Catching-up

Is it just me or is this summer just flying by WAY too fast? I feel like summer just started and today I was looking at my calendar trying to see how many weekends we have free through the rest of the summer, and I was surprised when I realized that we only have one or two. We have family reunions, a wedding, my class reunion, and a few other things planned and that pretty much fills up the rest of our summer weekends. I was a little bummed because we haven't done hardly any of the things I wanted to do this summer (like going camping). Hopefully we will find the time to fit in a few things before school starts. AHH- another thing that needs to be done- school shopping. Some days I just wish I had a rewind button so I could go back to the beginning of summer and start over. Then other days, when my kids are driving me crazy, I wish I could fast forward to the end of summer send send them to school lol!

These pictures are completely out of order but that's okay. The other day we had a party for the girl scouts. We usually do a field trip at the end of the school year for the girls but this year, there were 30 girls in our troop and we did not want to try to transport that many kids so Gina planned something close to home. The weather could have been better but the girls had a blast!

We had a giant bouncy house/water slide, pizza and snow cones.

TREK
a couple weeks ago, Dallas and I went on the trek with the young men and women. We were one of the ma's and pa's. It was so much fun. I don't have many pictures because we were not allowed to bring cameras. We had 8 kids and we went 25 miles total- a lot of which was uphill. It wasn't nearly as hard as I had anticipated. In fact, it wasn't hard at all. I think the mild weather made all the difference. If it had been real hot I'm sure I would have been miserable. It was overcast most of the time. I still managed to get a pretty good sunburn though on the back of my neck and on my face. I wore sunscreen but what I forgot was chapstick with sunscreen in it. On the last day we were there, I woke up and the first thing I noticed was that my bottom lip felt funny. I said to dallas "I think my lip is swolen" -then he turned and looked at me and just started laughing. I had a tiny little mirror that I looked in and it looked like I had a sausage link on my face. I was so embarrassed, I told him "I am not going out there like this!" Then I held my cold water bottle up to it for a while and luckily the swelling went down really fast.
all ready to go!
Here's our family- our kids were Hadley, Cody, Kalvin, Skye, Parker, Caleb, Kyleigh, and Stephanie.
I was so worried about the weather. At first, I thought it would be so hot, we would be totally miserable. Then as the day got closer, I watched the weather and it said rain and thunderstorms every day so then I was worried we were going to get drenched. We got rained on a little but it was no big deal. When the big storm came in, it was really neat. You could see it raining and lightening all around us but we somehow stayed dry. It was like the storm just split and went around us. I could go on forever about how much fun we had but I won't. I will just say that I am so glad we were chosen to go and I would do it again in a second. It was an experience I will never forget. I was really glad to get home though. After 4 days of no shower I was feeling pretty gross!

4th of July
This year for the 4th we all rode in the fire truck with Dallas. The kids had fun throwing candy to all the kids. I had to bribe them though. They knew that if they were in the parade, they wouldn't get any candy so after the parade, I had to take them to the store and get them some.



That night, the kids went to the neighbors for a bbq and watched the big fireworks with them. Dallas was at the fireworks with the fire dept but since they were setting them off just at the park behind our house, Avery and I stayed home to watch from the backyard. Me and her lit a bunch of sparklers-which she loved- then we sat in the swing and talked and waited for the big fireworks to start. It was actually really fun to sit and talk to her. We don't get a whole lot of one-on-one time so I really enjoyed it! She made it through about half of the fireworks, then she crashed.

The night before the 4th, we went to some friend's house for a bbq and fireworks. It was so much fun. There were SO many fireworks!
Here's the fireworks. All of those boxes on the trailer were completely full.
Avery loved them but she thought they were too loud.

Gavin loves the loud ones!

Mackenzie liked them too but she didn't dare hold any of the roman candles. They scared her which was funny because last year she did a whole bunch of them.

Lagoon!

Last week we went to Lagoon with Grandma Sill, Trey, Tage, and Shelby. The kids had a blast and didn't want to leave. They are already asking if we can go back.

I was so impressed- Mackenzie finally went on a roller coaster. This is huge for her because she won't even ride puff the magic dragon because it goes too fast.

They have this new roller coaster this year and she loved it. I bet the kids went on it 20 times. Avery even went on it twice. The first time she did okay, but the second time she cried through the whole thing. I didn't make her go on it anymore after that.

This is pretty much how Avery's day went though. Almost every ride we took her on, she would cry for the first half, then laugh and smile for the second half. It was pretty funny.

Her favorite ride is still the boats. She could have sat in that little boat all day.

sad

happy

dippin dots- the best part of going to Lagoon

shelby Jade

Mackenzie and Shelby were riding the roller coaster when it broke down. They sat on the track for about 10 minutes before they had them get out and walk the rest of the way down.

They all got soaked on the odyssey

Gavin's favorite part was playing in the water. He begged all day. Finally, at 10:30 I gave in and let him play in the water. Gav, Trey, and Shelby played in it for probably 40 minutes. Of course he was freezing once we got in the car to drive home. We didn't get home till after 1 am. the kids were tired and cranky the whole next day but it was worth it!