Our Hole

We are going to be building a home this year, and this is the view that we are going to have looking out on our front porch! I love how beautiful the mountains are, and we really do have a great view.
Alexis and Elizabeth have been asking every day when they could go and have their picture taken in the hole.

This is part of the garage footings and then part of the basement.
I tried to get a picture of the whole thing but I couldn't really get a great shot of it. (I am taking these pictures for you Annette... So you can see the start of our house :)
I can not wait to see things move along!!!

July fourth and more

We have had a really crazy start to July. I did all my pictures in the wrong order so we are going from newest to oldest.... (and there is a lot of pictures)
We went to my parents for the fourth of July this year (we do almost every year) and we had a great time. I had my ten year class reunion and it was so great to see everyone, and see the way everyone has grown up and had a family.
We also went to the Menan fair/parade. It was a very nice day, and we had a lot of fun.
The kids all got a lot of yummy candy.
It is always fun to go to the Menan park on the fourth because I run into a lot of people that I grew up with. And all the yummy food, snow cones, and cute booths to look at. Chris had a booth up for Heidi's fudge this year and almost sold out of everything... (I ate as much as I could also)
Alexis was sad because she didn't have much candy at this point, and was hot... but a few floats went by and sprayed her with water, and she was able to pick up a lot more candy.



I can not believe how many people make it to the parade....

All the kids eating their second snow cone for the day...
Summer, Annette, and Sara
Karsten. He was able to come and stay with me for about a week and go to a football camp. He is going to start playing football this year and needed to know how to the play the game! He is such a great kid, and was so much fun to have with me. He is so great with kids, and helping out in whatever you ask him to do. If I ever get a boy I hope they are just like him.
Grandpa and Brytlee

My girls all ran in the races at the park. Brytlee took first, and Elizabeth took first also. Alexis was so close to first but ended up getting second place. She was really sad because the other girls both got 50 cents and she didn't.
Ryan was really excited to find out that he has three fast girls!

I was able to watch Tessa for a half a hour while I was home. She is such a cute girl!!!! Me and the girls had a lot of fun playing with her.



She is so cute!
Alexis was pushing her on the swing and she was just giggling so cute.
We also went to a fun little park with Annette and her kids.
Brytlee was so fun and would have played all day but all the other kids were so HOT and thirsty, and hungry that they couldn't play at all.
This was a funny little toy. You would sit in it and it would spin you around. I sat in it and it made me sick. The girls could do this all day long....This is little Cache Jagielski (Annettes youngest) He is so cute

Lizzy is very dizzy
We went swimming and had a lot of fun! There was a lot of slides to go on, and the girls loved it. There was one slide that went straight down and then under the ground and then did a fast turn and then was done. I didn't even want to go down it because I have had a few bad experiences on slides but Summer made me go!!!! It wasn't bad but once was enough. My girls loved it and went on it a bunch more times.
Summer was able to come and spend four days with me also. We had a lot of fun together and stayed very busy. I could have her stay forever and just hang out together. I had a lot of fun with her!
Our friends the Marlows
Brytlee had the arm floaters on and loved it. She has never wanted to have you let go of her in the water but once she figured them out she was all over the place until she bite a hole in one of the arms.


I feel like I have been so busy and have way more to do than I can keep up with. We are also starting our new home tomorrow. (we are digging the hole)!!!! I am so excited!!!
It was a huge mess getting our permits and Ryan did all that he could and was able to get them to give them to us. (I guess on our land there is a invisible road that could some day be built and so they said it would be illegal for us to build on it...)
Ryan had to go to a meeting and it took about three hours to decide if we could build or not, and it all came down to a vote. It was two to three in our favor.
I have also been getting things ready in our house... packing up things that we don't really use so it is easier to show when people come, and cleaning all our carpets, and all that fun stuff.

softball

We had a softball tournament that we entered into a couple weekends ago. We had all the Harris family in it, (well, all but one, and no kids played)
Alexis made the front page of the paper getting her face painted. She was so cute when she saw that she was on the front page... she said, "I'm like famous now" Then kept asking why they wanted to take a picture of her.

They got this picture of me at catcher in the paper. I think over all we took fourth place in the tournament. We did well on a few games, and then really sucked on our last game that we lost. I don't know what was wrong with us.
I also had a both set up for the Idaho days. I sold some jewelry, Heritage Makers and some watches that I have been making. It was a lot of fun, and while I was away playing softball my niece Summer was there to watch everything and sell everything. She is getting so old it is sad....

Girls Camp

I am in the young Women's in our ward and I love it! I was able to go to girls camp for a night this year and I had so much fun. It really made me miss going to girls camp and being in the young woman's myself, but I loved watching the girls and hanging out with them.
We all had a lot of yummy food, and treats, and sat around the fire making smores, and roasting star burst. (very good if you have not tried it you should) We played games and had a testimony meeting. Then when it was time for bead all the girls started to plan all the pranks that they wanted to pull. One girl brought up saran wrap for the toilets and toilet paper and other goodies to get the other tent and the leaders. (but that doesn't include me, I was with them) so on the way back to the tents a girl starts walking and I hear her say, "oh look, a squirrel". So I look at it, and notice it is black and white..... so I yell, "skunk"!!! All the girls were really freaked out and started to scream and run. It was really funny.
About a hour later, the girls decided they wanted to make prank phone calls.... (there was a small cabin there and it had a phone in it) so we do that and I couldn't stop laughing and was really loud, when all of a sudden a girl flashed her flash light to the ground about 10 feet from us, and there was the skunk!!!! I jumped up so fast and ran that I accidental knocked another girl off of the porch we were sitting on, and I didn't realize how high up we were so I did a front flip off of the porch and then booked it to the tent. (leaving all the girls in the dust to get sprayed by the skunk)!!!(#1 leader)! So then we all got into the tent, and someone was outside scratching the tent and making noises, and putting a stick under the tent and making the sleeping bags move.... and all the girls were scared to death! It was very funny! So the girls that wanted to prank everyone ended up getting pranked all night, and never even did any of the pranks that they wanted to because they were to scared to leave the tent.

This is a picture of a couple of girls and one of the men that come up to help, and me on the end doing the splits. I still can not believe he can do the splits so well... and he just jumps and falls into them... ouch!

Rain, Rain, go away!

I feel like the rain is never going to go away! I am getting so sick of seeing the grey clouds and not being able to send the girls outside because it is soooooo wet!
We went fishing the other night and it was not warm at all, and had been doing light showers all day, but Ryan wanted to take the girls anyway. Alexis caught the very first fish and got it all by herself. It was a rainbow and a big enough fish that we could eat it. Elizabeth caught the smallest fish I have ever saw.... It was just a little bigger than a minnow. But we kept it and put it in Ryan's dad's pond.
Brytlee caught a fish like Lizzy's but it was two times bigger. (It also went into the pond)
After all the girls got a fish it started to blow, and rain harder, and so we packed up everything and left. We were only there for about a half an hour.
We went to Ryan's parents house and Alexis wanted to eat her fish right away, so Ryan cooked it up for her and she loved it. Elizabeth is our picky eater and the only thing that I could say to get her to try a bite was "It is a rainbow fish! That means it tastes like a rainbow" "Don't you want to know what a Rainbow taste like"? After she tried it, she would tell me what color of the rainbow it tasted like. She ate more than I thought she would and she really liked it.
Brytlee is a great eater, the only thing I have to do to get her to take a bite is pretend that she is a kitty, or a puppy, and she will eat anything that I give her. I think that it is really funny and I think that is why she likes to do it.
After we were done with the fish Alexis started to look at the body of the fish. (Ryan cooked it with it's head still on) And she grabbed the head and broke it off. Then she played with the eye ball and it came out. (I know this is my girl)! So then she came up to me and said, "mom, look at it's eye ball". Ryan said, "Hey, I will give you five bucks if you eat it". So without really even thinking about it she put it in her mouth, tasted it, and then bite down on it. She spit it out because it was as hard as a rock. (I always thought they would be gushy and pop in your mouth). She is pretty brave, and I was pretty impressed that she would try it.

Swimming

We went to a great little swimming resort last night that is a natural hot pot. It was about 50 degree's when we got there and raining, and everything is outdoors. I thought Ryan was crazy when he came home from work and said lets go swimming.... (as the rain is poring down, and lightning and thunder crashing) But ended up going, and I am so glad we did!
Ryan's dad and sister Hailey with her two boy's and we all had a great time. The girls all loved the water slide, and would go up the stairs as fast as they could and down the slide by themselves, and then back up the stairs. We all went at first, but after hauling Brytlee (who has to weigh close to 30 lbs) up all the stairs my legs were tired, and I was almost getting motion sickness from the twisty slide going round and round. So I let Ryan and his dad do all the work with the kids and sat in the hot pool. Then a little later Ryan came over so it was just his dad with three kids going up and down the slide. I had to think that there was something wrong with me. He is the grandpa and he was still going just as fast as the kids and I was being a lazy bum sitting in the hot pool..... but he is in great shape. He has been running in the 5k runs, and winning every time in his age group. I think he said he gets about 3.2 miles in 28 minutes? It could be less? He has challenged all of us to get into shape also, and run in the next one with him and try to beat him.... I am going to try, but I don't know how I will do yet?
Anyway, back to the swimming.... We had a great time, and the girls played so hard. It stopped raining and turned out to be a beautiful night. We stayed until 9:00, and I bet the girls went down the slide more than 50 times. Alexis and Brytlee took turns jumping off of the diving board, and Elizabeth really wanted to do it but couldn't get up the courage. Which is fine... two kids that are not scared of anything is plenty.
The best part about having the kids swim, and play so hard is how great they sleep! They all went to bed right after we got home, and then slept in till after 10:00!!!! I missed out on working out but I got a lot of cleaning done.

Made my day!

Brytlee woke up from her nap and said she needed to go potty! So I put her on, and she went number 2 for the very first time on the toilet!!!! This really made my day!

Life?

I think that I have something wrong with me? I have no clue what to do with myself, and have been so stressed out, and have not been enjoying my kids like I want to at all...... Alexis is going through a stage that is going to kill me if it does not end soon! She has such a attitude, and we have been fighting so much. She doesn't want to help me do anything, she has not been very nice to her sisters, and every day she tells me how boring everything is, and then she will cry about just about everything... I don't know if it is from being spoiled from her birthday, or if it is because she is out of school? (just now she came in and gave me a hug and told me she loves me... so I am going to stop venting right now because she is still my little girl, and I love her)
So besides going through the Drama with Alexis, we are potty training Brytlee, so I have to remind myself every thirty minutes to ask her if she needs to go potty, and make sure she is dry, and for some reason, she is having a very hard time figuring out the pooh part.
We are also going through the process of selling our house, and I am stressed out about showing our house, and trying to keep it clean all the time ( which is not easy with my little tornado's). (so it really has not happened yet, but I still try) We have had a lot of people look at it, and couple of people that want to make us an offer, but we have not accepted any thing yet.
We also are dealing with the City, and not having a permit yet for our house that I was hoping to have it started in May so that we could work on it all summer.... but of course the person that we need to help us is never in his office and only works one half day a week, and even on the day that he is suppose to be in his office... HE'S NOT!
So that is what is going on in my life, and there is a lot of good things that have been going on, but right now I just need to vent, and get it off my chest. So the next time I post I hope that I am in a happy mood again.

Alexis turns 7

Alexis is a seven year old now. She has been counting down the day's until she had her birthday party for a very long time. And I think that she had two very nice parties and had lots of her friends and family come and play with her.

We started our first party with just her girl friends from school and our ward, they came over at 10:00 and they all stayed until 1:00.



Alexis had some music on and was entertaining the girls with some of her dance moves.... I got most of it on video tape and it was pretty cute! A bunch of the girls kept saying, "how did you learn to dance so good". I had to bite my lip a little because it was mostly just crazy dance moves that we do all the time.....
Brytlee loved the party. She played so hard, and kept up with most of the bigger girls. She could climb up the big water slide and go down all by herself. She also loved the slip and slide.
After Alexis's friend party, we also did our family party at 4:30 and it went until around 9:00. We had a lot of fun watching all the kids play on all the water toy's while most of us stayed dry and just talked and had dinner.
I wasn't going to make a cake until her real birthday which was Sunday, but at the last minute I decided I had better. So this is what I came up with for her cake.... It is crown if you can't tell....


Denton and I got into a water fight, and I have to say that he is a lot faster than I thought he would be.... I still soaked him and if you were to say who was the winner.... it would be ME.
then after he got some dry clothes on all the kids wanted to have some more water fights so he joined in with that also. The kids all loved it and I think that grandpa did to.

Alexis loves animals! Hailey found a toad in her garden and sent it to our house for my girls. They played with it for two days until it started to slow down a little so we told them they had better let it go before it died..... Elizabeth was really sad that they had to let it go and cried but I really didn't want to see it suffer.....


Now that things have slowed down a little Alexis has been acting just a little spoiled... I am really not liking the attitude that she has going on, and hope that it won't last very long. I don't know if it from getting so spoiled from birthdays or what, but girls can be such drama queens!