Montana visit

We had a fun short visit with Curt's family in Hamilton this weekend. Every other year we like to go up to the sapphire mine to try our luck for the big gems. One of these years we're going to find the $5000 beauty I'm sure! It is fun anyway just to get to hunt through them and really we do find some pretty ones that can be cut and be over 1 carat still. I'm thinking after 10 years we will have enough to make Hailey a pretty bracelet or something.

Matthew is a really good sapphire finder. He called it treasure hunting. Hailey just liked grabbing rocks and throwing them. Do you see her fat little fingers sneaking in?

So to keep her from trouble I took her over to the kiddie play area.

Matthew is holding up his "sapphire". It was really just a pretty rock, but it fooled one of the workers which got us excited because it was 19 carats. Then she got a second and third opinion and gave us the negative.

There is some kind of a butterfly invasion going on there in Hamilton. These white butterflies were EVERYWHERE not joking. Matthew really liked catching them.

I told Hailey to catch a butterfly and this is the pose that she repeatedly gave me.

My little explorers!

Always love a good visit with family! Curt's parents are so great. I am so lucky to have such wonderful inlaws!

Palisades camping

We were able to go on a camping overnighter with our good friends, the Telfords. After mucho driving to try to find the perfect camp site we finally struck gold, and so did the mosquitoes! They were so bad there they pushed us out a little earlier than planned, but it worked out fine because the kiddos cooperated enough that we were able to do everything that we wanted to in one and a half days.

When we first got there the guys were curious about a mysterious fishy looking thing floating around out there. Curt was going to be brave and go get it but that didn't work out because my muscular, attractive, ridiculously amazing husband lacks perfection in one skill: swimming! Luckily Jim has the doggie paddle mastered and was able to cure their curiosity; it was just an almost dead carp, yuck! :)

Hailey was excited to go try out the water too!

unfortunately I was having so much fun that I forgot to take many pictures, but these are what I got so enjoy.

Curt was standing right under her. We're brave but not that brave!

that's camp dirt on his head, not a bruise! But can you see the millions of mosquito welts on his poor head?!

"Peace out, mom!" Hailey is the most gorgeous camper ever.

LAST possible minute before we left home Curt gave Matthew a haircut. He looks bald in this picture but I swear hair is there, it's just really really short.

We had so much fun! We went on a hike, and went swimming until I was shivering so hard I had to get out, and the guys got a teeny bit of fishing in and we stayed up late roasting s'mores after the kids went to bed....it was a fun filled couple of days! We would do it again next weekend if anyone can talk the mosquitoes into leaving us alone! Bug spray obviously was not enough.

When we're not sick

We've been kind of sick the last few days. and that is never fun! It makes me appreciate my mom a lot more though when she would take care of me when I was sick and I wonder how many of those times she felt sick too.

This summer has been so much fun though! We love going on walks, running, biking, camping, swimming, horse riding and anything else we feel like! curt got a new landscaping summer job, so he's gone a lot more, but he feels better now having something to do to make money.

The kids keep me busy though! If I don't get them outside soon enough they start giving me hints like this:

And if I feel too lazy to go running they motivate me like this:

We went through a phase where Hailey would never eat breakfast. It was really frustrating! Finally I just set my bowl of cereal on her tray and she went down on it. I don't think Matthew was interested in cold cereal until he was 2.

Bear Lake Highlights 2011

Bear Lake was amazing this year. I don't think anyone lost anything. The drive was great because Curt fixed the A/C shortly before the trip. What a relief!

The kids slept GREAT in the tent! In fact the first night home I thought we might need to set the tent up in our back yard so Hailey would sleep good again since she was waking up every few hours for who knows what reason.

The cousins played and had a great time.

Hailey got her first job: dog walker :) she was in heaven

s'mores of course

Matthew spent both days at the beach almost entirely in this raft.

while Hailey had soooo much fun on the beach and wading in the shallows

Curt and I got fried. We even used sunscreen!

and we got a new family picture!

My Montage 7/5/11 at OneTrueMedia.com

I know I said I'd post this video on the last post, but the blogger quality was REALLY bad. So here it is. I put this on facebook too, but I think she is so stinking hilarious!

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

***Our first Rexburg 4th of July ***

I don't even know how long ago it was that my family started going to Bear Lake every year for the 4th of July. I was maybe 12 or so. After Curt and I got married we just continued with the tradition because it was a great time for all of my family to get together, almost a family reunion type thing (it started as the Thorson family reunion but that has since changed). This year my family couldn't all make it on the 4th, so we're going the weekend after. That meant we were able to experience what Rexburg has to offer! We had plans of going to Hamilton, but after losing Curt's wallet we had to be flexible!!! still looking for it by the way....

This is a million pictures, but basically we just went to the parade with some friends, the Telfords, and then ate pizza at the park and played volleyball and then cooked hotdogs, smores, and lit fireworks at my parents' place in the evening. On our drive home the firework show was still going on at the fairgrounds and we caught the last few minutes and finale of that. We had a GREAT day!!

the parade was so huge, and there were probably a million people there. I was afraid we wouldn't get a spot, but it turned out good!

The guys did a great job guarding the spot and collecting the candy from Matthew and Braden as they gathered it :)

Vanessa and I had the hard job, but the best view!!!

I loved this group of horses. How are they ALL the exact same color? Must have been a requirement to get into the club. They also brushed each of their rumps in a nifty checkerboard pattern. That was awesome, and probably my favorite thing of the entire parade.

Matthew would wave and chant "I want candy, I want candy!"

Hailey thought it was interesting, and just quietly observed most of the time in my arms or Curt's. I think she was overwhelmed with all of the people. This was the one time she let me put her down for a minute until an old lady sitting next to us said hello. Then we were right back to shy Hailey

There was a bird in the garden and Curt caught it. Maybe a juvenile Robin? I am not sure. obviously it wasn't a good flyer yet. Hailey was in love. She couldn't stop squeaking. I will post a video at the bottom of her saying bird over and over looking for it after Curt took it back.

the boys loved it too!

sparklers were Matthew's favorite thing of the day I think. He kind of got crazy because he was so excited, but we didn't have any accidents luckily! Just kind of close calls eeek!

here he is scaring us to death

Curt tried to make a sparkler bomb like he used to as a kid but apparently they have since debombifiabled the sparklers, because it didnt' work *sigh of relief* so they had to shoot these fountains at each other instead.

My favorite has always been the snakes for some reason, I think it's so strange to watch them grow. Sorry mom and dad for the black on the steps. We will scrub it out.

I love my little family! It is so much fun to get to celebrate holidays with our kids! Curt and I were talking later that night about how it's fun because it's fun for the kids, even though for ourselves it's not some grand amazing new experience. Isn't that funny how you think as a kid "I can't wait to grow up so I can do whatever I want" and then when you do grow up and have a family everything you want to do is the same stuff you did as a kid because you want your kids to have the best too. If that makes any sense.

Dress day

I worked really hard and sewed up a dress, kind of using Hailey's Easter dress as a pattern to follow.

Matthew thought it would be a good idea to try on the Easter dress until he got it on. Then he wasn't very happy about that. He said it was too pretty.

I was just shocked that an 18 month dress fit him.....

look at those legs!

Hailey likes to play with her sunglasses, but will never keep them on in the car.

Here's the dress that I made. I have to say I'm pretty proud of it. It took me longer that I thought. It looks really crooked in this angle but I swear it's not. It's not perfect, but I will never tell you the mistakes and you may not notice!

It fits!