Dress-Up

This boy takes "dressing up" to a whole new level.  Well, at least he's wearing clothes. 

Power of Peer Pressure

I'm pretty sure these little battery powered vehicles were made for the sole purpose of making fools out of parents as they run like hell to keep their kids from smashing into trees or running over their friends.

Cole and Jack were recently at a birthday party where they had these cute little cars and 4 wheelers.  I have always been dead set against the boys having these...but seriously, those smiles?  It may be worth it.

 

Bear Lake

Every year, we go up with the Thomsen's to Bear Lake.  It brings back such good memories of going to Lake Powell as a kid, and after every trip I swear that we will someday get a boat.  

We spent our first day at a beach close to our rented cabin.  Unfortunately, the lake was high, so we were left with beach that was a little rough on the feet.  (Kind of like a spa treatment...with gravel.)  But the boys enjoyed just being on the beach and riding in the inflatable boats.

Cole and Mitchell

Jack's usual "I DO IT!" approach.

Check out those ears!

Jack conned Grandma Thomsen into feeding him fruit by the foot by hand.  I anticipate that he will be a lawyer or perhaps a carnie one day.

That night was a tough one for us.  The kids were up at 1:30, 2:30, 3:00, 3:30, 4:30, and then got up for the day at 6:00.  Everyone was pretty grumpy.  Unfortunately, this did not set a good tone for our morning activity, which was hiking Minnetonka Cave.  That mother is 441 stairs in and 441 stairs out.  They are mostly hand-cut stone stairs, which makes them so slick.  Jack decided early on that he would not be walking.  He also decided that he would scream if anyone besides me dared to touch him.  I'm pretty sure that was the longest hour and a half of my life.  

Before the torture began.

From there, we went to the north shore of the lake, where the sand was soft and the sun was out.  The true fun of the day started and everyone was much happier.

Cole loved playing in the waves and building canals and lakes with his cousins.  He also enjoyed smearing mud over his entire body.

Jack stayed mostly in the shallows and had the most fun pulling things behind him.  

Like boogie boards,

And wagons.

It was a great little break from the day-to-day routine, and everyone came away happy and exhausted. 

About Time

I'm embarrassed to say that we haven't been hiking much this year.  Cole loves it, but Jack is a little harder.  He's too big for a backpack, but still a little young to make it on a long hike by himself.  So, we do a lot of carrying.  Which is SO much fun for Bryce and I.  

We did make it up to Alta with some good friends recently, and hit it right when the flowers were blooming.  Beautiful!

Let me just tell you how much these four boys crack me up.  So cute!

Camping

Bryce and I have always liked to camp, but since Jack was born, we've been a little intimidated by taking the boys.  In July, we bit the bullet and braved the Uinta's with some friends.  It was so much fun, and the boys did surprisingly well.  The loved hiking to the river and throwing rocks.

Jack loved covering himself with dirt - especially since Mom didn't make him stop!

The dogs loved having kids around who would conveniently drop food for them to snatch up.

Cole and Bryce spent a lot of time building this incredible little hut out of sticks.  Cole painstakingly covered the sticks with pieces of bark.

We were also able to enjoy the 4-wheelers that Jeremy and Kelly brought up.  Those things are addictive!

We all had so much fun that some of us didn't want to come home.  This is Cole's actual reaction when we told him it was time to leave.  He thought we were going to live in the mountains forever. 

A good time was had by all!

Big Wheels Keep on Turning

So, pretty much everyone knows that physical activity is not my strong suit.  Like when you have to play Legos on the floor and get ALL the way up into a standing position afterwards?  Ugh.

But, this year, Shan convinced me that activity in the form of two wheels might be kind of fun.  I began going to spin with her and dragging my sorry self onto the bike every so often.  We signed up for two all women's rides this year - 40 miles on Goldilocks and 50 miles on Little Red.  Those numbers seemed really doable when I had 4 months to prepare.

Goldilocks was in Herriman in May.  The morning of the ride, I woke up to the drum of rain on our roof.  Shan and I were undeterred and decided to just give it a go.  The first 10 miles were completely miserable.  Water trickled into my shoes, and I could feel it slosh back and forth with each pedal stroke.  Without mud guards, the water sprayed from my tires pretty much everywhere.  And I mean EVERYWHERE.  Ahem.  At the 10 mile mark, we considered turning back and just doing 20.  But some pride kicked in, and we decided to just go for it.  It was one of the hardest things I've ever done.  But four hours later, we rolled across the finish line - we had done it!

I was proud of myself, but couldn't really envision doing 10 more miles, and began to dread Little Red.  The event was June 1st up in Logan.  That morning, our team joined the other 50 milers and began the race.  It was an absolutely beautiful day, and the course was fantastic.  No false flats, no strong winds, just a beautiful blue sky and open road.  About 10 miles from the end, I just kept thinking, "I'm doing this!  Overweight me is doing it!"  50 miles may not be much to a seasoned rider, but it was definitely a big deal for me.  It was a wonderful experience, and I hope to do it again next year!

July 4th Fun

The 4th of July is always fun, even though it fell on a Thursday this year (which means I got to work on Friday).  We started out the day with our neighborhood's annual bike parade and BBQ, which was so much fun as always.  That night, we had Grandma and Grandpa Thomsen, along with the Burker family over for food and fireworks.  

This was Jack's first year with fireworks, and he loved them - even the loud ones.  He quickly figured out how much fun the snappers were....

 And Aunt Leslie showed him how much fun sparklers were...

 But all he wanted to do was douse them.

 Our neighborhood was so crazy with aerial fireworks, we all decided we didn't miss the professional shows we could have gone to.

All in all, a pretty great day!