Friday, August 29, 2008

So I got a little bored with my hair and decided to try something VERY new for me. Its hard to see in the picture with the lighting, but I'll try to post better pictures when I have them. What do you think? Do I look good as a redhead?


Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Cousins

Needless to say - Garrett and Evan have a great time together! These pictures are from last Friday night when Garrett helped me babysit Evan while their parents and Riley went to a ward party. As you can see Garrett is a good little babysitter!






Potty Training



Wahoo! 3 successes and only 1 accident! He is sooooo proud of himself. Plus, he is the happiest, most hyper kid ever since he gets to drink all the “spicy juice” he wants. (aka root beer).


Oh, and he is becoming quite the artist.  Drives Parker crazy - he is quite abstract in his painting choices - and loves to mix his own colors.  Which apparently drives Parker insane (and probably his Aunt Anne who doesn't like anything to TOUCH or MIX!)

Friday, August 15, 2008

Ready or Not...

So, the boys were supposed to be taking a nap this afternoon.  There was too much laughing and jumping going on to even come close to "resting", but they weren't fighting and no one was crying, so I just left it alone.  After about 20 minutes of this, I decided to see what was going on.  Sure enough, happiness=trouble.  They were using the floor fan to "launch" their cars into the air like rocket ships.  Luckily, the cars (and fingers) were too big to fit through the slats to properly be launched, and they were perfectly happy with the air helping lift off, but I knew that it could get dangerous quickly.  Surprisingly, there were no fights when I took the fan away, and they continued to play.  I just peeked back in, and they were playing hide and seek, waldo style with the cars.  One car would count while the other car was being hidden amongst the very large pile of cars.  Here's Ryan's version... "2..3..5..9...8..9... here I come..."  


Well, the too good to be true afternoon has now ended in a huge pile of dumped out toys and a fight over something.  Both are crying, and I am hiding out here on the computer.  At least we had a small moment of sibling fun that didn't involve some sort of trouble!

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Anniversary #33 - Continued

On Tuesday, August 5th, we did something most people travel from far away parts of the world and plan for for decades to go see. We have lived in Arizona for 24 years (only 3 hours away) and finally made the journey to see the Grand Canyon. Why did we wait so long? It really is an awe inspiring sight. I guess we thought it was too far away to just look at a big hole in the ground or that it would be too hot in the summer when it was more convenient to go. We were wrong on both accounts. The weather was beautiful and the sight was gorgeous and there was really a lot to see and do. We went on a Ranger tour to learn about the geography of the canyon and while listening to the ranger, we were lucky to see several California Condors soaring overhead - seemingly close enough to reach out and touch. The incredible thing about that was that we heard numerous people in the park - Rangers included saying how rare an experience that was. Even the ranger talks about the Condors rarely have sightings let alone an hours worth of several soaring birds. There are only about 300 living in the world and we saw 3-5 of them during our visit. The condors are huge birds. They have a wing span of about 9 feet.

Happy Anniversary #33

Wow - 33 years - some might say we must be getting old. I say we are just getting better! Dad and I had a great time on our last minute get away to Sedona. In spite of the fact that out hotel didn't really turn out to be the "romantic" getaway that I had planned. I expected the romantic french provincial style of L'Auberge http://www.lauberge.com/ and we ended up with the tacky southwest style of Los Abrigados http://www.losabrigados.com/ . Oh well - it's all about who you are with - right!?

We didn't spend much time at the hotel so it really didn't matter. On Monday we drove to Meteor Crater. Basically a big hole in the ground. It was actually quite interesting to hear about how the hole was made. It is actually large enough to fit 20 football fields on the bottom and seat over 2 million people around the arena. It is 550 feet deep. The meteor was the size of 1/2 a football field and hit at ground at a speed equivalent to an airplane flying from New York to Los Angeles in about 2 minutes. (Or so they say - I don't think anyone was around to actually record any of this information!)

We had a nice guided tour of the rim and then drove to Winslow, Arizona (20 miles away) so we could say we'd been there and took pictures -as the song says - "standing on the corner in Winslow Arizona with a good friend of mine."

Of, by the way - the green thing above is the Geiko gecko in the flesh! It greeted us as we started the tour of the crater.

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!  Hope you are enjoying your RELAXING weekend away in Sedona or wherever you ended up going since there was NOTHING to do in Sedona but relax and shop!  :)  We love you.  Thanks for the great example you have been to all of us!

Sunday, August 3, 2008

This weekend, I was all set and excited to join a large group of random people from the area on an "All Out Camp Out" at Rohobeth Beach, DE. There was going to be smores, Rock Band, socializing, and then to top it off - slip'n'slide into the ocean! Unfortunately, my body decided to remind me that it has more control over my life than I do. Thursday and Friday I ended up having some pretty strange side effects from my new medication - everything from minor anxiety and depression to blurred vision, dizziness and rapid, pounding heartbeats. I figured it wasn't a very good idea to venture out on a camping/beach trip in that condition.

Luckily, I have a fantastic roommate who decided to spend the weekend with me instead of going camping. I felt much better on Saturday so we decided to be adventurous. We headed out to Eastern Market to eat a fabulous breakfast and check out the flea market/street vendors. We both spent more money than we had planned but got some great stuff! Later, Amanda and Ben joined us at the pool and then a big group of "non-campers" attended a rodeo out in Loudon County. It definitely wasn't a western rodeo, but it was entertaining nonetheless. Although it wasn't even close to what I had planned for the weekend, it ended up being a great weekend!