Princess Camp

Last week Ava got to go to Princess Camp. A local dance academy hosts it, and for one week, Ava got to go for two hours a day to craft, dance, sing, and play with princesses!

On the last day, they had a princess spa day, and got to get their fingernails painted and be pampered. Then families got to come and see them dance and get crowned a "real" princess. Ava was a grump and wouldn't dance. This girl in the picture below was Ava's special friend. She was with her all the time, and was sad when she had to leave her!

Ava had so much fun. She loves princesses and dress up, so this was a perfect match for her. Everyday she was so excited to go!

Payden is a leeeeetle flexible.

Things said in your friend's camper at one in the morning.

We were playing a yatzee like game, into the wee hours. I kept smashing my face into their screen to check to make sure no weirdos were entering the tent where the baby and Ava were, or the older girls who were in their own tents.

The yatzee like game was scored like yatzee, with the score card divided into two parts, top and bottom. I almost won, and was declared the almost winner because, according to my best friend:

"Look how full her bottom is!"

Okay.

A Crazy Fourth

On the 4th of July, we went to the parade, the farmers market, then home to rest for a while until we went to a BBQ at a friends house. We had a lot of fun and good food! We always enjoy getting together with our friends, and there is enough children there that all have something to keep them occupied. We were quite outnumbered; 12 kids to 6 adults!

All the kids had fun playing outside, and when the weather turned bad, watching movies.

The adults did what we do best; talking up a storm. Literally; while we talked we watched an awesome storm brewing. We took pictures and discussed what those unusual cloud formations could mean; we soon found out.

We stood under these for a while, talking about how odd it was that it was so calm; no wind whatsoever.

Then the clouds started to swirl in circles, there was more lightening and thunder, the wind picked up and we went inside just in time.



The rain came first, coming down in torrents. The kids watched the lightening from the window.

Then the rain turned to hail, in large amounts. I was concerned about our car; but it didn't get damaged. Our friends, the Harkers, had a beautiful garden. Sadly, it was ruined by the hail.

Only minutes before, we were enjoying ourselves here!

A handful of hail. It was ice hard, and pretty big.

Look at all that hail!

The men shoveled, swept, and anything else they could to keep the water away from the house; it was quickly forming rivers and lakes.

We got about an inch and a half in under an hour. We were graced with a wonderful double rainbow afterwards.

After our fun at the Harkers, (and we did have fun; lots of it! Even with the storm!) we came home to do our own fireworks. Here are the kiddos with sparklers.



Ava had a hard time with these last year; burnt her fingers in a couple of places. We thought she would never touch one again, but she didn't even remember!

Jason and I took turns setting off the fireworks.

We never get very big ones, and we try to stay away from the really noisy ones. We just love doing this as a family!

We had a very good fourth of July. I was so excited to come home and see that my tomato plants were ok! My lettuce was ruined, but I think that will grow back. We were SO GLAD we weren't in a tent somewhere, as had been the plan! I was also very touched by the speech during the fireworks(the one on the radio that plays music to accompany the fireworks). I hope I am not the only one who heard that! Let me know if you did, what you thought of it. A great fourth!

Pool fun

Ava and Michaela out in the pool on a hot day. Michaela put Ava on the floatie and was pushing her around the pool on it. It was so sweet!

Summer Fun

We went to Raft River yesterday for some true summer fun!

This place has a huge slip and slide, a zip line, tramp, swings, candy shooter and lots of room to roam. We brought a picnic dinner and wore our suits.

Here is Michaela and her friend Kayla on the slip and slide. You could either go down on tubes, or just with your body. As time wore on, you could see tubes coming down with way more people than they should hold, and grown men would come down in a big group, crashing into each other on the way.

Here is Michaela on the zip line.

And Payden. She was scared at first, but after she finally went down, she went back for more and more!

I even gave it a go. It was so much fun! A little scary at the end; it looks like you won't be able to stop. But I did, without harm!

Here is a pic of all the kids catching candy. If you click on it to make it bigger, you can see all the candy in mid air!

We didn't bring bags for the candy, so I just told Payden and Ava to put it in their suits! Payden was a little worried at how silly this looked, but Ava didn't care.

Ava, candy in her suit, looking for more. She ate it as she found it!

I took the baby down with Ava in a tube. If you click to make it bigger, you will see she looks terrified, but she was giggling at the end. I think she just didn't like the wind in her face.

Jason even tried the zip line, and he is afraid of heights. He told me he almost chickened out at the end, but didn't!

We had so much fun; we want to reserve if for all of our friends to come with us!

Running and running and running and running and

I have been running in the morning with a group from my neighborhood. We meet at 7am. There is all sorts of levels, some walk, some run/walk, others RUN. I am somewhere in the middle of running and RUNNING. That word gets more and more funny the more I type it. Running. Running. (giggle.)

Anyway, I am training for another sprint tri, and want to do better this time. I was having a hard time getting myself motivated to train until this running group. I love it! I try to keep up with the RUNNERS, but even when I have to slow down, I still keep them in sight and it pushes me to go harder longer than I ever do on my own. This morning I ran about 4 miles, which is really good for me.

I typically hate getting up early, but knowing that there will be people there helps me get up out of bed to go. Once I am up, I love it, and I feel good all day.

So I think I will be better prepared for the running part of the tri, now I just need to work on the bike and swim!