Baby Bearded Dragon

Welcome to our Family, Spike!!! WE've barely had him a week and yet, there are so many things we love about our new pet...

...He sticks his tongue out at us and makes us laugh! (double click to enlarge & see better!)

...We can wear him as a beautiful pendant!

...He's a great back scratcher!!

... he is a good Listener :)
...he loves to give Hugs...

...And he LOVES our Friends!!!

~ How To Eat A Cricket~
Parental Warning...young children and those persons with weak stomachs are advised to not take a look at the following!

#1- Get your Bug Sucking Gun! Meema & Peepa brought each of the kids one of these! It vacuums up a bug and then encases it in a clear container so you can look at it through it's magnifying glass! ...Then you let Mr. Cricket go into the Dragon's Den for dinner.

#2- Chase it down

#3- Smash it's head and Hold it down

#4- SMILE at the camera

#5- enjoy your dinner! We love watching him eat--It's just so cool!!

~One Can at a Time..Adding to our Food Storage~

Another thing that we did while my parents were here was add to our Food Storage! We got the Caner, went and purchased boxes, cans, lids and Oxygen packs (Thanks Mom & Dad!!) and then after I went and bought all of the food I wanted to can and we canned it all!

Grits, sugar, brown sugar, spices, Ramen Noodles!!! and Cocoa Puffs were just a few things I canned! Not sure on the life of the Cocoa Puffs--but if we were starving, even stale ones would make a good little treat, right?! I also got about 50lbs of oats and some other necessities and canned those as well.

I wanted to kids to be a part of the experience and understand that we, as a family, need to work together to help prepare ourselves for any emergency that might arise, so we all took turns working the caner. It was a great opportunity to remind the kids why we have Food Storage and got them talking and thinking more about it's importance.

Brant LOVED it and actually did, probably more than half of the cans!! He did an awesome job!!

When it was all said and done, we canned 10 cases (60 cans) of food and found the perfect space for them!! I'm excited to can more in a couple of weeks!! I'm grateful to my mom for getting my feet moving to add to our Food Storage and feel peace about it and little more security and self- sufficient now!! Thanks again Mom and Dad!!!

Wet~N~Wild

This year we bought some season passes to the new Water Park~~Wet~N~Wild!! Meema & Peepa kept Rissa home with them, so that left the rest of us free to stay as long as we wanted!! Honestly, I didn't get many pictures b/c I couldn't carry my digital around while we were riding, and at the end of the day, frankly, I was just too tired to walk too far to snap some shots....but here are a few.

Jacob & Kas in front of the "kids" section:) Just for the record, there were a lot of adults in and out of here all day long--and it was fun:) Note to self: Most of us chose the Tornado (blue & orange -looks yellow but it is orange FUNNEL in the left background) as our Favorite Ride. [It is an Adult ride, it's just behind the kid stuff]

The only thing I can say about this picture is that I had so much fun with Brant and Kas and they look great here:)
We lucked out and found a whole row of empty lounge chairs right near the wave pool.

Nikole Lounging after a long, hard day of fun!! We went down some super fun slides, floated on the lazy river about 20 times, laid out, went up against the Wave pool numerous times, ate and went through tons of water bottles and drinks! After about nine hours of fun like that, WE WERE ALL POOPED!!!!

~The Wave Pool~

The kids are trying to block Jacob in for a picture, but he just can't resist the next wave that's coming!!

Marty's looking pretty buff here! ...I'm not sure what the cowgirl chick is doing in the background...probably thinking, "Suck my tummy in so I look good and buff when this girl puts me on her blog!"
Jacob's favorite was the pool! He LOVED diving into the waves!

S'MORES in 125 degree weather!!

The kids had all been wanting to roast marshmellows, so one night week we roasted Hot Dogs for dinner, had our FHE and then roasted marshmellows! YUM!!
I had found these HUGE marshmellows in the Mexican section of the store a month or so ago and thought it'd be fun to fire them suckers up and smash them up into yummy goodness that we call S'MORES!! That's a regular mellow compared to the Mexican Gigantor Mellow!
"Come on baby light my fire!..." Meema sang to Brant as he lit her mellow with his (we like ours a little burned-lol:). ....(something) Flame of Fire and 'I'm feeling Hot, hot, hot!" were a few other tunes that whistled through the air while we roasted MMellows in the warm summer night!

...Like I said, we like our Marshmellows ....a LITTLE burned!! Look how big that Mexican Mellow swells!!! I'm not sure, but I don't think Kas ate that one.

This, my friends, was THE BEST S'MORE EVER!!! I am not even kidding about this!! I've learned from the GIGANTOR marshmellows that if using regular, normal size mellows, you should probably put 3-4 on one S'MORE to get the optimum taste that is required for the Perfect S'More!! I only ate one of these huge things, but I sure did want another!!

FAMILY + S'MORES in Desert summer weather = a lot of LOVE, sweat & YUMMY treats!
...Rissa had a good time.....
Jacob used the Strawberry Mexican Mellows to make his S'more!
...He ate every bite of his too!!

A Movie @ Westgate & a Trip to the Mall

We all went together to see UP...well, all of us except for Rissa:) I just really didn't want to spend the money for one of us to end up in the foyer with her, so Allyson so kindly switched kids with me for most of the day, leaving Rissa at her house and Tyler came along with us!! We loved the movie UP! so we snapped a shot for memories sake, in front of it's poster.

.....and then, OF COARSE, we had to snap a few in front of our dear friends, Edward & Jacob!!!

I have LOVED loved! having my nieces around!!! They are two of the funnest girls I know!!

I love my dad!! It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about he & I! I'm definitely a "daddy's girl", and have just cherished the time that we've had together.

Nikole fell in love with Rissa and couldn't keep her hands off of her (well, Kasidy did too!!)--but Nikole & I had a lot of opportunities to talk. I was telling her how so many times, I'd glance at her playing with Rissa and it instantly reminded me of myself with her when she was Rissa's age. Nikole got to go to YW's with me and that was really a lot of fun!! To and from the activities is where we found a lot of our 'talk time'. (I have absolutely loved being with Kasidy too! I will talk about her wondeful qualities in her Birthday Post...soon to come!!)

My mom and dad are amazing & I am so thankful for them!!! My mom is such an inspiration to me and I have always wanted to be like her!! She's such a great example to me and one of my best friends!!

The kids at the Mall

Rissa and her new Dora Doll!! She LOVES Dora and was soo excited to get her very own Dora that she can play with and change her clothes and shoes and brush her hair and put 'make-up' on her and ..........

Totally WICKED!!!!

A couple of months ago, Marty bought tickets to WICKED, so shortly after my parents and nieces arrived, we took a night to go out on the town with some of our good friends, Sarah & Chris! We had a great time eating with them at My Big Fat Greek Restaurant and then we walked through town to the theatre for the show. Even the Monsoon (luckily, worst of it took place during the show) and blisters that Sarah and I got (from all the walking in our shoes) didn't deter us from enjoying the night!! :) ...And yes, Marty & Chris even enjoyed the show~~don't know if they'd go again, but they enjoyed it-lol! Thanks for a great double date guys!!

Rock Climbing

Go Through

Climbing UP!

...UP!

...UP!!!

...Going DOWN!!

take a break and smile!

cooling off

much better:)

I LOVE my Peepa!!