Crickets instead of Cake!

Jayden and Dallin had a blast for their 13th birthday, they are at such a fun age, I can't believe I just said that! They are teenagers now and I am scared of teenagers, but they are so much fun to have around. They are big helpers at our house, they take care of the yard and Ty and I haven't had to mow the lawn for the last couple of years. This year they wanted to celebrate by going to Laser Assault with a couple of friends. Wow! There were 8 boys in all including Halen, after a fun game of laser tag we were off for icecream and back to the house to open a few gifts. One of the gifts were onion powdered crickets! All the boys joined in helping gobble them up. I snapped a few pictures of the grossness!

Sad! July is almost over!

What a month July has been. July is my most favorite month of the year and it is fun to share the time with some of my BFF's, Erika who loves July and exercising as much as I do and Kristen who loves camping more than I do. July has been full of birthdays to celebrate, camping trips, fireworks, and night time walks, looking at the stars, sitting around a campfire, warm dutch oven desserts and sitting on the porch with otter pops. These are just a few of my favorite things but many other things have kept me busy. I finished two more classes, geology that I scored an A and a teaching class that I scored an A- in. I also started a math class this month that has challenged my brain, only 3 more classes to go until my Associates degree is finished! I also applied for a few jobs in Nebo School District and landed my first official job. It has been 13 years since I have been out of the career world. I think that this job will be fun, I am the new 4-H after-school program director at the elementary school my kids go to. I get to hire teachers, parents and volunteers to teach classes and set up the curriculum, an added bonus for those who teach get a chunk of cash at the end. I also got called in as 1st counselor in the Relief Society at church and have loved getting to visit with people in our ward. Life is at such a fast pace! If I only knew how to slow time down a little. Here are some of the pictures I took at our last campout over the 24th. I didn't take many because the trip went by fast also!

Happy Birthday Aubrie

My sweet, sassy,determined Aubrie!! I can't believe that she turned 10 on Sunday, too crazy. Here are some fun memories of Aubrie. She is my shopping partner, it doesn't matter what you are shopping for she loves it, even Home Depot with dad or bra shopping with mom does not bore the child. My true middle child, stuck in the middle of two sets of twins she is a fiesty one with attitude but still sweet and caring at times. Aubrie loves to dance and sing, which she is quite good at but is becoming shy about her talents. Dallin actually named her ten years ago when Ty and I were discussing names for the baby, I mentioned the name once and that was it - he went around telling everyone "it is an Aub-a-Ree baby". She was a surprise girl for us, we wanted to wait till she was born to find out. She was a beautiful baby with lots of dark black hair, and I had so much fun dressing her up and putting bows in her hair. She still loves to dress up and shopping for shoes is her favorite. This year she a picked a few favorite friends and I took them to Build-A-Bear workshop for her birthday.

Spoiled...

The kids started this habit of spoiling our dog. We discovered that Titan loved ice when we dumped the leftover ice from our cooler out on the grass last year. He rolled in it, liked it, and chewed on it. He also loves the snow, hence the nickname Polar Bear came along. Well the kids decided that he needed to have giant ice cubes during the summer so every day they fill up a container with water and freeze it so that he can have a refreshing treat. They have even added pieces of food to the ice cubes like something you would see at the zoo. I am amazed that they have been constistent with spoiling him. Now if I could get them to be consistent at something like making their beds everyday.

Loving Summer!

Camping at Joe's Valley

We had such a good time camping and this spot is one of our favorites. We had a rainstorm and saw this beautiful rainbow afterwords.
Jayden and Dallin enjoying dutch oven cobbler. Yum! My favorite part of camping.

My friend Kristi and some of the kids. I should have gotten a picture of all of them there were 7 adults and 14 kids!

Brian Nichols enjoying dessert.

The kids shooting BB guns. We are teaching them safety, that is why they are all lined up.

The kids were thrilled to bring our motorcycle and the campsite was perfect because there was a large circle that they could ride around.

The fishing was awesome, we went to Millers Pond and the poles couldn't stay in the water we were catching them so fast. They were catching rainbow trout. Our friend Mark barbequed them for us and they were delicious.

Dallin and Austin having fun cleaning their own fish.

Halen learned how to gut his own fish too.

Halen's fish.

Dallin's fish

Halen loving having his own tackle box.

Dallin on the motorcycle

Wild flowers were everywhere.

Ok this may make your heart beat faster, it did mine. The kids told us they had discovered a tree swing. When I finally had gone to check it out this is what I saw. I almost freaked out, look at how high Aubrie is on this swing. The swing is on a steep incline down the mountain and so it is easy for the kids to climb on but the drop is probably 15 feet! I didn't have the heart to stop their fun although it made me nervous.

Sadie swinging

Aubrie just climbing on.

Aubrie finally recovered from her last Super Woman stunt on the motorcycle deciding to attempt learning how to ride our motorcycle again.

This is the track and the beautiful view we had at our campsite.

Gorgeous

Silly personality traits of mine

Silly personality traits of mine.

Erika inspired me to write down some silly personality traits, I am sure they will not be as funny as hers.

Some of my dumbest fears are not the ones that you would think I would fear most. Like locking doors while I am home alone or carrying a cell phone while walking at night. Even walking through a dark parking lot alone returning with two carts of groceries during my midnight trips to wallmart. I have never been afraid of the dark or getting robbed or kidnapped even though I once had a pretty good scare all I did was laugh histerically at my friend (whom will remain unnamed) scream profanities at the pretend kidnappers who had outnumbered us and had every opportunity of shoving us in their van with a getaway driver and the whole works.
No what do I fear...

I fear going to public pools and getting whatever gross stuff that may stick to my wet feet or my children's feet. Yuck. I am guilty of wearing my flipflops right up to the edge of the pool and then taking them off only to hope they are still there when I get out.
Yet the silly thing about this is I have no problem swimming in any lake or pond- as long as I have some type of shoes on. ( My mother would tell you that I never wore shoes when I was a child).

The next silly thing is that I fear becoming fat. But I do not diet or even think of dieting because I am too busy enjoying brownies, cheesecake, otter pops, snow cones, and icecream. I do some exercise but not even close to the amount that I would need to burn off what I eat. I would like to learn how to eat healthier but I don't think I want to give up the good stuff. (yes I grew up eating cake, donuts, muffins for breakfast)

I think I have the ability to predict what bad will come to my children, and I am a little overly protective. For instance I am always telling them things like "don't run on that kitchen floor you will slip and fall and crack your head open" I have a huge fear of children falling on hard sufaces like cement or tile and hitting their heads. I can actually make myself feel ill just thinking about it. I am working on this one so that my poor kids can still act like kids. My mother would tell you that I thought I was invincible as a child and did things I would not think of letting my kids do. Like bungi jumping on a date in highschool, or climbing to the top of a train bridge while the train went underneath and nearly rattled me off the bridge. Riding big wheels down water-runoff tunnels that were pitch black. (my poor mother)

Although I did not grow up with choas at all being the oldest of only two children, the house was quiet most of the time and things were always in order and the house was always clean, I somehow have adapted to choas. I almost need it to survive, now this must have come after marriage and twins. I sometimes sign myself up for way too much. Like callings in the church or volunteering at school. Everytime I think I can handle the load I have, I seem to justify that I can add to the load. Like right now being a fulltime student, I am thinking I need a part time job and perhaps a fulltime one would make life more interesting. Maybe it is a boredom thing, I am not sure. Funny how things can change.

Never 2 Late for the 4th

For some reason this post is all out of order and I can not move these pictures, instead of spending too much time on this you will have to put up with it. Sorry.

Finally I am posting the fourth of July pictures, but it is never too late I say. We had a good time barbequeing with our friends Erika and Thaus Amonett.

All little Xavier cared about was a drink. We started him off last year with a hatred for fireworks which really doesn't fit Erika's plan of patriotism. He followed tradition with hating the fireworks again this year and Erika got some much needed loves from him during the show since he was terrified.

Here is the guys pretending to be camping or something. We really spent the evening in our driveway with a fire and yummy hamburgers, hotdogs, brownies, and smores. We had the best part of camping anyway, the campfire and smores.

My good friend Erika loves July as much as I do. Maybe because we both celebrate birthdays in July or something.

The kids loved cooking smores and waiting for the fireworks to begin. The kids actually put on the entire show for the adults this year. It was a relaxing night sitting back and letting the kids light everything on fire.