Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to all the wonderful dads out there. 

Paul got his favorite thing for Father's Day. Frozen cookie dough. (I got him some BBQ supplies be he claims that I bought them more for me than him so they don't count. Geesh!)

Me and my dad today

We had a big dinner today to honor the boys. It was delicious.

We love our dads!

Week in Review, Sort Of

My mind is fried tonight. I haven't gotten enough sleep for the past two weeks and I don't feel like I am functioning properly so this will be choppy. 

Monday was low-key as usual. Kids did chores blah blah blah.

Tuesday was piano for Emma and a hike for the cub scouts. They went up to the waterfall that is right by our house. They had a little picnic while up there. Andrew had a blast. He loves scouts and his leaders. I love that he has something each week to look forward to. 

Wednesday was pretty exciting. At 7:30 am a landscape crew came and started clear cutting the mess that we call a yard. YIPPY!!! They were done by 2:30. (amazing!) 

Here are some pictures. Our yard was one hot mess. It still has a way to go but we are making progress. I can't wait to go a get some more pretty plants for our terraces. 

Before:

After: (Yes I know these pictures blow)

Before:

After:

I really want to do something more with the box from hell. Either take it out completely, redo the lattice or just plant some prettier stuff in it that won't be so...big. I am wishing we had the crew rip out the roses. They suck and really need to go.

So you see how this is working? Before:

After:

Our jungle

has been tamed

Check out the size of the weed!

Ah, much better

Just a few more shots of the hideousness. 

The next changes I want to make are....a new door. Ours is old, fades, ugly and just plain crap. We will then paint the shutters to match. I have hated the teal since day one. Last but not least I want to find out what it will cost to get rid of the wretched heart railing. I despise it with every fiber of my being. The hearts are the reason I didn't even want to look at this house.  

After the yard was finished we went out and picked up my quilt from the quilters (Wahoo! No pictures though. Not yet. Gotta wait until it's finished.) and did a few other things before it was time for the Strawberry Days parade and the rodeo. (That has already been covered so we're good.)

Thursday we were invited to our friends pool. We spent the whole afternoon soaking up rays and sitting in the hot tub. It was pure bliss. That is the life. I wish I could lay out by a pool everyday. Can you believe I didn't take one picture while we were there? I'm telling you, I'm sleep deprived. 

Friday I had to go into work for a couple of hours. A got home a little before lunch time. After lunch the kids had friends over so I cleaned the kitchen and did some laundry. You gotta look busy right? ;) I got a little bitty nap in the late afternoon, ate dinner and got ready for Beauty and the Beast at the Scera Shell outdoor theater. 

I was really interested to see how this version compared to the Broadway version. I would give it two thumbs up. They really did good! Belle had a beautiful voice. She was really amazing. The set was so creative and they really did put on a good show. We still have West Side Story and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream-coat to look forward to. 

Today we drove all over the free world, went grocery shopping (This is how Wal Mart is selling their donuts now. The sales tactic worked. Emma had to have one!)

and then went to grandma Fern's for some family time. All of David's brothers and sister-in-laws were here. 

It was nice to visit with them. I got to hold two brand new baby boys tonight. They were so cute and snuggly. After that I asked Paul to drop me off down town so I could play with my camera a bit. Here is one shot that I liked. Check out another one on my other blog. 

It was torture for the kids to sit in the car and see the rides but not go on them. (Paul's being frugal. He wants to save money for our vacation and not waste in on a local carnival.) I told the kids we would take them to Steel Days or Lindon Days a little later in the year. 

There you have it. Three weeks into summer break. The kids haven't died of boredom so I guess all is well.

Going Back, Way Back

The original Project 365 goal was to take a picture every day. I then found all the cute digi-kits dedicated to scrapping all of the photos that were being taken. I couldn't resist doing something with all of my memories so I jumped on board. I got behind, way behind, so I starting scrapping forwards and backwards. Paul has been waking me up pretty early and I don't want to wake the kids with the sewing machine so I have had a lot of time to play on the computer. Here are a couple pages that I needed to go back and do.

And here is the week we just finished. Hopefully I will keep up from here on out and I won't get further behind. (I'm dreaming again.) 

A Very Wet Strawberry Days

Strawberry Days are going on this week in our little town. There are a lot of things going on but the highlights are the carnival, rodeo and today was the children's parade. 

We have not participated in the parade since moving here. Yes I know, we're lame. I promised the kids last year that we would be in the parade this year. As I was getting Andrew fed before we took off I noticed half of the sky was very dark. Like there was no way in the world that it wouldn't rain dark. Sure enough, it started to rain while we were in line waiting for the parade to start. We had an umbrella so all was well. 

Here they are holding the sign so our ward would know where to line up. 

These are Maggie's kids, Kyle and Olivia, all decked out for the parade. 

It took a while for the mob, I mean paraders, to get moving. Emma, Jenna and Andrew were on their scooters. Before I knew it they were gone. They were suppose to stay with our ward but they decided to race ahead on be in the front of the pack. There were cops everywhere, the parade route was short, I knew nothing would happen, but I still felt the need to find them. I took off as fast as I could, leaving my friends behind, to catch up with them but I never did. 

They were already at the final destination before the front of the parade even got there. I was ticked. I made them feel pretty bad for taking off like they did. 

They broke the rules and the biggest sin of all, they denied me photo ops. I have no pictures of them in the parade. I have no pictures of them by their ward friends. I have no pictures of my friends. I had no clue where they were. I didn't get to spend time with my friends. I had to walk fast which is almost like exercise. Good grief. It all just sucked. 

They did get their popsicles and their stamp to get into the rodeo for free tonight. 

When we got home we all started twisting Paul's arm. He really didn't want to go. I really thought we should. We won and Paul pouted all the way to the rodeo grounds. 

These are the sheep from the Mutton Bustin'

Here is Emma at her first Rodeo
And Andrew with his new and improved (Really? Is it?) mohawk.
The "cash cow". The kids get to chase this little cow and try to get the money off of it. We didn't get there in time to get the kids involved. Next year.

We were there about 30 minutes when it started to sprinkle. Hey, no big deal. Look how happy we still are.

We got our Strawberries and Cream and hung out a while longer. 

Then it started to rain. A lot of really wet, cold, rain. We didn't have an umbrella. Paul was in shorts and a t-shirt. Our sweatshirts weren't doing us much good. We stayed another 30 minutes before we gave up. The kids had so much fun it was sad that we had to leave so soon. We got to see some mutton-bustin, some bareback horse riding and a few other things before we left. They are already talking about next year. 

Another Week Down

Can you tell it's summer break? Pages to do, calendars to fill in, quilts to sew, so many things to keep me from cleaning my house!

The Calendar Pages

These are my favorite part of my 365 album, BUT, while I was in Hawaii I stopped working on them since I didn't have Photoshop on Paul's laptop. I got out of the habit big time. Today Paul woke me up much earlier than I would have liked (especially since he kept me up until well after 1:00am with all of his snoring and weird noises) so I needed a quiet project until it is time to get the kids up. (I would rather be sewing but that is way too loud.) So I decided to finish up April and tackle May. I need to start on June soon.

Some Pages from my Project 365