A month late..... but Alli turned THREE!!!

How did my sweet little wrinkly bald baby turn into......

A fiery red head with attitude to spare?

I can 't believe Alli is three already. Time has flown by. She is certainly her own person now. She likes to do everything, "By my own," and she is a huge helper around the house. Her favorite thing to help out with is laundry. She loves folding the towels, actually she just rolls them into big sausages, but she's trying and that's what counts. She is a very determined little girl and I love that about her. Well, most of the time I do. I think as she grows older this little girl could do anything she puts her mind to. Here are some random up to date Alli facts....

Alli...

- loves school and has lots of friends, but her favorite person there is Bella.

- is looking forward to starting ice skating.

- still loves Mickey Mouse.

-has been fighting ear infections and strep the first 5 months of the year. Oh and she has strep again... :(

-loves her puppy, Abigail.

-likes sorting objects and hums while she does it.

-will often say, "I told you five minutes ago," when she is angry that someone did not do what she wanted them to.

-loves boats.

-takes her Pooh Bear and Pooh Blanket to school everyday.

-potty trained pretty much on her own.

-loved her binky, but we have been binky free for awhile now.

-is very concerned with ownership. She gets upset if people don't have items that belong to them.

-wants to be like her big sister in every way.

On her birthday we went to dinner at the Spaghetti Factory.

Then Saturday afternoon we had a BBQ at our house. The kids played on the tramp and went down Alli's new water slide. She loves it! The theme again was Mickey and Minnie because she loves them sooo much! My mom did an amazing job with the cakes!!!!

July...or at least part of it...

This is my attempt at catching up. We have been so busy lately, but we've been having fun in the process. Here are some photos from the first part of July.

We spent a weekend out on Mike and Robin's boat. It was great to sleep out in the middle of the lake, minus the brine flies. Those things are nasty! I love watching sunsets out there though. That's one thing I miss about working at Kennecott, the sunsets.

We had a great 4th of July. We all climbed up the ladder to watch the fireworks from Mike's roof. I even practiced some of my skills from fire class as I carried Alli up the ladder. It was cool to see all the fireworks going off that are no longer illegal here.

I have Mondays off now so I usually have Rylee and Logan with me. We went to Wheeler Farm and were chased by geese. I loved watching Alli feed them. It was not a gentle toss of food in their direction, some of them may have head injuries from their feeding time with her. We also went to a school and the kids had a blast on the playground.

I'm still liking my new job and I am learning a lot of new medical lingo that I'm sure will help me in the future. Well, if I ever finish school it will.

Paige and Rylee went on a week long Girl Scout camp to Camp Cloud Rim. They had fun making crafts, going on hikes, and playing in the lake. It was crazy to see how much snow was still up there. I'm glad they had a great time, but I was so ready for her to come home!

Miss Alli also celebrated her third birthday. I will post pictures of that soon, I hope. I can't believe she is three. She sure has the attitude of a three year old. The other day she wanted me to go up to her room. When I told her I couldn't go up right then she yelled down, "Don't you tell me no!" Ah kids, gotta love them....

A Busy Four Day Weekend

We had a four day weekend and kept ourselves very busy!

Thursday was our Anniversary and Mike and I celebrated by going out to dinner at Log Haven. We have been there before, but the food was amazing this time! Thank you honey, I love ya!

Friday Robin and I took the kids to the zoo while the guys were working on the boat. Alli loved the animals. Can you tell?

Then after the zoo we headed to Paige's competition. She did awesome! First and second place. She is improving so much, it amazes me!

Saturday morning we finished the competition and then headed to the boat for an overnight stay. All the kids headed to Grandma Kathy and Grandpa Bill's house. The weather was great on Saturday and it was nice to kick back and relax. We headed in a little early because there was a storm brewing.

After we finished our BBQ at the dock the rain started pouring and poured all night. Good thing we had the boat to find shelter in. We just hung out, played games, and watched movies. It was a Birthday (my brother's) and Father's Day outing.

Sunday morning we braved the rain and picked up the kids. Then we headed up to Grandpa Old Guy's house for a great Father's Day dinner.

Sail Fest 2011

We went to Sail Fest this year out at the marina. The boat is kind of out of commission right now, but we slept out there at the dock and had a great time. Saturday they had breakfast for us and then they had card board box races. They were hilarious! When I first heard about it I pictured people hooking sails to shoe boxes and seeing if they would go. I didn't realize that people would actually be in the boats. After that they had a carnival for the kids. At night we had a BBQ, steak always seems better on the boat. The kids also had fun catching brine shrimp.

Paige's Birthday Celebration

Paige had a great Birthday this year. We had a BBQ and although the weather wasn't the best we still had fun. We had to move our party indoors and I was surprised that we were able to pull it off with about 30 people in our house.
Paige got a ton of cool presents and was happy she finally has a pillow pet. In fact, she has two now. Her big present this year is scuba lessons and now we are just waiting for Uncle Mike to get better so she can start.


My mom made this island cake for Paigey. She loved it!!

My Uncle Jack and Aunt Chris were in town and I'm so happy they were able to celebrate with us. It was nice to see them. I was able to see my Aunt last year, but I think it had been about 20 years since I had seen my Uncle.

Paige is TEN!!

So it's hard to believe that my baby is TEN!! I have to be honest, it scares me just a tad. She is such a sweet girl, but is also very strong. We've had some great Birthday celebrations although we had to change our plans quite a bit due to the weather. I will post pics of our celebrations when I get them all.

Random things about Paige:

-She is still an awesome skater and has learned many new jumps this year. They look great, but honestly I can't tell them apart.

-She is so smart and a great student. Although she has some days that she says she hates school.

-She is getting ready to take Scuba lessons. I had a proud moment on Sunday when we took her to the pool. She was so comfortable. I hope that she loves diving as much as Mike and I do.

-We have a new addition to the family. A cute little hamster. Paige keeps changing her name so I'll keep you posted.

-Paige is an amazing big sister. Alli loves her so much and wants to be just like her Gigi.

-Glee is her favorite TV show and probably her favorite Wii game too.

-She loves all types of animals, especially horses.

-She is always catching some kind of bug or creature and likes to keep it for awhile to study it.

Happy Birthday sweet Paige! We love you so much! You are growing into an amazing young lady!

When it rains, it pours....

So this last week or so has been a little crazy at times. It started off with a 6am wake up call from my mom on the 6th. My dad was taken by ambulance to the hospital. He was admitted into the ICU, but luckily recovered quickly and was discharged on Sunday the 8th. I was really impressed with the doctors and nurses. They were great!
On that Sunday we decided to help my parents with some yard work. This led to Mike having a strained ankle and left me with a bruise and a goose egg on my head. We were removing a dead branch from one of their trees and the branch that Mike was holding onto broke. As he came crashing to the ground I caught the tree branch with my forehead. Don't ask.... Oh, and this was also the weekend of my birthday and mothers day. Luckily my dad was discharged in time and we had a makeshift get together with dinner.
Monday my grandma had surgery and I think the verdict is still out on whether it worked or not. However, she's doing well.
Then today I found out that someone has decided that our bank account is a community account and now our account is short a few ATM withdraws. All I can say is that I would love to meet the thief personally and tell them what I think of them. While I was on the phone dealing with the bank our sweet little artist, Alli, decided that the suede on the kitchen chair needed a little color. Permanent marker of course!! I think I was dangling at the end of my rope today!
On a happier note I got yet another new job. Just as I was getting used to my new hours they will change yet again. This new shift will be early in the morning. It will be nice to be home when Paige is off school and it will help with running the girls everywhere in the evenings. This means daddy will be in charge of getting the kids off to school, but he will have a meal ready for him when he gets home. Well, that's the plan anyways... :)