The end of summer

Bittersweet, that's what it is. I love the change of seasons, Fall is beautiful in Utah. I love Halloween, and soup, and caramel apples.... but, summer flew by way too fast.

Lately, we've had lots of late nights swimming & enjoying the last few days of summer. Lots of tired kids:
Sadie started 1st Grade!!! She loves it, I mean LOVES it. When I asked her if she missed me on the first day she said, "not as much as you missed me." Apparently not!
We spent a day with friends boating, SO FUN!!! Best part of this picture, I told the kids to make silly faces & Gracie actually did it!

Fun with cousins at the splash park in Highland. Yeah, it's awesome! Worth the drive? For sure, if you have a great sis-in-law to chat with :)

Tiffany (Nate's sister) had her first baby, Quentin Blake. He is so stinkin cute, seriously. It's been fun seeing Tiff with her first baby, she & Blake are great parents!

Lastly, the first BYU game of the season! What a fun game, we got a sitter & made it a date night. Best part of BYU games: watching Nate get so excited when BYU does well, he's like a little kid again.

I forgot to take a picture, but I do want to say that we missed the Knowltons! It wasn't the same without you guys!

Lake Powell

Our week at Lake Powell was so much fun! Highlights include:

• No kids = much needed relaxation
• Reading both the Hunger Games & Catching Fire within the first 4 days, LOVED them!
• Dance parties on the back of the house party, the Milne girls have got moves.
• Playing cards again and again and again.
• THE FOOD! One thing is for sure, we eat well at Lake Powell!
• Late night movie time. Word of caution: don't put on the subtitles during the pow-wow scene in "The Proposal." Bad.
• Jarem getting bit on the nipple by a fish, no joke.
• Spending a week with my favorite person in the world (Nate) & his amazing family, some of my best friends! What a blast!!!!

Sexiest thing in this picture? Nate's feet. :)

Washington

There are things worth driving 16 hours in a car with 3 children. Washington, my family. The Wilsons know how to have fun and lots of it.

First we went to my 10 year high school reunion. It was..... interesting. Well, I loved seeing Kirsten, it's been way too long.

We spent a day at Lake Tapp's boating. What a beautiful lake!

This scene brings back some fond memories of my dad carrying all 5 of us kids to bed just like this. I tried to hop on too, but my dad said I'm too big, can you believe the nerve?

A day at Ocean Shores. It was a little chilly, but we had tons of fun flying kites on the beach.

My mom's friend Julie was so kind to invite us all over to let the kids ride her horse. They had so much fun!

A couple of days at the beach close by my parent's house.

A day at the Seattle Children's Museum with my mom.

I always get emotional leaving my family, and this time was no exception. I love my parents so much, they are amazing parents & grandparents!

The new baby

And we shall call him... PHIL.

It took a lot of work convincing Nate I need ANOTHER stroller. Well, I didn't think so either until Marcella & I hung out for a day & I compared pushing 2 kids in my double to pushing 2 kids in this bad boy. I was baby hungry in a stroller way.

And I am IN LOVE! We went jogging together as a family last night, me with 2 kids & Nate with 1 in the single jogging stroller (which I was planning on selling, but it sure came in handy last night), and oh the joy!

Thanks Marcella for showing me my life wasn't complete without this. And thank you Nate for only rolling your eyes behind my back. I love you.... even more than "Phil."

A story

Here's a story of a beautiful wedding reception for Nate's cousin & his bride. It was beautiful. The food was amazing, the company was terrific, the view from the balcony was gorgeous.

Apparently, my son had other ideas when standing on the balcony. Bad ideas. He thought it would be a great idea to PEE off of the balcony. In front of many people.

This last picture sums up his mood after getting in trouble for the "incident.

Seriously.

Brilliantly mischievious

This morning Sadie & Carson were having an argument. Carson snuck one of Sadie's grow-bugs (the little capsule with foam bugs inside that grow when you put them in water... don't feel dumb if you don't know what I'm talking about.)

So, I took the bug away from Carson & put it in time out. Both kids were mad. Just how we like to leave things in our house, no one should be happy if I'm not. (a joke.)

Fastforward to this afternoon. The kids are up in the bathroom happily playing in the water. I come upstairs and Sadie says, "I gave Carson 2 of my grow-bugs." I feel an abundance of happiness seeing her being nice to her brother, I even give her a hug & tell her thank you.

So, we sit & wait anxiously for the foam bug to appear from the capsules. And wait.... and wait. Hmmmm... I think, why is it taking so long. I stick my finger in to feel if the capsules are dissolving & when I do I realize that there are beads inside, not foam. My daughter, my brilliantly mischievious daughter has replaced the foam with those melty beads (the ones you put on a peg-board & then melt together with an iron). They fit perfectly together inside of the capsules, I honestly couldn't tell myself until I broke it apart.

So, how do I react to this situation? I have to give Sadie a talk about not tricking people when it might hurt their feelings (because we all know Carson was devistated!). But inside of me I was, honestly, SO PROUD of my daughter!!! I mean, that's brilliant, I'm still laughing inside thinking about it. Someday I will give her props for this trick, but today I'll just blog about it.

Catching up...

In the last month we have:

Celebrated Sadie's 6th birthday P.J. style! All of the kids got to paint pillow cases & then watched a movie w/ popcorn. My kind of a party!

Celebrated Nate's big 3.0.!! I tried to be a good wife, I really did. First I planned this huge "Amazing Race" surprise party, but decided more people could make it to a BBQ instead. He wasn't really surprised, but he was a good sport & acted like he was. In the chaos of the night, I only got one picture, and Nate's not even in it.... hmmm.

Tried babysitting the CUTEST baby ever! I watched her for a week, and it was so fun for me. Not so much fun for Gracie, however. She got super jealous & attention-hungry all of a sudden. My kids were so sad to say good-bye, she is so cute!

A couple of trips to the zoo. I'm still madly in love with baby Zuri, the elephant.

LOVED every single moment of Sadie's dance recital! She is quite the little dancer, I love it! (Considering I can't dance, she obviously didn't get it from me!)

And now I am looking forward to summer! And a little less of a schedule. Is it okay to admit that I am looking forward to staying in pajamas until 11:00 every day without going anywhere? And even then, at 11:00 I'll just slip on a swimsuit & head to the pool with the kids. Sounds blissfull.