Sunday, July 31, 2011

Aquarium

 July 28, 2010

Here's our trip to the aquarium down in Sandy. It's a small aquarium, but it is fairly well done for a city that is land locked. It was nice to have a day inside with all the sweltering heat outside. We were grateful for cousins who joined us too!

Colin, Tanner, Lexie and Benson on the frog. Ribbit!

Some of the sea life we saw inside.

Aunt Andi and Cousin Carter
Playing puzzles in the boat.
The Aquarium did a good job of showing you what life on the ocean or river was like.
Andrew with his leg up, fast asleep. It is always nice to tucker out a child.

Downtown SLC

July 27, 2010

A trip to Salt Lake City just isn't a trip without some downtown fun. My two FABULOUS sister-in-laws joined me this day for the hot, sweaty, fun.

We started off at the beautiful downtown Public Library. There the kids found several rooms to play in.


 Andrew sported us his fish lips. He's been working hard on this! Down right kissable I tell you!

 Next we went to the reflection pool for a snack.  Little did we know that the kids were sending their fish crackers for a swim! I hope the Temple Square grounds keepers don't hate us! 

 Us moms were a little distracted from what the kids were doing though because we saw a much greater perspective and just had to capture it!

 The flowers on temple square are always exquisite.  I once called the Temple Square Grounds Department  to find out the dates they would be taking the tulips out.  I planned our wedding date to make sure there would be tulips in my pics! It turned out to be a beautiful day too!

While we were there, I took a picture of each of my three oldest in front of the temple. Nothing fancy, just a reminder of what they really want in life.



 Carter's big blue eyes at the ice cream store.

 Our travels were combined with a trip on UTA's Trax. The kids loved it! Wish I could say the same. It is crazy some of the things we do for our kids. Riding Trax is one of them. So glad they love it so.

Grandpa's swimming pool

July 24, 2010

When grandpa heard we were coming to town he pulled out his inflatable pool! The kids and their cousins had a grand time!



Cousin Benson -- shivering in the cold Rocky Mountain water.

 Cousin Andrew

Here's my attempt to keep Colin's leg dry.  Good intentions.  Dumb idea. This is a two year old we're talking about. In the end, I took off the bag and just let him get wet. Then I let him swim until he was plum tired, put him to bed, and put his cast on a rock in the hot sun for 20 minutes to dry. Worked like a charm! 


Grandpa watching the festivities with Scooter! Thanks for the hours of fun grandpa!

Poter meets Scooter

July 24, 2010

Aunt Carlie and Uncle Jeffrey just got a dog and his name is scooter. Porter had a grand ole time meeting. Scooter was a trooper and did a great job with Porter! Nice to meet ya little fella!

Broken

July 7, 2010

This post is slightly out of order by about 3 weeks. Sorry.

My sweet 2 year old decided to jump off Tanner's bunk bed during naptime. He came into my room limping.  I of course, kissed him and sent him on his way like any good mother would do. By the next morning, he was still limping, but only here and there. I was pretty skeptical honestly. More like, in denial.  So, we went to the hospital for some x-rays.  2 year olds are amazing creatures. They can fool you for anything.  By the time we were in the elevator on our way to the x-ray machine, I was on the phone with my husband asking him if he remembered WHICH foot it was he was actually limping on.

Sure enough. Fracture into the growth plate in his leg, and one in his foot too. I took a pic with my lousy picture-taking cell phone.  Can you tell I got to pick the color of the cast?

A tangent...
That evening we got out of the orthopedics's office getting a cast on his leg. I picked up Derek and we went over to the mechanic's to pick up his car. On the way home we blew a tire in Derek's car. So we left the car on the side of the freeway and went to pick up the rest of the family. Then we headed over to Sam's Club to pick up 4 new tires since the full spare was already on the car from a previous blow a couple of weeks earlier. We arrived at Sam's Club at 7:02 pm and looked for someone to help us in the tire dept. We discovered that the tire guys leave at 7pm! Just our luck. I looked at my husband and said, "Well sweetheart, it's been a $2000 day. How about we get a pizza to top it off?" So, we walked a little further in and bought a pizza for dinner. Our kids were all starving for sure!

Despite our expensive day, I was grinning ear to ear as I watched Colin try to walk on his new cast. He was a hoot! The little guy just struggled to get from one place to another and did a lot of just staying put. With all the gray hairs this kid was putting on his mom, I was delighted to think he'd be enjoying some down time over the next 6 weeks. Little did I know...

The next day, he continued to wobble around in the morning, but by the afternoon, he was back to running. Bummer! That evening I dropped the kids off at a friend's home while Derek and I went to a Pathology dinner. When we returned I walked in to see Colin JUMPING on their little exercise trampoline. Yes, just 24 hours.  That's all the "down time" I got.

On day two of his cast I went in to check on Tanner and Colin during naptime. They were playing nicely on the floor together. I noticed, however, that the safety bar from Tanner's bunk was on the floor so I asked Tanner about it. "Colin did it mom." I'm thinking at this point, the whole reason Colin broke his leg in the first place is because he didn't know how to climb down.  Hence posed the next question: "How did he get down?" Tanner matter-of-factly replied: "He just grabbed the sheets and slid off the side". Tarzan. That's my boy!

That night when Derek came home we took apart the bunk beds.

One week later. Exactly.  Colin started crawling and bawling.  His behavior was significantly worse than when he had actually broken his leg.  I was really worried that he had hurt it somehow. We took him in and they took the cast off. He had several blisters on his foot with one about the size of a quarter on his little heal. The Nurse Practitioner decided to go with a walking cast for him instead. This would enable me to treat the blisters. It also took a great load off my shoulders as we were just about to embark on our journey to Utah and I knew there would be a lot of water involved in our summertime fun.

My favorite was the GOLD emblem across the back of his boot:

 Ain't that the truth!

 

24th of July

July 24, 2010

The 24th of July is a special day for Utah. It is the day the Saints arrived in the Salt Lake Valley.  In the year 1847 the Prophet Brigham Young looked out over the valley and declared, "This is the Place". He had seen the valley previously in a vision and knew it when he saw it. Today there are well over 1 million who live in that valley and 2.8 million in the State of Utah.

Each year this momentous occasion is celebrated.  It is a day to honor the pioneers who made the trek to Utah to establish religious freedom.  This day is honored not only in Utah, but amongst the Saints throughout the world. But in Utah, they make a pretty big deal out of it and I was just tickled pink to be able to be there just in time for the festivities!

A lot of handcarts and wagons during the 24th parade!



This parade is one-of-a-kind. I love to see how creative the floats are. No where else will you see Mormon floats filled with uplifting themes!




This one shows the difference in travel between then and now. Wagon vs. minivan. Trek vs. vacation. We sure have it easy!







Grandma and Grandpa High came with us to the parade!



A parade is not a parade without the marching bands! The kids always learn a lot about the different musical instruments when we go to parades.


Gotta love these funny fellas!






 Colin and Lexie had prime seating for the parade!


On my bucket list is a couple of costumes. These are a good sampling. You see a lot of this attire during the 24th.



The Parade always ends with the missionaries!

A trip to Utah

July 22, 2010

In July we made a special trip to Utah.  I've made this trip a few times now and never tire of the beauty of landscape. There are always comments of how boring and flat Nebraska is, but it really does have it's own kind of beauty.  Large expanses of rolling hills makes this part of the country rich in fertile growing soil.