Rain, rain, go away!!!

Can I just say....I am SOOOO sick of the rain!!!!!!!! I know it sounds so cliche because I know many people here in Utah feel the same way, but I am seriously ready to scream! I HATE RAIN!!! I can "deal with it" in the Spring, but this is getting ridiculous! (I know, I know, technically Spring just ended yesterday, but still, you know what I mean.) We are almost 1/3 of the way through the summer (or at least what is "summer break" from school) and it hasn't even truly felt like summer. I think we've had 2-3 days that have been rain-free since school let out. I know we need it, but can't it just rain in the middle of the night, please?!? I am not someone who handles bad weather days very well and all of this rain has really been getting to me lately! It cheered me up a little to see this the other day.....



....but I'd rather have no rain! Matthew and I leave tomorrow for Vegas for a week though, and even though it's SUPPOSEDLY going to start being better weather starting tomorrow, I'm happy to know that I'm headed somewhere that is pretty much GUARANTEED to be warm.....o.k. HOT!! I have so much to catch up on with blogging, but it will have to wait at least another week. I'm outta here!!

Oops!

So the other day I was making smoothies for everyone and the blender was having a hard time "blending".....so being the smart person I am, I stuck a wooden spoon in it to help push the strawberries down. When your mom tells you to NEVER stick any kind of utensil into the blender while it's going, she means it!

This picture doesn't actually do it justice. It was splattered EVERYWHERE! I was laughing hysterically, but the kids were all just staring at me like I was an idiot. O.k. maybe they were right.

FULL HOUSE!!!

Lisa's kids arrived last Tuesday and will be here for a month. So we now have 4 adults and 9 children in our household! Did you catch that? That's 13 people!!! Surprisingly it has not felt too crowded and things have actually been going VERY well, all things considered. They're such good kids, and all of the kids have really been getting along. Occasionally you'll see them as a couple separate groups doing their own things, but the majority of the time they're all together as one big group.

The weather has been horrible pretty much from the day they got here, so you'd think they'd all be cooped up in the house going stir-crazy and driving us crazy. But no.....they haven't let the bad weather deter them. Rain or shine, they spend most of their days outside running around.

The night they arrived.

Jessika spending time with her new baby sister. I think she was a little nervous to first meet her, but she has fallen in love and loves helping out with her.

Kaiden showing off his moves on his skateboard.

Like mother, like daughter!

Skyler trying to be like his big brother, Kaiden.

I think there was a game of football, soccer, and frisbee all going on at the same time in this picture....with all the same people. Fun times!

Logan's preschool graduation

O.k. so technically Logan still has another year of preschool, but he did graduate from his FIRST year of preschool. And he was NOT happy! He fell asleep about a half hour before we left for it and he is a BEAR to wake up. We dragged him over to it and tried to get him to sit in his chair. He eventually reluctantly stayed. He did not participate in any of the songs, but did go up to accept his diploma. We were so proud!

Could he be any more sad???

His amazing teacher, Ms. Patty!

He started perking up towards the end.

I think he finally woke up just as we came home.

Joey's & Emily's Big Day

It's official.....Joey is off the market. He and Emily got married a couple weekends ago (May 30th). We have a new sister-in-law and the kids have a new aunt. Although according to Kya, Emily was already her aunt. I saw her writing one day about how her Uncle Joey was marrying her Aunt Emily. Hmmmm..... Anyway, it was a beautiful day! The weather turned out great, but we were nervous about it all day long. It kept threatening to rain, but waited until the reception was over and we were almost done cleaning up. :) I think most everything went smoothly. There were only a couple things that didn't work out. Bonnie and Travis weren't able to get their temple recommends renewed in time (long story!) so they weren't able to make it to the ceremony. And Nick wasn't able to make it to the ceremony either.....or the luncheon. He is living back East and working for the summer, and he missed his flight home.....which led to a whole slew of missed/delayed flights. He finally arrived at about 3 or so that afternoon and was able to be there for the reception, but had to wake up at 3 am to turn around and go back. Poor Nick! I felt so bad! But other than that, I think everything else went very well. The actual ceremony was very sweet. I teared up....a lot. The sealer had some amazing words of advice. One of the things I remembered most was about how you should "RISE in love" not "FALL in love". I loved that!

Joey is on the phone with Nick.....this was our way of getting a shot with Nick in it. ;)

My goofy sister-in-law, Ginger, jumped in front of the camera as I was trying to take a picture. She cracks me up!

My sweet, sweet cousin's daughter, Destiny watched our kids while we were at the temple and then brought them over after the ceremony was over. She was such a great help that whole day! I love her! I also love Kya and Logan in this picture. Hilarious! They're trying to entertain themselves while all the pictures were being taken. Bless their hearts.

Bonnie, Me, Chuck, Emily, Joey, Mom, Dad

Peyton

Emily looked beautiful!

The luncheon was held at Willow Park which is a really cool and fun park up there in Logan. (I totally forgot to get pics!!!) There's a little zoo as part of the park, but we didn't get a chance to go see any of the animals. Everything was great though except that the willow trees were shedding terribly! There were things floating all over in the air. You could hardly talk without one getting caught in your mouth. They were a wonderful addition to the allergies Matthew was already suffering from! I, however, thoroughly enjoyed myself because after one year and one whole extra week.....I had soda for the first time! It was only my mom's homemade root beer, but hey, you gotta ease back in, right?


The reception turned out great. Matthew even described it as "one of the least horrible receptions" he's ever been to. He hates receptions whether they're for close friends/family or very distant relatives. I appreciate him enduring that "trial". It really did turn out very nicely though. It was in Emily's parent's backyard which is beautifully landscaped and had many great areas to take pictures at.

The cool cake.

Peyton was being such a ham for the camera the whole day. I think the official photographer got as many pictures of her as she did of Joey and Emily. ;)

My battery died right after this picture which I was really mad about because they had a fun photo-worthy cake fight. I hate when people are cutesy-wootsy and just feed it to each other nicely, so I was happy about it, just mad that I didn't get any pics.

First dance

My Dad having one last man-to-man talk with Joey before they took off. I don't even want to know what THAT conversation was about.

And they're off......

What a beautiful day! I'm excited to have Emily as part of the family and I'm so happy for both of them. They're such a great couple! I wish them many, many wonderful memories together. I already know they'll have a happy life!

NO DOUBT!!!

One other fun thing Matthew and I got to do on Memorial Day was to go to the No Doubt concert!! I have been wanting to see them in concert for over 10 years. I am a HUGE No Doubt fan!! I was a little nervous because they performed a few weeks earlier on American Idol and the performance was really strange. I was so afraid that that's how the concert was going to be and I was kind of setting myself up to possibly be disappointed. But I absolutely was not! It was an amazing show!!! The stage set up was really cool and they all sounded great live. I'm not a fan of crazy interpretations of songs that sound nothing like the original, and they weren't like that. Everything sounded very similar to the albums which is perfect in my book. Sorry, I hate change! Also, it was Gwen's son's birthday the next day so she brought him out on stage toward the end and had everyone sing Happy Birthday to him. He was so cute. The whole thing was so awesome. One of the funnest nights of my life! A big thank you to my parents for watching the kids for us so we could go. :)

Paramore was the opening band. I like a few of their songs so it was pretty cool. And they sounded pretty good live.

This was No Doubt's grand entrance. I thought it was pretty cool.

Outfit #1

Outfit #2

Outfit #3

Memorial Day weekend

We had a very busy, but fun, Memorial Day weekend. We were determined to get the rest of our fence put up (the parts that connect from the side to the house), but it kept raining and ruining our plans, so we only got as far as getting the posts cemented in. We did get a bunch of other things done with the yard though. It now looks more complete than it ever has.

I forgot to take pics of the finished project, but here's some in the middle.

If you look closely in the top right window you can see Peyton peeking out of her window. She was taking a nap but could hear all the commotion and fun going on outside and was looking longingly down on us.

On Memorial Day it was actually Tate's birthday, so we took a break from the yardwork to go over and celebrate with him. Kalun and Kristi have been so busy with other things that it all got kind of thrown together at the last minute. But it turned out great! The weather cleared up for a few hours and they were even able to pull the slip n' slide out. The kids had a blast!

Matthew was trying to stay in the shade so he wouldn't get burned, and Peyton decided to be his friend.

Let's play "How many people can you fit on a trampoline?"

Tate got the bright idea to take the sprinkler out from under the tramp and spray the girls. We thought it was hilarious....the girls didn't.

Peyton was tired of waiting for someone to get her some cake so she went inside and got some utensils from the play kitchen and went and helped herself to some of Tate's. Smart girl! :)

Eventually she got her own and boy did she enjoy it!