New Living Room

When we moved into the house we painted the living room and dinning room and light grey that was actually a light blue. We were never crazy about it and it wasn't long before I was dreaming of a dark bluish green paint on the walls. Well there is this thing that happens when you are pregnant called nesting and this dream finally became a reality.

Russ and I worked very hard to get it done fairly quickly, I really wanted to get it done before we started homeschool again because we do homeschool in the dinning room.

We added white molding to the ceiling and around the windows and we love it. It feels like that room has "grown up". It is still not completely done because we are putting a family tree up but it is really close to being finished. And we even got the timeline up before school started.

Also before school started I wanted my wall map hung which required Russ to go up in the attic and add a stud for it to be hung into since we now had molding. This is what his arm looked like when he came down for a drink,.

I felt so bad every time I looked at him. It was so hot up there. This guy does so much for me!

But look at how great it looks!

July randoms

I'm glad these two like each other.

Snuggled up on the couch at Connie's watching Man From Snowy River

I had to cheat and open my eyes to see this but it was just so cute.

Gracie and Joe asked me for some gum and when I came into the kitchen to get it down for them this is what I saw.

Boys

Gracie holding Lennon. I am sad Gracie is blurry in this picture but I love Lennon's cheeks and cute smile.

"Is that a giant pickle?" Connie gave a watermelon that someone brought to her work.

Joe's super sad pouting.

Russ playing face swap with the kids - creepy.

One night for dinner we had Nacho Libre salad and Gracie made everyone's into a face.

Falling asleep at nap time.

I guess this is comfortable

We went over to the Carters to see their nine puppies that their dog Dolly had. They were so tiny and cute and we were all in love. I am glad we went to see them because later they all got Parvo and died. It was so, so sad and all the kids cried over it.

Here is William and Laney doing face swap. It was pretty funny.

And I ended the month with an awesome girls night to go and see the premier of Austenland. Such a good movie, if it is playing in your area you should definitely go see it.

My moms elementary school

My mom went to elementary school in Queen Creek and they have turned it into a little museum so it was fun one day to go and see it with her and some of the other cousins.

She remembers drinking from this drinking fountain.

My moms class pictures hung on the wall, she is the only girl on the second row.

I decided I wanted all the furniture from this place for our homeschool room.

They all loved playing school.

This is a picture of my moms family that they had up in the museum.

4th of July

Russ worked the 4th of July so me and the kids went to my parents during the day and swam and had yummy BBQ then we went over to Rex and Shaleigh's to spend time with Russ' family. And of course Russ spent most of his time with Face Juggler. 

 Russ and his dad

 Russ and his brother Rex

 Russ and his mom

 and my favorite, Rex and Shaliegh. 

Some of us watched NY's fireworks on TV which was the way to go for me then we went outside and did some fire works.

Grandma even got into it. And right after this Joseph threw up. So that ended the night for us.

Utah trip

On June 26th our family plus Connie and my mom headed up to Utah. I have to remember to always have them join us on road trips. They helped out so much with the kids. Especially when our car sorta wigged out in Beaver Utah and we had to take it in somewhere to get it checked out. We hung around outside in a grassy area and Connie wrestled with the kids because she knew they needed to get rid of some energy and that I was not up to it. 

 This is also when I was really grateful for the power of prayer. The guy at the car place said it could be the cars computer that effects everything major in the car and we would need to have it towed and back track over an hour. By this time Russ had driven it around town and it was working fine with no problems so we prayed about it and decided we should just go on. The car worked fine and has not needed a thing since. 

We dropped my mom off in Orem to stay with her brother Berry and Connie stayed with us at Russ' brother Erik's house. We love it there. I decided while I was there that Sue lives a really lovely life and not by accident but by her choices and hard work. I hope I am more like her some day. It was also great to be able to pick her brain about home school since she has done it quite successfully for many years. 

 Look at her beautiful roses. She was trimming them and shared them with the kids. They loved them.

 Going over to visit her neighbor. 

 That night Russ and I got to go to the Salt Lake temple for the first time and it was really neat. I loved being there. 

 The next day I took the kids to Sugar House park. At least I think that is what it is called. Russ was taking a continuing education coarse so we had to find ways to entertain ourselves. This place has a little creek running through it and we waded down the whole thing. 

 Definitely not something we get to do often in the valley of AZ so we enjoyed it a lot.

 Then Russ got off early one day from the conference so we headed up to park city to ride the alpine slide.

 Gracie was really not sure about the lift when it started going.

 But she warmed up to it. I never did though. It was beautiful but it would periodically stop and every time it did I would have a slight panic attack.

 heading to the slide

 It was usually hard to get them to nap. Everything was too fun but I knew they were so tired so I made them lay down and read a book with me and it wasn't long before they were out.

 Sunday was our nephew Kent's farewell talk and we were so glad we got to be there for it. He did a wonderful job and we know he will be an excellent missionary.

After church we hung around for the pancake lunch and then we were off to Idaho to meet up with Connie and my Mom at my aunt and uncles house.