This summer while we made mini trips around to see our families I realized that I am very grateful for the more untouched parts of the world. 

I really like where I live in the city. But I love that there are still places that are wide open, without houses in every direction, where the air smells fresh and clean. It's just really nice. And I am glad that I came from a small town.

Bear Lake

I just have to share this story about my nephew Jaxon. So in the picture above we have Bear Lake and you know how it is at the lake sometimes where you have the little pool of water, a bar of sand and then the rest of the lake, sand bar right? 

Well while we were on vacation at bear lake this lined the whole beach.At one point we sat talking a little bit to Jaxon and Garrett and we looked out and one of the girls (I really don't remember which one) was laying in this first pool of water with her hair all in the muck. And so we called out not to dip your hair in that yucky water. Jaxon pipes up and says: "Why not? is that where you're supposed to pee or something? because I peed in the other side." 

Ha! we all laughed and everyone said "no" and we pointed to where bathrooms were (far walk of course). He laughed and said " I really didn't I was kidding." 

Was he? ....was he? ha ha ha I guess we'll never know, but that stuck with me, it was pretty funny. What can you expect from a son of Jared's? ... oh yeah Garrett once peed in the vent ... in our house .... hmmm

Summer Va-ca

For our vacation this year we went camping at the ranch, a 4 day trip.

There were a lot of fun things to do.  

The day that we left was Maren's actual birthday. She turned 2!!! 

So she was able to open a gift from Brad, the kids and I while we roasted marshmallows around the fire.

The kids (and Brad and I too) were thrilled to sleep in a camp trailer! I mean I don't mind tent camping but we haven't tried to sleep all 5 of us in our tent and it was tight with 4 so we're probably due for a new one.

But this was really exciting for the kids.

It was Maren's first time sleeping outside of a crib and first time sleeping with another person (me). She did fine, the first night was a little rough but she got the hang of it after that.

The next day, when more of our family joined us at Bear Lake we had a little party for Maren and opened gifts from the rest of the family.

When I asked Maren earlier on what she wanted for her birthday she said "Pink" ... well ok that is fairly straight forward. So she had pink cupcakes to share with everyone! 

(you'll notice a big scratch on her cheek she got from falling the night before, dang! its still a scar months later, ouch!)

Everyone had lots of fun at the lake.

 And everyone got to ride the horses around a little bit. 

Embrie is our animal lover, she was eating it up!

The last day was spent shooting skeet, and then going to Minnetonka Cave, near bear lake.

I was excited to take my kids here because I loved it when I was a kid. It's 800 stairs, up and down, round trip in this cave. I would say I got a pretty good work out carrying my 2 yr. old. Feel the burn in those calves! The kids thought it was pretty cool (despite the grumpy look on Garrett's face). 

Wonder what next year's vacation will be....

The End of 1st Grade

During Garrett's last week of 1st grade they had 'camp week'. They got to have a tent in class, eat lunch in class, each class had their own tie died shirts that they made in a specific color and picked a camp name for their class, and went on a walking field trip that their families could join them for. 

Garrett LOVED his teacher Mrs. McMullin, and his whole first grade class.

(we loved her too! she is a fantastic teacher)

On the second to last day of school, they watched a slide show that his teacher had put together with pictures of all the class through out the year. Many of the kids shed tears that first grade was over .... apparently Garrett shed lots of tears. He's not usually very emotional, but I guess he ended up crying for the last 45 min of school after watching the video and couldn't even be coaxed to play a game.

Poor guy! When we got home he just kept his backpack on, he wasn't sure he wanted to move on to second grade and be in a different class with different kids and a new teacher. But he was able to sleep on it

and the last day of school was field day and he had tons of fun!

I'm glad that he loved 1st grade so much and we saw him make lots of improvement through out the year. He did so well in school, it was amazing to see how much he learned.

 I hope he'll love 2nd grade just as much.

Princess Festival

My how time does fly! Sheesh!

Back in June Embrie and I had our own mother-daughter day. (Garrett had been to the Monster Truck show with Brad in the winter, so it was our turn.) 

We went with a group of friends, other mom's and daughters to the Thanks Giving Point Princess Festival.

I bought for Embrie a new princess dress up of her choice (provided that she pick something she will also wear for Halloween :) 

She chose Repunzel.

She got a princess story book that had a place in the back for autographs that she would collect.

And watching a tea party with the Alice in Wonderland crew

(these guys were so funny, I think Embrie was too intimidated by the queen to pose for a picture.)

Robinhood! You've got to throw in a handsome prince-of thieves, right!

There was lots of entertainment. A magic show and several 'quests' that you could go on with different princesses. If you passed off so many quests you got a free snow cone.

Embrie's first quest was to help this princess find the missing stuffed animals that she'd been collecting to give to children who didn't have toys.

They followed the clues until they found the culprits who'd stolen them.

In the Thieves cave, they found Robinhood and Sinbad the pirate with his pirate crew and the little princesses convinced the robbers to give them back. *So cute!*

...in another quest Embrie helped put together a big puzzle and solve the clues to find snow white's missing apples.

Then she met Captain Hook, who was being very careful not to poke anyone with his hooked hand.

they had coloring and crafts, face painting

Embrie and friend Becca (Snow White) even found Repunzel and Snow White sitting together, perfect!

Me and my girl!

It was fun to spend some one on one time with Embrie

baseball season

Garrett and Embrie played coach pitch baseball and t-ball this summer.

Embrie's first time playing, we were pretty surprised how quickly she picked it up.

She turned out to be quit the hitter and not a bad throw either!

Garrett has played 3 years in a row and loves it of course.

He's gotten pretty good at throwing and hits the ball pretty well too.

It was during the hottest part of summer which put us all outside for 2 hours at a time in the triple digits for weather, but we brought our squirt bottles, lots of water and sunscreen. It was fun to watch them and see them improve.

Celebrating Grandpa's 60th