Ward Campout - Two Brothers

After the Dinosaur Museum, Hailey headed up to Nana and Papa's for a few nights.  So it was just us and the boys when we headed to the ward campout that night.  We weren't able to stay the night since Jeremiah had an activity he had to be to early the next morning, but we decided to go up for dinner and hang out until dark.

Zach had a blast running around the campground with his friends.  At one point, they stopped to play games on one of the picnic tables and when Tate spotted his brother, he hurried right over there to join in.  I had to laugh at how he was trying to do just what Zach did.  If he stood up or got on his knees, Tate would too.

If he sat back down, so did Tate.

These two are so darling and I love watching Tate trying to be just like Zach.

Zach is a good and patient brother and takes good care of his little brother - I love these two boys!

Dinosaur Museum

All summer we have been getting together for our "play days."  I admit that I haven't been the best at getting many pictures taken.  I think most of that has to do with having a toddler than no longer will sit in a stroller and insists on running around and seeing everything himself.  With 3 kids and only 2 hands, I don't get much time to whip out my camera or phone.

Luckily I had some time to do it when we visited the Thanksgiving Point Dinosaur Museum last week.  Our first stop was in the "Tinkering" exhibit they had set up where the kids could discover and play with all sorts of things.  Tate and Libby spent time at the color/shape block table.

Tate of course grabbed all the green triangles right off the bat and didn't even look at any of the others.

Zach and Hailey spent most of their time at the sand table.  They had a turntable that would spin and you could dump sand on it and make all sorts of shapes and designs with different tools.  

They were having a blast!

We also took time to build some structures with some wood blocks. Papa would have been proud!

Tate was really concentrating on his work, not sure what he was building, but he was really into it.

After we finished that exhibit, we went into the Dinosaur Museum.  I thought for sure Tate would be afraid of all the dinosaur bones and such, but he didn't seem to be afraid at all.  Here are "most" of the kids (Elsee and Seton were sleeping in their strollers) in front of the big Brontosaurus skeleton.  It's amazing to think of how big those animals were!

And here they are in front of another exhibit - I think this was the quarry exhibit where they talked about recovering the bones from the ground.  Elsee woke up and was in the picture this time!

Of course we had to spend some time at the erosion table.  I think this was Tate's first time actually playing in the water, I think the last time we went to the Dinosaur Museum, he was just a baby!  

Hailey was doing something with all that sand, who knows what, but she was having a great time.

Zach is the only one I could get to actually look at me long enough to get a good picture.  Even though he's getting older, he still enjoys the erosion table too!

How is it that no one was afraid of this exhibit?  I thought both Tate and Libby would run screaming from the room, but not only were they not afraid, they walked straight up there and stood for a picture.  Zach and Hailey are giving us their best "raaarrrr!" faces.

Tate and Libby just hung out and didn't seem to mind that the likeness of a giant bloody-mouthed shark was just a few feet behind them.  We finally had to call them to move on when the time came - some things never cease to amaze me.

And last, but not least, the sand pits.  Here the kids are able to go into the sand boxes and uncover dinosaur bones that they have buried there.  They love this and although the air is filled with dust, it's one of the fun places we have to stop and play at.

Tate wasn't loving the sand, so he stood on the bench by me and watched his brother and sister do the digging.  He kept talking to them and telling them what to do next.  Guess he's working on his supervising skills.

Definitely a fun and exciting trip to the Dinosaur Museum!  Nana then bought everyone ice cream and rounded out the day on a sugar high.  The kids sure had a blast!

When Is It TIme To Buy Your Toddler A Helmet Of His Own?

Why, when he is so excited to wear one that he will wear his sister's pink princess one all during Cub Scout Pack Meeting.

He had no idea that he was wearing a "girls" helmet, then again, with an older sister, he's not quite up with what is for girls and what is for boys.  

He sure did look awfully cute though!  Guess we know what he's getting for Christmas this year!

The "Less than Mediocre" Show

July - it means two things - 4th of July and Fireworks.

It's hard to live up to Uncle Bubby's "Big Show."  Especially when you factor in the price of fireworks now-a-days.  Since when does a box of sparklers cost $6????  We put together a measly amount and then split it into 2 groups so that we could do fireworks for the 4th and 24th (Pioneer Day in Utah).  

Luckily for us, a very generous neighbor invited us over to join his family party for the 4th and he had spent a ton of money on fireworks - he had all the good ones, even the aerials and it was great!  We added our small, insignificant 1st group to his pile and felt like we maybe paid for the time spent sitting on his grass - maybe.  But we had a good time and are so grateful for their generosity in inviting us.

The 24th wasn't as spectacular.  We pulled out our 2nd group of fireworks and decided to just do them on our own.  Tate had to come home early during the neighbor's show because he was scared, so we decided to keep it low key so that he wouldn't be too afraid.

We started off with some sparklers (some of those $6 a box ones) and the kids loved them.  Zach is getting more and more brave and at some points actually scared us.  But we all survived and no lawn was damaged in the filming of these pictures!  :)

Hailey was all about the poses - she was quite the model when I was taking pictures.  

Tate wasn't quite sure about the fireworks at first, but after the first few, thought they were pretty fun.  

You'll notice all my kids are in the pj's.  We decided to bath and get all ready for bed so that we didn't have to do it so late after our fireworks were done.

Once we exhausted the sparklers, which took all of about 5 minutes, we moved on to the big ones.  Well, bigger than sparklers anyway.

It was almost comical lighting them and realizing how much they paled in comparison to the expensive, fancy ones we saw not two week earlier.

But the kids were still excited and loved them - they especially liked taking turns picking out the next one to do.

And bless their hearts, they were glued to the few we had to light.

Yes, the "less than mediocre" show lasted less than 15 minutes and most of that time was spent trying to take the paper off the fireworks to light.  But we still had fun and Tate managed to stay outside during the entire time, which for us was a success.  Guess I might want to start saving now for next year's fireworks so that we can at least move up the review to "mediocre."

Uh-oh look what somebody found!!!

With his love of motorcycles, it wasn't too surprising that he fell in love with this motorized bike when we saw it at Cal Ranch the other day.

He's already informed me that he wants it for Christmas.  

Jeremiah laughed and said he can just see it now - Tate cruising up the street on his motorcycle bike with his "I heart Mom" tattoo gleaming on his arm.

I just said:  "Yeah right."

Jeremiah said:  "To which one."

I said:  "BOTH!"

Hopefully this 3 year old won't remember this little item when it comes to making Christmas Lists because I'm not sure his mom's heart could take him having one of these!

Bybee Family Reunion

The middle of July is hot Hot HOT!  Luckily for us, the Bybee Family Reunion was at the Riverdale Splash Pad again this year and it was a fun day to run around and cool off!  Most of us adults sat around and talked while the kids played in the water.

Tate and Libby spent time on this little mushroom.  Tate spent most of his time just sitting on it and letting the water spray his feet.

Libby loved the water coming out of the bottom, she kept saying it tickled her feet!

Every once in a while the water would turn off and then all of a sudden it would come back on, much to the delight of these two buddies.

I had to include this one because it was just too funny!  Although the water isn't actually coming out where it appears to be, it definitely looks like it is.  I think Libby was trying to get each foot in one of the sprays, but it was a funny picture none-the-less.

We had most of the Grandma Bybee's great-grandkids there, so we restled them all over for a picture at one point.  I don't even know how many she has now!

Another fun activity was the pinata breaking.  Tate took a couple of whacks and almost broke it!

I'm noticing a very obvious lack of pictures of Zach and Hailey - to be honest they were running round so fast that every single one that I took of them (when I did manage to find them) was blurry!  So I guess here's where you use your imagination and picture them having a blast in the splash pad and whacking the pinata - just like Tate.

It was a fun reunion and it was great to see everyone.  We hope the tradition continues of doing it at the splash pad because we all have such a great time!

Daddy's Boy

Hanging out with Dad, watching some Sports Center.  

Nothing better than that!

Definitely a daddy's boy!

Hailey Chopped Her Hair!

Hailey has been begging me all summer to get her hair cut.  I have to admit that I loved it long and just didn't want to chop it, but I finally gave in when I realized it was her hair and up to her how she wanted it.

We couldn't get a hold of the lady in our ward that usually does it for us, but she didn't care as long as she got it done, so we jumped in the car and off to Fantastic Sams we went.  We explained how we wanted it and even though she didn't cut it as short as we had hoped, it still looked cute.

She was especially excited about the small amount of bangs on the side - she had been wanting those forever!

It's been fun the last few weeks getting used to doing it being so short, but she loves it.  And I think it's fun and light for the rest of the summer.  She is a beautiful girl and it probably wouldn't matter how we did her hair, she would be darling in any style!  I'm just a bit biased, but that's what moms get to say about their own children!  Love you Hailey!

Slurpees!

Who doesn't love a slurpee on a hot summer day?

Nothing like a little bit of cool going down your throat to make you happy!

Gotta love slurpees!

A Practical Joke

Anyone who knows my husband knows that he has this sense of humor that comes out at the strangest times.  It gets worse when he gets together with my brother - especially Taylor - I don't know what it is about the two of them together, but I swear the maturity level of each drops in each other's presense!

About a year or two ago, Jeremiah had this random idea of parallel parking in my grandma's driveway (yes the short way).  This little idea has taken off and now my husband and brother are trying to one-up each other each time they visit the other's house.  Well, a couple of weeks ago, Taylor and Amanda came down for a BBQ.  We had taken the kids to an afternoon movie and got back after they did.  Taylor of course parellel parked, blocking the driveway as his one-up.  So what does Jeremiah do?  Why, he blocks him in of course.

His Nissan was already in the driveway, so it was simple to just back it up right up to Taylor's Toyota.

There was absolutely no room to get in the drivers side - front or back doors.

And since we had the Pilot, Jeremiah decided to pull that up on the other side - so there was no way to get on the passenger side either.  Taylor thought it was hilarious and begged me to take pictures and post them.  I'm sure they'll laugh about this for years to come.

Luckily, Amanda thought it was just a funny, a good sense of humor is good to have if you are dating my brother!  Especially since he gets a little crazy when he gets around my husband!  We had a fun dinner and hanging out time and we were even gracious enough to move the cars when it was time for them to go.  We could have made Taylor climb in the back sliding window, but we decided to be kind, although I think a picture of that would have been hilarious!

As a side note, I did get plenty of questions about our "parking arrangements" in church the next day, so the neighbors must have thought we were all crazy!

Lehi Children's Parade

We usually try to make it to at least one parade during the summer.  Lehi has their Round-up the last week of June and this is usually when we get to one.  Luckily for us, they have a children's parade on the Friday Night before the big parade on Saturday and it's so much fun!  They have all the kids floats and throw tons of candy!  We were going to skip the children's parade and make it to the big parade this year, but a weather forecast of over a hundred that Saturday had us changing our plans last minute.  So off to the children's parade we went.  It was still hot and humid, but we took our umbrellas this time and managed to keep most of us in the shade.

We had to get a good spot, so there was a lot of waiting time at the beginning, but once the parade got going, the kids were all smiles.

Even Tate thought the parade was awesome!

Although I had to laugh, I ended up sitting behind the kids and Jeremiah in order to help position one of the umbrellas, so with the people just to the right of us having an umbrella as well, I couldn't see any of the floats until they were almost right in front of us.  But Tate, unaware of this fact, would always point and say "Look Mom!" as soon as he could see it - which was a bit earlier that I could.  He did it with every single parade entry.

Over and ...

.. Over.  It just made us laugh.

I had each of the kids pick out a favorite float and then I like to take a picture and post it as "their favorite."  It gives them something to do while they are watching and in between gathering candy.  So, without further, adieu, here are the favorites for this years parade:

Zach loved the shark float - what a surprise, he's been into this stuff lately, a sure sign he's getting older.

Hailey's favorite were the groups after groups of cheerleaders.  Another big surprise, she seems to be obsessed with cheerleading lately.  Luckily for her, it seems they have cheer squads for every grade from 7th on up, so we saw a bunch of them - she was in heaven!

Tate had a couple of favorites, but I think his most favorite was this one with the wizard of oz theme, but more because it had a ton of green than anything else.  Did I mention his favorite color is green???

Yes, we had a blast at the parade, despite the heat.  The kids all came home with tons of candy and smiles on their faces - not bad at all.