Some random June moments

Davis was gone alot of June with sports camps and youth conference.  A bad month to get a new puppy.  Gator took great care of Joey, but he is sure glad Davis is home tonight.  And to be honest we all are, and not just cause he has the puppy back in his room tonight.  

 Gator likes to stay busy and have friends over all the time.  I decided she was old enough to ride up to a local gas station where there is a snow cone shack.  They thought this was the best thing ever. 

 Our last cleaning has taken a couple months to complete.  The kids had some cavities that needed to be filled and that took quite some time to accomplish with all the summer activities.  Gator also had some stubborn baby teeth that she needed to have pulled out.  Now that we are finally done, we only have 4 months left until we go back for our next cleaning. 

 Joey is making his way into everyone's hearts.  I'm still not a huge fan, but I do enjoy watching my kids with him.  In all honesty he has been a good puppy, still just not something I wanted to take on, but he's here and the kids love him!

 More trips to the library.  She is doing great with her summer reading.  This pile of books will keep her busy for a couple days, then we will head back to the library for a restock. 

 There was a small tragedy  the other morning.  Joey got in Gators room and got to her baby.  Gator loves her babies and Harper got her thumb bit off.  I took her to the store to pick out some fabric so she could sew a new baby blanket. 

 Owen was mowing the lawn and the evening was so nice and cool that we went outside.  I felt bad that Owen was working and we were just playing with the puppy.  But I did help rake and pick up some sticks.  All we have right now is a push mower.  An acre is a pretty big yard to push the whole thing, thanks Owen for doing it. 

 His strange addiction continues.  I've got about 20 signs in the basement that Owen swipes.  This one he got in the shed at work, at least he got permission to add this one to his collection. 

Cousins

I love days spent with family.  We've done a lot with our cousins this summer, and it's been so much fun.  On Wednesday Krissy came out to go swimming at our neighbors house.  Davis was next door hanging out with his friend, he kept popping his head over the fence to say hi.  We hit 100 degrees for the first time of the summer on Wednesday, so the pool felt really good.  Gator had just been in this pool a couple hours earlier for lessons, and as soon as we got out, she got an invite to go to another neighbors to swim. She really should've been born a fish. 

Then on Friday Krissy called us and asked if we wanted to go to Lagoon.  Owen was working, and Davis went to youth conference, so we thought it was the perfect idea to go have fun, and get a break from babysitting Joey (okay maybe that one was more me than her).  

And today we went paddleboarding.  We picked up Davis from youth conference so he could go with us.  He was exhausted and spent most of his time crashed on the sand.  It was actually that kind of a day.  It was cool (which I love), but also very windy (which I hate).  So naps on the beach were kind of nice.  We did get in the water, and the little kids spent all their time in the water, and didn't want to go when we said it was time to go.  Lots of memories were made this week with our cousins.  

Family Pictures

My cousin sent a couple of the pictures that she took last weekend.  We haven't done family pictures for a while, and I think these turned out great.  I really like my family picture, as well as the group ones.  My cousin is amazing, because our family is big and with all these kids, hard to photograph.  It was the first group photo we had taken without my mom, that was strange, but I know she was there smiling along with us, we just couldn't see her.  

Our spot on the river

It was HOT today!  It has actually been a pretty mild June, but today we retreated to the river.  We've been going to this spot for a few years and it's always a good time.  Except this year a bunch of snakes moved into the neighborhood, and that wasn't a good time.  

Weekends

Our weekends have been busy.  This past weekend, my dad and Dianne came up for a visit.  Andrea scheduled family pictures and I am anxiously waiting those to be finished, I hope my cousin can photoshop because with a family this big it was a quite the task.  I took a couple of pictures with my phone just to tide me over.  I didn't intend for Joey to be in our family pictures, Davis brought him along and it just sorta happened.  Although I am sure he had in planned all along. 

 I only got Gator and I a pass to Lagoon this year.  It makes me sad, but I think I ruined my boys and Lagoon after getting a pass for so many years.  Gator would still go every day, but the boys are sick of it plus Owen doesn't fit on anything.  Both of them will go swimming with friends, but they don't usually want to go when Gator and I go.  It is okay, I understand.  I don't like it, but I do understand.  Good thing we still have cousins to go play with us. 

Friday we went to Cherry Hill with Dad and Dianne.  They were such great sports and went on everything the kids did.  Owen was working, he seems to be doing that a lot lately.  He is saving for his mission, but doesn't like this transition phase of life at all.  Davis was home blowing things up in the backyard with his friends having a bon fire. 

It seems ever since we've lived out here whenever we get the 9:00 church they do boundary changes and we have it taken away.  Well, we've had it for 6 months this time around with no change in sight, but we were blind sided on Sunday.  And it is kinda crumby.  We are changing back to 11:00 in a different building and had a big chunk taken from out ward with no new families added.  I don't understand because our ward was already tiny, now it is super tiny.  The church is true though, so we will go with it.  At least we keep the same bishop, I love our bishop.  After church and dinner, the kids and I took our hammocks and went up by Pineview for the evening.  I made muddy buddies just to make sure I was in good standing with the boys and could get them to come.  I love hanging out with all my kids, but like I said before I understand life changes and they like to do things with friends more than their mom.  I don't have to like it, and I'll just make sure I really enjoy the time I do get with them. 

Oh ya it was also West Haven Days this weekend.  With everything else going on we only made it to the fireworks this year.  The boys went Saturday evening with friends to the rodeo and to walk around, but Gator was helping to babysit Krissy's kids so I picked her up and we stopped on the road close to the park, but not in all the crowd since we barely made it in time.