Summertime

I have come to a new appreciation of summer.  Since I started working at the school, I love the break.  We had 5 parties the first week after school let out.  I was just so excited.  We did Liv's birthday party, our annual end-of-school party with hot dogs, games, an outdoor movie and night games, I threw a block party that was pretty successful, we had an outdoor FHE with the neighbors and a high priest social.  Whew!  It was so fun.
But I digress.  I also love that it's more relaxed and I get to hang out with my kids.  I am so busy running them to activities I don't really get to goof off with just be with them.  Even during the slow times, though, it's hard to get all together.  We had to make the effort to get everyone together.  But here are some things we did this summer:

 The girls had an outdoor piano recital in Brother Jensen's backyard.  

 We took a trip up to Salt Lake on the frontrunner.  We had a good time riding the train, playing guess who.  I was surprised considering how long we've lived in Utah how little the kids knew about the history and Mormon culture in Salt Lake.  We went through the visitors centers, took a tour of the Conference Center, ate lunch at City Creek, visited the planetarium and rode the train home.  

 Aw.

 Christian on Mars.

 Gutter of Fire

 My cute girls

 We spontaneously took a ride put the canyon to Heber and got shakes at the Depot or whatever it's called.  They were excited to each get their own.  That rarely happens.  Then we went to the park across the street and played.  It was a beautiful night, we just missed Alyssa.  As usual.

 Have I mentioned Amber belongs to 4H and how much I love it?  She wanted to join last year and I was hesitant, but it's awesome!  She has activities every week where they do crafts or games and once a month they have family nights where they FEED US DINNER and then usually have a cool activity.  This night we went to Rock Canyon park and they had bubbles to play in and large trikes to ride.  I love them!