4th of July 2014 :: City Festivities

 Our 4th was pretty typical; parade, BBQ at Grandma & Grandpa's, hiding from the heat, and watching Daddy in the home run derby & city softball game.  The home run derby was cancelled due to CRAZY wind, but they played the game and it was a fun time.  Here's some photos from our appearances at the city festivities.

It didn't take long to have the kids celebrating here and there for the handfuls of candy they scrounged up.

Cousin Brigham... the kids loved getting these little flags from one of the floats.

Macy was in a kind of crabby mood that morning, but people throwing candy at her helped her snap out of it.  She loves to clean up and put things where they go, so she LOVED picking up candy and putting in in the bag.

Cute little Harper.

 I don't know what it is about the 4th of July, but we always go hog wild taking pictures.  We seem to get the most cousin pictures on the 4th and Christmas Eve.  Here's Cassadee and Carly in the middle of those shenanigans.

The annual photos of the cousins on the grassy hill.  

It's fun that everyone comes to watch Colby play softball and it lends to a really easy opportunity to snap our favorite photos of the kids.

(This one was blurry, but I loved it.  Silly boys.)

These silly face pictures were great, and the fact that Macy was a little late with it (on the second one) but she soon caught on and tried to pull a funny one... so funny!

The kids had the hill mostly to themselves for a while and had a ball playing catch and tag.  Macy had a little crash with Tyler on the tramp earlier so her leg was super sore and she was stuck sitting on the blanket with Mom.  She wanted to get in middle of the fun with the big boys, but she got over it eventually.  She had a blast making cheesy faces at the camera and kissing her little Lambie.

The stormy night shared some pretty sights with us as well.

 It was a beautiful day (minus the horrible winds for that little while in the evening) which lent to a great opportunity to reflect on our many blessings we enjoy living in this great nation.  Happy birthday, America.

Maui Ocean Center

Besides having 10 whole days of Colby and the boys without interruptions from work and stuff, my favorite part of our vacation was these little boys.  Marshall, Tyler, Karter, and Brigham made our trip just a little more magical and I loved it.  Before we left for Hawaii, the one thing we knew we would do was take the kids to the aquarium.  Look at how great they thought it was!

I snapped a few pictures of the creatures the boys loved the most.  I should have made a note of what each of these are called.  Whoops.

I think the best part of our trip to the Ocean Center was how excited the kids got about EVERYTHING!  They were constantly running from tank to tank, yelling at anyone that would listen to come look at this and come look at that.  Colby's dad reminded me once we were home that there was even some old guy that made an annoyed comment about the rambunctious kids that couldn't be tamed (I clearly remember that man looking exactly like Colby's dad, haha).

I love any time I can watch Colby be a hands on, excited dad.  That was one of the most attractive things about him when we were dating... I knew he would be an amazing dad, and he is!

Egg Hunt at Great-Grandma Stratton's

I love the tradition we have started Saturday morning of Easter weekend.  A few years ago we organized an Easter Egg Hunt at Great-Gma's house for all the grandkids.  They used to do this kind of thing when a lot of the older grandkids were little, but now there's a big group of young ones again.  It's fun to do it at Grandma's so she can be there and witness it all without any extra effort on her part at all.  Here's a few pictures from the festivities.

Grandma Stratton was getting Tyler excited for the hunt to start.

I love watching them search out the best goodies and walk right past so many that they aren't too excited for just yet.  It's so funny that my boys haven't figured out they can actually have as much as they pick up.

Caught ya!  Marshall is getting old enough to find some of the more tricky ones now.

I love Tyler's face right here.  He was working really hard to get that full basket lifted as high as he could.

All of the younger grandkids that were able to make it that morning.  It's amazing to see them grow.

Here's all the grandsons and great-grandsons that were there.  They took a similar picture with the girls, but I was goofy and didn't hand my camera to Colby to get one of those.  I'll get one from somebody sometime and add it sometime.

These three boys make me smile.  Things are getting pretty wild when they are together.  Last night, for example, they were running at each other head on and seeing who could remain standing.  Even Brigham (who is just out of this shot) is starting to get in on it.  He's super good at finding some kind of kitchen tool (whisk, potato masher, rolling pin, etc) and chasing after the rest of the boys.

Easter is always a fun time for us as we gather as a family in celebration of the life and resurrection of our Savior and the fact that we can be together forever, thanks to Him.

Loving Life

Marshall, Karter, Brady, Brigham, & Tyler

I love this small town where we live.  

I love that Great Gma & Gpa live only a couple blocks from Gma & Gpa so the boys could travel in style.
I love that my kids get to enjoy some of the things I did when I was a child, even though modern codes of conduct and societal acceptance would generally say otherwise... all thanks to our special small town.  

I love the adventurous spirits these kids have and how simple things can get them so excited.  

I love family time.  

I love my boys.  

I love this wonderful life we have.

Santa Visits Again!

We must be the luckiest people in Hurricane!  We got a special visit from Santa again this year.  We figure that his reindeer must get tired right around here each year because he has stopped by Grandma & Grandpa's house the last few years and there are even pictures from when our Daddy was a little boy and Santa would stop by and say hello.

My little brother Tyler was quick to greet him with a hug.  He was so excited to see Santa. 

My mom was tricky and got a picture of me smiling ear to ear when I realized who had stopped by.  

I sure love Santa.

Check out my cousin Karter.  Even he was so excited!!!

Santa gave us each a special surprise... coloring books!

I guess my baby cousin Brigham was nervous or something because anytime Santa would look at him 

he would scream and scream.

I almost forgot.  We each got PEZ dispensers too.  Those are the coolest candies.  Santa could only stay for a second... so we wished him a Merry Christmas and told him thank you and he was on his way.

Here's a picture of all of us on the mantle.  I think we take this same picture every year.  

Look at Brigham.  He is so funny eating his box of crayons.

There.  I got my piece of candy and I was ready to smile.

Remembering Jesus

On Christmas Eve, Cassadee helped do something special for the little boys.  She had done this little production for Sharing Time in Primary and organized it one more time for the boys to do at Grandma & Grandpa's house.  They started out dressed like Samuel the Lamanite declaring the coming of the Savior.  Notice that Tyler wanted to wear his head piece on his neck.  I just had to let him be an individual :)

The boys got to choose "presents" out of a bag that all went together and each piece had a song or a story to go with it.  They really enjoyed taking turns and unwrapping the little surprises.

They were unwrapping pieces of the nativity and learning all about the birth of Christ.

Here's proof that Brigham and the older "kids" were there.

Grandma played the piano for us to sing to.

Brigham was so cute... just playing with all the pieces of the nativity while the other kids were paying attention to everything else that was going on.

 Look how sweet these little boys are... listening so closely to Grandpa reading them a story.

Notice Tyler is slowly losing interest...

(So was Colby, haha.)

Soon Tyler found his way across the room... getting distracted by who knows what.

He made it back to all the action and made sure to turn on a little music on his way.  He loved that it was his job to press the angel and start the song.

This was too funny.  While Cassadee read the boys a story, Marshall got right up next to her and played with her hair.  It was cute until she started getting tired of it falling in her eyes.

And then Marshall had fun flicking her bangs back down into her face.  Little goober...

Carly even got in on the action and finished reading the story to the boys.

When it was all over, the boys got plenty of time to play with the nativity and take turns pressing the angel and starting the music.

A super cute moment from this night was when there were only a couple pieces left in the bag and Joseph, Mary, and baby Jesus were still unaccounted for.  The boys started talking about how they hoped they chose whichever piece they were hoping for.  It was Tyler's turn to choose and everyone was talking about wanting to pick Mary.  He unwrapped Joseph and in the sweetest, most excited voice announced, "It's Ma-wy!"  Even though it wasn't, his sweet little voice was so darling.  I loved that and remember it more than most everything that took place that night.  It was a great way to calm the growing excitement of what was coming later that night and remember what Christmas is all about.  I loved how often during this Christmas season that I heard Marshall say that Christmas was about baby Jesus. I'm glad to know Marshall understands the importance of the season, rather than getting totally caught up in all the commercial stuff.