Loser Guys

For FHE tonight we learned about the Holy Ghost.  It was a good lesson where I used a pin drop as the "still small voice."  I played music loudly to prove that you couldn't hear the pin drop if things in your life were too loud. Caden chose to play Scene It Disney for the activity.  Not to brag (well maybe a little) but I have never lost a game of Scene It Disney.  Ever!  Tonight was no different.  Caden called for Tyson to be on his team, Brennon was on mine, Shelby was with Randy and Keilie was on her own.  After our victory, Brennon got a little hot headed.  Victoriously celebrating, "Guys, I am the winner.  And you are all the loser guys! YES!"  Can you guess what next week's lesson will be?  Humility!

Literal #2!

I came home from a meeting yesterday and found Tyson waking from a nap.  I was surprised to see he'd taken one so earlier, and even more surprised to see that he'd fallen asleep on the couch.  When I asked how long he'd slept, Randy said he would have slept more if Shelby hadn't kicked him in the head.  Shelby piped up, "Dad, I didn't kick him in the head.  It was my knee!" Again, so literal!

Literal

Let me begin by saying Randy likes to do EVERYTHING as a family.  This doesn't bother me most times, but tonight it grated on my nerves.  He loaded us all up for an outing to Walmart to get Caden some stuff for a campout with the Scouts.  2 items to be exact! I HATE taking all of the kids shopping.  They aren't bad, per se, but I don't like it when they aren't paying close attention and wander into the aisles.  Or wander away from us.  Or hang on the cart.  Or grab stuff off of the shelves.  Or simply just walk in too large of a pack.  It's just stress.  Especially when it's crowded, which it is most of the time at Walmart.  It was not a fun time tonight.  Shelby ended up skipping ahead of us, around a car that was pulling out, and then just sauntered over when I was SCREAMING at her to GET OVER HERE!!!!  I was at the boiling point by then.  I made the hasty comment that, "Now I know why my parents NEVER took us to the store!!"  After a minimal amount of time, Keilie asked, "Mom, were you amazed?"
 "Amazed how?"
 "When you first went to the store?" 

This made Randy burst out laughing.  Hard!  Which then got me laughing.  Then the whole car, but Keilie, was laughing.  She can be so literal!  The tension was lifted from the car, but the questions still remains... Will we ever take all of our kids to the store again?

Probably

Hood Park

Saturday morning, Randy and I went to the Temple.  It was wonderful.  I think I found an easier way to kneel for extended periods of time without passing out.  I was able to do many names without even feeling faint.  This was my first time not passing out!  It was an amazing feeling!  We came home, packed up, and headed back to the river.  This time, we tried a place closer to home on the Snake River called Hood Park.  It was amazing.  We got the most coveted spot.  It was a table that had constant shade right next to the water.  It was perfect.

Of course, Brennon took a long time to convince to get in.  Entertaining ourselves on the beach.

 You can see Caden and Keilie far in the top left-hand corner, Ty a little closer in the mid-right, and Shelby on the tube.  They got in the second they had their spray on.  I don't know how they can totally disregard the coldness as fast as they do!  It took me a while to get all the way in, including some almost-hyperventilating huffy breaths.

 These two were so much fun to watch.  Love Tyson's face!

 Then we pulled out the big guns.  We bought this on clearance one year in Casper to maybe float the North Platte.  We never did.  This was the maiden voyage.  It was the only thing that got Brennon out on the water!

 Love my beautiful girls!

 Proof that I got out in the water.  I need one with me completely in the water!  At one point, we had Randy, Shelby, Brennon, and Tyson on the raft while I swam next to it pushing them out to the buoy.  It was fun!

 Proof that Randy got in.  He never made it past his waist.  Wimp!

 Brennon wanted on the raft, but didn't want to go out too far.  I laid down to anchor the raft to the shore.  Tyson would run from the beach, jump over the seat back face first and then the boys would LAUGH!  He did it over and over, each time getting the giggle I love most from Brennon.  It was so much fun to watch.

 At one point, the boys laid down in the surf.  It only took Brennon 3 hours to finally consent to getting wet.

 It wasn't sandy at all, but that didn't stop the kids from burying my legs.

 And then begging me to bury theirs.

 FINALLY, Brennon got up enough courage to let Randy take him out on the raft.  He even allowed him to let go of the handles and spin him in the water.  It was fun to hear his laugh from the shore.

 I had to take a picture of his little nose.  On Independence Day he was playing with our neighbors, having a good time, when tragedy struck.  He ended up falling off of one of their skateboards directly onto his face/nose.  It was pretty purple that day and then turned into a scraped up mess.  He commented days later that his forehead still has a bruise.  Poor little guy.  Doesn't distract from his radiant smile, though!

When asking if we should come back to this park, we got all thumbs-up responses.  It was so much fun to spend four hours as a family on the water.  We absolutely love living here.  There is so much to do and explore.  Next week we have plans to go out to another place we heard about over the weekend.  Again, on the water.  There is so much to do!!!  I love Tri-Cities Washington!!!!!

Independence Day

We had a great Independence Day this year.  We started of with a family breakfast of pancakes.  I love me some pancakes.  Our next activity was something I'd found in Family Fun that I knew the kids would like.  We cut out a star stencil with cardboard, misted the grass between the stencil with water and then sifted flour onto the wet grass.  Keilie had the idea to lay out the actual cut-out and flour around it.  Look how neat that is! 

 

Happy Independence Day!!

 

We were going to go bowling with our KidsBowlFree passes, but they were closed, so we came back to get ready to head to the river.  We tried a new place on the Snake River and ended up having a great time.  The Burch's came along for the ride and made it an unforgettable adventure.  We found a spot where we got our own beach with at least 100 yards of shallow water.  The paddle boat was so much easier to maneuver without the current!  At one point, a gust of wind actually picked up the canopy and blew it into some trees.  We were reminded of Casper in that small moment.  I'm not sure how long it will take us to stop thinking/comparing everything here to there.  We stayed for a few hours, came home to relax and have a simple meal, watch a movie together, and then went to a firework show.  Jamie invited us to sit with them in a spot she goes to each year.  We parked across the street from the soccer stadium and sat in the back.  The kids had free reign for an hour to run with their friends.  We ended up finding another ward family to come and sit with us.  There were no less than 18 kids in our group-all running/tackling/squealing in delight.  The fireworks were beautiful.  Ty asked if we were on one of them when it went off if we'd pop:)  The finale was quite disappointing, but we had to remember that they had almost 30 full minutes of constant fireworks!  The finale was only about 10 going off at once and then it was over.  It just proves that it doesn't matter how well the show is going, if the ending is terrible, the rest of the show is forgotten.  We loved our full day with Jamie and Cameron.  We're so blessed to have such close friends.  Ones that know Washington well from years of experience, and who are willing to take us on our new exploring adventures!

Another Cleaning Game!

LOVE Brennon's face:)

 

Preface: It has been HOT here.  Today it hit 110 and it was only 2:30PM.  Last night I checked the temperature at 10:00 to find it was still 95 outside.  It's just HADES here right now.  Not sure how hot it is right now, but I know I don't want to go outside.  That hasn't stopped us from doing fun stuff this week, just not stuff that requires us being outside in the sun without shade and a sprinkler to cool us off!  We've spent a lot of time indoors, though!

 

With all of the hours spent inside, it's easy for our little home to get messy and feel quite cluttered.  We went to the library yesterday for 2 hours and came home with 53 books.  All of those books were scattered on our front room floor at one point.  Add this mess to the overflowing sink full of dishes and the laundry that needs to be folded (only one load this time) and you have a cluttered house.  Not one that you want others to see, hence no pictures!  So, while at Wal-Mart for some milk this afternoon (this is how I know what the temperature outside was) I picked up a giant bag of gummy bears.  I'm always trying to find ways to get my kids to clean with the least degree of whining.  They aren't too bad, but with the rising heat comes a rising intolerance for disobedience.  So, with my candy in hand I made up another cleaning game.  For everything they picked up and put away IN THE CORRECT SPOT (Keilie and Shelby are the worst at this step) they got a gummy bear.  I kid you not, a house that was a complete dive was SPOTLESS in 15 minutes.  They were running around cleaning anything in sight.  This includes Cloroxing all three bathrooms!  So, for $3.75 I got a CLEAN house.  The kids commented that this was their favorite game yet- surprise, surprise! My kids are always enticed by food.  It won't happen often- it was a huge bag of candy- but, it was one of my better games.  And to prove that the sink was full...I got 84 gummy bears and still had to do some by hand:)

Charades

Randy is going to be out of town tomorrow night and since we don't like to miss FHE, we had it tonight.  Caden gave a great lesson on Tithing.  Keilie had the activity so I suggested that we play charades instead of Clue.  That way the younger kids could feel like they had something to do other than roll the dice or move the pieces.  We started with some ideas from Guesstures, and ended up having them come up with ideas on their own that they wanted to act out.  It was SO much fun watching their little minds work.  They would have to tell me what they were going to do so they didn't stand up there for 10 minutes trying to make our guesses what they thought they were acting.  Tyson stole the show more times than not.  One such time he went to the front of the room, turned his back to us and jutted out his behind.  We guessed a few times before he turned around and said in the cutest little voice, "No.  It's pants!"  The kids just burst out laughing.  The only acting he did was wiggle his little toosh at us!  He entertained us with karate which looked like a standing seizure, slicing (which he calls swicing) licking, and eating.  We loved it.  Randy would try and guess what Brennon was acting each time.  'Cause as soon as you said it correct, his eyes would go all "Bugsy" and he'd scream and point, "YES!  You got it!!!"  It was so cute.  We had such a good time!  It was weird to look at the clock and see that an hour of acting had taken place.  Watch out...we've got some natural born actors in this house!  And not just the kids.  I do a mean "Dance."  Even if Randy begged me never to do it again:)

Feetsies

While eating breakfast this morning, Tyson kept kicking the island.  After repeated times of asking him to stop, I got pretty stern with him.  In an exasperated voice he said, "Mom, my feet is doing it by itself!"

Multnomah Falls 2013

Photo progression at Multnomah Falls

June 27, 2013

 While we were cooling off our feet, a train came barreling above us.  Brennon was fit to be tied with how loud it was.  He was ready to bolt!

It was such a beautiful day!!  No rain, can you believe it?!

Toes

Sometimes I can be a really cool mom.  I find ways to make my kids have as much fun as they can.  I make them fun foods, take them to places they love, and do things with them that are traditions I love and hope they love too.  However, I'm a mean mom, too.  Here's an example...

 On the night before Danielle's wedding, we got all of the girls together for a Pedicure night.  Things didn't work out as we thought, so we all gathered around and painted our own toes.  I didn't want Keilie and Shelby to think they could get a true pedicure from Natalie, so I painted their nails beforehand.  So, when they noticed that we were all doing our nails, Shelby asked if she could do mine.  I thanked her for her generous offer, but said no.  I had family pictures the next day and wanted everything to be perfect.  I hate that about myself sometimes.  That I can be so uptight about something that is really no big deal in the scheme of this life.  But, I can't change it, either.  So, she went around to all of the other girls at the part and asked.  Megan, bless her heart, said yes!

And Shelby painted.

And I felt like a bad mom for saying no to something so dumb.

And painted my own toes with a heavy heart, vowing to do better next time.

Eyes On Me!!!

 

~That frustrated moment when you see that the only one marring this picture is your TWELVE YEAR OLD SON!  "Caden, how many photo shoots have we done in your life?  LOOK AT THE CAMERA AT ALL TIMES!!!"

Johnson's Bliss

Saturday, June 15, 2013

Danielle & Taylor Johnson's Wedding

Eden, Utah

 Taylor's mom has a friend that owns a Bed & Breakfast in Eden, Utah.  They called in a favor to use the BEAUTIFUL yard for the wedding.  It was magical!  They brought their own decorations for the entry, but the rest was just the gorgeous landscape.  It was such a beautiful day for a beautiful couple!

 We took a few minutes before people started to arrive to get a picture of my kids decked out in their wedding attire.  Danielle's colors were purple (no surprise there!) and Gray.  What a perfect time to get a matching family picture!  I do hope that the one the photographer took turns out a little better.  Maybe one where we are all looking at the camera with model smiles and poses!

 Taylor's mom also had a friend that makes cakes.  Danielle said she would have preferred less flowers, but I think it turned out lovely!

 I love watching my dad!  This was a candid before Taylor got to see his bride.  Wonder what advice my dad was giving here?!

 Me with my beautiful Mom!  I just love her!!!

 Me with my baby sister, Brooke.  And sneezy Kenyan of course:)

 Taylor with "The Dads!"

 Waiting for his Bride!

 First glimpse of Danielle!

 Daddy, Daughter, and sweet Payton.  You'll notice later that Danielle doesn't have her signature purple high heels.  She was so nervous about falling that she nixed them.  She still looks stellar!!!

 Giving his daughter away!

 Turning to look at those that love them.  It was only Parents, Grandparents, Siblings, and Neices and Nephews in attendance, yet there was an abundance of love!  We sure missed Ash, Russ, McKaylee, Daphnee, and Austen.  They were unable to make it.

 You may kiss the Bride!

 I wish you could see the look my dad gave better!  I love his I-love-my-daughter-tear-face!

 To the Taylor & Danielle Johnson family!!

 Sweet little Payton in the dress I made for her.  I'm so glad it turned out better than the first two I made for my girls.  I was super honored Danielle asked me to make it!  I even got a compliment on it from someone asking where they could find one! 

 The Wayne Burrell Family

 Sisters!

Miss ya Ash and Keilie Fran!!

 Danielle with her brother.  These two became super close redoing that condo.  She even called crying one night saying how much she missed hanging out with Randy.  He truly is an amazing man that loves without bounds.  I love that they are so close.

 Love my sweet Payton!

 Such a cute new family!

 The next day, June 16th, happened to be Taylor's birthday and his very first Father's Day.  What a weekend!!!

 My Brennon would not leave Grandpa Kimber's side!  He sure loves that man.  As do I!!!

 Apparently she wasn't going to go easy on him:)

 Gorgeous even with cake all over!

 Me with my sweetie!

 Grandpa-Great with his boy!

The weather was perfect, the Bride was radiant, and the family became friends.  Danielle couldn't have asked for a better day!  I'm so happy to have another brother!  Congratulations Danielle and Taylor!!