SCHOOL STARTED!!!

Our school actually started a week ago, so I figured I better get there first day of school picture up....

Rylee is going into 2nd grade..she is sporting her Justin Bieber shirt and LOTS of duct tape bracelets, because (in her words), is the HOTTEST BOY ALIVE......

Morgan is going into 7th grade, she was very excited. Morgan and our neighbor get to ride there bikes to school. I LOVE THAT!!!

MOM, take the picture, ALREADY!!!

Jos actually doesn't start preschool for another few weeks, 

but she got up and got ready.

Fun With Family

We had such a fun night with Boomer's family. We were able to go to Midway, where Boomer's brother, Ramsey had a camping site. We meet at a park for dinner, then headed up for the site. It was so fun. 

We played in the park for a little bit and did sparklers.

Hanging out at the Camp fire....Mo and Mollie were singing to us, 

while Boomer and Ramsey started the fire!!

This is our tired little bug

COUSINS (all but, Brian, he was in bed already)

Look, the fire had an "A" in it...SO COOL!!!

This was my favorite shot of the night. 

Ramsey with his little girl, Brooke. 

So, so sweet!!!

It was so fun relaxing by a fire, eating SMORES and being with family..

We have such an awesome family!!!

Day 2 of Birthday Celebrations!!!

On Saturday we had a fun day of just FAMILY. My Mom rented a Bouncer, OH MY GOODNESS, the kids were ecstatic. The bouncer came after lunch. Then at 4 we had a Photographer come and take Family pictures. This is the FIRST time in a long time we had EVERYONE all together. We were able to get every GRANDMA'S dream picture with ALL the kids in the same place. There are many pictures taken, when you are taking family pictures with a CRAZY FUN bunch of people you get some GREAT shots. I had to add all the pictures that were taken till we FINALLY would get the perfect best shot.

The first thing we did to start off the party was have a rocket flying contest. Each family made a rocket out of 2 liter bottles, 1 golf ball and lots of Duct tape. It was really fun. 

Everyone loved the BOUNCER, I think the adults

 had as much as the kids.

The most comical part was watching people fly down the slide.

My sister Britt, compiled a book of memories about Dad, from family and friends. It turned out AMAZING!! He LOVED it.

Here is the family pictures:

 My oldest brother, Mike and his family trying to get a picture on the slide, YUP, no luck, they fell every time, really funny!!! The standing one worked out better!!

My other brother, Fred and his family

My oldest sister, Michelle and her husband Chuy

Our family... ( I don't know where Morgan disappeared, 

I didn't get a single shoe of her)

My little sister, Brittney and her family

All the kids and their spouses

All the siblings..Michelle does YOGA, look at that stretch :)

SISTERS, I think this story went that Britt was getting an eyelash off Michelle's cheek and ACCIDENTALLY pinched her cheek REALLY hard!! We got it together for a beautiful shot.

The Boys...Syd was fixing Grandpa's hair..PERFECTION!! 

The GIRL, grand kids with Grandma

The BOY grand kids with Grandpa

ALL the GRAND KIDS...18!! AWESOME!!!

The AUNTS with the TWINKIES

These are the TWINKIES....lots of CREME filling.

AND the 2 that are responsibly for ALL of us!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAD!!!

Our entertainment, the best there is, Chuy.

To hear more of his bands incredible music, click HERE.

(just a little plug)

MOMENTS.....

Seriously, the chicken...it was a juggling chicken for Chuy which became the parties mascot. It was late, we were partying ALL DAY and this chicken became the funniest thing ( we had lost it)..yes, you had to be there, just look how happy Julia looks with the chicken. Oh, Mr. Chicken how we miss thee....

Joslyn in the bottom picture is happily petting a DEAD dragonfly, she was in heaven. We buried it after!!!

Chuy's juggling act....

This is what happens when Twinkies are around, 

you get creamed.

Boomer and Luke

I thought this was a cool picture. We had a YUMMY dutch oven dinner. The briquettes made PERFECT Mellow roasters. This is Julia feeling the love. YUMMY, smores!!

Stay tuned for more fun days......

SURPRISE!!!!!

We threw a SURPRISE party for my Dad's 70th Birthday. AND we pulled it off, YEA!!!! We had 2 days of FUN PARTIES planned... the only reason we pulled of his SURPRISE party, is we did it one on Friday night. Dad suspected something, because myself and my sister Michelle came in to town, but he just figured it was on Saturday (which we had one planned then too). Through out the week anytime my Dad left for work, we grabbed all the stuff and started planning and creating for the party. Then when we saw him pull in, we would start shoving and hiding any evidence. It was quite a show. When you are trying to run in the house with 24 balloons, before your Dad drives in the driveway, my sister and I were laughing so hard. Good times!!

We had planned on dinner for the family, so everyone started showing up for that, which was not unusual for my family to get together. It started getting closer for the SURPRISE party to start and the guest to start coming. After dinner we started bringing out chairs and decorating. My Brother, Mike set up a DJ station and my Brother Fred started the Cobbler for the evenings dessert for the guest.

We kept trying to get my Dad to change his clothes, he was pretty casual for the evening. At one point he looked outside and saw us all busy decorating, he turned to my Mom and said something to the effect of, "OK, WHAT IS GOING ON." My Mom simple replied, "GO, GET DRESSED". Right as my Dad walked out to the backyard, his first guest walked in and the evening went on with family and friends coming. It was so fun. Sisters, Aunts and Cousins of my Dad that he hadn't seen for awhile came. It was an AMAZING night to celebrate an INCREDIBLE, Father, Grandpa and FRIEND!!! 

Here are pictures of the night......

More to come of the FAMILY party.....

Last Post of Our Getaway!!!

On our last day of our little escape together. We decided to go to the Park City Ski Resort and ride the Alpine Slide and Coaster. The Alpine Slide we both had done while we were younger, but the Coaster was new. That was REALLY fun. We had a great time. After we meet Boomer Brother's, Kris and Ramsey for lunch, which was so fun to see them, then headed home. It was a well needed, FUN mini vacation. Thanks, Dad and Mom for playing with the kids!!!

Now, more to come of the REAL reason we were in UTAH!!!!

Day 2 of Utah...(long post)

The 2nd day we were in Park City, we woke up and drove up to the Olympic Park. I really wanted to do a zip line. When we first arrived we could hear music and a crowd gathering, we went to check out what was going on. Their were a bunch of kids, all ages practicing their jumps into water. They were fully clothed with a wetsuit, life jacket and ski's. It was AMAZING to watch. There were little guys that were 5 and 6 learning to jump along with trained Olympic jumpers practicing for the next Olympics. After waiting for awhile, we went and purchased our zip line tickets. We started to head down the hill to the chair lift. While walking down you could here this sound that truly sounded like a small jet taking off, and we rounded a corner and realized we were at the bottom of the Nordic Ski jump. It was absolutely breathe taking to see. All the Olympic Athletes were practicing that day. We watched in AWE for hours. The talent that these young athlete have is AMAZING!!! After watching for awhile we decided to take the chair lift up to go zip lining. Once we reached the top we realized that we could go to the top of the Nordic ski jump and watch the athletes up close and personal. We found a bench that was right above jumpers. It was really fun watching all of the athletes little routine as they got ready for their turn down the slope.
The men were very serious, did the same ritual every time, never spoke, just focused. The funniest thing we saw was there was 2 women that were also jumping. You could hear them talking the second they got off the lift, as they walked closer you could hear the conversation about a guy from the night before....the girls would walk down doing the SAME routine as the men but NEVER stopped talking. The one girl keep talking till she pushed off to go down a REALLY steep hill. Boomer and I have laughed about the difference between the way the men and the women were, it was awesome. We sat there for another hour absolutely in awe of these athletes. Soon after we went and did the zip line, we had to wait for about 30 min for some rain and storm clouds to blow over, but FINALLY we got to zip down the mountain. It was really fun.

This is a close up of the ski jump. The artificial turf on the jump reminded me of a hula skirt. Here is some close pictures of it. The track that ski's go on have small balls that help the ski's move, that is what made the sound of the small jet. 

I loved these shots, the one on the left is what it looks like right now, notice the flag poles. The one on the right is what it looked like during the Olympics. Where the flags were they had 10 story high bleachers. So AMAZING!!

Some of the men training for the 2014 Olympics in Russia.

These next pictures are a step by step of the athletes getting ready to jump. They would first slide on these metal seating poles...

Can you see the turquoise spot on the grass

The 2nd jumper sliding on the pole....

This was a fun show all the jumpers put on with music. The detail I loved, is there was a man in charge of the BUBBLES in the water. As soon as the jumper would take off, he would start the bubbles. The bubbles made it so the jumpers wouldn't hit hard in the water and then it make them surface quickly. So, belling flopping didn't hurt!!

It was really fun to watch.

The bottom right corner picture is the bob sled run.

We had such a fun, amazing (I say that word A LOT) morning. Now we were off to an afternoon of golf. The golf course was BEAUTIFUL and the weather was PERFECT!! I got side tracked at the beautiful scenery, homes and barn. Here are some pictures of the fun afternoon.

That evening we decided to head to Salt Lake City for dinner at Market Street Grill, SO, YUMMY!!!! We got all dressed up hoping to go dancing, we found out that is REALLY HARD to do on a Tuesday. 

It was a very fun, relaxing night.

Day 3 to come.....