4th of July

The 4th has become one of my favorite holidays. It's one day of fun, nothing too crazy or stressful, but still packs a punch. This year we started out with our annual neighborhood parade and breakfast. I know I've said it before, but I just love this part of the 4th. It's one of my favorite things ever. It goes: family, church, nutella and then the neighborhood bike parade. ;) The day before the parade, Miles learned how to ride his bike without training wheels! Big day! He was hesitant at first because of how laborious it was for him last summer. He worked and worked at it, but never quite got it. We think that since he's done all that eye physical therapy, it really helped out with balancing etc. This year Richie held on to the seat once down the road, and after that, he had it! We were nervous about letting him try out his new skills during the parade since it's so congested. After one small crash at the beginning, he was incident free and was the first to make it to the breakfast line. Competitive boy, this one. This also marks the first year that Gwen rode almost the entire parade route without being carried! Both previous years, she's given up riding her bike once we are at the end of our street. This year, she choose the scooter as her ride of choice, and made it almost all the way to the end! She's such a tough girl, truly. Lindy was unimpressed.


After the parade we came home and blew up the pool and played kick ball in the backyard. I got some food ready and the Garners came over for lunch. After lunch we played with some water balloons out front. We rested for a bit, then we headed to Rich's cousins wedding reception. It was so fun, until Gwen threw up more than I thought was possible for someone of her size. Gotta have one of those experiences as a parent I guess. Luckily, it was a really casual reception, outside, and the gross-ness was easily cleaned up with a hose.



She started feeling better, and after we put Lindy down to bed, we got ready to enjoy our streets fireworks. Our neighbors are the best. On the 3rd, some neighbors who decided to set their fireworks off a day early, invited the kids to come watch, which they thought was so cool. On the actual 4th, we set up a blanket on the front lawn, let the kids to pop-its and sparklers, and then watched our neighbors light thousands of dollars worth of fireworks. At one point, we even got up on the roof and could see fireworks being lit all around Riverton. It was pretty awesome. I had one of those moments where I just wished we could freeze time and keep our kids little forever. It was a good 4th.

The rest of June

Miles found some old Halloween face paint and turned himself into a tiger one Sunday during quiet time. :)


First picture of official first pig tails on Lindy. I've said it before, but, totally a big milestone. :) So much square footage on those cheeks!!


Lindy is a master mess-maker. Partly because of the age she's at and partly because I think she has some special talents. If the pantry door is left open, watch out. She grabs whichever cereal bag is closest and shakes it everywhere to get to the cereal, as pictured here. Also make sure you always close the craft closet door. We've made that mistake quite a few times and we are always sorry we did. This particular day, it was glitter.


Miles drawing his first serious portrait. Dad was on the couch, he handed him his superman figurine, and told dad to sit very still do he could draw him. It was the first time he did anything else besides 2 dots for eyes and a line for a smiley face. He worked so hard on it, and it was so fun to watch the process.


We went to the Herriman Reservoir with some friends in the ward. It happened to be a little chilly that day, but still so fun! I love the ladies in my ward.


Here's the kids taking one of the bunnies for a ride in their bike. :) This one was from the first kit,of which we sold all but one. Later that day, after the bike ride, we sold that ginger one and the kids were heartbroken. But when they realized that they get paid when we sell bunnies, and that the mama kit and new bunnies coming to play with,they were ok with it.


We took a field trip to the landfill with our homeschool group! What an eye opener! I'm already a little bit of a granola, and I'd like to think we do a pretty good job recycling, but we're kicking it up a notch after that trip. Super fun outing, only made more fun by visiting an out of the way park that we normally don't get to.


Ross and Amanda moved. :( They are working and going to school up in Portland now. We're so excited for them to have this experience, but they are sorely missed around here.


Another book finished, another party. :)

Happy Anniversary to Us!

A few things you should know about this picture:


*It's about 11pm on June 26, 2015. It's our 8th anniversary and we are sweaty messes.
*You can see the flowers in the background that Richie brought home for me. I was so hoping for some flowers, so it was a really nice surprise.
*If you look really closely, you can see some milk (real milk, not almond) and ultra-stuffed oreos. Those 2 things are pretty much never in our house, so it's a real treat.

So the week before our anniversary, our water heater was having some issues. We had lots of cold showers that week, and the kids had lots of baths warmed up with water that had been heated on the stove. On Sunday, Richie told me his window washing schedule for the week and estimated he'd make about $800 extra this week. Sweet! Monday, the water heater officially bit the dust. On Wednesday we had our friend who fixes water heaters come and install a new one. Wanna guess how much it cost? :) (see above estimation) We were gone for most of the installing, but when we got back we started putting the kids to bed as our buddy was finishing up. All of a sudden Richie says, "I think I can hear water in the ceiling." I convince him to brush it off, until the hallway ceiling starts leaking.

Long story short, when our friend installed the new water heater, he accidentally hooked the pipes to the old swamp cooler pipes that were still in the attic, even though we no longer have a swamp cooler. He turned on the water...and the attic flooded. The ceiling in the bathroom caved in. Then we ripped out more ceiling in the hallway and took out the swamp cooler vent. It was a total disaster. We hid the severity of it from our friend Chad, not wanting him to feel worse than he already did, and then after he left we called Dad Garner and Tanner over to help clean up at around 10pm. Yuck.

The rest of the week was hot and sweaty. With the attic open and exposed, our house quickly became very hot. We spent nights downstairs. Thank goodness for basements! On our actual anniversary, Richie and his dad were busy patching up the ceiling. I got pizza to celebrate, and to avoid cooking in the kitchen. And as I mentioned before, Richie got me flowers and we splurged on some oreos. :)

After a day of having the ceiling patched up, I was hoping the house would cool down, but it just seemed to get hotter and hotter. So finally on Saturday night, we called a HVAC guy in our ward to come check things out, and what do ya know, our house was 96 degrees. He replaced the thermostat and fiddled with the unit downstairs, and now we have a nice cool home.

Now, if we can just fix the broken vacuum cleaner, and deal with having our van in the shop all next week for cosmetic repairs (made possible by the guy who backed into me at the DI, thank you), I think we will have filled our bad luck quota for the year. We'll see I guess. Forget date nights, fine dining, and fancy jewelery. I'm sure this is the most expensive anniversary we've never had. :)

Happy 8 years to us! :)