Bowling Mania

So recently we have rediscovered the Wii. With my weight watchers plan, I am trying to "move" more and we have been accomplishing that by riding our bikes down to our church and back most nights (3 1/2 miles) but sometimes I feel like supplementing by bowling a few games by myself. This afternoon I bowled for nearly 45 mins straight, bringing my overall score up to pro level and bowling a record 231 as you can see in the picture above. If you look hard, you can see that I bowled 5, count them FIVE strikes in a row!! So, when Robert got home, he had to show me up and so we bowled for another half hour to 45 mins until he had to go back to check on the pivots. When he left, I bowled for another half an hour working on my power throws. Talk about going bowling crazy, but it's been fun and I worked off the brownies we had for dessert (hopefully!)

Swings

Sammy was just laughing and laughing on the swing, but of course the minute the camera comes out he stops, but you can still see how much he loves swinging!

Another Day at the Park

I thought this picture was cute because I was really only looking at Sam when I took it, but Fox was also in the picture and also stepping down.

Theirs is sort of a love/hate relationship sometimes! Thanks for coming with us again Fox and McKenzie (and mommy!)

Peeking through the holes. Sammy would squeal with delight when I would play peek-a-boo with him!

And the bubble - tons of fun! Sammy has really found that he loves swings and slides at the playground and that he can't get enough of them!

And here's McKenzie on the swings - such a doll!

First Fruits

This is so exciting for me, but today we were able to enjoy the first fruits of our hard work in our garden - strawberries!! They aren't really big, but hey we grew them!

So I was planning on each of us having two, since there were six. But when I wasn't looking, our little stinker swiped Daddy's two strawberries and stuffed them in his mouth (leaves and all) before I could stop him - sorry honey!

Scentsy Giveaway

For those of you who like Scentsy, over at Make It and Love It there is a giveaway for $30 worth of Scensy products. In addition, they are giving a 10% discount all throughout the month of August to get ready for their fall products that are coming out. So head on over using the Make It and Love It button on the side of my blog and enter to win some yummy smelling stuff!

Random Pictures

Sam chugging away at the rootbeer in his sippy cup

The black foot tribe :)

Sammy first had Daddy's sunday shoes on, but decided he liked Mommy's better!

And this is a picture of my first pie ever! I made it to contribute to the Pioneer Day stake activity we had on Friday. Unfortunately, it wasn't all that great, but that may have been because it was a weight watchers recipe for a healthier pie, but oh well. At least I gave it a go, right? Maybe next time I'll just do a regular pie and it will turn out better.

Giveaway Time

Make It & Love It's latest sponsor is giving away a photo shoot! This happens to be a girl who recently moved into my ward and is super nice and a great photographer. Her name is Tasha Poulsen and her button is down on the side of my blog if you'd like to see her work. Even if you are not in the area, you can give the photo shoot to someone else (like me), so head on over and enter to win. The giveaway closes on Saturday the 25th. Good luck to everyone (even though we all know I'm going to win anyways ;)

Silly Sammy

I've been working on card designs for my next event this morning and while I was working, I heard the funniest thing coming from Sammy. He was looking at himself in the closet door mirror and laughing at seeing himself holding my hot glue gun and sucking on it! Occurances such as this are becoming more common and I love to see the happy little boy my little guy is turning into. And, not long after I took this video, I went to find Sam to put him down for a nap, and he was in his room "talking" to Lightening McQueen and Mater that are on the head of his toddler bed we just got for him. He is so excited for it, but I haven't had the time to finish making the sheets for his bed yet. When I do, I promise I will post pictures of all the Cars stuff we have for him! (Sorry the movie so short, regular batteries don't last long in taking movies and the normal battery was charging, but enjoy what I got!)

Splash Park

So we went to the free splash park in Rexburg today and invited all our friends to join us if they wanted to. Bec and the kids came before lunch and these pictures are the ones she took for us. I got wet with the kids and helped them play in the water. Thanks, Bec for taking such great pics for us!!

Sammy liked the smaller fountains. After about an hour, we went and had free lunch in the park sponsored by the city. They do this every day throughout the summer, cool, huh?

Here are the three kiddos gathered around one of the smaller fountains. I tried going down one of the slides with McKenzie because she was a little scared, but it didn't work out so great. So we stuck with the fountains.

Fox and Sammy sharing the fun. After lunch, Julie and Andrea joined us with their kids and we played for a bit longer until to really started to get hot. Then we watched Josh and his mommy ride the carousel and then headed home to get out of the heat and down for much-needed naps.

Look, I'm even brave enough to post a picture of myself! All in all, it was a great day spent with our best friends!

More Friends

Today Sammy got to play with Joshua, another little friend he likes to play with often. Josh's dad is my brother-in-law's younger brother, if that makes any sense at all.

Josh turned two about a month ago, but he and Sam get along pretty well playing with blocks and trucks and balls. Here, they are trying to clear the blocks as fast as they can, hence the blur.

Here Josh is showing me the "W" block that has a picture of a watch on it, saying that Josh wanted a watch, too.

Sammy has begun a fun little practice of stuffing things down his shirt. It's funny when it's blocks or cars ... not so funny when it is strawberries or crackers!

And lastly, I had to show off my Smurff hand. I saw an idea in a magazine for some "goop" that you can make at home for kids to play with. I thought it was supposed to be like play dough, but turns out it wasn't a good substance to give to toddlers. The blue food coloring I used was a little potent or something, because I cannot get my hand back to its normal color, even after five washings! I just wonder what people will think when they see it at church tomorrow!

Rigby Lake

Yesterday Sammy and I went to the local lake with our friends, the Davis's. Fox is about to turn two, McKenzie is four, and I don't think Bec wants me to reveal her age, but she's the mommy! :) These were the only pictures I was able to take before my camera died, but they give a good representation of how it went.

You can't hang out at the beach without a few snacks! It was so cute, when we got to the lake, McKenzie asked her mommy why there were no waves like at the beaches in Australia (Bec is from there originally and they just recently went back for a visit)

Here are Fox and McKenzie with their mommy enjoying the cool water.


And my Sam-Sam giving us his classic quirky smile! He absolutely loved playing in the sand, wading out into the lake with Mommy, and throwing rocks into the water that Mommy would find for him! We had a great time and we were so glad our friends could join us!

Tender Mercies

Today Kaylie's rosebush bloomed. The soft but beautiful yellow blossoms remind me Kaylie's simple but beautiful spirit. Thank you again to Ben and Corinne for this wonderful gift that will bring beauty and comforting remembrance year after year.

Lately things have been....well, I don't know really, just off. You know when you're sick but you don't really realize the extent of it until you get better? It was kinda the same today. I've been "sick" all week, just not taking care of myself or really having motivation for anything, until today when an awesome friend decided to stop by and visit for a while. She helped me to realize just how "sick" I was and got me back on track; jumping back into living life again. I'm so grateful for these tender mercies the Lord sends to us when we really need them most, from flowers to friends.

Sammy's Latest

Sammy's latest trick is to go in my closet and pick out a pair of shoes he likes and he goes tromping all over the house in them. It's really funny because he usually ends up in a pair of my high heels!

What do you think? I think they make his legs look great! :)

My happy Sam Man showing off his teeth. He has all the front teeth and one molar on each side on top and bottom; now we just need the canines!

This is my proud little guy after coming in from moving the sprinklers (yeah, having a large lawn is fun ... until you have to water it with only two sprinklers that you have to move all over). Sprinklers + Little Boy = very happy and very wet little boy! :) Oh what I would do if I didn't have my little guy to keep me busy!

Selling Success

So this event went much better this time. I actually made money, which is great. I also was able to hand out a few business cards to people who were interested in having me design some cards for them. I also decided to use up the rest of the hair clips I had to sell along with my cards. I think the bows were more successful than the cards, but whatever works! Thanks to my great friends who came to see me, it was great to see friendly faces! Sammy had a great time and was amazingly good the entire time. He loved running around to our neighboring vendors and keeping them from getting lonely! :) All in all it was a good day and worth the work and effort!

Another Attempt

So tomorrow I am going to again attempt to sell my cards as a vendor. But I have a few new ideas for this time, so maybe it will be a bit more successful. It would probably also helped if the weather cooperated, but it has been gorgeous weather for the last two weeks, so hopefully no more rain showers! I also decided to put all my ribbon to use and made 130 (yes, I counted!) hair bows to sell along with my cards, so hopefully that will draw some more people in. I'm also trying another idea of having a box of "discounted" cards. I'm thinking they will be either $1 or $0.50 and these will be the cards that I didn't have enough stuff to make a multiple of 4. Wish me luck and if any of my wonderful, fantastic, awesome friends in the area want to stop by to say hi, we'd love to see you! ;) Have a great weekend!

Watch Giveaway

Make It & Love It is having another giveaway (man, they never stop!) but this one is so freakin' cute, I had to let you all know asap so you can enter, too! This sponsor has done a giveaway before, but for some reason she left and now is returning and doing another giveaway. She is giving away any watch face and band you want, for free! So go on over and enter, it couldn't hurt to try, right? And if you don't want it, enter and then give your free watch to me! ;)

Mommy's Little Helper

So this evening while I was on the phone with my dad, I noticed Sammy was laughing to himself in the kitchen. Thinking he was up to no good (because we all know that is what 18 month olds are good at) I went to check on him.

What I found was my sweet little boy "helping" Mommy out by putting the dirty potatoes in the sink to be washed.

Each time he got one in the sink, he would laugh hysterically and run to go get another one from the bag!

I love my sweet little guy!! This potato he managed to plunk into the loaf pans I had soaking :)

Fourth of July cont'd

We didn't take our camera to the next event, but we should have! We were invited over for a BBQ at a neighbor's house. While there enjoying some yummy jumbalaya and pulled pork, Sammy decided to try standing on the seat of a little car he was playing with (he does this on his horsey all the time) but unlike the horsey, this little car had nothing to hold it in place, so he went facefirst over the handle bars and ate the concrete pretty good. He had a bloody nose, scraped up his upper lip and cut the inside of it with his teeth. But, after three popsicles the bleeding stopped and Sammy was a much happier kid.

Right after the BBQ, we rushed over to Idaho Falls to secure us a good spot for the fireworks. Sammy had only taken a 1 hour nap, though, so he was extremely onerey!! Couple the lack of sleep with the lip and with having a runny nose and fever, you get one very very unhappy guy! He was so miserable! Daddy and I took turns taking Sammy for a walk in the stroller while the other played Rummikub with Ashlee and Nate until it was time for the fireworks.

This Ashlee and Nate's little guy, Ian. He is so adorable and just grows so much every time we see him! He was born about three weeks before Kaylie, I think. We had a great time with them playing games and eating all sorts of yummy treats!

A crazy moment for Mommy and Daddy. With the holiday, I couldn't get in the eye doctor, so I've had to wear my glasses for the last few days, grrr! Thankfully I go in tomorrow and get my beloved contacts again!

Ashlee and Ian chillin'

Sammy finally gave up the fight on the way home from the fireworks, which actually didn't take that long, thanks to Nate's excellent recommendation of where to park and where to sit. We were right across the river from where they set off the fireworks, so they were even more spectacular even though we got debris raining down on us. All in all, it was an enjoyable day despite a few mishaps and an unhappy, sick little guy. He woke up every half hour through the night and needed to be rocked back to sleep each time, so he and I stayed home from church and slept in. But, he is acting much happier today, so hopefully he is over whatever little bug he had!

Fourth of July

So in the morning, Robert took Sammy to work with him (just to turn the water on), allowing me to sleep in. Then, we got all the stuff together and we back out to the farm to do some shooting with Robert's new Mini 14 - he loves this gun! I'd gotten a laminated poster of beef cuts from an Enrichment activity that we put up on a board and we used each row of beef cuts as targets - it worked out great and we all had a great time!

Here you can barely see the target, but with the scope, it wasn't too bad.
Sammy thought the ear plugs felt wierd in his ears, but he was grateful for them when we began shooting!

You know you've had a long, fun day when you get this afterwards. (I know, he isn't in a booster seat, but it wasn't very far, so shhhh) And no, this was not the end of our day, but Sammy was still tuckered out!

Gotta Love S'mores!

Here we are enjoying our homemade firepit in the corner of our lot roasting marshmallows and making s'mores! I have to admit, I've become addicted since rediscovering them around Memorial Day

Sammy had a great time eating everything separately, but getting plenty of each.

He learned from the best! You can't tell he works outside all day everyday, can you? I love my hubby!