REAL Soccer Game!

 We had a great time at the soccer game in Salt Lake one night! We signed our kids up for soccer and got a great deal on tickets! It was a lot of fun to watch professional soccer game.

Me and my sweet boy! He actually did better than I thought he would do! He liked all that was happening around the stadium! 

 What a cute girlie! She is a great soccer player!

 My boyz! That Caleb sure is an awesome soccer player! He had four goals in one game this season! He really has come along way!

And some day Carder will play soccer too! Love this kid!

The Smokin' Solar S'more!

One of Ty's projects for 4th Grade was making a Solar S'more. We made it at home together but he had to take it to school and demonstrate how it worked. Everyone in his class made a Solar S'more but they were all different!

Ty made his Solar S'more out of a Pizza Box. He named his the 'Smokin' Solar S'more!' On the day of the presentations they tested them outside to see if they would work. Believe it or not it worked! Thank goodness it was a sunny day!

Carder was happy to see Ty and see what he was doing. He was most excited to help eat some of the graham crackers!! I'm really proud of Ty for working so hard on his solar s'more. He did a really great job!

Silly Sleeper!!

My sweet baby Carder cracks me up! He is such a silly kid, even when he sleeps! Carder is such a great sleeper! When I lay him down he waves 'bye-bye' it's pretty dang adorable! The other cute thing is finding Carder in all sorts of wacky sleeping positions as he sleeps! Love, love love this Carder boy!

What's up with this pose!? Feet in the air like he is doing the splits! 

 

And then there is the arm through the rail! 

 

Who knows how he managed that move!

 

This is Carder's favorite night-night blankey!! He loves this blanket! He just squeels with delight when he holds his blanket! 

I love that Carder wakes up so happy and cheerful!

The other thing I love when Carder wakes up is his fuzzy hair!!  Yup! He has his daddy's bed head!

Carder gets this cute little fuzzy duck tail in the back! I love it and I love this baby boy!! What a sweet little guy!

Another Beautiful Play Day!

I am loving the beautiful autumn weather we have been having!! It is definitely too nice to pass up! After school one day we played at the park in Wellington all afternoon! We had a great time!

Carder is so big! He can now climb up the stairs, the slides, and even onto my kitchen table! NOOOO!!

Help me! Let me out!

The kids love all the tall slides at this park!

For some reason she kept wanting me to take her picture! She is such a cute girl!

It will be a sad day when Ty no longer wants to play at the park! Today was almost that day! He seemed too big to go to the park, but I think he was just disappointed his friend couldn't come!

It's a good thing Mara has such long legs!

My little buddy enjoys the park more and more each time we go!

I'm pretty sure that is not how you are suppose to do the monkey bars!

Hold on tight Caleb! Don't fall!

Mara must be part monkey because she sure is good at the monkey bars! She can even skip a few!

One of Caleb's favorite things to do is rock climb!

Pretty sure he was having a blast at the park, I could tell with the permanent smile on his face!

These are my favorite kids in the entire world! My life. My joy. My four best friends!

Another home improvement project: DONE!!

Oh the joys of home improvement...or should I say the pain in the ..... of home improvement!?! We have had this project hanging over our heads forever!! Looking back now we should have just left it alone and not done anything but what's done is done and I'm glad it is DONE!

 We had this great idea to replace our fireplace, re-tile it, put a new mantel, really make this room look amazing! The fireplace we had didn't work very well. It burned wood but filled our room with smoke and was not efficient. The tile job was hideous. So ugly! Nate is amazing at tiling and he could really do a great job. We decided to take the old fireplace out and put in a new wood burning stove. Sounds easy enough right?! Wrong! We started this project six or seven months ago! It has been hanging over our heads and we have had problem after problem ever since we started.

After we took out the old fireplace and bought a new fireplace we had a contractor come look at our project only to find out our new wood burning stove did not meet code.  We would need to hire a mason and have a new chimney built. Then we would have to install a new flue. So basically another $3000+!! Great, just great!  Ok, scratch that idea. Let's just wall it up, save the money and move on with life!

So that is just what I did! While Nate went on his second fire I decided it was time to finish this project! He couldn't come home until it was done! My dad happened to be down visiting for a couple days and we were quite the team getting this job done!

This is the fireplace before. The grout was all nasty. The tile job was not done well! We bought all new tile and hearth stones. It was going to look amazing!

Our front room prior to a lot of work! We started the demolition long ago. Nate and my dad even made an awesome and very sturdy platform to hold the new fireplace. When we decided to wall it all up we had to take that out. 

Before we could do anything we had to fix a leaky roof! That was a project in itself! But we stopped the chimney from leaking and then built a frame for the hole in the wall!

Next sheet rock over the hole! What a mess! My entire house fell apart while we worked hard on this one room!

With a lot of spackle and some sanding the hole was gone! Enough spackle can fix anything!!

My dad did an amazing job fixing my wall! Who knew he was a professional?!! 

 

I know my dad loves me because he serves me every time he comes down to Price!! I couldn't have done this job without him! Thank you dad for all your help!! I owe you big time!!

 

You can barely tell there used to be a fireplace in that wall!  I textured the wall so it matched the rest of the wall.

 

 Then I did a couple coats of paint!! But I wasn't done yet!

Last thing I had to do was the crown molding and trim on the floor. Yikes! I have never done this before! But I could give it a try! First time using a power saw! It was pretty awesome! With a little spackle it looks nearly perfect! I have found I get a lot more done while Nate is gone because I can work until wee hours of the night when the kids are in bed! Boy won't he be surprised when he gets home!  Well...Nate was very shocked when he walked in the door! He stood there for a minute just looking in amazement! The kids ran in to hug him and they all said "Look daddy what Mommy did while you were gone!" Nate was very happy to have it done and was grateful that he didn't have to think about this project anymore!

The finished room! I love, LOVE, LOVE it! I am glad that we didn't put in the fireplace. It makes the room bigger! Nate helped put in the new light fixture and yes, we even bought a new piano!

One last Summer Fling!!

It was a sad day when school started, the weather wasn't as hot, and our fun times had to come to an end! While Ty and Mara were at school the boys had one last hurrah playing in the water in the backyard! Actually Ty and Mara came home soon after and they all loved playing together like it was a relaxing summer day again!

Brrrr! It might have been a pretty hot day but the water in our pool was very chilly! Carder is not sure if he likes the cold pool water!

Caleb checking out his new super soaker he won!! He could barely lift this thing! He had a lot of fun running around spraying it!

Carder tried picking out all the grass from the pool one by one!!

This is by far one of my favorite pictures of Caleb!! He got these spy glasses and thought they would make good swimming glasses! After dunking his head in the pool water filled his glasses and he decided they weren't so good for water sports after all!! What a funny kid!

 Carder is trying to figure out what Caleb is doing with his head in the water!  It doesn't take much sometimes to have a fun afternoon! I loved the giggles and smiles of the day! Keeping cool and playing in the water! Grateful for fun days in the sun!

Playin' at the park!

Before the weather turned cold I took Caleb and Carder to the park on an almost daily basis! The days were perfect for two pals to play at the park! Carder loved discovering this new world of climbing, sliding, and digging in sand! Oh boy he is really growing up fast!

They might not look like brothers but they are best of buddies like brothers! 

Even matching shirts and all!!

 I can't believe my baby is walking!! It was the cutest watching him take baby steps around the park!

Caleb liked taking Carder down the twisty slide! 

Carder is already trying to do whatever his big brother does! Caleb climbs up the slide...Carder is right behind him! 

How did he do that?! Carder just couldn't quite make it up the slide like Caleb could!!

I absolutely love these perfect days I have with my two buddies! Especially Caleb, this being our last year together before he goes to kindergarten! I'm glad we can have fun memories together!

I'm sure glad we took advantage of the nice beautiful weather while we did! I miss those warm mornings at the park already!

This little guy sure loves being outside! Oh the life of a one year old--swinging in the swing, sliding down the slides, carefree and happy! How it would be to be this age again with no problems in the world!!