July Phone Pics

I always have so many picture on my phone at the end of every month, so for this month I just picked some of my favorites!!

 

I think this was actually June, but oh well!  Saturday hiking with Becca and Jesse!

 



 

Playing on the rock wall after swimming at the new Provo rec center!

 



 

Making letters with popsicle sticks- this could entertain her forever! 

 



 

 



                                               Fourth of
July at the Springville splash pad.  It was so fun to have my entire family there!

LOVE it when Cami comes to town and we get these 3 cute kids together!  I love seeing what cute little friends Hadley and Jane are, even with only seeing each other 2 or 3 times a year!

 



Love my little family!

 



Mommy/daughter date to shop at the mall!  And of course the mall wouldn't be complete without a visit to the carousal. 

 



Summer Colorado Trip

We took our annual trip out to Colorado this summer and this year Steve got to go with us!  It's so sad to think that at this time next year my parents will most likely live in Salt Lake and we won't visit Colorado as often anymore!

 

We had a super fun trip and loved spending more time with parents and especially with Ashton and Kylie and the kids!

 

 A snoozing papa and Brenner...



 

Brenn and I hanging out in the shade at the splash pad.

Zoo trip... Obviously Hadley didn't want feed the giraffes like Fox and Fiona!

Skyride to the top!

 

Always a must?  Penny Arcade... Hadley was in heaven, Brenner stayed warm and cozy in the rain.

Cousin love- Hadley doesn't see these guys very often and she loved every minute!

 

I always love going home :)

Update on Life

 - We blessed Brenner on Sunday and it was such a nice day spent with family!  Steve gave a really nice blessing!  Afterwards, everyone came back to our house for a bbq filled with yummy food and fun conversation.  I love these pictures of my parents with my kids and with all of their Utah grandkids :)

 

 - All of these cute babies are going to be best friends, they are all within 9 months of each other!  They all woke up from naps at the same time and were all eating and we thought it would be fun to get this picture of all 4 of them.  Kate is certainly outnumbered by the boys :)

 - Hadley is still recovering from an extremely late night on Fourth of July and then a weekend of nonstop family stuff!  She is really into drawing and coloring recently (and still obsessed with reading books all day!).  Her newest things to sketch- family pictures!!  I love how we are all covered with hair and I (on the far right) have a rather large nose!

 

 

 

- Hadley continues to do pretty well with Brenner.  But the poor boy just has to deal with her trying to play with/on/by him all the time!

 

- I love that my kids are such great sleepers!  Brenner is on such a good sleep schedule right now... Naps from 9-11 and 1-4 and then he eats at 7:30 and goes down and has been sleeping until around 6:45 or 7 each morning!  He is also growing like a weed!  At not even 2 months, he no longer fits in about ninety percent of his 0-3 month clothes because he is sooooo tall!  He also has bad cradle cap (ugh, ugh, ugh!!) and it's hard to put the lotion on with all that hair!  So he currently always looks a bit greasy up there.  He smiles ALL the time- lots of times at nothing :)  We certainly love this little boy!

 



- I am keeping myself busy with 2 kids, scout stuff, house stuff, and everything else!  But I have to admit that I have a pretty good life- not much to complain about!  I am still tutoring just one evening a week for a first grader in Springville, but I can only see that going through the rest of the summer.  I've been spending more time reading and have found some super good series.  I also have been getting up earlier each day and I love the extra time to get stuff done (plus I love to walk when it's cooler than 90 degrees outside).

 

- Steve continues to stay busy at Doba and finishing up school (finally!! yay!!).  He loves his new calling of Stake Sunday school presidency although it keeps him away from us more on Sundays.  Hadley is connected to Steve at the hip when possible- she is definitely a daddy's girl.  I think she thinks, "Brenner has mom, so dad is MINE!!"  That makes things tough sometimes :)

 

We are off to Colorado tomorrow and are excited to have Steve's full attention and more time with family!

Hadley's "School"

 Each day we spend about 30 minutes or so doing fun educational activities and games- we practice letters and numbers, and just make things fun!  I wanted to record some of the things we've done in the last couple of weeks (Tor this is also for you!! :)).

 

Let's start with a picture of this pretty girl...

 

 

We braved the 90 degree weather (at 10 in the morning no less!) to practice recognizing our numbers playing hopscotch.  Hadley didn't really get the concept of hopping from number to number, she just ran around counting and naming them!

 

 

I took a book that I had several copies of (from teaching) and we looked through the pages and found different letters.  I would ask her to find a letter and she would circle it and she would point out a letter and then look through the whole page to find all of them.

 



 This was a favorite!  I put the alphabet up and down the stairs and then we just played lots of games with it.  Racing to different letters as fast as we could, singing the alphabet while we climbed the stairs, picking a letter and writing it to see if it looked the same, etc.  Two weeks later and the letters are still up!

 

 We do a couple pages in her preschool book each day...

We come up with fun ways to write our letters.  With the pudding (we also do jello powder) if she writes it correctly she gets to lick her finger.  Yes, not super clean or sanitary but we wash our hands before so hey, oh well!



 

Letters in salt!

 We made name caterpillars for everyone in our family.  She traced some of the letters for each one!  She loved this one too!

 

We are having so much fun doing these things, but it has made me realize one thing... I could NEVER homeschool her :)  Love her to pieces, but no!