Week 1 of our Utah Summer Trip 2011

We love going home to visit Utah, but we don't love the 21 hour drive.  Along the way we saw many of these buildings.  I think they look so cool, so I took a few pictures.  The kids, luckily fall asleep for part of the drive and of course, I have to take pictures.

 My Mother in law has the prettiest flowers outside her house and Payton was admiring them, smelling them, touching them, and picking them. 

Carson and his cousins
Riley, Carson, and Kaden

Easton and Ethan

BOOT CAMP

My Mom loves to do Boot Camp for the grandkids every summer.  She always has a theme day and activities planned accordingly.  This year she did American day and Hawaiian day. 

American Day

For American day, we went to the dump to learn about keeping the areas around us clean and how we can help do our part.  We then went over to the firestation to learn about firesafety.  We went to the cemetary and listened to a veteran tell us about our american heros and how we can be a hero too.  We then went to the park for a picnic lunch, a pinata, and a game of all American baseball.  After lunch we prepared for our festive parade. We finished off the day with an all American dinner of Hot Dogs and then the kids made homemade ice cream.  These are pictures from our American Day activities...

Grandpa telling the kids about his grandfather who was a war hero

Goshen Fire Station

Carson and Ethan helping with the Flag

Paytie and Heidi

Pinata time

Picnic

My Mom, the lady who make boot camp lots of fun for the kids.

My little sis, Annie, who is such a good sport to let me tease her endlessly

Hawaiian Day

Hawaiian day was filled with learning how to hoola dance, maori dancing, limbo, and hoola hooping contest.  Carson can really shake his hips.  For lunch my mom made spaghetti and they had to draw a number that coordinated with a certain kitchen tool with which they had to eat with.  There were things like...spatula, mellon baller, ice cream scoop, lattel, pie spatula, whisk, measuring cup.  The kids loved it.  Here are some of the highlights of Hawaiian Day.

I have been friends with these ladies since we were 3 years old.  They are awesome.
{Susie, Sarah, Kim, Dixie, Keri, and Jami}
It was so fun to spend and evening with them.  We were only missing one friend.

Posting for week 2 of our Utah trip will be coming shortly.

My Computer is Working again!!!

If you have been wondering if I fell off the face of the earth, no I haven't.  My computer was having some major issues and I haven't been able to import any pictures, but thanks to my BIL Brian, I now have my computer life back.  Look for future catchup posts coming soon - there will be alot of them!

Whirl wind weekend

I have the best husband. He sent me Home for the weekend so that I could spend time with my family.

When I got to the airport in Dallas, I ran into a childhood friend, Jennifer. I haven't seen her since we were probably 18. We changed our seats to sit by each other on the plane and catch up, it was so much fun. She actually lives in Texas. What a small world.

My little sister, Annie, didn't know I was coming so when I got to my moms house, I hid in the closet right as she was getting off the school bus. My mom asked her to put something away for her in the closet and as she opened it I jumped out. I thought I was going to die of laughter. I love surprising people.

This is me and my 2 sisters.

My mom had a birthday party for Annie while I was in town and she had them decorate hats since the royal wedding was the same day and they were all wearing hats to the wedding. My Dad joined in on the fun.

These are my cute neices whom I have missed terribly. They all begged me to take them home with me, which I gladly would have taken any and all of them.

One of the reasons I came in town was to visit my Uncle Dave, who was recently diagnosed with Lung cancer. He is such a sweet man and a fighter. I love and admire him.

This is my Aunt Sherry. She is amazing too.

The main reason I wanted to come Home to visit, was to see this sweet lady, my grandma. She was diagnosed with alzheimers and has been rapidly declining. I wanted to spend some time with her before she forgot who I am. I wanted to make sure she knows how much I love her while she still remembers. She is an angel.

My parents had tickets to the Yanni concert while I was in town. I can't say that Yanni was my first choice of concert, but we had a lot of fun together, and the concert ended up being good.

Furniture Makeovers

I wanted to find a cool frame that I could turn into a chalkboard for Payties room. I found this golded beauty at the trift store (for only $3.98) and painted her up. It turned out better than I thought it would.
BEFORE...

AFTER...

Green with Envy

This little treasure was in my neighbors garbage. Yes I pulled it out of the trash, well actually my son did. It had a broken leg, but with some wood glue I was able to fix it. I think it turned out good.



BEFORE...AND AFTER...

New Floors!!!

I have wanted wood floors for a loooong time and I now have them and I LOVE THEM ! ! ! They are so beautiful and so I wanted to share the before and after pictures of the floors.

Pouty Payton

My very talented friend Mandie took these pictures of Payton a little while back. She was being a little grumpy that day which is why there isn't one smile. I actually like the candid straight face looks. Either way she still looks beautiful.

Easter decoration and Armoir Makeover

I didn't want to use the standard plastic eggs for my jar so I came up with a solution. I tried painting them with regular craft paint, but the paint wouldn't stick, so I spray painted them first and then applied the craft paint over that and it worked. I think they turned out ok.

ARMOIR MAKEOVER

I bought this armoire from my neighbor a few years ago and was using it for Payton's closet, but when we moved her up to her big girl room she no longer needed it. I was debating whether to refinish it or leave it as is. Payton decided to pull the fabric panels off the doors so the decision was made for me. I didn't have a picture of it with the panels on it, but you get the idea . . . it was in need of a makeover. The paint job was terrible before.