August

August has always seem to be the month that I take the least amount of photos. School/Work has started again, no more fun vacations to take, and we get busy with everyday life. This month, we did go up to Idaho to honor the life of Mike's grandma, Mildred Schwabadissen. She passed away at age 95 in the most joyful, sweetest way-in her room surrounded by her four children. She lived an amazing life, filled with laughter, fun, and family. She is definitely the kind of grandma that I hope everyone could have. She cared about each person on such an individual level, remembering the small details of their life and asking about them. She was a home ec teacher, so we often talked about teaching to each other. My favorite attribute about her was how excited she got for us about the things going on in our lives. She couldn't see the last few years of life, so when I asked Maggie if she was going to miss reading books with Grandma Schwabadissen (they would look at the pictures and Maggie would tell her what was happening in the pictures), Maggie looked at me all puzzled and said, "Mom, Grandma didn't know how to read." It made me laughed. I am so happy for her to return to heaven and be with her husband. Even though it was her time, I will still miss talking to her at family functions.

Finishing up July

I know that I posted some of these on facebook, but I wanted to have them on the blog for our family journal. July was such a fun month because Mike was on community medicine, a very easy month. It was a nice transition into residency. The kids are really loving it here. There is too much to do; I can't get it all done this first summer, which is such a nice problem to have. 

Sam is really starting to like books!! He hass to have a book to look at in the car. His favorites are ones about farm animals, dogs, dogs playing with balls, books that you sing along with (the wheels on the bus book), starting to get into dinosaurs and trains.

 One of our favorite parks to go to is Beus Pond. It has a fun playground and a path around the pond that is surrounded by a forest. We will bring our bread ends to feed the ducks and lately, we have been able to pick blackberries for jam.

An outing is not complete with snacks. I swear that is all they want to do when we go to the park. 

Chasing the butterflies at the pond. I just love how girly she is. She wants to be a fairy, loves to shoe off all her new ballet moves, and picks everyone flowers to wear behind their ears.

Having a fun backyard has been the best thing for the kids. We are out there everyday making up new games and imaginary stories (usually about Periwinkle and Tinkerbell fighting the pirates and freeing the other captured fairies).

After the first time of picking blackberries, Maggie wanted to make a blackberry pie. She was so excited to try it, but ended up not liking it so much. The next time we made jam, which she gobbled up.

Oh the neighbor girls. These were our first friends here and have spent many evenings playing with them. Since then, we have found some great kids throughout the neighborhood that we like to get together with. 

On one of the Saturdays, we went up to the Cabin to help pull out all the old carpet. It was suppose to be a work day, but we definitely had our share of fun.

Mike's sister just got Razors, which is a mix between a jeep and a four wheeler. It was really fun driving it to Lily Lake.

I wouldn't say that our kids liked it, but they weren't crying. It was really windy and bumpy for them.

 I wanted to post this picture for Nicole because on the way back from the Lake, there were hundreds of sheep in the road. I had to keep honking the horn just so I could pass through.

The biggest news of July is that was got a dog. Mowgli is a Jack Russel Terrier, think Wishbone, but has a 1/4 yorkie in him which is where her got the black and brown color. He has been wonderful. We are still working on getting house trained, but honestly he is outside most of the time, that it is hard to be strict about that. Maggie absolutely adores him and calls him her baby. She drag him all over the house, singing him songs,and "rocking him to sleep".

McCall Idaho

Every four years, Mike's family does a destination vacation/family reunion. This time, we all met up in McCall, Idaho. The beginning of our trip was pretty rough. We had to stop in Boise to buy unexpected new tires. That's always fun, not. But once we got to the Lake House, all was well.

The lake house was right on a shallow, beachy cove with a dock. It was perfect for the kids. We went down to the lake at least once, if not twice, a day. 

Because a beach trip would not be complete with a mermaid and merman. Oh Sam, how your life would be so different if you were the older sibling instead of a sister.

 Our first "hiking" trip. We made it 200 yards before everyone was eaten alive by mosquito. It was bad. So we went back to the parking lot and threw rocks in the pond and played in the dirt.

The local State Park was having a Junior Ranger Day. It was a lot of fun. They had all these different booths with activities for the kids to do. When they completed the activity, they got a stamp in their book. When their book was full, they got a small toy. 

 The highlight of Ranger Day was watching Maggie "climb" up the tree to retrieve a feather. She was so scared to do to, but after a long talk and comparing this to Mulan climbing the pole, we got her up. The worker pretty much pulled her up, but she was very proud of her purple feather that she grabbed.

 One of the days, we were able to use the cruiser boat. We took out a couple of trips to the middle of the lake and I was so proud that our kids were brave enough to jump off the back. I even got to drive the boat for a bit. Not going to lie, I felt really cool driving it.

 We went on quite a family bike ride. I was so impressed with some of the little kids peddling their one-speeds up these long gravel hills that made me huff and puff.

 A night out on the town getting burgers and McCall's famous ally ice cream, known for their giant cones. And yes, they were huge.

This was our real hike. I didn't quite make it to the waterfall because it was so steep going down, which I didn't think mix well with a no-fear one year old. 

 This pretty much sums up the trip: play hard, sleep harder.

Fourth of July with the Price

We had a great Fourth of July with Dusty and Janecce's family. They were here for only two days, but we filled it with a lot of fun things. They rolled in late Friday night. We had Rita sleeping in Maggie's room. Poor Rita was tired from the road trip so she just wanted to go to sleep, but this was the first time that Maggie has had someone sleep over in her room, so she just kept bouncing out of bed to talk with her. Finally, around 10:30, both girls were asleep. Saturday was the holiday and we spent it going hiking, playing at the splash pad, having hamburgers and lighting off fireworks, and ending the night with Brigham City fireworks (one of my favorite things). Janecce got the girls matching skirts, which Maggie thought was the coolest thing ever (Janecce-she still wants to wear "Rita's skirt"). 

The next day was Sunday. We enjoyed church in the morning, good naps in the afternoon, and went to Temple Square in the evening. It was so fun to be able to have family come stay with us, as we have never had a place big enough. We really like Dusty and Janecce. The kids got a lot so well. I loved how Phillip became quick buddies with the neighbor boys because they had a basketball hoop.

Week in Ceder City

My mom was in Ceder City for a week, watching my brother's kids while they were on vacation. So we headed down there to try to get as much Grandma time was possible. I didn't get that many photos, but we did so fun things during the week. We went to the Aquatic pool, the lake, visited a couple of parks, drove up the canyon, got in a lot of dog time, and played with lots of new toys. At the end of the week, my mom took Maggie on a date to get ice cream (which she mentioned how much fun she had on it again today because she is wearing the same dress that she spilled ice cream on). The boys were really nice to Sam, pushing him around in the cozy coupe. The dog was tolerate of all of Sam's body slams. Plus the kids slept so well, so in my mind, it was a goof trip.