. She even went with me to my Scentsy party (at the request of the hostess). She's a little trooper. I just love her so much!

 

Wednesday, August 27

Captain Hook, meet Super Man! I am constantly entertained by Zack. He is so funny! (Seriously, look at that expression on his face!) He is getting better at potty-training although he still gets in trouble about every other day for having a "twosie" in his pull-ups. We are best buddies now that big brother and sister are in school all day. My Z-Man makes me smile.

 

 

Tuesday, August 26

Best. Home Teacher. Ever. Brother Williams just showed up at our house with yummy shakes. What a special treat! I love knowing that our home teachers are thinking of us!

 

 

Monday, August 25

The kids and I went to Jenni's today to have lunch with her and mom. This is the last week of doing this before bowling starts on the 8th (next week is a holiday). So fun!

Sunday, August 24

There were lots of things I could have taken pictures of today. First, baby Ricki is 2 months old today! I can't believe how fast the time flies by! Second, we celebrated Trevan and Jake's birthdays today. They had a BYUtah birthday party. :) Third, Simon and Kenny were challenged by BJ to do the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. Basically, you fill up a bucket with water and ice and have someone dump it over your head. You then make a donation to ALS research. It is in an effort to raise awareness of ALS (aka Lou Gehrig's Disease). We personally know people that have had this horrible disease. Brother Melton in our current ward recently died from it and my good friend from way back, Jodie Bashaw, is slowly being taken by it. This ice bucket challenge is all the rave on social media. It is a horrible disease and I am glad more people know about it now.

 

 

Saturday, August 23

Simon and I got a fun night out on MACU. They threw a Cirque De Solei employee celebration. They had tons of different food stations (things like hamburger sliders, chicken curry, and even a real taco truck), circus games you could play to win tickets, Cirque-type performances on the center stage (you can see the stage behind Simon and I), prizes, and ended with a super hilarious comedian, Ryan Hamilton. (Look Ryan up. He is SO funny!) I always love these employee parties because I see lots of friends that I only catch up with at events like these.

 

 

Friday, August 22

Mom and I talked at midnight last night and made tentative plans to go to the movies today. They were going to see "The Giver". I have read the book a couple of times (years and years ago) so I was anxious to see the movie. I dropped Zack and Ricki off to a saint my sister and enjoyed this fun outing with just my parents and I.

P.S. I LOVED the movie!!

 

 

 

Thursday, August 21

Simon was invited to attend a special Sandy City Chamber event at the Bees game. Luckily, he was able to bring the whole fam along too! We rode Trax to the Smith's ballpark, had hamburgers and hot dogs for dinner with the Chamber, and enjoyed the game until the 7th inning (we had to go to get kids to bed for school). It was really fun though.

 

 

 

Wednesday, August 20

Jenni and I needed some Café Rio so we went to lunch together. (Yes, sometimes Café Rio is a need, not a want.) I love being with these adorable little kiddos and my favorite sister in all the land!

 

 

Tuesday, August 19

While Simon and Dave worked away on the basement, I took all 4 kids to Nick's Pack Meeting. He did so well this past month. He got several pins and belt loops. He loves scouts and his leaders are simply awesome. Huge shout out to Erin Coles, Andrea Child, Kristi Sivertson, and Heather Doman for guiding him through his scouting experience!

Monday, August 18

Simon went to the "Swing for the Kids" golf tournament today. It's a benefit tournament for Primary Children's Medical Center. They had a rescued golden eagle there and Simon got to pet it! So cool!

 

Sunday, August 17

This little tiny booklet is causing great stress and anxiety in my life. :) I am a Family History Consultant in my ward and at our last family history meeting with the bishop, he asked if Simon and I might be willing to teach a combined lesson on the 5th Sunday this month. By "combined lesson", he meant the WHOLE ward other than the primary! Yikes!! In preparation for our lesson, we are trying to fill out these booklets about our most recent 4 generations. They will be the main focus of our lesson in a couple of weeks.

 

 

 

Saturday, August 16

We spent the whole day outside today! I started working on the weeds in the backyard (yep, they're back). Dave and Simon worked on the basement for a bit while Viv and I transplanted flowers from her yard to mine. I also got on a roll pulling weeds in the front flower beds and finally got it all done just before dark. We took a break at dinnertime to go to our ward picnic. They do a huge slip-n-slide down the hill in the park. The kids and adults loved it! Dave & Viv joined us for the party too. It's been a really good day!

 

 

Friday, August 15

Jenni and I were so domestic today...jam it! Grandma Howard bought us each a case of raspberries (straight from Bear Lake) so we worked away making them into raspberry freezer jam. It was a lot of work but so worth it for a year worth of jam. Yay! I love having this done!!

 

 

Thursday, August 14

Girl's Night Out. Wahoo! Tonight was Bunco at Celeste's house. Melanie made these amazing Neapolitan cupcakes with strawberry ice cream float frosting. They were even more delicious than they look! I set some sort of new record by sitting at the same table in the exact same seat for the entire evening! I won the booby-prize by a long shot with only 48 points. The winner had 131 points! Yikes! Despite my horrible luck, it was a fun night! 

 

 

Wednesday, August 13

Zacky and I had a rough day. He threw a bunch Kendra's little plastic beads all over the family room, entryway, and hallway. When I asked him to pick them up, he threw an absolute fit about it and ended up falling asleep trying to pick them up. I was trying to clean the house at the time and threatened (to no avail) to vacuum them up. Ultimately, he got help from Kendra and Nick after school and they helped pick them up. Thank heaven for siblings that take pity on little tiny people with really big attitudes.

Tuesday, August 12

Ricki needed a bath...badly! I couldn't help taking a picture of her sweet face while I was getting her ready to get in. Tonight, my sweet neighbor brought us dinner. She felt bad that she didn't know what I had gone through and insisted on still bringing us dinner. It ended up being a crazy night so this was so helpful! We tried to go to Thanksgiving Point (again) but it rained like crazy so we didn't go. Instead, we opted for a movie at my parent's house. We watched "Old Dogs" in memory of Robin Williams.

 

 

Monday, August 11

We met Mom and Jenni at the park for lunch today. Mom gets a break between her job so we stayed for a couple of hours and visited. We nailed down dates for Girl's Trip...YAY!

Another noteworthy event today is that the amazing actor Robin Williams died. He seemed like such a great person and a wonderful actor, it is so sad that he's gone. I grew up watching Robin Williams' shows like Mork & Mindy, Mrs. Doubtfire, The Dead Poet's Society, Aladdin...the list could go on and on. I'm really sad to hear of his passing.

 

 

Sunday, August 10

We did our annual trip to Silver Lake. It was super fun and of course, we got pictures on "engagement rock". :)

 

 

Saturday, August 9

Celebrating 11 years of marriage! We started the day off by dropping the kids off at Dave & Viv's then going to breakfast at Kneader's. Yum! We then took Ricki to Jenni's house and went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple for an endowment session. Wow, that temple is so beautiful! We picked Ricki back up and went to a bunch of Parade of Homes homes. It was fun going with Simon; I don't think we've ever gone together. We had dinner at the Red Dragon (Chinese food) then went to a few more houses. We topped the day off with shakes from Iceberg and a movie, "Heaven is for Real". It was a fun day just to be with Simon!

 

Friday, August 8

First thing first, today is our anniversary! Simon brought me home roses and a 2-liter of Diet Coke (he REALLY loves me)! The Coke said "Share with your family" so we did just that. It was a huge treat for the kids since they're never allowed it. I spent most of my day snuggling with this cutie and building this puzzle. Nick wanted to get out and work on a 1,000 puzzle so we got this out a few days ago and guess who did it all? ME!

 

Thursday, August 7

I got a call from the school this morning saying Kendra had a bad headache and needed to come home. I went and got her but she seemed fine to me all day. We had Joel Rowley come out and spray for spiders. Simon and I have seen 5 black widows outside around the house and this one in the garage. Well, when he sprayed, he said he found several dozen! YUCK! I hate spiders and especially the poisonous kind...that totally freaks me out! The good news is, when we find them now, they'll be dead!

 

 

Wednesday, August 6

We went to the Jo Dee Messina concert but I'm horrible at remembering to takes pics! This little girl has been smiling since she was 4 weeks old (or younger) but we can't ever capture it on camera. We took about 10 pics while she was smiling at her daddy but this is the best one we got! :)

 

 

Tuesday, August 5

August means $2 Tuesdays at Thanksgiving Point! We wanted to go to The Gardens today with my parents but it was raining so the McCullough's and I decided to go to the Museum of Natural Curiosity instead. As expected, it was busy but it was so much fun! Simon would have come too but he and Dave went to Girl's Camp for the day to help them get all set up. They also had a great time.

 

 

Monday, August 4

Today ended up being memorable. Mom and Jenni called me first thing this morning and said that mom's job fell through for today and they were wondering if we could make it to the Parade of Homes. Heck yes! We struggled and stressed trying to find a babysitter but thought all was well when mom called one of her young women girls and she could do it. We had lunch at Olive Garden with dad then us girls hit a ton of homes in Riverton and Herriman. It was a great day...until we saw the havoc the babysitter left at Jenni's house. I won't go into detail but let's just say that $1/hr per kid was WAY too much to pay her. Especially with the mess, throw up on the floor, kids missing, and box of chicken nuggets she ruined! Oh well, it was fun while we were oblivious!

 

 

Sunday, August 3

Today was baby Henry's blessing day. He's such an adorable little guy! It was extra special too because Gary & Alexis were able to come from Vegas to spend the weekend with the family and be at the blessing. They met Ricki for the first time and love her! It's been a great day.

 

 

Saturday, August 2

Simon and I needed this reminder from my fortune cookie last night. After Simon took the kids camping last night, he got home to find that a few other things didn't go according to plan and we ended up having a bit of a rough family day. It ended well though and I agree, we have a happy life to look forward to together.

 

 

Friday, August 1

Today has been a rollercoaster of emotions. Really, I've gone from giddy-happy-joy to bawling in a matter of minutes several times today. My day started out with me at my 6-week (well, 5.75-week) appointment where I learned that I will need another "feminine" surgery and have another 6-weeks of recovery. Bring on the tears! I am DONE with the hospital and all things involved. However, my day got better when Simon called and said that he found a 4th generation iPad for a smokin' deal. I went and picked that plus a baby sling up and I was over-the-top happy...until I thought about surgery again... But my day ended with my family, other than Ricki and I, leaving to go on our ward campout. I was able to spend the evening with Marisa Olsen having a girl's night out. We went to Panda Express, stopped at Dave & Viv's to see Gary & Alexis who just got into town, and then visited until after midnight. Crazy day!!

 

 

Thursday, July 31

Sara Broadhurst's friends and family had a get together in memory of her husband Paul. She's been through so much! Last Friday, her husband died in fire at their home. He actually set the home on fire and it exploded with the help of gasoline. She lost everything but luckily, her and her girls were in Idaho with her parents. Otherwise, it could have been much worse. I have and will continue to pray for her little family. (Sara was at my MOPS table this past year.)

 

 

Wednesday, July 30

I was worried about how on Earth I was going to shop at Sam's Club with Ricki. Well, here's how: pile everything in around the car seat carrier! I have to admit, this is a problem I love having! :)

 

Tuesday, July 29

First grade started on Tuesday but they had orientation on Monday. This is Kendra and her new teacher, Miss Lockwood. She is so excited to start first grade, go to school all day, and eat lunch at school. She had a great first day!

 

Monday, July 28

Today was Nick's first day of third grade. I think he's really going to like his teacher, Mrs. Fay. Her room is cute - it's decorated in a western theme. He's very happy he'll be learning cursive. I've taught him a little but he's excited to practice and learn the whole alphabet. I feel hopeful that this will be a good year for him. I can't believe I have a third grader!!