Back into the swing of things…

Blog Books

I finally have some time to cross off things on my giant list of things to do. I was able to finish 3 more blog books this week! (2006, 2007 and 2008) I just have 2009 left to do and then I will order them all at once. My friend said she used a different place for a blog book called “cutest blog on the block”. I tried it out and it was super easy- you just put in your blog address and within minutes it has slurped it into a book. From what I can tell, its more expensive though. Anyway, just thought I would share in case anyone was looking into making one.

Cutest Blog on the Block

How many cavities??

Tyler, Alayna, and I had our dentist appts this week. I almost put up a contest to see who could guess how many cavities Alayna had, but soon realized none of you would get it right. When the dentist told me Alayna had 8 cavities I thought he was kidding me. But he wasn’t. 8 cavities?? Are you kidding me? So, I have to take her in this week to get them all filled. We got her a new electric toothbrush with all the trimmings. You don’t EVEN want to know how much this will cost us. Goodbye savings…

Garden

Our garden took off while we were gone. That “miracle grow” stuff REALLY works. Now the tomato plants are taller than Alayna. Our apple trees actually have tons of apples. Our raspberries were perfect in this amazing chocolate raspberry pie. (Anyone want the recipe?) Anyway, I’m sure we will be spending weekends making salsa soon. Looks like we have a giant crop of tomatoes on the way.

We have vampires in our family?

My awesome sister-in-law made these really cool photos of Kayla and Alayna in honor of Eclipse coming out. We think they are super cool! Alayna posted hers in the kitchen. She had been working overtime on her points chart and claims she has earned the title of “Employee of the week” and so her picture is now posted on the fridge to show everyone.

Hart family pics

Here are some adorable pictures Corey took at the Hart reunion.

Reading:

I’ve also finally been able to do some leisure reading. I almost forgot what that meant. I finished “The Lost Symbol” by Dan Brown (heavy reading but I really enjoyed it) I read the 1^st 2 books in this new teen series called “Conspiracy 365”. Great concept and lots of fun. I need to somehow get a hold of the other books. The libraries don’t have them yet and I don’t want to buy them all. You can see more about it on http://www.conspiracy365.com/ . I also finished “Heat Wave” which goes along with the tv show “Castle”.  Anyway, that was a very fun read too. I have a huge stack I am working through, but I know at some point I need to work on some work stuff. Its seriously coming up way too quick!

EFY

The girls had a fantastic time at EFY this week in Normal, Illinois. I am hoping they will take time to update their blogs with the experiences they had this week. They came home tired but said it was worth it!

(Just home from EFY))

Home SWEET Home!

We made it home last night. Hallelujah! Even though we had a fantastic trip and loved being with family, we are super happy to finally be home. It was a long trip full of rain, massive winds, and tired cranky family members. Why is the trip home always harder than the trip there??

(Entertained themselves over an hour with animal crackers.  This is an “E walk” get it?)

(Lunch in windy Nebraska)

(Lunch in windy Nebraska)

My Blog Book arrived!! Im so excited that now I am a “published author”!

The girls leave in the morning for EFY and we see our summer slipping by really fast! So, we plan to take full advantage of the time we have left.

Mountains, water falls, and an eclipse

We drove up to the Rocky Mountain National Park (I think that’s what its called?). It was a very scenic drive through the mountains. We took a shuttle up to Bear Lake where we walked the trail the whole way around the lake. It was so beautiful and we had perfect weather.

(Dont ask me what is up with the frowny faces.  Geeks!)

(I swear Tyler wanted to take a picture of every rock there!)

Then we followed another trail up to Alberta Falls which was absolutely beautiful. The only draw back was the kids kept getting really close to the edge and I was terrified they’d go over the edge. I swear- the things we moms worry about. We ended up walking about 5 miles and the kids actually did really well.

We also went to see Eclipse today! I really enjoyed it, but that’s because the 100 kissing scenes don’t bother me, but all those teenage boys that went with us….poor Tyler had his head in his shirt for those parts. Anyway, it was more violent, but I still liked it. Now-if I could only get Stephanie Meyer to make an alternate ending that includes more of Jacob…

White water rafting and a surrey with a fringe on top (or not)

Well, the main group went white-water rafting today. They went on Cache La Poudre River. Bob went with Marisa, Kayla and Tyler. (Alayna was supposed to go but got sick last night so Marisa took her spot). I stayed home (as anyone who knows me knows that river rafting is SO not my thing) with Alayna. We went to Estes Lake to ride the “surrey bikes” (or at least that’s what we call them). It’s a lot harder than it looks! But we went for around 25 minutes or so and really enjoyed it.

(rafting crew)

(surrey crew)

We celebrated Abigail’s birthday tonight by playing games including volleyball with waterballoons. Grandma even made 3 ice cream cakes so we were pretty much in heaven!

Guess what we saw!

We went to the YMCA today. First, we played miniature golf and then had our picnic lunch. Then most of the group did swimming, bocce ball, and volleyball for the remainder of the day. Marisa, Grace, and I helped Corey do more grocery shopping and then hit the fudge factory!! The funniest thing: we were at a red light when Grace spotted the fudge shop and said “Come on guys, lets go get some” and she jumped OUT of the car and ran to the store. Marisa and I were still staring in shock as the light turned green. We did try some really yummy fudge! It made me feel better since my grandmother had made me some homemade fudge in Utah, but my mom FORGOT it at the hotel! (Insert crying here).

On our way home, as we were close to the house, guess what we saw??

It was RIGHT by the road. It must have been a young one because his antlers were still fuzzy. Then as we turned onto our road, we spotted about 25 deer in the trees. It was a really cool site! Im loving it up here!

Estes Lake and Movie Mania

We went to Estes Lake this morning to explore and walk around the lake. It said it was 3.75 miles around the whole lake. Before the walk even started, Alayna fell down a steep side by the river scraping both her knees and ripping off some skin on her back. Then about 15 minutes into the walk, Alayna started having problems breathing. When I started carrying her she started gasping for breath- that was really scary! And since there seems to be only one entrance into the trail, we were stuck. So, I carried her the remainder of the way on my back. Bob offered to take her, but apparently, according to Alayna he isn’t as “comfortable” as me. We didn’t make it the full way around the lake. We took a detour (around mile 3 I think?) to go to a playground and tennis courts. Thank goodness Missy came by in her car to pick up Alayna!

(Marisa with cousins Andrew, Ian and Jared)

(Kayla with cousins Abigail and Rachel)

(Not sure why Tyler looks like he is under arrest)

(Eating on the deck)

We came home for lunch and even got to eat on the deck. Then everyone split into their assigned groups to film movies. I took this as an opportunity to FINALLY relax so I spent the afternoon reading “The Lost Symbol” by Dan Brown and I am already half way done!! Man it feels so wonderful to just sit and read!! I hope I finish it soon because I have 6 more books in my luggage!!

(Kayla and Alayna with Jackson)

(Alayna with Abigail and Rachel)

We were in charge of the family activity tonight so we played many different mini-games as a family, ending with one that correlated with our scripture for the evening. It was an enjoyable evening except when Bob almost smacked Wendy in the face and then almost sat on her! Most of them are still downstairs playing. Its amazing how much everyone loves to play games.

(Thats Alayna- can you tell she is feeling better?)

(Marisa leading a game)

On an odd note:

This is a big beautiful house with only one drawback…The people who own this home are huge hunters. It’s a little creepy when you see how many dead animals are mounted around the house. (A vegetarians nightmare?)