Friends, Family, and Reunions

We got back a couple of days ago from Utah! I went up before Jake with the kiddos to see some friends and family before the Smith family reunion started. My grandparents met me and the kids in Cedar City and drove the rest of the way up with us, so the drive really wasn't bad. Thanks grandpa and grandma :)

First stop on our trip was Woods Cross... my BFF's house. Ashley and I have been friends since we went to nursery together at church... so pretty much our whole lives. Here we are when we were like five. Apparently we had some awesome hair skills.
Here's another when we were like seventeen...
I think I'll end the old and embarrassing pictures there. We don't get to see each other that often any more, but it always seems like things are just the same when we get together. I love that. Luke had fun playing with Presley (check out these pictures from when they were babies), and Ella and Evvah just kinda watched the big kids play and tried to keep up. Maybe next time they will be old enough to play too.

Here's Luke, Presley, and Ash in the hot tub. Luke was a little hesitant about wearing pink and purple floaties. Haha. Kind of a bummer that this is pretty much the only picture I got when we were there. Anyway, thanks Ash for a fun time!

The next day we headed up to Ogden and hung out with Grandma Nan and Grandpa Arnie. Some of my aunts and cousins and their kids came over and we had a fun lunch. Aunt Carol came up and visited for a while, and Luke and Ella couldn't get enough of the swings and playhouse.

Grandpa gave Luke and Gabbi a ride...

Grandma went with us to the Dinosaur Park. Luke didn't like the Dino's as much as I thought he would. Bummer. He just wanted to play at the playground and swing the whole time.

Dinosaur Park Stuff!

After our stay in Ogden, we went up to Wolf Creek for the Smith family reunion. It's always so pretty up there, and good to be with everyone. I am lucky to have such awesome in laws!

Here is a picture from the house we stayed at. One of these days I want to live in a place with a view like this!
And another...

Here's Jake with his parents and the siblings.

Rick and Sherry with all 15 grand kids! Smith ladies... Me, Shauna, Hailey, Melanie, Kristen, and Jenni

2006 Babies all grown up... Luke, Austin, Gunnar, Lane, Lucy, Seth, and Logan
Luke and Ella with Grandpa and Grandma

Newly engaged... David and Shauna!

Mr. Luke tromping through weeds...

Ella was liking Utah's soft grass

Family program and fun... Shauna was a good sport!

Whipping cream game...
Luke was loving all the cousin time!

Why is it that every year I get a picture of Luke and Ethan with sticks?

More cousin stuff...

After our time at the reunion, we headed over to Huntsville to see Grandma Fran and Grandpa John! We stayed the night and headed out the next day. We managed to fit in lots of playing outside, book reading, bull riding at Uncle Den and Aunt Kathy's, visiting, and eating.

Grandma and Grandpa reading to the kids...

Grandma let Luke water her flowers :)

On our way back home we stopped in Provo to walk around BYU like the good old days! I love Provo. Dorky thing to say, I know. But, I do. And, it was fun walking around and thinking about fun times, classes, and the good friends I made there. We got a few things at the book store, and then drove the rest of the way home. Phew! Long post.

Ten Things Tuesday

1. This is my morning baby. She's always up by six, and so excited to see us. Luke doesn't wake up until eight or nine, so the early morning hours are fun with just her. Love her morning hair! It has gotten longer and thicker lately, but still manages to stick straight up a lot of the time!

2. Jake's fellow residents and their families came over for a BBQ on Saturday, and the Zimmermans came over to eat and hang with us on Sunday. We haven't made the effort to invite company over much since we moved here, so it was a fun change of pace.

3. This is to die for. Here it is... Summerberry Stack made by Sweet Street Desserts. You can buy it at Costco. Don't worry, it's just 310 calories, 19 grams of fat for 1/2 a piece. ;)

4. What is the deal with "Bumpit"?? The infomercial about them is on all the time here. At first I thought they were the funniest things ever. I thought about buying one for a white elephant party or something. Then, I started seeing them at Walmart, and the lady in the return line ahead of Jake at Target was returning one. So, PEOPLE REALLY BUY THESE. (Or maybe they just do here in Vegas area??) Do you have one?

5. Whenever I go into the living room lately, Luke has taken off all of the pillows and couch cushions to make what he says is a rocket. He makes these "rockets" and then finds all of the remote controls, calculators, and toys with any type of button on them and shoves them under the pillows. Because, you know, cock-pits have a lot of buttons in them. NOT fun to clean up every day! Sometimes he lets Ella join him.

6. This spider lives on the front of our house. Jake wants to see how big it will get, so he isn't into killing it. I say it should go. Sick.
7. Last week I went to the base for Ella's Dr. appointment. We left the house early, and made it on time. Got to the office, and the lady was like "um... your appointment is actually for tomorrow." Great. So, we went back the next day for her appointment. Everything looked good. She never went in for a 9 month check up since we were moving and out of town, so we just made this her one year appointment. She's cutie short and still chubby, and doing everything she should be doing. I'm curious to see when she starts walking. Luke didn't walk until 15 months, but I'm thinking she'll decide to take off soon. I have to take her back this week to get her 1 year shots. Can't believe she's almost 1!

8. Saturday I pulled a muscle or did something to my right leg and I am bummed about it! Hurts just walking. Super annoying! I have logged over 250 miles over the last twelve weeks doing a Hal Higdon program... and felt great up till now. Six more weeks until the St. George Marathon and I was planning on doing another 170 miles before then. If I end up not being able to run the marathon because of this I think I'm going to cry.

9. Been thinking about putting Luke in a pre-school of some sort. He wants to go to school so bad and loves being around other kids his age. I don't know though....

10. My blog book came in the mail a couple weeks ago! Almost 4 years of blog inside. I took out some of the random posts I did that I no longer cared about, and ended up with 300 pages. Holy cow. Makes me want to keep blogging even though I don't always feel like doing it! And, it helped me realize what kinds of things I will actually care about later. I love looking back at my kids when they were tiny, and reading stories about them, and family vacations, and the day-to-day things. Not stuff that other people would find interesting, but I blog about if for us. Those are the posts that I'm glad I have now. I love scrapping, but know I'd never get around to scrap booking all this stuff. S0o, yeah for blurb!

St. George

On Saturday we decided to drive up to St. George for the day. It's just an hour and a half away, and I wanted to check out Tai Pan Trading (wholesale home decor store). We had a fun time, and the kids were champs in the car so we will have to do it more often! We drove by the temple and found a fun park. Drove by a sign for Brick Oven Pizza and got all excited since we liked that place in Provo, but when we got to the restaurant realized it doesn't open for another few weeks. Anyway, we ended up finding a Pizza Factory which we love too. In Provo, we ate at the Pizza Factory on our first date. And, we hadn't eaten Pizza Factory since we were engaged. Got to love the twisty bread sticks! I could eat like ten of them. They are way too good. Jake caved on his ultra healthy diet he'd been on to have pizza and bread with us. Thanks, Jake. I found a few things for the house for good prices at Tai Pan. Yeah! Oh, and when we were at the park there were some guys with huge speakers at the other end of the park pumping out some gospel rap. Crazy stuff. Haha. So, while listening to some "thank you Jesus" rap and hip hop, interspersed with shouting about being saved and hell fire, we ran up and down slides, climbed, and swung on the swings. What a day.
Here is Ella playing like a big kid on the playground equipment!

Jake had a little too much fun swinging with Luke.

So much that he tore his pants. See that big hole by the right pocket? Haha

Awww.. it's Ella with her messy park hair.

Loving the swing!

The temple
Mmm.m.m..............

Oh, and Sunday Jake and I got our callings at church. We'll be teaching the 12-13 year old sunday school class. Should be interesting to see how it goes!

Mr. Airforce

Jake came back from Alabama last week, and to say the least, we were happy to have him again! 32 days is a long time to be away. COT was a lot of work but he seemed to actually enjoy it, and he came home ten pounds lighter and happy to be in the military. His first day at work was this past Thursday! Here he is before his first day. I like him in his ABU's! What a hunk :)
With the kids the morning after he got back...

Trying on dad's hat...

Jake brought Luke home a couple of surprises. Here he is having fun with his airplane!

More AZ Stuff

So, we are finally home. Have been for a few days, but just getting around to downloading all of the pictures from this past month! Phew! The kids and I had a great time with family in Arizona while Jake was away. I'm so glad we live close enough to see family more often now! We made another trip once Jake got back to go to my new little niece's baby blessing. I could probably make the drive to Mesa with my eyes closed now! Not a bad drive. Anyway, some more stuff from time in Arizona this summer that I don't want to forget...

*We swam a lot. Thanks to the pool, sprinklers, hoses, and squirt guns... Luke would end up soaked every time he went outside.
*Went Jet Skiing with dad, Abby, and Chris!
*My fam was nice enough to watch the kids while I would run. Even Dak got in on the babysitting action. 54 days left until St. George!
*Here's cute baby Amy, Daniel, and Ella. Ella was pretty curious about Amy, and didn't like me holding her. I managed to hold her a few times though.

*Luke and I were hanging out on my parent's porch one day eating some chips. This mantis sat and watched us for the whole time.

*Luke found out that he loves "strawberry cheese cream." He will eat some bagel with it, but mostly requests the "cheese cream" just on a spoon. He makes me smile.

*Ella found out at Grandma and Grandpa Smith's house that she can climb up the stairs. FAST. Scary. She has been loving the stairs now at home. Luckily hasn't fallen yet!

*Went to Davey and Shauna's birthday dinner. Had more fun with fam! Awww... aren't they cute. *Got to hang out with my college roomies and their cute kids! One day Jess and I took the kiddos to the Mesa children's museum. We spun Luke around on this spinny chair thing and he was so dizzy that he puked all over a few minutes after we were done. YUCK!! Luckily Jess brought an extra shirt for Tagg that Luke was able to squeeze into!

*Cyndi and cute little Paisley and Cosette met us at the Tempe Town Lake splash pad another day. The kids had fun cooling off while moms chased them around. Karalee and Heather, we missed you guys! We all had so much fun at BYU together. I'm glad we get to catch up every once in a while!

The kids... Luke, Paisley, Ella, and Taggert.

*Saw other friends... the Padillas were in our ward in TX. Went swimming at their new house in Queen Creek. Good to see them in their new place!

*Got to hang with Abby and Chris quite a bit! Luke "helped them" paint some book shelves they were making with my dad. Another night Chris made us a Dutch dinner from the mish. He's a good cook!

*Visited Grandma Taylor

*Met Abby for lunch during her work break a couple of times!

*Built LOTS of paper airplanes and sailed remote-controlled boat in the pool!

*Shopping! Went with mom to Arizona Mills and another day went with Sherry to find picture outfits for all the cutie cousins next month. We managed to find the same skirt and similar tops for all the girls, and matching navy polos with khaki shorts for the boys. I think it will be fun!

It was great to have so much extra help with the kids and just relaxing with everyone. Thanks everybody!