First official summer beach day

The day after Fourth of July we headed to the beach.

And it was a huge success. Lots of fun friends came. Most of us had our hubbies with us. No major incidents. And the kids all seemed to have a great time. 

And Renee was there too with her family. So we got to see her twice. Yay!

Me and my favorite teenager Callie. 

Christie and Callie. Two of my laurels that I adore.

 Emily and Beth. These two girls have been through a lot 

with me over the years. Sure love them.

Fourth of July

What a crazy fun and exciting fourth of July we had. It started out bright and early with a 5K in Newhall. My friend Becky texted me Monday and asked me if would run it with her and some crazy part of me replied, "Sure why not"? 

So Tuesday morning I had to go out and run and see if I could actually run on a real road without dying because while I exercise fairly regularly I am NOT a runner. I don't like it...I never do it....I'm not good at it. BUT....I have always wanted to do a 5K. Not a 1/2 marathon or anything. Just a 5K. 

Michalle ran it with us too. She's done a few before and Becky just finished a 1/2 marathon, so you could definitely say I was the slow poke of the group. I told them to not worry about running with me because I didn't know how I was gonna do. They of course both took off and left me within a matter of minutes (or seconds in Becky's case). LOL. But it was okay. I didn't want to hold anyone back. My goal was just to finish it. I'm not gonna lie. It felt really long and there were a couple of times I really wanted to stop. Once I actually did slow to a walk, and as soon as I did, a guy ran past me and cheered and encouraged me on, so I started running again and finished it off somewhere around 33 minutes. So I probably did about an 11 minute mile. But I was happy with that. It wasn't as terrible as I thought it would be. And I'll probably do it again at some point, but I'd still say running is not my favorite thing.

Becky ran it at about an 8 minute mile, so she was there at the finish line to snap my photo. 

After getting home, we gathered the swim gear and headed down to the pool. It was fun to have Paul home to swim with us. The kids especially had fun because he's SO much better at throwing them around in the water than I am. I try, but I just can't do it. They usually end up laughing at me.

Then about 5pm, we headed out to grab Subway sandwiches for dinner and were off to our local park to watch the fireworks with friends. It was another successful year with lots of fun friends and we all had such a great time. 

We had one minor hiccup in the evening though. Brandon got his first bee sting. He was pretty freaked out about it and I was trying to get the stinger out, so he wasn't too happy with me. But luckily some park attendants came around and got us some bee sting medicine. It seemed to help a lot because Brandon was up and running in no time. 

While all this drama was going on though, Carter seized the moment and snagged my ginger ale. He's a smart one I tell ya!

Family photo. LOVE Leah's face. She's always up for a photo op.

All the gals!

We really are so lucky to have so many good friends around us. 

The kids were all fully entertained the entire evening. No one ever complained of not having anyone to play with.

It was a great show this year. Carter was a bit scared for a moment but as soon as he was snuggled in my lap, he thoroughly enjoyed it. At one point he says to me, "mom, I love fireworks. They are so awesome". I about died laughing. 

Emily's birthday at Cleo's in Hollywood

I got to celebrate Emily's birthday with my lovely Encino girls a few days after getting back from Utah. And the best part was that Renee was in town and got to join us. We've missed her so much since she moved, so having her here for one of our birthday celebrations was really awesome. Unfortunately, Jackie was out of town, so we were still missing one. 

We went to Cleo's in Hollywood. A tappas restaurant where you order a bunch of things and then all share. A place I would have never thought to go to on my own, but it was SO SO good. I ate things I have never eaten before and it was so dark in there I could barely see my food. But maybe that was a good thing because I didn't even know what half the stuff was. But we had such a fun time and ended up chatting until after midnight.

Yes, I'm always the tallest where ever I go and usually by a lot. I must just have short friends. Yeah, that's what it is. Short friends. LOL!

Brooke gnawing on a lamb bone. It was so good. See the lack of meat left on that bone. That's because we ate it all!

Love you girls! 

Utah Trip...the final days

I didn't take as many pictures the last few days we were there. Thursday morning I went to breakfast just me and my mom. It was really fun cuz it's not something we ever do. Then we packed up and headed to Provo/Orem area to spend a couple of days with my cousin and her family. On the way there we did a little walking down memory lane to the condo we owned when we first were married. Well...we owned it with Paul's parents. So really they owned it and let us put our names on it too! 

I was impressed at how nice it still looks there. I loved that place. It was so hard to drive away that awful summer day back in July of 2003. Not that I would want to live there now, but I have so many great memories there and it makes me happy to visit and think back on them.

After that, I went to my cousins house with the boys while Paul took the girls to BYU to look around. Paul hasn't been back since we graduated 10 years ago, so he was having a blast touring the girls around. 

We mostly hung out at my cousins house which was so fun because it's so kid friendly, which made life for me really easy. The kids played in their bounce house and on their playground and upstairs in their huge playroom. We ordered pizza for the kids and got Cafe Rio for us. My cousin has two adorable little girls and the kids all got along so well. Ashlyn shared a room with Cali and on the second night there I heard a bunch of commotion so I went in to find that Leah had snuck in after her room mate, Ava, had fallen asleep and the three girls were having a pillow fight. My first reaction was to tell them to settle down and go to bed (because it was so late), but then I was like, what the heck and told them to go ahead and have fun. Then I closed the door and walked away. They gotta make some fun memories right?!

On Friday we went to Chelsea's community pool and swam for a while and then got to have dinner there. 

Then we packed up that night and headed out early the next morning. It was a long 10 hour drive home in record 118 degree heat through Vegas, but the kids all did really well. Despite the fact that Carter only took a 15 minute nap the entire ride home. When we got home, we put everything inside, changed clothes and headed out to our good friends, Dewy and Timmy's, birthday party at the Aquatic Center. I was kind of a zombie, but the kids loved it and I think were happy to get some energy out after being in the car all day. 

Over all it was a really great trip. I would say the hardest part was that Carter didn't sleep very well. But I think each trip we take will just continue to get easier and easier as the kids get older. I look forward to more adventurous family vacations over the years. It'll be great memories for us and the kids.

Utah Trip Day Four

So day four didn't turn out exactly the way it was suppose to but I guess that is life. Originally we were going to go to the park for a picnic and then head to my friend Renee's house for the afternoon. But Ashlyn had been saying her ear was hurting since we got to Utah on Sunday. At first I thought it was just the driving and her ears needed to pop, but by Wednesday I knew it was probably an ear infection and I needed to take her in to an urgent care. She never had a fever or acted too sick or anything, but she had a cold the week before so it must have settled in her ear. Poor thing. So we set out to find an urgent care. Definitely all takes longer when you are out of state, but about four hours later I finally had antibiotics for her. I told her to look sad in this picture...this is what she gave me. Funny girl!

The park the rest of the family was intending on going to was too hot when they got there, so they packed up and headed back to the little water park we went to a couple days earlier. So me and Ashlyn met up with them there and let the kids play for a while. It was a pretty warm day, and Leah got probably the worst bloody nose she has ever gotten (she gets them pretty easily), so we ended up going home and just relaxing and hanging out the rest of the day. 

Paul and I did get to go out to dinner though just the two of us, so that was really fun. Always grateful for a date night. Especially when the babysitter is free.

Ashlyn did a lot of laying around that day. She needed a day to relax.

Leah's bloody nose was quite traumatic and the bathroom had no paper towels, so it was quite fun trying to clean the poor girl up. 

But on the bright side, Paul and I had a REALLY yummy dinner at Texas Road House restaurant. Really it was all about the bread with the amazing cinnamon butter, but the dinner was pretty good too. Afterward we did a little shopping at the mall next door and then headed home to help get the kids to bed. 

So even though it didn't go exactly as planned, it was still a good day.