On The Road Again...

As if we hadn't logged enough hours in the car that summer, we made a road trip out to Utah. (I kept teasing Jake that there was going to be a permanent booty mold in my seat). We went out to LA where Jake had an interview (with the firm that he is actually working with now here in Boston...ya still don't understand the whole time frame on that one). His interview was pretty early in the morning, so with LA traffic there was no way he'd make it from Murrieta, so we stayed in a hotel down there. Since LA is halfway in between my parents' house and Santa Barbara (where Kelsie goes to school), she was kind enough to ditch her college happenings and meet up with us for a day.

After Jake got back from the interview we grabbed some lunch and headed out to Utah. (We actually had my Mom and Jaxon with us, because that week the Brown family <my Mom's side> was having a little get together/reunion of their own, so we just dropped them off in Orem on our way to Sandy).

We hadn't seen anyone since we had moved from Bountiful to Boston the previous August, so it was great to see everyone. The kids loved spending time with all the grandparents, aunts and uncles and getting to play with all the cousins.

Like I mentioned earlier my Mom's side of the family was all in town as well. I'm the oldest of all the cousins on that side, so I have a bunch of cousins that are around my kids' ages. We got to see them a couple of times while we were in town which was really fun. One evening we met up with them at Vivian Park for a BBQ, some fishing and family games.

My little Huckleberry Finn (but lets talk about how classic that picture of Jaxon is...love that little sourpuss!)

Carder loved trying to fish for his first time, and Brenn loved all the "friends" (I have a bunch of teenage cousins who were there as well, and that little lady had them wrapped around her finger taking her where ever she wanted to go and playing with her at the park). When we got into our car to go home I asked Carder how he liked fishing on the Provo River and he told me he got "skunked," which he then explained to me is what my Uncle Gary told him its called when you don't catch anything. Another vocabulary word to add to his "Drats," etc. to make it like he just walked out of an episode of Leave it to Beaver.

The boys were especially interested in the little campfire we had going on. They tried their hand at roasting some starbursts and tried to throw whatever they could in there when no one was looking. I dunno what it is about boys and fire, but thankfully we didn't have a President Monson-like experience at Vivian Park.

We then played some "spud" and "missionary tag." Family games are always so fun when you have a bunch of people, I think Carder could have played forever.

Since it had been awhile since the whole family (minus Emily who was absent serving her mission in Chile) had been together and there were quite a few new additions since the last family picture we had taken, we got some new ones done.

Grandpa & Grandma with the Grandkids 

(Upper Left: The married-in spouses (Ryan had us sneak this one in because he was going to give a framed one of these to Todd for Christmas, I'm not sure if that actually happened or not) Upper Right: The Siblings (Minus Em in Chile) Bottom: The whole clan)

The Grandkids...which is actually obsolete now since we just got another cousin with the addition of Baby Rose a few weeks ago to the Terry family. 

 They did some of the individual family units as well, here are ours...

Brenn would not smile to save her life during pictures (little stinker), and in some of these looks scared to death for some reason (which coupled with her big doe eyes makes for some "deer in the headlights" action going on) 

We happened to be in Utah over Pioneer Day. It's always fun to be there the 24th of July, but Grandma made it even more fun by renting a giant inflatable water slide for the kids. To say that they enjoyed it is quite the understatement.

Brenn wasn't a huge fan of the water (I think Jake got her to go down once with him). It was a little chilly that morning and she gets really cold really easily, but she found plenty of other things to do like being the self-appointed water slide police, wading in the little pool, doing who knows what, climbing in and out of the cooler, swinging on the swings, jumping on the trampoline with the kids and bubbles.

Since my kids have been known to turn anything at their disposal into a trampoline (my bed, our couch, their beds...) having a real trampoline to jump on was heaven. Jake busted out an old trick he would do in the hallway of the MTC that he calls "Peter Pan." It was a big hit with the kids, Carder even tried it out himself. 

This little girl could swing all day long...can't wait til she learns how to pump cuz this Mama's arms can't handle pushing her ALL DAY LONG.

Brenn sure had lots of love to give to baby Isaac

Before we headed back to California (Jake did have to get back to that Bar Exam he'd been studying for most of the summer), we got to spend a night up at Jake's family cabin in Midway. (and of course had to get ourselves some amazing milkshakes at Dairy Keen on the way up :) ...that chocolate dipped strawberry Mmm Mmm Mmm!)

We had a great night getting Grandma as well as Grandma & Grandpa Apostol all to ourselves, as well as exploring and ATVing around the mountain. (I love how those helmets make the kids look like Speed Racer) Carder rode with me and I'm pretty sure I tried his trust as I got us stuck on a pretty steep hill with one of the back wheels starting to come up...(I was a little scared myself, I ended up making him get off with me and having Jake drive it down to safety, after that he requested to ride with his Dad...oops!) Then right before we headed back on the road we partook of some of the yummiest mexican food in Utah (Tarahumara in Midway...yummy yummy!)  

Boom Boom Boom

With the craziness of our lives this past year, I have majorly neglected our blog. I sat down the other day and wrote a Kindergarten post about Carder (I needed to finish that baby before he was no longer a kindergartener). I was just going to post that and then work my way forward from there, and then go back and do catch up, but let's be honest, the catch up of the last year was never going to happen if I did that. So once again I am trying to recommit myself to blog catch up so that this thing is actually relevant :) 

My last post was about our road trip across the country. Our final stop was California. The kids were super excited to be at Mimi & Poppy's house. Once we got there we got to partake in all of the firework festivities (the town my parents live in does a birthday party for itself every year where there is a live band/fireworks; and then Fourth of July). As I reported last year in my 4th of July post, the fireworks didn't go over so well with Carder. Literally they brought him to hysteria because they "hurt his ears" so badly. I love fireworks, so I was determined to work our way through this. We got to the Murrieta birthday party just before dusk and set up camp. Carder was doing well with all the music, dancing/playing around with Jaxon and Brenn. Once it was announced that the fireworks would be starting soon he began to panic. I took him to the furthest away part of the park (where you could still see the fireworks) and we sat down and I told him that we could stay there until he got used to them. His hands came down from his ears, and we were slowly able to move our way up, finally making it back to our seats with the rest of the family. He made me hold my hands on his ears for a while while he sat on my lap, but pretty quickly decided that wasn't necessary and enjoyed the show like everyone else. He ended up loving fireworks that night (halleluja). When we were leaving we scored some sweet glow stick paraphernalia from a vendor closing up shop...Carder was pretty excited about the loot we scored. Just icing on the cake for making the fireworks a positive experience.

Jake was ahead of us walking back to the car with Brenn. Once we met up with them Carder shared his glow sticks with Brenn. He's such a great big brother.

With the Murrieta Birthday Party being such a success, the 4th of July was totally stress free. We did our annual swim day/BBQ then got ready to head out to Temecula for the firework show. 

The kids were quite excited about their dollar tree glow sticks Mimi gave them.

Brenn sure does love her Poppy and Jaxon

Brenn is our little dancing queen.  I guess its in her blood being born in Las Vegas and all. Ever since she was 6 months old I remember her moving her foot/leg to the music as we would watch So You Think You Can Dance. Ever since then when that little lady hers music she just cant help but move that little body of hers.

Brenn didn't have any issues with the booms of the fireworks, she just LOVED them. She would say "oooo sparkley" as they would go off in the sky.

As if the firework shows weren't enough, Mimi had plenty of sparklers and popper thingys for the kids to do when we got home (yes those would be Batman jammies that Brenn is wearing, she borrowed Jaxon's jammie shirt so she could be just like Carder).