We Shall Be Mountaineers

Last weekend Tyler & I decided that we should do something outdoorsey.  We went on a hike to Secret Lake up Cottonwood Canyon.  Connor, as usual, did awesome. 

I love how easy this kid is.

 

   

I love that Tyler loves being a Daddy and loves doing daddy things

 like carrying his baby on his shoulders. It's SO cute!

 We saw 3 moose when we were there.  A mama and her twins.  

We stayed far away from them, that's why they look like ants. :)

I forgot how much I loved going on hikes. 

 Summer is the best. 

California Here We Come!

So a few weeks ago Connor and I went to California!  (I know you all know that) I thought that it was time to share some of the adventures that we had while we were there! He did so well in the car, I was so impressed by how good he was.

 

Connor & his Grandma Jensen

We went to the Huntington Beach Farmers Market with my family one night.  That's one of my favorite things to do when I'm in California.  They have live music and other entertainment and of course my favorite, lots of good food!

Connor with Papa

 We went to visit Grandma & Papa in Murrieta too!  Papa was holding Connor one morning and said, "let's go for a drive." Then he got up and walked away.  I thought . . . how come he didn't ask me to come . . . then Connor came cruisin' in the living room on Lightning McQueen.  I can see another Cars lover in our family. :)  

 Connor also got to take his very first bath in a big boy tub when he was at Grandma & Papa's.  He liked it so much that when we got home and I tried putting him in his infant tub he threw a fit. I guess he's just ready to be a big boy.

 

Connor met his California cousins.  I loved that the twins had such opposite reactions.  Owen loved "the baby" and loved to touch him and give him loves.  Jacob liked "the baby" a lot less.  When Mommy started to hold Connor, I'm pretty sure that Jacob started screaming. It was pretty funny. I love that in this photo Jacob is trying to get as far away from Connor as possible.

We went to Big Corona!  It was so fun.  The water was too cold for Connor, but it was nice and hot for us laying out on the sand! He was so cute in that sun hat!  He hated that thing though.

 

 

It was nice to get away for a little bit, but boy were we happy to go home!  We both missed Daddy so much. 

First Day of School

Okay, so I already posted pics on Facebook but Meagan chastised me for not putting them on here. ;) 

Cailyn & Landon both started school on Tuesday and had a great first week!  I love that my kids love school.  They both have great teachers and I'm excited for the school year.  Cailyn already had a fun lesson this week.  They learned all about SNAILS.  She had to bring a snail into school and they had snail races, weighed their snails, and used them to paint (by putting food coloring on paper and letting them wander around on it).  They also got to try escargot and I was so proud of Cailyn for trying it.  She said it tasted kinda like chicken and mushrooms and she loved it!  I found the whole snail unit quite disgusting but at least she enjoyed it. :)

So here are their pics from the first day.  I got a couple new photoshop actions and had a little fun with them.  :)  I only wish I'd gotten some better ones of Landon.  The sun was so bright in the afternoon and we were kinda running late so I didn't get great ones.  But I do love the way Cailyn's turned out.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAL!

I went to my first real soccer game ever! We saw Real Salt Lake play against a team from Panama the other night (Colby was totally jealous)! Can I just say I LOVE soccer! The game was awesome. We had seats a few rows back from the corner of the goal, which were awesome seats. We were so close to the action and all of Panama's fake injuries. Real smoked them though! Didn't give them a chance to score and won the game 2-0. Plus they made so many really close shots right where we were sitting which made it an intense game to watch.

Bowling with a Twist :)

So....I saw this cool idea on pinterest and really wanted to test it out and figured who better to test it with than Taylor :) SO MUCH FUN!!! It was completely dark other than the pins we tried (and mostly failed) to knock over. We filled the pins (Sobe bottles) with water and a glow stick and attempted to knock them over with a soccer ball. For some reason it was hard to throw the ball straight! We were totally legit though because I printed off an official score card with our sweet bowler's names on them :) You really need to try this, we laughed and were silly the whole time playing. BEST BOWLING EVER!!!

Six flags fiesta!

When I agreed to move to Denver, I told Wes's boss that it was only on the condition that he gave Wes a day off so that we could go do something fun in Austin. So Saturday we left Mckay with our friend and spent all day together at six flags fiesta! We had way too much fun and got super sunburned :). It was pretty sweet because you get free admission to the water park with admission to the amusement park, so we spent a few hours going on waterslides and such.  Wes has pretty much been dreaming about six flags his whole life, considering that lagoons roller coasters were like the biggest hes ever been on. He seriously was like a 10 year old kid and even got yelled at for running when the park first opened so we could be the first ones in line for superman lol. We completely wore ourselves out and had THE most fun day off ever :). I love that boy!

PS... We saw the hugest gas station ever on the way there. The picture doesn't do it justice but it was like 3 times bigger than the one in Primm! I guess things really are bigger in Texas :)

It Begins Again...

Remember that time I wrote a post about the house we were going to buy in Austin? Those were the good old days...oh wait, that was only two weeks ago haha.  So it's true, we are moving to Denver in less than 2 weeks. I cannot believe how much I have grown to love Austin in the short 5 months we have lived here, and I am so sad to leave it. Not to mention my beautiful house that I already had completely decorated and activities planned for in my head :). Oh yeah and there is that amazing ward we just moved into! There are just so many thing that we will miss in this great city, but most of all we are dreading winter! I was sooooo looking forward to laughing and pointing at you Utah dwellers when the snow came and basking in the sunlight, never to be pasty again! Haha, but alas we will be freezing right along with you.

But you know what? After I went through about 3 dozen emotions in one day...most of them being somewhere near the realm of paralyzed anger/fear... I am actually excited about a lot of things in Denver.  It seems like ages ago, but we did live there last summer and it is a nice city.  We now know the good areas to look for a house to rent, and we have lists of things we never got to do while we were there last time. It is sunny like 300 days of the year or something and for a city it is pretty freaking gorgeous. Although I would give anything to be able to buy our house here, the fact that we are no longer going to own a home for awhile makes it possible for us to completely pay off our student loans and finally be completely debt free (and of course Wes's pay raise wont hurt either :)). But most of all, we are sooooo excited that we will finally live close enough to our family again to be able to drive and visit so much more often :). That is truly the best part of Denver.  Now off to start the ridiculous two weeks of crazy packing, cleaning, and driving! Wish us luck!

Superhero Capes

Mom and Cailyn spent the day together yesterday and made some awesome and adorable super hero capes! 

This is Cailyn using the serger for the first time.  She is a quick learner!

These are the 4 logos she made out of felt for the capes.

This is the regular sewing machine.  She is a pro at this since she already learned how to make a pillow!

I'm so happy to have a granddaughter I can pass on my sewing skills to. :)  Sorry girls, your grandma was supposed to teach you. :)

Superheroes, unite!

Up, up and away!

"You don't raise heroes, you raise sons & daughters. If you treat them like sons & daughters, they'll turn out to be heroes, even if it's just in your own eyes."

Hat's

So I love my hat hook but it doesn't fit all my hats so I decided to improvise.....

Yes, I put nails in my closet to hang the rest of my hat collection on...so cool!!!

 

And now I finally have my own space to hang up my cool Christmas present...it is so convenient for my earrings and I don't loose them :)

Fun Times

So Taylor thought it would be funny to tease me the other day. He had some bumps around his eye that were bugging him and when I got home from work the other day he came over with this eye patch on. TOTALLY freaked me out! He told me some story about how it was this rash that spread into his eye and he had to wear the patch and take some crazy medication. I bought it! LAMO! He will fit into the family nicely! ;)                                                           



                                             
                                       Date night! Individual skillet pizzas (pepperoni and pineapple...mmmmm),          
                                                           fabulous cantaloupe, root beer, and 17 Again....fun night! 

Weekly Menu

So, I do not always plan out dinners for every day because sometimes Wes comes home late and just wants cereal or something, and a lot of times we just eat leftovers :). Therefore I have just been planning and shopping for 4 or 5 meals a week and making whatever the heck I feel like on whatever day :).

1- Tortellini with cream cheese tomato sauce, garlic bread
2- Wingers sticky fingers wraps
3- Marinated chicken, garlic mashed potatoes, grapes
4- BBQ chicken pizza, breadsticks
5- breakfast burritos
Sunday Breakfast- homemade bagels, honey cream cheese

I have been doing something special and awesome for breakfast every Sunday since we've been here and I love it. It is the only morning we get to spend together since Wes leaves for work at 630 every other day and its fun to try new things every week. Not to mention we have fruit juice for breakfast every other day. Have a fantastical breakfast ideas? :)

Our new house! :)

Yes we are under contract for a house! Woohoo! :) We are do stinkin excited! Hopefully we will close sometime in the middle of September, but in the meanwhile, here are some pictures from online for your viewing pleasure.

There is more HERE if you want to see them :)