Memorial Day Weekend

Memorial Day weekend was a pretty laid-back, but enjoyable weekend spent at home. Jeff suggested taking a trip, but after all the traveling we've done, I preferred to do things around home!

The kids had fun playing outside, and have re-discovered a fascination for bugs.

Lots of bike riding, scooters, and playing basketball, soccer, and tag.

We decided to try out the local zoo. Even though it was extremely hot, we had a good time and enjoyed seeing all the animals.

Matthew loved the giraffes, Jacob and Caleb liked the Rhinos- especially the new baby that was just born.

Emily loved the little squirrel monkeys- she kept squealing and laughing at them. It was pretty funny.

Making dinner at home and bathing the baby at the same time. Emily's new favorite!

We also did some work in the yard, and on our garden. We don't really have a great place for a traditional garden, so Jeff built a few garden boxes. The kids were great helpers.

Emily loved to be right in the middle of everything. She was cute, but she kept trying to eat and play in the dirt. She wold also squeal and scream when Jacob and Caleb showed her the worms in the dirt- it was cute until she started trying to eat those too. Gross! (She tripped over backwards and landed in the box- she definitely earned herself a well-deserved bath that night!)

Our three cute boys!

Best Dollar Ever Spent

A couple years ago I got tired of searching through the section in my purse where I kept receipts. The receipts would be bunched together and it was sometimes hard to find the receipt I was looking for. Then I found this little beauty in the Target dollar section, and knew it would be perfect for storing receipts. It always stays in my purse and has been one of the best purchases I've ever made.

It has divided sections and tabs which makes separating receipts into categories/commonly visited stores so easy. The most recent receipts go in the front. Best of all, the receipts stay nice and orderly. They don't get wrinkled, they don't get lost, and I don't have to search for them.
Even though it was only a dollar, this one has held up great over the years and it's been a great sanity saver! (I still see these around fairly often at Target & other places...)

Just for Fun

At my Grandma & Grandpa Tanner's home, they have baby pictures of all the grandkids on the wall. It was fun to see my picture again, and I snapped a picture so I could do a little comparison with Emily. There are some differences, but there are definitely a lot of similarities too.

Me as a baby

Emily

On The Road Again

On Monday, May 9th, we started our road trip to our new destination. We had a week to make the trip, so we decided to take it slow (at first) and make stops at all our grandparents along the way. We would have loved to spend a week with each of them, but we were happy to have the chance to at least spend the night.

Our first stop was to see Grandma and Grandpa Haworth. It was great to be back on the farm, and spend some more time with Grandma and Grandpa. The kids loved watching some basketball games, jumping on the tramp, and feeding cows out on the farm. We loved having time to visit with Grandma and Grandpa, look at old pictures, and listen to stories.

Emily just walked over to Grandpa and wanted to sit on his lap, it was pretty cute.

Tuesday morning we headed to the Tanners. The kids loved playing with Austin and Rowan, playing outside on the playground and toys, and taking rides in the 'Rhino'. They all got along so well together. I wish we lived closer so the kids could play more often. Again, we loved visiting with Grandma and Grandpa, sharing stories and memories.



We left Wednesday morning for Grandma Hiller's home. As an added bonus, Kristie and Lilah drove up to spend the day with us there. It was fun to see Grandma again, she's such an entertaining sweet lady. The boys loved Grandma's yard as always. I especially loved watching Emily and Lilah play together. They get cuter and cuter together the older they get. I'm really sad they won't get to see each other as much, but we'll take what we can get. We had a yummy dinner together that night and then said goodbye to Kristie and Lilah & gave hugs to Grandma who had her early temple session in the morning.

Thursday morning we got everything packed, and bathed kids. I was lucky to squeeze in a quick run, and then we were off to see Grandma Forman. Our original plans of taking her to lunch ended up not working out because our schedule changed- we were sad about that. But we were so happy we were able to see her, even for a quick visit. She looked as beautiful and radiant as ever. The kids enjoyed seeing 'Sister Forman' with her missionary tag, and we were able to take a couple pictures with the temple in the background. We sure love her and were glad we could see her.

From there we started our long drive. The kids did well- fortunately they're seasoned travelers. The only mishap we had along the trip was at one stop. We stopped to fill up with gas and get the kids some ice cream cones. Matthew wasn't paying attention very well, and walked RIGHT through a new section of concrete that had just been poured and smoothed. I had seen the guy finishing up right before I ran in to the gas station. Matthew had wet concrete all over his legs up to his knees & up to his elbows when he had fallen down. It was pretty bad. I looked at Jeff, speechless, then we just started busting up. I felt bad, but it was just too funny. Fortunately, we were able to get him cleaned up- and luckily the guy still had more concrete work to do, so he just re-smoothed the area and it wasn't a big deal. I'm a little sad now that I didn't take a picture, but at the time I didn't really want to bring any more attention to the situation.
The kids played, read, talked and laughed, and slept. They were happy to have a dvd player too. We wanted to make the drive as quickly as possible, so we just drove straight through without stopping other than to fill-up, and one stop for a stranded traveler*. We arrived about 4:30 on Friday morning- where Jeff realized the garage door pad wasn't working, so we drove around to try and find a battery at a gas station, then when we got back he realized he just hadn't been entering the code right. We finally got in, got kids in bed (our movers even set up our beds- thank heavens!) and we crawled into bed about 5:30am. It was nice to be home!

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mothers Day!

It was a wonderful Mother's day this year. We were able to spend the special holiday with our own mothers, and I got the best gift- a long nap after church!

Next year I need to include a 'happy smiling picture' in the list of requests for the holiday though. Is it really too much to ask for one happy smiling picture? Apparently it is... :)

Pulling funny faces...

Eating jewelry...

Although not perfect, I'm glad we at least got an acceptable one. :)

Mother & Daughter

We really were so happy we could spend Mother's Day with two of the most amazing mothers ever. They mean the world to us!

In the Meantime

It worked out that we had exactly two weeks between our moving day and Jeff's first day of work. So we were able to spend a whole week enjoying time with family. A week goes by much faster than anyone wanted, but we did have a lot of fun together.

We spent lots of time playing games, and enjoying time together.

One night, we got together at the Stevens for a dinner/birthday celebration for Aunt Amy. It was fun to get together with cousins. Jeff even picked up a pinata to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. (more pics to come later)

Emily & James

One night we left the kids with babysitters, (Scott & Amanda have some fabulous ones!), and had a bowling date night for the adults. I love that our families are such great friends- it's fun to go all together.




Saturday morning we went to the park to enjoy some tennis. The kids enjoyed playing on the playground. Matthew & Gideon also enjoyed 'watering' all the surrounding plants- seriously, I don't know where those boys learn their shenanigans!

Emily really enjoyed playing with everyone's water bottles.

We went bowling Saturday afternoon so we could take the kids too. That's always fun and entertaining. It was fun to go for ice cream cones afterward.

We also had a belated birthday celebration for Emily. She had fun opening presents. Mom and I found some cute outfits for her when we went on a quick girls shopping trip. My favorite present, however, was the darling little purse and bracelets my mom found for Emily. She loved them!


We're sure going to miss spending time with our families, but I'm glad we were able to spend the week with them.