4th of July Fun!!

We have been having a fun summer!  Here are a few of our fun times over the week of the 4th of July....

Summer fun for Mama= decorating the porch and patio.  I got these cushions for 1/4 of the usual price.  I love deals!!  We still have work to do on the patio (ignore the snowmobiles, they don't usually sit there...) but at least we have a place to eat chips and salsa. :)

 This is how the kids have summer fun.... Pool parties!!  Well, inflatable pool parties anyway.  This little thing provided hours of fun.  We have had a hot summer for Heber and need a little something to cool things off.

                                                 Here's my Addy again!!  Isn't she adorable?
                                               I don't know how I ever let Amy take her home.

                                                                     Ashton

                                                                  Kaeleb and Brennan

We got a trampoline for our 4th of July present to ourselves...  Kwint and the boys worked really hard putting it together for 2 mornings in a row.  Kwint and I attached the net on the 5th and now we are having "Sprinklers on the tramp" parties with the neighbors almost daily.   All of us love it!

 On the 4th we went to Kris and Barbi's for a BBQ and Aunt Marie's famous scones.  It has been the tradition for many, many (40 or more?) years.  Nobody makes them like Aunt Marie!

 The boys are very much into archery these days.  Kaeleb bought a bow with his b-day $ last year, Talan got one for Christmas, and Brennan just might get lucky on his b-day this year... They are really getting good! 

 This was my favorite part of the day.  While the boys were shooting, cute Gracie was teasing Kaeleb.  Over and over and over, she filled up her squirt gun with water from her little pool.....

 Sprayed it on Kaeleb's bum....  and ran away laughing!!!

We had a mini "Stay-cation" the week before the 4th.  We went to Boondocks fun center one day and the new Museum of Natural History at the U of U.  Boondocks pics are one Kwint's phone and I am far too lazy to download them right now, but here are some of our faves from the museum.

                                         Lots of fun learning tools for the kids...

                                         I am an environmentalist at heart, this was eye opening.

                                     
                                                                 Carbon chains

                                                     Pieces of a giant mammoth skull

                                        Oh no!  Kaeleb is careening down to the ground!
                                                  Haha, glass floor atop a dinosaur quarry.

                                                   Kwint and his sweet Mama

                                       I will admit, the prehistoric giant crocodile freaked me out.

                         Mammoth, baby mammoth and prehistoric bear with people arms...

                                           No idea what this guy was

                                          Lake Bonneville display

 These two were taken at the natural disasters exhibit.  I was not a big fan of this floor, I don't love disasters, actually... but these two remnants of hurricane Katrina amazed me enough to share them.  This was a log that bent into a 90 degree angle.... whoa....

 And the street debris was sombering.

                                           This is the sky exhibit (yeah, a big deck on the roof.)

                                             And boy, we were glad for the dinner afterward.

Fabulous friends

This is ridiculous of me... I have a bunch of pictures my dear friend Amy took and has been emailing them to me... so that I could let them sit in my email for several months.  Here they are now, completely random in the timeline of our lives, but special to me nonetheless.  Our families have unofficially adopted each other (well, they can't get rid of me, I'm too attached, whether they like it or not) so the Starks have appeared throughout our blog once in awhile, but here are more.  Above and below you are looking at us hiking last September (2012) and I can't even remember where we were.

Next up, Dec 31st 2012.  This was our New Year's Eve Party with the Sprays and the Starks.  We had a lot of delirious fun, and yes, we let the kids stay up.   We played slap scrabble and ate strawberry cream pie...mmmm... Amy is good with desserts... Wonderful friends!  We so love our friends!!

 And, here we are in June, at the cabin.  Above we have Ashton, Brennan, and Dylan.  I love this picture- this illusion of sweet perfection you see.  Totally fabricated.  They are bananas together!!!! 

                           Addy, oh Addy!  I love Addy!  Everybody loves Addy!  Especially me. 

This is Addy saying "Mom, u-up!"  Look at her face!  She called me mom for a few weeks, Amy is "Mama" of course.  But mostly "Na-na" or Gi-na".  I love to spoil her.  We decided I get to be her Godmother even though we are not Catholic.  There will be an official ceremony in Pig Latin, since we don't speak Latin.