Training Wheels NO MORE

Yesterday, our neighbor Matt was teaching his little girl Carlee to ride her bike without training wheels, they asked if Kyle wanted to try riding her bike, and what do you know!! He was off and riding like an old pro within minutes. Then he insisted we take his training wheels off his bike. I was sad at first because of course Justin was working and was missing out on another milestone in Kyle's life, but luckily he was near by and was able to stay for a while. It was the perfect ending to our day. Kyle was proud of himself, and I was glad that Justin was there!

Good Job Carlee and Kyle

Our wonderful neighbor Matt teaching Kyle... Thanks Matt

Pioneer Day!

What a great day! We of course started it out with a parade, which was wonderful because finally after 4 years we got a good spot and sat in the shade the whole time!

Justin and Sydney eating doughnuts waiting for the parade to start

Kyle and Porter goofing off - what else is new!


Checkin' out the parade - Look Mom!

The kids got a kick out of this clown fire truck, it bounced and made crazy noises. Kyle found the thing hillarious.

Campin' in the outback

Tuesday night we camped out in our back yard. We roasted marshmallows on the grill, made hand shadows on the door of the tent, and I spoted the first star. We didn't get much sleep, but had a ton of fun... this one we'll be making a tradition!!

Girls just wanna have fun

I was clearing pics off my camera and I found these. Sydney was supposed to be taking a nap, I went in her room and two of our neighbor girls were in her bed jumping. They had a blast!

Cedar City makes headlines

So our flood seems to be as famous as Noah's, the only difference is he had an Ark. We made Fox 13 news, the Cedar City news paper, and the spectrum. Everyone is talking about it on KSL and other web sites. So many people are making outlandish statements, and outrageous remarks... Who knew there were so many stupid people in this world. One person was critizing the mayor for not getting school buses to bus us out!!

Here is a link to check out, it was pretty unreal - these pics are of the water making its way towards us. For any of you who know where we live the water came from the Middle School and then under the freeway and right into the "lake"!
http://www.ksl.com/index.php?sid=381600&nid=460&pid=3
http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=460&sid=3816001&pid=4
http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=460&sid=3816001&pid=5
http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=460&sid=3816001&pid=7

Home improvement made easy

Nothing is better than having a project, and having your friends do it for you... My neighbor Johanna has this darling faux treatment in her entry way. I decided to try it in my entry, and Johanna was kind enough to show me how. However, she was so good at it that she ended updoing most of the work, with the exception of shenette! They whipped it out so quickly and it was a blast... thanks girls - I love my entry way!!

Where's Sydney

This is what happens when I put Justin in charge of getting Sydney ready for Church.
PLAY PLAY PLAY

The rains came down, and the floods came up...

Around two this aftertoon, the rains began... The flooding came so quickly it was amazing! Luckily our house sits further up the street and one street over. These pics are taken out side of our friends house. They had one crazy day! This pic was taken towards the end, finally the city sent a back hoe and that was
the saving grace, we were waiting for.

The white car you see in the back ground was rescued only after the water reached its windshield. Justin said the guys were pushing it back and forth, because -oh ya- it was FLOATING! Finally some guy with a big truck pulled it out.
Keri's house, before it got really deep
I wish I had pics of the floods during the height of it, but we were all to busy working, Believe me it was unreal!

Kyle says so...

Justin: "who raised you?"
Kyle: "Jesus."

nice eh!

Cup of Pee

So I have a funny story... We signed Kyle up for Head Start, consequently they require a full physical, dental exam, and what not. Justin took kyle to the doctor for his exam and they asked him to pee in the cup. Well of course he couldn't pee on command (that only happens when we go places where they don't have bathrooms or when we have to walk 2 miles to get the potty.) So they told him that he could pee at home and then we would bring the sample in as soon as we got it. Well, that night Justin put the cup on the toilet and told that when he woke up he was to pee in it. So the next morning Justin asked Kyle if he had done as he was told. Kyle said yes, and we checked... he did pee in it, but then dumped it out right in the potty. So later that day, kyle came running into the house needing to pee. I stayed back watching to see what he would do. It was hillarious, he had waited so long to go that he was dancing in circles and could hardly get his pants down, as he was chanting "Pee in the Cup, Pee in the Cup." So I helped him out and he went in the cup, I put the lid on and left it on the counter so I could get ready to run down to the doctors. I went back to get the cup and he had stuffed toilet paper in it! Silly kid!! So finally the next day after he went I had to run it immediately so he couldn't sabatoge the cup again!
If you the think about though it makes sense... Pee belongs in the potty, and toilet paper goes along with pee... You can totally see his confusion.
Update: Today Kyle ran for the potty, and was screaming for the cup. We told him he didn't have to worry about it anymore, and you should have the relief on his face!

The grass isn't greener on the other side of the fence anymore

Check out my garden, I am so excited about it. I finally picked a red tomato,
but squished it before it even made it into the house! nice eh?

For many of you who aren't my neighbors, you may not know that we have been working on our back yard for a long long time. Some how out of everyone on our street we ended up with the most challenging back yard. Our first challange was that it was one massive slope, secondly we did most of the work ourselves, but worst of all we had to deal with frustrating contractors to build 4 retaining walls. What a nightmare! Any way, this last week we finally finished and layed sod. Oh and Justin built the kids a spectacular sand box. It's huge and only took 17 trips with the wheel barrow. He's my Hero! So the only projects left are to build one last fence on the east side, and to pour cement near the drive way! It feels so good to be done, and we can't wait to finally enjoy it. There's only two complaints though....

1- Now that we have grass, I would like to walk on it.

2- (this complaint is from kyle) "I want a Trampoline"!!

I'm just sayin'.....................

Happy 4th of July

Sydney sat in the chair and ate grapes during the parade

Kyle in awe of the monster fire trucks that are almost as cool as his daddy's police car

Kyle and Sydney chillin' or roasting waiting for the parade to begin

Most of the crew all lined up -the kids anyway

Swim time at Krista's pool

Independence Day turned out to be a really great day for most of us! The initial plan was for our "entire" family to go the parade and spend as much of the day together as possible. Justin has been working a swing shift which is from 4 pm to 2 am. The morning of the fourth, Justin didn't get off work until 6am (all the idiots of Cedar came out of the wood work) ... so needless to say, he slept while I took the kids to the parade. Funny how some things never change! Thank goodness I guess, because like always I have awesome neighbors and they saved us a spot amongst the crowd, it's always fun being with them, and they take such good care of us! After the parade we went to the Dodd's and swam, then Justin headed back to work and I BBQ'd with my wonderful neighbors again! The day really was fun and it was wonderful to celebrate our precious freedom!