Next Stop...Girls Camp!

The next stop of my summer tour of fun was girls camp!!! Woo-woo! :) I always love going to girls camp! This year I went as the photographer, and it was a blast! I was afraid that I would be a loner the whole time because I wasn't a 'part' of anything. But I still had a blast, luckily for me, a lot of my friends went up as leaders as well, so it was great!

Here are a few of the awesome people I got to hang out with:

Shannan ALWAYS makes me laugh! And girls camp was no different! :)

My dear dear friend Heather and her husband Jevon were there too! Jevon was the priesthood guy all week, so he was legit! :) I thought that this was a cool picture of the two of them:

One of my favorite pictures of the week was during the girls water Olympics. I looked over at the first year level leaders and all three of them were out in their chairs. They must have really been enjoying those Olympics! :)

Of course, I always love hanging out with the young'ns:

And of course, there was a lot of this going on, as well:

While up there I made Taylor a headband during crafts. She seemed to like it OK:

And that about sums up girls camp: crafts, singing around a campfire, crazy hair and outfits, lots of laughing and fun and a few naps here and there! :) I just hope I still get to go when I actually have daughters there! :) I sure do love those other daughters that are up there though! :) It is so fun also to go to the same camp that I went to as a youth. Not a lot has changed and it is like a well oiled machine! A LOT of work goes into making it great for the girls, and I love seeing that first hand. My work actually came after girls camp when I had to sift through about 3000 pictures! The week after girls camp definitely exhausted me more than the week OF girls camp!:)

And a HUGE Thank you to my sweet and wonderful cousin, Kjersti for watching my kids during the day for me while I was gone. It was so nice to know that they were in good hands! She totally stepped in last minute, and was A-Mazing! :) Love you KJ! And of course, my A-Mazing husband who just steps right up and does double duty at night with the kids and does it so well and without complaining  :) I SO appreciate that!

end of july...

We came home just in time to spend the last few days of July here in Spokane, and for Tucker to start swimming lessons. This was his first year in swimming lessons and let me tell you, it was awesome!!! He went to a lady named Rhonda who is amazing. She is SO good with the kids. He became so comfortable in the water, and after just two weeks was swimming with his head under and actually stroking in the water, not just doggy paddling. It was awesome. He loved it, he became my little fish! I couldn't get him out. We were swimming every single day! It was so much fun. I love to swim so it makes my heart happy to see Tucker enjoying the same! I can't wait for next year to put him in again and for him to learn even more!!!

Learning to dive...

Unbeknownst to us, a girl from Tuckers pre-school class, Araleigh was in his swim class as well, so that was fun for him to have a friend...

I quickly learned to bring toys for Taylor to play with during the lessons. She wanted so badly to be right in there with him. But Rhonda doesn't take kids with swim diapers. Next year, Taylor Rae! :) (If she ever goes on the big girl potty! I was hoping that spending a month in Alabama with her cousin Kaiya who is potty trained would help, but not so much--the stinker!!!)

We were also able to squeeze in b-day party for my dad at the end of July. He does so much for us, it was nice celebrating him and doing things for him for a change! We just had a small family dinner & dessert.

Taylor helped Papa blow out the candles:

And then he told her she couldn't have a cupcake. She was less than thrilled to hear that.

Luckily Papa was only teasing and she got to enjoy herself a big ol' cupcake!

My sister was in town with her family for the whole month of July. Unfortunately I missed most of it because I was down south, but we did get to spend the last week together, and we had fun! They went back to Milwaukee for the month of August, but are going to be here for the months of September, October and November while my brother in law is doing rotations. So, at least we will get to see a lot more of them soon!!! :) And my dad had surgery on his shoulder while we were in Alabama. He's not the kind to slow down, so it's either really going to bother him, or it won't even phase him at all! We'll see how it goes!! :)

I just love having this girl around to love on!

It was a night of desserts, Kathryn brought over my dad's favorite German chocolate cake, just for him. Then the cupcakes for the rest of us. Then we had to have some home made ice cream with our cake. So, we got all three desserts. Oh, and Tucker made a special dessert he had been wanting to make papa all week on his birthday, consisting of whip cream, chocolate chips, chocolate syrup and sprinkles. It was a masterpiece and he was so proud of himself! :) So cute! :)

While we waited for the ice cream to churn, Tucker and Kathryn played their made up game of 'Marshy Ball' as Tucker likes to call it. It is baseball with a Marshmallow. They play this every time we come over to Papa's house!

It all started because when Kathryn got Tucker a Marshmallow gun to keep at Papa's house. He plays with it whenever we are there. One day they found a dried and hardened marshmallow in the back yard and started playing baseball with it. And the rest is history... :) Uncle Jason  came up with the great idea to use the marshmallow gun to pitch the mallow to the hitter! Tucker was, of course, all over that! Thanks Uncle Jason!!! :) If someone gets hurt (most likely Kathryn) we know who to blame! :)

Taylor loves to dance, here she is, really into her robot dancing...

And finally the home made ice cream as done and topped with freshly picked raspberries and it was Heavenly!

Happy Birthday to the greatest Papa around!!!

Oh...and we also came home to a brand new swing set in the backyard that daddy put up for the kids while we were gone! He loves to surprise us when we get home from Alabama with fun things!
Thanks so much to our neighbors who were getting rid of it and thought of us. Ben got it, fixed it up a bit and the kids love it! Taylor calls it her playground! The girl loves to swing

My kids have the BEST dad!

My awesome In-laws...

I am one of the lucky few who has wonderful in-laws! I really couldn't ask to be a part of a more wonderful family. Ben has four sisters and a brother whom I just adore, and their spouses! 

Here are us troopers who were there for the long haul this summer:

Meribeth, G-ma, Lynlee and I (the most unflattering picture, ever!)

Aunt Meg is a workin' girl and was only able to come down for a week and a half, and of course we were sick through a lot of it! Lucky for us her nursing skills came in handy and she took care of us! :)

Meggie is one of my most favorite people on the planet! :) Shopping with her is a real treat though, especially when we find treasures like this one-pieced denim jumpsuit! $80; really GAP???? :) And I have to say that I am so proud of her, she looks fabulous after losing a ton of weight; she is my hero!!! :)

B-ma painting Taylor's face on the porch after Taylor did a real nice job on her face! :)

Such a wonderful B-ma! My kids adore her!

And Aunt Lynlee sitting through a face paint (luckily she has some awesome games on her Ipad that we all got addicted to!) :)

Grandpa and Elijah playing. Good thing grandpa was there, Elijah loves men and he was in a house full of women for the month, except grandpa who he just adored whenever he came home from work:

Aunt Meg painted the girls finger nails and toe nails!

See, they really are the best! They love our kids and are so wonderful to them and we love them so much!!!

Even when plans changed last minute, they changed their plans too and drove us up to Atlanta and we all got a hotel for the night right by the airport so we could make our early morning flight! They totally take care of us! We are so lucky!

Grandma got Taylor this doll for the plane ride home and she was serious about taking care of her:

And luckily for us, the plane ride home was TOTALLY uneventful! Both kids did great!

And whew...in a nutshell, it started off a bit rocky, but in the end, like it always is, the trip was awesome and we had a blast with our cousins and family in Bama! I just wish it wasn't 6 months in between every time we see them; we are already looking forward to Christmas! Some of my favorite things about this trip:
Elijah's Uh-O-Ah
Kaiya's Mumberfun rendition of Jingle Bells
and
The Awesome made for TV movie we watched starring LeAnn Rymes :)

Cousins through the years...

These boys are so cute, and I love that my kids have so many cousins their ages who are their friends! I grew up with cousins my age and it is the best!

Here are Jonah and Tucker Two summers ago watching a movie in grandpa's chair:

I thought I got a picture of the two of them last year on that same chair, but I didn't find one. I did find this one of them at the zoo:

And then this one of them this summer in that same chair, almost sitting the exact same way they were two years ago:

Kaiya and Taylor from two summers ago in their matching outfits:

Last summer in their matching outfits from grandpa:

It is crazy the difference a year makes, they are totally different than last year:

I'm sad we didn't get a picture of them on the couch like in years past, but I did do a little photoshoot while we were there, and I loved this one of the two girls together!

And of course, matching cousins:

I can't believe how tall Kaiya looks in these photos! She is only a few months older than Taylor and Taylor is pretty tall herself! I sure do love me some Kaiya though, she is one of my most favorite little girls! :)

And these two got matching jammies:

Even though they are long sleeved and it was the middle of the summer, they insisted on wearing them! :)

Another cute little matching shirt we realized they both had:

So, speaking of the photo shoot, here are some more of pics.

And yes, this was the best one we got of all 4 kids! :)

Here is a more accurate representation of what the shoot was like:

Gorgeous Kaiya:

My little Elijah buddy:

My Taylor Rae:

And the Tuck man:

And my two munchkins: 

I love these cute cousins!!