Sailing/GNO

My aunt and uncle, David and Deanie took our older kids (my sweet mom stayed back with the babies while they napped) out on their sailboat one afternoon. We loved it! We anchored for a while to take a swim, let the kids kayak for a while, and swim over to a little island and play in the mud for a bit.


One night we did a GNO (girl's night out) and went to dinner and to see Eclipse. All of us except for my mom have read the books and seen the movies, so she was pretty hilarious to watch during the movie and she had NO idea what was going on! What a trooper!

July 4th Celebration

We did our annual 4th (actually 3rd this year) at the Ranch as my parents get the month of July off - swimming, cook-out, and fireworks. And no one got burned this year!

Spence and Carter

Kim's girl's with mine
Gavin jumping off the diving board
All 16 grandkids - LOVE it!

Amazing Jakes

My parents set a goal for all the grandkids to read their scriptures for 10 minutes each day in the month of June. They then rewarded them with a day at Amazing Jakes and (big surprise) the kids had a ball! My sis-in-law Emily and I actually left early to bring all the babies back to my house for a nap. I knew I was carrying some seriously precious cargo with 5 sweet babies in my car, but we made it safely and effectively got them all to sleep. We really looked like a mini-daycare!

Happy Birthday Brighton!

My sweet Brighton - where are the years going? On Saturday you'll be halfway to 18 - a scary age for a mom to think about. I will so miss you on your birthday but want you to know that Dad and I will be thinking of you the whole time we're gone! I am so proud of the helpful, sweet, beautiful, smart, righteous, caring girl you've become. You're more than a mom could ever hope for in an oldest daughter. I love you so, so much!

Summer Vacation

Months ago I had planned out our wonderful, beautiful, relaxing trip to Destin, FL and we'd been looking really forward to it. But then BP had to go and mess that one up for us. 2 days before we were supposed to leave the oil hit the beaches there and we quickly changed our plans. I have NEVER planned a vacation just 2 days in advance, but we stayed up until 2:00 am that night reconfiguring things. We ended up going down to South Padre Island (the very southern tip of Texas) with a few stops on the way. First we stopped off at Ben and Emily's in Temple, TX and went to a water park and Children's Museum there.
The next day we were off to the beach! The kids had a GREAT time there. No, it's not the white sand and crystal clear water of FL, but I was actually quite impressed! Much better than any other TX beach I'd been to. I guess that's what 10 hours of driving will do for a TX beach. Our condo on the beach was great and the girl's especially LOVED boogie boarding in the water. I was surprised at how nervous I got watching them swim so far out in the ocean, but they loved it. One of Sydney's favorite parts was being out in the ocean with Chris and watching a huge group of dolphins swim right past them and around them less than 30 feet away. And the boys loved the sand and water, too.



We also celebrated sweet Carter's 4th birthday at the beach. He kept saying the whole time how "I know everything now that I'm 4". He was so excited to finally be 4 like his cousin Tanner. Happy birthday sweet toehead!

Then on the way back we stopped in San Antonio to take in a few sites and then headed to Sea World the next day. We spent most of our time there at the Sea World water park since it was so hot, but another fun day in the sun!


We just love family vacations - the only bad thing is that Chris has to go back to work when we get back!

Look here, young man!

The other day we were at the pool and a boy about 4 years older than Carter took his ball. Carter then said to him "Give me back my ball, young man." The boy then asked me "Did he just call me a dumb man?" Why do kids make me laugh so much?

Still Playing Catch Up

My mom was able to fly back with me from Guatemala because I had vericose vein surgery on my leg (my pregnancy with Gav did a number on me). She helped take care of the kids and keep me off my feet for a while, which I GREATLY appreciated. I think she realized what a crazy, loud house we have, but also realized how much we loved having her around and how much my kids really miss her when she's gone.

 

Just some cute shots of Gavin with a sucker one afternoon - he was SO happy with this thing!

 

 

We are just loving our big backyard - the kids love to have water fights out there.

 

 

Brighton and Sydney performed in their dance recital earlier this month, Brighton for her Hip Hop class and Sydney did tap from her tap/ballet class. Call me crazy, butI just love dance recital time!

 

And Carter sang his infamous "Do Lord" song in his preschool end of year performance (amongst other songs). Very fun!