The Last Hoorah!

The last hoorah before school starts back up began on Friday with a trip to the pool with a bunch of moms and kids from our ward. It was a ton of fun as the mom's showed off their long-suppressed tricks on the diving board. I wish I would have taken my camera for proof but trust me, it was hilarious and the winners of the competition were:

Longest Dive goes to Marni (her facial expressions won this event for her).
Best Cannonball goes to Teresa and her sychronized diving partner, Dallin.
Best Back Dive goes to Amber...what form!
Best Toe Touch goes to Jana...STRETCH!
Highest Butt in the air goes to me...the pike will do it every time.
Best Flip...can't remember.
And Rebecca won the award for holding out the longest...15 years!!! Hopefully,it won't be another 15 years before she goes off the diving board again.

That night we took off for the mountains and the cool, crisp air. We rode horses, Mark went on a mountain bike ride and the kids just played and played.

 

This is me riding "Roy" on top of the world. What a view!

 

Josie and I went for a short ride. She loved it.

 

Today was the first day of school and here are Em and Linds in their first day outfits. The drop off went well...no tears...much better than last year. Both girls really like their teachers and they're willing to go back tomorrow. Phew!

 

Mountains vs. Desert

Last week Mark and I took separate vacations. He went with a bunch of guys from our ward on what they called a "Scout backpacking trip" to the Uintahs. What they don't want everyone to know is there were 11 men and only 3 scouts. If they hadn't recruited those 3 scouts (and one of them was from a different stake) they would had to have called it a "Men's Only Trip" and none of their wives would have let them go. Mark is so lucky to have such a cool wife who encouraged him to go. he he he

He had a great time hiking, fishing and riding horses. The girls and I went to Lake Powell with my family for a few days and we had a blast. Mark had the camera so I don't have any pics of our trip but here are some from his trip.

 

 

 

My kids belong in the zoo!!!

So, I read all these mom-blogs where the authors sing the praises of their little angel children who are just the cutest kids in the universe and never do anything wrong. There is never a cross word spoken, kids just play all day while their mother's complete incredibly cute projects, and never, ever mess up the house that was just cleaned.

Let me tell you about a recent day I spent with my children at the zoo. To give you a little background, when I have to get up for some event in the morning, I will not sleep the night before. I'm going over lists in my head, what snacks to take, don't forget the stroller, things like that. And to make sure I don't sleep through the alarm, I won't sleep at all. So the day starts out really bad anyway and put on top of that 4 hours of driving, walking around a stinky zoo in 97 degrees, feeling like I'm melting, trying to keep wandering-Lindsey with the group. It just makes for a really long day. But I pride myself on being a pretty fun mom taking my kids to do all kinds of fun things most days of the week. Despite it all, we had a good day at the zoo and Josie was fascinated with all the new creatures she got to see up close. However, the kids favorite part of the zoo was this giant carved elephant that sneezed and spit water and air out of its trunk. The kids couldn't get enough!


We left the zoo around dinner time and headed for an old favorite restaurant of ours...Robintino's. This kids were pretty wound up but didn't make too much of a scene. Only one guy kept staring at them as they giggled and played with their food. We left the restaurant and drove to the mall where I wanted to get a shirt for my class reunion which was the next night. I don't normally go shopping with all three kids...let me rephrase that...I don't normally go shopping, period. But since it was a special occasion I had to stop while I was in the big city.

We got to the mall and as soon as we entered the only store I wanted to go to Josie said she needed to go potty. Arrggghhh! I figured she could hold it for a minutes while I looked around since she went less than an hour ago. Within two minutes of entering the packed store I had to get after the girls for messing around and being too noisy. I picked out some shirts and headed to the dressing room with the three girls in tow. I tried some things on and had to go back out into the store to get something else. All of sudden I hear glass-shattering squealing and Lindsey yelling at Emily in the dressing room. I went back in and scolded the kids, telling them to be quiet. Josie reminded me she needed to go potty. I said, "Ok. In just a minute." She said, "Ok, mommy."

Tried some more shirts on going as fast as I could, back out into the store, more squealing, yelling, crying and laughing coming from the dressing room. Hurrying as fast as I can, trying to pretend like they were someone else's kids. Went back to the dressing room and hear Josie say, "Mommy, peepee!" Looked down at her to see her peeing all over herself and the brand new stroller I had just bought that morning! Oh my gosh! What do I do? Got some paper towels from the store employee who offered to clean up the mess until I told her that my child had just peed all over the dressing floor. She said, "Oh" and handed me the paper towels. Good thing it was a concrete floor.

By the time I was done cleaning up the mess I was so angry with my kids I thought I was seriously going to hurt them. I was shaking and it took every ounce of my being not to lose control in the store. I decided I would save it for the car. I couldn't believe how selfish and inconsiderate they had been and how poorly they behaved in a public place after I had just spent an entire day with them at the zoo in the heat, spent a ton of money on them, bought them lunch and dinner and they couldn't give me 30 minutes to shop for a shirt without making complete fools out of all of us! I was sooo mad. I think I even let a few choice swear words fly as I was cleaning up the puddle on the floor. Did I feel bad after swearing at them and giving them a complete tongue lashing in the car? Heck no. They needed to understand the consequences of their behavior. What are the consequences? No more fun mommy. No more fun activities. At least not for a few days anyway.

So to all you mommy-bloggers who tell everyone in cyberspace how wonderful your kids are, I have one word for you...LIAR!!!!

Pres Uchdorf Rocks!!

Last week we had a great experience at Young Women's. We attended the Castle Valley Pageant in Emery County. We got a tip from one of the girl's friends who was in the cast that Pres. Uchdorf was going to be there so we were really excited that we might get to see him and get a picture. Apparently everyone in Carbon and Emery Counties had heard the same thing because the place was packed! We got off the bus and immediately started looking for a tall, white haired man with a crowd of people following close behind.

We didn't see him right off the bat so we decided to walk around the pioneer village when we heard an announcement that the cast meeting was starting. Being the wannabe groupie that I am, I figured the cast meeting would be the place where Pres. Uchdorf was hiding out and I was right! We decided to wait just outside the tent and be the first ones to get at him. My counselor thought I was crazy but it's not everyday that girls from small town Utah get to meet a general authority. So we waited and waited and he finally came out. You could tell he was trying to avoid the crowd of people who had gathered but we snagged him anyway and him and his wife were somewhat happy to take a picture with us.

As we walked away he said, "Goodbye, Princesses!" That was so cool because we had gone to the General YW Meeting where he had given his famous "Happily Ever After" talk so the girls knew what he was referring to. Yeah! It was better than meeting a rock star.

International Days!

Karen says I need to update my blog but for the first time this summer we've had about a 10 days where nothing has been going on. It's been kind of nice to lounge around the house, go swimming, do some chores here and there but have no real obligations. The girls have been attending a science camp through 4H and have had a really good time. Luka came down and went to the Slimy, Gooey, Gross camp with Lindsey. They had a great time making snot, mold, gloop, glow in the dark bats and exploding Diet Coke using Mentos.

International Days finally came around again and the kids had a great time watching the parade and collecting candy.

Josie didn't like the sirens on the firetrucks so much.

Lindsey got to ride in the Dance Technica float during the parade. After the parade we headed up the park so I kids could ride the carnival rides and I could get my annual Funnel Cake fix. Yummy!