The Joys of June

We had a lot of fun events in June, so I will warn you that this is a very long post.

The kids had their last few days of school June 2nd.  

Every Thursday, the entire school year, Jeff wore the same shirt to school.  Thursday is PE day and his shirt shows how confidant he is at athletics.

On the kids last day they always do Field Day at the elementary.  I've gone and helped every year, and this year we were there again.

Here's Jeff with his teacher, Ms. M.

Here's Cedric with his teacher, Mrs. L.  Both boys had great teachers this year.

Lily decided to miss her last day of school and come help me and Sophie with Field Day.  We were in charge of the water station, which was nice, because it was in the shade and I'd get wet occasionally refilling the igloo.  The activities they had at the field day were not super exciting, so the kids (and teachers) had a hard time lasting the full three hours.

That night, Tom, Jeff and Cedric went down to Levan, Utah for the Fathers and Sons camp-out.  They got to go four wheeling, shoot clay pigeons, eat yummy food, sleep in a tent and have a devotional.

The boys loved the four wheelers!

I went out with my friends, Tiffany and Chris while Lily and Sophie had a girls night.  We went to Brick Oven Pizza and sat there talking in the restaurant for FOUR HOURS!

The next day we had the traditional Bhurd BBQ (a party put on by my cousin's real estate company).  Here's my cousin, Bryan and Uncle Doug in our selfie.  They always put on a great party.

The kids love the face painting, snow cones, bounce houses and cotton candy.  Lily brought a friend and they had fun going around the park taking pictures of nature.

The next Tuesday we went to the West Jordan pool to swim with our friends, Kristi and kids.  Lily opted to stay home and clean her room.

That night, Tom surprised Cedric and took him to see "Captain Underpants".  Cedric had been excited to see it after reading the book, and he doesn't get to do things with just his dad too often.

We went swimming the next day at the dairy pool.  It's so peaceful there, and I enjoy relaxing while the kids swim.

Thursday we were heading up to our cabin for the weekend.  Tom was at work and I had to drop Cedric off at his autism assessment across town.  I had two hours to get home, run errands, finish packing, load up the van and be back to pick Cedric up.  We were a little late, but he just waited in the waiting room with the iPad until we got there.  I literally threw everything in the back of the van.

We picked up Cedric, grabbed some lunch and picked up some Papa Murphy's pizza and then headed up to the cabin.  We were the first ones there, but Candalyn's family and Mike's family soon arrived.

We enjoyed the day playing games,

trying to catch squirrels,

playing volleyball,

basketball,

and the traditional Candy Bar Game.  Tom and Aimee's family arrived that evening.

Of course, we enjoyed the zipline too.

You're never too old to take a turn on the zipline.

We played some more games that evening.  And the kids tried to settle down in their beds upstairs.

Jeff was sleeping downstairs with the big boys.  However, about 1am he came in our room and was unable to sleep downstairs because he was scared.  I moved him to the top bunk, because no one else was there, and he fell asleep just fine.  I, however, had a very hard time falling asleep after that.

Friday we woke up to a very nice day.  The kids quickly congregated at the zip line again.

Sophie loves going on the zip line with her dad.

So in all my frantic packing, I'd forgotten to pack any extra shirts for myself.  Luckily, Jessica had an extra shirt and so I sported the Granger Lancers T that day.

Tom had spotted a moose, so he and I took the kids on a walk to find it.

We spotted not only the adult moose, but her baby as well.  You can't tell in the picture, but they are in the dark area of the trees above Lily's head.  

Here's some better pictures of the adult moose.

We continued onto the Moon cabin, which is located near a very steep hill.  Tom (aka Curious George) decided to go down the hill and several of the kids went with him: Lily, Michael, Marcus and Jeff.

Caleb, John, Cedric, Grace, Sophie and Adair stayed with me.  (Although, Cedric wanted to go).

They had fun exploring the river below, but I was nervous about them falling into the rushing current.  Thankfully everyone came back and was accounted for.

We were waiting a while for them to return and the little girls were getting bored.  So I left Cedric with Caleb and John and headed back with the girls.  Although they had fun picking dandelions as we walked, I was nervous about running into the moose, so I kept my eyes and ears open.  Luckily, we made it back to the cabin without any moose sighting.

We enjoyed some more games and mingling.

Then we had dinner all together.

Candalyn had to leave to catch a flight, so we got a picture of the group before she headed out.  Tyler made it up later that night, and we missed Dad, Suzy, Aubree, (uncle) Caleb and Nate who are on missions or live in Germany.

The kids are showing how dirty they were by the end of the day.

These two sure have fun together.

We enjoyed another evening of visiting and snacks, this time sleeping much better at night.

The next morning we got up and got ready to head home.  We packed up and cleaned the cabin.

The kids had fun outside with their cousins before heading home.  Cedric caught a butterfly.

We had such good weather at the cabin, although Saturday was cooler than the other days.  By the following Monday, it had dropped in the valley from the 80's to the 60's!  Cedric had his first scout camp that morning and was a bit teary with some anxiety.  However, he went and was ok.  Except it was cold and rainy so they had to come home after only a few hours.  The next day was even colder and so they had to re-schedule his camps all together.

Monday night we had a small break from the rain and had a pleasant neighborhood barbecue party.  These two crazy kids played in the sprinklers until they were soaked to the bone!  It was a cold night, so I thought they were crazy to want to play in the water!

Luckily the weather was perfect for going to the zoo on Wednesday.

Tom's sister, Teresa invited us since she had a zoo pass and could get some of us in for free.  We were grateful for the discount and for a fun outing with Teresa.

These lion drinking fountains have been at the zoo as long as I could remember.

They also had their giant bug exhibit going on and had pretend bugs all over the zoo.

We were planning on going to the bird show, and wanted to get there a few minutes early to get good seats.  We decided to eat lunch real quick, right outside the bird show.  We sent the kids on ahead while Teresa and I cleaned up lunch.  We were literally two minutes behind them and got to the gate right at 1:00, but they wouldn't let us in.  I was glad the kids got in and I stood on the cement ledge in the back and could actually see the show pretty good.

We went to another show, not quite as exciting and geared more towards younger kids.  However, they picked Jeff twice to help or answer questions and Cedric was pretty upset by it.  Here he is reluctantly petting the millipede.  He told me after it was the worst day ever.

He wanted to play in the splash park, and was upset about that too, so he hid from Teresa and I.  I could see him hiding, and he'd run whenever he saw us looking at him.  It was really frustrating, but I finally caught him and asked him what he'd do in my shoes.  He realized that running off meant no splash pad and came with me to see the sea lion show instead.  He was much better after that.

However, Jeff was getting one of his headache's so he wanted to go too.  We still had a few things to see and so we quickly finished looking at the animals.

Cedric was so excited about the gorillas.

And the baby orangutan was so cute!

Cedric still wanted to go to the splash pad and Sophie wanted to go to the playground.  Jeff still wasn't feeling good and Lily was done, so I sent them back to the van with the keys to sit in the AC while I quickly took the little ones to the playground.

Overall it was a good Zoo day, even with a few hiccups with the boys.

Our awesome neighbors let us swim in their above-ground pool whenever, so the kids have had fun there a few times.

Cedric wanted his annual Mohawk for the summer.

We compromised with a half Mohawk.

 This made him look a little like Yando from "Guardians of the Galaxy".

We enjoyed a weekend barbecue party with Da Guys group (Tom's high school buddies).

The kids only see each other about three times a year, but they all have fun and enjoyed playing games, swimming and running around with all the other kids.

Father's Day was a nice day.  We didn't go anywhere for dinner, but had a nice meal of baby-back ribs at home.  Then we went to Tom's parents house to wish his dad happy Father's Day.

These kids are sure lucky to have such an amazing dad!  

They gave him a new shirt.  It references the new "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2" movie.  "Any man can be a father.  But it takes someone special to be a Daddy".

I also got to Skype with my dad.  I missed him a lot this Father's Day.

The women in our ward always bring something for the men to pick from on Father's Day, some sort of goody.  Tom picked this fancy Father's Day cake.  Which is funny, since our family isn't big cake eaters.  The kids thought it looked good though, so he picked it.  And it was pretty tasty.

We got together the following Monday with our friends from our old neighborhood, Dawn, Brysen (Jeff's friend) and Tyler (Lily's friend).  It was fun to see them and catch up.

The next day I dropped Lily off at Dell and Teresa's house.  She went with them on an 18 day trip to Texas and learned how to kite and motor paraglide.  It was hard to say good bye to her for so long.

Sophie missed her a lot and made letters for her, which she put in Lily's room for her when she got back.

Although my best helper and main babysitter was gone, she had an amazing time in Port Aransas, TX, learning so much about flying.  It was a dream come true!

Most of our summer we just sit around, I sleep in and the kids play on electronics.  We don't get a lot done.  So one day I got Jeff's turtle, Tank out of his tank and set him on the floor by Jeff.  This turned out to be a great project for the kids.  They had fun taking him "swimming" outside and made mazes for him inside.

For Jeff's date night he picked Airborne Trampoline arena. 

He and Tom both tried the Ninja obstacle course.  Tom did great at it!

Jeff struggled.  And I didn't even try.  It looked really hard!

We had a fun time, and then we went to Sonic afterwards for shakes

For one of our mutual activities we went to a ropes course on a Friday afternoon.  We had some fun team building activities and then we got to go on a giant swing at the end.

It was fun, and I even attempted a few flips. 

While I was at the ropes course, Jeff got to go with his friend, Cedar to Taylorsville Dayzz and went on all the carnival rides.

Sophie and Cedric went to one of Sophie's preschool friends house, Raegan.  Raegan's mom took them to a relatives pool and they had fun swimming all day.

Because Lily was in Texas, Jeff was at Taylorsville Dayzz, and Tom was in Logan, it left just me and the two youngest that evening.

We went to Del Taco for dinner.  It was nice to be down to just two kids for the evening.

Unfortunately, Jeff got a very bad migraine the next day.  He said he's never had one so bad and thought He would die!  He got a priesthood blessing, and felt much better the next day.

That same day (Saturday, June 24th). Tom and his brother, Eric participated in the MS bike ride along with his friends, Dee and Angelyn.  He's been doing the bike ride fore several years now.

The following Wednesday, the kids, my friend Kristi and her kids, and Aimee's boys, Marcus and Caleb, and Grandma Kay went up to the cabin for the day.  I had to wax the red floor in the cabin for our families cleaning assignment, and I brought Kristi to help since none of my family was available and I was really nervous about how to do it, since I'd never waxed a floor before.  It really wasn't bad and we had a good time.  The kids mainly stayed outside and even Jeff commented on how fun it was to go up there.  

There's a new splash park in Bluffdale that EVERYONE has gone to it seems.  So one day Maren and I decided to take our kids.  It was crazy crowded, but the kids had a good time.

Cedric got to go to scout camp again, this time the weather was much better.  Tom went up with him the first day, and he had so much fun!  He was a little anxious the second day, since his dad wouldn't be there, but did just fine.  I was down to just Jeff and Sophie that day and they got along so good and it was a very pleasant two days.  It's amazing how no matter which kids you take out of the group, fewer kids are just easier.  Plus, it gives them a chance to spend one-on-one time with siblings they don't normally spend time with.

The following Thursday we had a pool party with my cousin, Shelley and her husband, Tyson and their four boys.  Jeff was in heaven having so many boys his age to play with!  Sophie was very outnumbered.

After the party, Tom and I went and picked up our new (used) dining table.  Our chairs were starting to become too wobbly and it was time to replace our table of 12+ years.  We'd gone looking at several tables the night before, but they were around $200-$250 and we weren't sure which one would be best for us.  Then I found another one, went and looked at it the next day and decided to buy it.  This one is used, but nicer than ours and was only $75 for the whole set!  Plus, we didn't want something brand new while our kids are still destroying things growing up.

We had my cousin, Rosey's wedding reception in my Grandma's yard.  We had fun and enjoyed taking Grandma Kay with us.  We went to Joe Morley's for dinner and my great aunt Barbara's viewing that night too.

Jeff got to be our main babysitter with Lily gone and did a pretty good job!  It was nice to see him take the role of the oldest child seriously.

Wow! June was sure a busy month!  If you made it all the way through this long post, good for you!