Seattle/Bear Lake

I can't believe I've already been back one week. Some vacations you are ready to have end but I have to admit that I was sad to see this one wrap up. We had the best time, lots, of sights, lots of sun, happy kids and not nearly enough sleep. Just the way a family vacation should be.
We flew to SLC on Friday night 9pm, almost two hours after they should have already been in bed. I kept them awake, played hard all day Friday, expecting them to sleep the whole way. I was very wrong. We landed at 11:30, slept in a hotel and were back at the airport Sat. 5am to fly to Seattle. That was the worst of the trip, from there on out it was the best.
We were able to see my sweet nephew baptized Sat. We flew in our church clothes, drove straight there and showed up with about 5 minutes to spare, but we made it!!! It was such an awesome baptism, the spirit was so strong and I was so happy that my girls could watch one of their cousins be baptized. We had an awesome lunch and the kids ran and played for hours in the gym while we gave plenty of hugs to all of our long lost family. (Not really lost but they live a long ways away). Ryan and Brenda, showed us to the Northwest Trek that afternoon and took us to Eatonville, some small town at the base of Mt.Ranier to eat and have yummy ice cream. The next three days we spent in Seattle taking in all of the tourists sights. We saw the aquarium, went to the beach, rode the ferry, Pike's Market, Poulsbo(sp?) this great little Norweigian town with the biggest donuts I've ever seen. I didn't make it up to Forks, I did suggest it but was voted down.
After we said goodbye to the Morris clan we headed to Utah to see the Graham fam. It was so great to fly into Utah and see the mountains in the daylight. I was just so happy to be in Utah. It had been a long time and it brings back so many memories every time I'm there. We took our kids to the same Taco Time that Chris and I went to on our honeymoon where we ordered, got the total and decided it was too much money so we just kept driving past the pick up window. We've come along way in nine years since not only could we order and afford it for ourselves, we could feed our whole family of five! I was able to see my long lost Houston friends Melissa and Nan which was the best!!!
On the way to Bear Lake we hit a deer. I was so traumitized even though I didn't see it. As soon as I knew what was going to happen I closed my eyes so instead I got the sound effects from both that poor deer and Chris. I was all worried about ruining the rental car but luckily our credit card covered it all. Serious perks to having a credit card. We turned it in early in the morning and they told us we were the third car to be turned in that day that had hit a deer.
Chris's family had a big cabin overlooking the lake were we all stayed. It was the best for us to visit with brothers and sisters and the best for the kids to have cousin sleepovers. We went through tonz of sunblock, went boating, jet skiing and made many sand creations.
Our last day before flying back to the real life we went to see the new kids Rat in a kitchen movie that's to hard to spell. Chris went and got the tickets for us and his two brothers and ordered 11 kids tickets!! He had to repeat himself because apparantley thats even alot for good old Utah! We got a picture of all of the kids outside the theatre because there were just so many of them.
Wow!! If you made it through all of that then you deserve a serious prize. I put a slideshow on of some of our favorite moments!!! Sorry for the sideways pictures. I'll have to figure that glitch out next time.
(The slideshow will someday make it back when I figure out how to not make it monster size).

Twilight/New Moon Frustrations

Disclaimer: Don't read this post if you're going to read the Stephanie Meyer books yourself and don't want to know anything that happens.

So there are many of you out there who have already read this book and made comments about it. I'm joining in with my opinion. I read twilight so quickly and moved right on into New Moon. I loved the begining just as much but cannot seem to finish it. Once she headed to Italy I lost all interest. My book came with rub-on Tattoos and if I had a camera that worked I would firmly plant "Jacob" on my bicep and take a picture for you all to see because he's my guy. I have no idea how the book ends because seriously I can't finish it, I can read a few pages at a time because the obsessive Edward/Bella connection is way to much for me that I feel like puking a little. I'm not even excited to read book three know because I know I've set myself up for dissapointment. I just love Jacob and the way Bella was when she was with him. So to continue with this blog world book club can anyone feel my pain.

Now I have to run and pack, I just keep putting it off hoping it will magically get done. I'm such a procrastinater. We're taking off for Salt Lake - Seattle for the next ten days. I hope to have many great stories to tell when I return and post many good pictures with my new camera. I'm especially hoping to post one of my three kids behaving like angels on one of the plane rides.

Big Fun 4th Weekend

We love to be in Idaho for the 4th of July, the family, the food, the fireworks but are getting there a week late this year so we had to make do here in Texas.
Keeping with tradition we had our own red, white and blue breakfast with friends from the ward. Chris was the official pancake maker and shopper. He spent all one night looking for the master pancake recipe he grew up with. We pulled out a million cookbooks, allrecipes.com and looked at a 100+ recipes it seems. He was determined to have this specific one where you whip the egg whites and a bunch of other fancy steps. His mom was out of town and I tried to convince him that pancakes were pancakes just pick a recipe and get on with the night. At 10:30p.m. our time he called his Sis in Utah who luckily for him had the very recipe. So it's ours now, in our possesion if you ever need the perfect pancake recipe. (They were delicious). He got lots of blueberries, raspberries and strawberries to go on top for the "red" and "blue" and then the spray coolwhip stuff for the "white". It was so fun and we were glad to bring the Idaho touch here to Texas.
If you've followed the weather (I never do) you'd realize that we're building boats at this point because the rain will not stop. It has rained ALL summer long, huge heavy storms day in and day out. It doesn't even seem like summer yet because we've had maybe two sunny days. My kids love to play with umbrellas and get drenched and Sat. was no exception. They jump in the puddles and dance in the rain until they're soaking wet. The street gutters make a swift stream and they've been racing popsicle sticks and laying down in the water. It's gross but will definately be a memory of this summer.
The rain stopped long enough for the fireworks to go off. It seems odd to have the big firework celebration in June but that's when it was. Normally everyone piles onto the grass near where they shoot them off but it was WAY WAY muddy. Instead everyone was piled in the streets on some nice hard concrete. Comfy. We still got so dirty because even the sidewalks are covered in mud. We're living in swamp land. We were filthy and bug bitten and had to laugh at how pathetic the whole situation was when the kids fell asleep half way though and it's just Chris and I sitting there. Of course the fireworks didn't compare to the good ole Melaleuca Freedom Festival but that made the situation even funnier.
That night we came home and I beat Chris 4-2 in a "how many flies can you kill contest".
Today I gave Charlotte a perm. You wouldn't know by looking at her though, because the curl hardly took, it's wavy at best. She still looks so cute and was so excited to have it done.
Happy 4th of July to everyone!