JULY

Started out celebrating the 4th of July with our ward breakfast and kids bike parade. 

Swimming, BBQ and fireworks with a few friends. 

Bad picture, but Noah did some extra chores to earn the privilege of helping light the fireworks this year.  He was SO excited!

I found this commercial shave ice maker for a good deal and decided to buy it.  It's been a huge hit all summer.  We've used it as the dessert for most of our BBQ's.  We've upped our shave ice game with ice cream at the bottom and cream on top.  Oh yeah, they're good.  Just like the ones in Hawaii. 

One of our summer craft days - took some online lessons of chalk writing.  

Chick-fil-a day and 7/11 day all on the same day.  Heck yes.  Free lunch and free slurpees.  

Chick-fil-a had bounce houses, cotton candy, games.....it was pretty great. 

The kids turned the craft room into their sleeping quarters for about a week. 

Noah trying the knee board for the first time. Took the Wutkees to the cabin for the weekend. 

We had AC issues pretty much the entire summer.  Luckily it was still working, just not well.  For about 5 days though we couldn't use it at all and it was sweltering in our house.   Crazy how you can't do anything when you're that hot.  We just sat around trying to survive.  I don't think I could have been a pioneer.  

Discovered Orbeez

Played at upper Clementine a few times.  

Ava marking off one of her New Years resolutions to cliff jump.  Now she loves it. :)

We had a little Seattle friends reunion at the cabin.  The Jensens came down from Washington and the Broadbents DROVE from South Carolina to hang out for a few days.  Adam and I were a little nervous it would feel really crowded or overwhelming with that many people at the cabin (7 Jensens, 5 Broadbents, 5 of us and a couple nights we had our Bishop and his family there, 4 of them).  It ended up being a great few days.  

We spent a lot of time on the lake skiing, tubing, playing on the water mat and hiking to the waterfall. 

Pretty sure this is where lady bugs come from (this is on the way to the waterslide on the lake).

I told Noah he could jump (not dive) off this rock!  He had to land in the middle of that small pool for it to be deep enough.  

Adam took a few of our guests to the overlook. 

S'more time. 

The kids really had a ton of fun together.  

We weren't quite sure about sleeping arrangements, but obviously it didn't matter, because the kids wanted to sleep outside on the deck anyway. 

The most people we've had on the boat at one time. 

Every inch was packed with stuff or people.  Good thing we all like each other. :)

The kids found a black scorpion while on the beach at the lake (didn't know they came in black).  He's now part of our growing bug collection at the cabin. 

Took them to our favorite cliff jumping spot. 

After all our guests had to leave, Adam went back to work and the kids and I stayed at the cabin for a few more days.  We went to Castle Crags for a few minutes.  It was getting late so we only did one of the overlooks.  The babies started fighting when we got there and I told them I wouldn't keep walking with them until they apologized.  We sat there for 30 more minutes while they cried and quarreled some more! UGH! Seriously, sometimes kids are brats.

 At least Noah and I had some nice views to look at while the babies came to their senses.  Mt Shasta is such an amazing mountain. 

One of the days we found a beach on the lake and tried to fish.  Ha, we are NOT fisherman.   We just took our time and swam and played in the water. 

Finally got our old garden boxes ripped out (had to move tons of rocks and dirt out of the way) and started getting my new planters in place.  As of today all 7 of them are in place.  Well, that's a wrap for July.