One Busy Summer

This has been one very busy Summer for us. Between keeping the kids entertained, millions of illnesses (I may have exaggerated that one), and working on our yard.... we haven't had time to breathe. I thought that I would share some of the major highlights so far...

First, we finally moved into our new home. YAY! We have been lucky enough to finally have some good neighbors. Not to mention that we now live only around the corner from my Mom and Dad. The kids have really enjoyed playing with the neighbor kids, and walking up to Grandma and Grandpa's house. The yard is finally completed (at least for now..... a yard is always a work in progress). Here's an updated pic...

I am simply amazed by how quickly Michael has managed to get it done. He has put in a fence, built a shed, put in a sprinkler system, curbing, flower beds, and grass in less than two months. I will have to post pictures of our backyard later. He's even planted a couple of trees for us to enjoy. He has done a wonderful job, and our kids are loving it!

Mikey enjoyed a session of swimming lessons for the first time. He had a lot of fun, and learned how to maneuver around the water pretty well. One of his favorite parts was "jumping" off the diving board into the arms of his teacher. This pretty much involved me throwing him into the water because he would chicken out every time. He still doesn't care to put his head underwater, but that will come in time.

Jovie finally made the move to a big-girl bed. It was surprisingly easy. There was only one night of major tantrum, and she goes right to sleep in it now. Of course she had to bring her entire crew with her. Notice all of the "chicken bears" that she has lined up beside her, and also the pile of My Little Ponies that are tucked into the bottom. She has to have all 18 of them in bed with her before she will even consider going to sleep. Trust me when I say that she knows exactly where each and every one of those little suckers is, so there's no tricking her.

We took the kids down to Thanksgiving Point to visit the Dinosaur Museum. It was a blast, and the kids had a great time! While we were there we decided to watch a 3D movie. Here are some pics of the kids with their "birth control" glasses on.

The 4th of July was a fun day for us. The kids had been sick the entire week previous, so we weren't sure if we'd be able to do anything. We kept it pretty low-key. We took the kids to the Clearfield Parade in the morning. Jovie was really nervous because of all of the sirens, so she took a seat on Daddy's shoulders. Once the ponies showed up she was fine, and was diving for candy with all of the other kids.Later that day, Michael set up the blow-up waterslide for Mikey and the neighbor boy, Edward. They played on that for hours, and had a great time. Jovie went down a few times, but she got frustrated easily because she couldn't get her little legs up the climbing wall.

Instead, she enjoyed an ice cream cone. Which you can see she really got into...

Michael treated us to a "fried" Turkey that he made with his brand new Big Easy "oil-less Turkey fryer" . I must admit that I was VERY skeptical of it since you can't really fry something without oil right?!? However, it was very tasty and very crispy. Kudos to Mike!