Keepin' Busy

There are lots of ways to stay busy in the summer!

Meleah colored these pictures with a red pen (not a marker).  It took a VERY long time, but she was pretty happy with the results. (Even though Savanna got a hold of her pen for a minute and added a few red splotches on the side.)

  

Legos!

 Games!

This is Savanna's new "smile" -

 Playing with Build-A-Bears!

(in an extremely messy toy room)

 Dressing-Up!

 Not to mention all the shopping and cooking that is required to feed this many children ALL DAY LONG!

They've also been loving Play Doh and Water Wow (basically a glorified paint with water).  Still not desperate enouh to pull out the Moon Sand, though.  I hate that stuff! ;)

Lagoon 2013

We look forward to Randall's work party at Lagoon ALL YEAR, which is why I was pretty bummed when I threw up the morning of the event.  (NO, I'm not pregnant.)  I felt fine after I threw up, and figured it must have been the crappy hot dogs I ate for dinner the night before.  All the kids were fine, so we just continued on with our plans and headed for Lagoon.  We had lots of fun, but after dinner Randall started feeling nauseous.  He decided to go home with his parents, and I stayed at Lagoon with Jackie and Casey and the older kids.  I rode a few rides, and started to feel a bit queesy, but we HAD TO do our usual Tilt-a-Whirl and Scrambler before we went home.  Unfortunately, we got the spinniest Tilt-a-Whirl seat EVER.  (Why couldn't I ever get that one when I was 12 and WANTED to spin really fast?!) It seriously would NOT STOP TWIRLING!  I was literally praying for it to end, and FINALLY it did.  I was SO SICK.  Jackie took the kids on the Scrambler and we headed for home.  I spent the entire drive home HOPING that I could make it there before tossing my cookies, and FORTUNATELY I did.  Barely.  Randall and I spent the entire night taking turns hurling in the bathroom.  The good news is, none of the kids ever threw up.  Cameron and Meleah were also sick, but managed to hold it down (thank goodness). 

My girls' last ride on the boats because they'll be too tall next year.  (How is that possible?!)  Good thing they got the pink one! 

 Emma was such a good little baby all day!

We planned to get bounce-back tickets with my family the following Monday, and I admit I was a little less excited about it than I would normally be.  I just kept thinking about how terrible I felt the week before at Lagoon. Fortunately, we were just fine all day, and we had a fantastic time. 

 It was SO hot (over 100 degrees) so we spent a lot of time on this ride getting soaked -

 Even Lydia went with us and she HATES to get wet!

I didn't think to take a picture, but Meleah got stuck on this ride for about 20 minutes -

It was actually kinda funny because she ran to the elephant with the pink collar (which Lydia also wanted) and then it ended up getting stuck at the highest point.  The guy ran it a couple of times trying to fix it, then had everyone else get off and called for help.  They finally got it to lower about a millimeter a minute (and apparently they couldn't take the child out until it was COMPLETELY lowered), so it took quite a while.  Funny little memory. 

Side Note:  What the heck is Cameron doing?!  I'm not used to having a kid that has to be told REPEATEDLY to keep their hands and legs inside, stay seated, etc.!  Oy.

 These crazy boys rode the Sky Coaster at the end of the night. My other pics are just a white dot in the black sky, so I'm not gonna bother posting them. 

Favorite Ride

Carter - "The Go Carts!"
Lydia - "The train."
Meleah - "Bombora! Can we go on that first next year?!  My second favorite was the TIDAL WAVE."
Cameron - "The Octopus one with the sharks and dolphins." (Odysea)
Savanna- She was pretty happy on all the rides we put her on, but I'm going to say the Merry-Go-Round and the boats.

We had tons of fun (despite the stomach flu, and that dang Tilt-a-Whirl), and can't wait to go back again next year! 

Summer Fun Has Begun

This pic was actually from Easter weekend, but in Vegas that FEELS like summer -

Emma and I went to Vegas to attend my friend Holly's Dad's funeral, and Randall decided it would be fun to sleep out in the backyard with the kids while we were gone.

Apparently it was a little chilly that night...

The next weekend I stayed overnight in Salt Lake for youth conference, and he made a fire and s'mores with the kids.  What an over-achiever! ;)

Please do not look at how AWFUL our back yard looks!  I swear it's MUCH better now.  ;)  Gotta love Weed n' Feed!

Grandma Brown sewed all our pants with holes in the knees into shorts, and used the scraps to give the kids a little sewing lesson -

Our neighbors next door have a really affordable candy store, and the kids have been doing all kinds of little chores around the house to earn money so they can go buy candy. 

I thought the kids would get tired of holding Emma, but they still LOVE it. 

Randall's work gave us tickets to the Bees game, and I only got this one crappy cell-phone picture.  It was admittedly a little hectic with all the kids, but we still had fun.  Next time I think we'll make it a date night!

Liberty Park

Bre and I took our kids to Liberty Park and then Leatherby's for ice cream.  Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of the ice cream Sundae that I bought.  It was HUGE.  I split it up between ALL of my kids and we even had leftovers!

Brown Family Reunion

Lydia LOVES dogs.  Too bad she has a mean Mom that won't get her one!

 After the reunion we met up with our friends for
Taylorsville Dayzz

 

None of my kids were scared of the fireworks again this year.  Savanna actually kept reaching up to try and touch them!

Even Emma liked to watch.

 West Jordan Park

 

 

 

 The kids LOVED it even though it was over 100 degrees that day.  Luckily Grandpa and Grandma Brown brought a cooler full of water to keep us all hydrated!

 

 

Jensen Family Reunion

 It's SO CRAZY to watch my kids climbing all over play equipment that I climbed on as a kid. I wish I had a picture of me on this bear from 25 years (YIKES!) ago.  I'm  guessing it would have looked a lot like this -

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanksgiving Point Children's Gardens 

Jax, Jenni, and I took our kids to Thanksgiving Point at the beginning of the summer.  There are SO MANY things for the kids to do there!  LOVED it!

 Cameron was a little bit cold...

We also went swimming in Jax and Casey's neighborhood pool, (too busy trying to keep my kids' heads above water to take pictures) and to Jump On It to celebrate Logan's Birthday (forgot my camera, and my phone DOES NOT do well with motion shots).  We've been doing all the usual summer stuff - going to the park, slip n' slide-ing, running through sprinklers, and eating LOTS of popcicles.  We've had TONS of fun so far, and even more coming up.  My only complaint is that Summer is flying by WAY TOO FAST! (That's right, I'm not even going to complain about the extremely high, record-setting temperatures.  BRING IT ON!)