Andy, the golfer

At the Spanish Fork Golf Course they offered lessons for kids, so we got Andy signed up! He loved it. On the last day they went out on the course and did some real golfing. While I was watching Andy during his lesson it seemed to me that he did really good. But what do I know about golf. I do know that it is really boring to watch on tv. But Andy likes it, his dad likes it and his papa likes it.

Ellyn had to do something to keep herself entertained durring the lesson, so she found a few friends and they ran up and down the hill. I don't think that is really allowed on the golf course.

Ellyn's Birthday

This year for Ellyn's birthday we let her pick what she wanted to do. First on the list was to go to Jumping Jacks (it is a play place with all these fun blow up things for the kids to jump on) she wanted to take her good friend Trinity. It happens that Trin's brother is one of Andy's good friends. So they each had a friend to play with. After jumping for a while Ell wanted to go to the Pizza Buffet in Provo. I think dad helped her decide on that place, it is one of Steve's favorites.

Trinity and Ellyn, would you believe that Ell is the older one?

Having so much fun sliding and jumping.

Tanner and Andy on the sinking ship.

The next part of Ellyn's birthday was the cake. We decided that we were going to bake her cake this year instead of buying one. It was fun picking out what kind of cake she wanted, what color icing, and then getting some fun candles.

The finished cake. Good job Ellyn.

The next part of her birthday was the traditional birthday dinner. We had the family over for a BBQ at our house. Steve did the grilling, good job dear. It was so great to have everyone over to celebrate our Ellyn's birthday.

Aaliyah and Treysen. He is just the cutest baby, and such a good one also.

Party in the back yard. We are very lucky to have shade in the afternoon. We have a huge tree behind our house that we just love.

Grandma (steve's mom) always taking pictures.

Don't know if you can see it or not but in the picture with everyone in line getting food, while i was taking this picture LaShon poked her head down (she is at the end of the line) and made a silly face. I didn't even see it until after the picture was taken.

Ellyn said to me "I am six, going on seventeen. And at seventeen I can get married." Try again sweetheart.

Boys!

Boys will be boys.

I have wanted a garden for a while, but just never got around to doing it. So, this was our year to begin. I had decided to do a square foot garden, no weeding, easy upkeep it all sounded so great to me! I still don't know what I am doing, I keep asking those that have gardened before me many questions. But so far, so good. I am ready to eat.

Our first growth in the garden was this cute jalapeno. I am ready for salsa.

What cute little tomatoes.

If all goes according plan we will be eating tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, onions, cilantro and watermelon. We also have sunflowers growing for fun and strawberries for next year.

Eye See You

Sandra, this is for you! A cow's eye. Guess he doesn't need lasik now.
Each year with our homeschool group we do a dissection. This year we did a cow's eye. Yuck! But I put on a brave face for the kids, and told them "This is going to be so cool!" Yuck again. Now I love to watch the surgery shows. I don't get grossed out by much, except, the eyes. Anytime I see someone coming close to cutting or doing any type of surgery on the eye the channel quickly gets changed. So, I knew this was going to be tough for me. But once I got over it, it was kind of cool. It took a lot for Andy to even touch the eye, but he did. I think he liked looking while I did the working. Last year we did a shark (which happened to be his idea) and he got all into it. He still has some teeth and eyes. Yuck, boys. We did learn alot about the eye. After we did that our leader, our brave leader had a cow's heart that she was going to dissect and let us watch. Now, that was cool.

He wouldn't even pick it up with his hands, he used a large pin.

Here they are looking at the heart.

In as little as

1)

2)

3)
We have a new ceiling. Steve had contacted a guy who was licensed and had him come out and give us a quote on how much it would cost to fix our lovely hole. We would provide the dry wall and he would provide everything else. When he came Steve was asleep, so it was up to me. I make an executive decision. The guy had everything in his truck, including the dry wall can could fix it right then, so I told him to get to work! Now we just have to clean up, again. They did a great job, didn't make too much of a mess. But we still have a ladder, tarp and dry wall pieces in the basement. Think I could hire a maid to clean it up for me? And while they are at it finish the laundry, mop, vacuum......

To the dads in our life

What could Steve and his dad be looking at? They are looking at what we had just found in our basement, where the water fall had just been flowing. We heard water running and we went running to find it flowing in the basement. And what is it you do when you don't know what to do? You call dad of course. Kathy and Ev had been out and didn't mind a stop before heading home to help us out.

And Ev's words of wisdom? "Let's cut your ceiling!" Really, is that helping to make more of a mess in my living room? Well, I guess father knows best.

At first Steve was a little hesitant to cut into the water logged ceiling, but once he got started he just kept on cutting.

Then the search was on for the leak! The looked and looked and looked some more.

Until they finally found the leaky pipe. And like any good repair man Ev returned the next day to fix our leaky pipe. Thanks dad. You see this is why we will always live by our parents. If we had been close to my parents house, you can know for sure my dad would have been right over to help us out. And just like Ev he would have helped Steve find the problem and get it fixed. We are very blessed to have some great dads in our family. So to my dad, my dad-in-law and Steve: Thanks for being such great dads!! We love you.

Oh, by the way, this is how my basement currently looks. I have to remember it could have been so much worse.