Friends, Family, and Fireworks

What a fun Fourth of July weekend we had this year! We contimplated going to California for the weekend but decided to stay home and continue the traditions we've started for our family and I'm so glad we did, we had an awesome weekend!

Friday afternoon started with a trip to Incredible Pizza in Draper. If you've not heard of it, it is a buffet restaurant with a bunch of games for the kids to play and rides such as bumper cars, go carts, mini golf etc. The boys had a blast! Then that evening we continued cleaning our garage. Since Chris was sick of looking at the garage he offered to help our neighbors move mulch to their flower beds. I ran a few errands and the kids played outside with their friends.

Saturday started out early with us heading to the Murray Parade which we've done every year since we moved to Salt Lake. We sit with the rest of our Weeks Family and the kids have so much fun. This year was a bit different because the weather here cooled down so much that it was actually cold! Usually we are all fighting to get in the shade but this year we were all fighting to sit in the sun-strange huh!

After the parade we came home and I got a call from a friend to go see Eclipse with her. So three of us girls headed to see the movie while Chris and the boys took a nap. I got home around six and Colby was still napping so we woke him up and headed to our friends, The Viall's house. We had an amazing time with them and other friends, The Payne's. All three of us have kids in the same class so the kids played outside while the adults ate, drank, and were merry! Then we walked over to the ridge to watch the fireworks over the valley. It was so neat to watch all of them going off at the same time. After that we went back and shot off some fireworks of our own.

Since Saturday night was such a late night we slept in Sunday morning and hung around the house being lazy for a while and then got back to work cleaning up the garage while the boys rode bikes and scooters with their friends. That evening we went to Target to get a scooter for Colby that he earned by cleaning up all the toys in the basement by himself. I have to admit, this was a huge job for him. The basement was such a mess that you could not walk through it without tripping over all the toys. It probably took him an hour and a half to get it all cleaned up and it looks incredible! After Target we had dinner at Red Robin and then went home to get ready for fireworks that night. Chris bought a few the day before and we set them off in our ally with our neighbors. It was a good day!

Monday Chris took the boys to see The Last Airbender and I went and got a pedicure. Then we hung out the rest of the afternoon with our neighbors. That night we had grilled hamburgers for dinner, got the boys bathed, and then relaxed with a movie. Serioulsy we could not have asked for a better weekend!

Now it's back to reality but I'm hopeful for more weekends like this one in the near future!

Our cute little family at the Murray Parade.

Silly boys!

Cameron, Colby, Lizzie, Jamie, and Ethan being patriotic with their flags.

Neighbor friends-Aubrie, Maelynn, Cameron, Adele, and Colby with Adaline and her sister in the chair.

See, they can be sweet sometimes! I love them!

Cameron Turns 3

My sweet baby Cameron turned 3 last Monday and I can't believe it. Seems like just yesterday I was driving home from the hospital in 110 degree heat with him as a newborn. I love this little boy so much, he's such a sweet little soul! Here are a few pictures of us celebrating on his big day.

Look Who Is Visiting Our House Tonight!

The Tooth Fairy!

Okay, so it's not the best picture but it's hard to get a close up of a missing bottom tooth. It was really loose today and my neighbor was dying to pull it out but Colby wouldn't let her anywhere near it. Later this evening he was eating a grape and said he felt something hard so he spit it out and it was his tooth. Man, he's growing up so fast. So many new things happening for him in the last month, graduating kindergarten, riding a bike with no training wheels, riding a scooter, now losing a tooth! Think I can put him in some kind of capsule to keep him this age forever?

Now it's off to find the going rate for the tooth fairy.

Success!

Finally, we are a training wheel free family...well until Cameron is big enough to ride a bike. We started teaching him last Sunday and by Friday he was a pro, so much so that we even took a family bike ride around the lake last night. He made it up all the hills and never crashed one time. The only thing he still has trouble with is getting started and that is just sometimes. We are so proud of him! He would have been content riding with his training wheels on until he was 21 had we not forced him by taking them off.

And Cameron has finally mastered the skill of scooter riding, well I guess as good as you can when you are still shorter than the scooter.

Ladybug Launch

Yesterday was the annual ladybug launch here at the Daybreak gardens. Thousands of ladybugs are let go into the gardens to help eat the bad bugs. This was our first time doing it and boy was it fun. The boys were able to let the bugs crawl around and play with them as much as they wanted. We were one of the lucky ones that got our own container and in each container was at least 500 ladybugs. Of course we shared ours with other kids. I'm glad we live in a community that does all these fun family activities, we love it here! (Cameron did sneak a ladybug home with him too. They "lost" it in the yard last night.)

Oh and on a side note, they posted a picture of this on the Daybreak facebook page and guess who it was a picture of...our boys' container of ladybugs. Of course you can't see any faces but we can see Chris' arms, Colby's arm and Cameron's foot. Pretty cool, huh.

Wonder what Cameron's thinking here!

Colby's Guardian Angel

Last night on our way home Colby was inquiring about Memorial Day and what it meant. Chris explained to him that it was originally for us to honor fallen soldiers etc but that a lot of people now also honor anyone who has passed on by taking flowers to their grave. They then ended up in a deep conversation about death and my mom. Chris and I truly believe that he was with my mom before he was born. There have been things he has said and talked about that there is no way he would know if he hadn't been with her before. Well last night he also informed us of this little tidbit:

Grandma comes and visits me at night while I'm sleeping and when she's here she kisses me on the cheeks and that's how I get my freckles.

Chris and I teared up instantly! Thank God he has my mom as his guardian angel, I can't imagine a better guardian angel than her.

Kennecott Copper Mine

Last weekend my brother and his cute little family came to visit us. We did a lot of things around Salt Lake while they were here. They arrived late on Wednesday night and then Thursday since Chris had to work we headed to the Copper Mine, to pick up some groceries, and then took Brad to his first visit to Chic Fil A before heading back to the house to wait for Chris to get home from work. Here are some pictures of the Mine, I'd like to point out that it was FREEZING and WINDY there.





When Chris got home we had some dinner and headed to Costco and Sam's so Brad could find the perfect video camera. And then we went to Classic Skating so the boys could play dart tag. And when I say boys, I mean Chris and Brad too. Jen and I sat with Cameron and Braden at the jungle playground while the boys had their fun. I think Cameron was excited to have someone close to his age to play with since he's always the one too little to do things.

Up next, the zoo!