The Andersons

We had a little Anderson get together over the weekend of the 24th. Everyone came to my house and set up tents in the backyard. We missed Erick, Leslie, Bryn, Kyler, and Koby. It was fun to get together and see everyone. The kids had a lot of fun playing together. Avery just ate chalk

Mackenzie coloring with sidewalk chalk

and Avery eating it. She was eating an orange popsicle, but I guess she thought the chalk was better

Mackenzie and Sara with Kenzie's new kitty

The kids colored their own cups and tote bags

This is the look Avery had on her face in about half of the pictures I took over the weekend. Priceless!!

Mackenzie and Gavin decorating their bags.

Avery and Taylor taking turns drinking from the hose

Friday night the kids did some sparklers and Avery LOVED it!! As soon as hers was gone she would start begging for more

Kyrie loved them too!!

I love this picture. Avery was a grandpa's girl. She LOVES her grandpa. If she could see him, she thought he needed to be holding her. All day Sunday after everyone left, she kept saying "Gompa Go??" Then when I was putting the pictures on my computer every time she would see a picture of him she would say "Gompa!! Gompa!!" and she would do this thing with her hands reaching out to the computer that she does when she wants to be picked up- like he was going to jump out of the computer and hold her. Then I would change the picture to something else and she would start crying. Waiting for the parade to start!

Saturday morning we went to the parade. again, Dallas drove the fire truck and took Mark, Mackenzie, Sara, Dusty, and Rylee with him

After the parade, the guys played the saltine game. You have to eat 6 saltine crackers in one minute without taking a drink of water. Doesn't sound too hard does it?? well, it's impossible- and pretty funny to watch!!
Mark Braden
Chris
Grandpa
Dallas

Then they played horse granny style. That was pretty funny too!

Rylee The kids painting T-shirts

One of the few pictures I got of Gavin. He won't let me take his picture anymore. In fact, I didn't really get any pictures of any of the boys... Every time I had my camera out, they were nowhere to be seen!!
Gavin, Jaxon, Dusty, Alek, Hayden, Rylee, Taylor, Sara, and Mackenzie taking a picture to send to Bryn and Kyler
Saturday night we did some fireworksJaxon, Mackenzie, and her friend Kolby

Avery loved them- here's the face again!!

Joye hated them!! She would not let me see her face.

Thanks everyone for coming!! We had a great time!

what????

Oh, I looked out the window and what did I see?? a moose in the backyard eating my tree....

I went out to mow the lawn the other day and this is what I saw when I opened the door!! It scared me to death!! I am just glad that he was on the other side of the fence!! The kids had fun watching him reach over the fence and eat the leaves off of our tree!! He was back there for quite a while, till the cops came and chased him off.

SWIMMING LESSONS!!

It's that time of year again!! The kids just got done with swimming lessons. They both enjoyed it but are always glad to be done. Gavin passed level 2 with flying colors and again, Mackenzie didn't. The first year she took swimming was 4 years ago, and they bumped her up from level one to level 2 saying she didn't need to take level one so I thought she would just fly right through. Not so much!! This was her 6th session of swimming lessons in 4 years, and she has yet to pass level 2! She loves the water but she is terrified of swimming! She would prefer to float around on a floatie rather than try and swim. I have to say though, that she did much better this time!! She is getting to be more comfortable in the water so hopefully next time she will pass!! I don't care if she is never a great swimmer, I just want her to be able to stay above water for safety reasons. I want to know that if she falls in, she will be able to get out!!
Gavin has no fear which is actually a very scary thing sometimes so he did pretty well. Sometimes I wish they could rub off on each other a little bit. It would be nice for Mackenzie to get a little bit of Gavin's fearlessness, and for Gavin to get a little bit of her cautiousness!! I love them both though!! Just as they are!!

Where has the time gone??

WARNING!!!! Picture overload! Where has the summer gone? It is going by so fast and I can't quite seem to keep up. I have been terrible at taking my camera with me to take pictures. It's so big that I just don't like to pack it around . But, Mackenzie has been packing hers EVERYWHERE so I have been stealing it from her to snap some pictures. Love the glasses!Last weekend Dallas and Gavin went camping so me and the girls took some friends and went to Ogden for the day- we went to the dinosaur park. My kids love that place.
It was a good day to go. They had a carnival going on that day with train rides, games, snow cones, ferris wheels, and fun houses.

Mackenzie has to dig for gemstones every time we go there.
Avery enjoying her snow coneas part of the carnival, they had a bunch of snakes, turtles, little alligators, and lizzards for the kids to look at. I was trying to convince Kenzie to hold this big snake and I couldn't expect her to do it if I wouldn't I think she would have done it too but when she went to touch it on the head, the guy said, "here, you can touch the tail in case your afraid it will bite you." After he said that, she changed her mind about holding it.

After the dinosaur park, we went to arby's and got some food then went to the duck park by our old house in layton and let the kids eat and feed the ducks. Avery LOVED it!
Both of the Kenzie's did too!Avery just kept running up and down this hill- I was so afraid she was going to trip and face plant it into the cement!Here's another picture of our "little" friend. Seriously, snakes creep me out. I couldn't get it off me fast enough!

4th of July Weekend!!!

We had our nephews Trey and Tage for 6 days and it happened to be over the 4th of July weekend. One night I took them all swimming. Avery HATED the water at first and cried and cried but then she decided that she loves it! All of the kids in the pool

Then just for fun, the day before the 4th we went to some friends house and let the kids do their own parade. They got pulled around by the 4 wheeler and threw candy off the side. Then they got off and hd to run and find all of the candy.
Tage looks miserable but they all thought it was funrunning to pick up the candy

Mackenzie and her best friend Jaydee

Then, later that night we went to some other friends house for a bbq, then we lit a whole bunch of fireworks!! It was a lot of fun!
This is the face Avery made every time a firework went off.

The kids had a blast doing sparklers and roman candles

Dallas getting ready to lite a "few" fireworks!

Trey lighting roman candles

Gavin
Kenzie

Avery

me and AveryOn the 4th of July we we went to the parade

Avery saw smokey the bear and was so excited she kept pointing and saying "Gook (look)!! Horse!!"
She thought she was in heaven picking up all of that candy- she kept trying to run across the road to pick it up on the other side too. Tage and Kenzie

Gavin and Trey were in the parade. They rode in the fire truck with Dallas

Mackenzie, Avery, and Tage with all of their candy from the parade- they had to share with Gavin and Trey, of course!Later we went to the park where they had some games, bouncy house, and super slides for the kids.
Mackenzie and Trey did some relay races. Here they are trying to run with oranges between their knees!

playing on the fun house

When it got dark, the fireworks started! They were pretty good but the kids were all happy when they were over because they were all freezing!! ...and they all needed a bath because they were covered in nacho cheese and cotton candy!!

Dallas and Trey