Family pictures

We had some new family pictures taken and they turned out really cute. I put most of them on the side of the blog. I can't believe how big the kids are getting.

2 out of three cooperating isn't bad. It still turned out cute though

The time has finally come to give Baby H a new name here on my blog. She's simply not a baby anymore. I went through all of the nicknames she has here at home. Little Man always says 'hey girl' or 'sweetheart'. Those didn't work. I finally decided that Little Princess fits her well. So Baby H will now be called Little Princess.

In other news this week. Big man went to the dentist this week. He has two cavities :( but he also has a loose tooth. I was floored. He keeps talking about when he loses his teeth. I told him he had to be 6 to lose his teeth. That was around the age his cousin did. I had no idea that at 4 1/2 he'd already be starting. It seems like just yesterday we were working on getting them all in and now they'll be gone :) He was pretty excited though. He's going to save his tooth fairy money for a slurpee :)

The Kiddos

I wanted to take a picture of the kids before church. Baby H got some new dresses and they're adorable. I can't believe how big she's getting. She's 10 months tomorrow. This picture was taken on the rock garden in our backyard. Jeff created it last summer-pretty good huh.

24th Festivities and Other Fun

Happy Birthday 'HeHe'. We have two 24th of July birthdays in the family. Cousin 'Hehe' and Jeff's sister Emily. Although Emily lives in Idaho, so it's not a holiday there :) We had a fun party

A vision in yellow. Grandpa with Baby H. We didn't plan it.

I can't for the life of me get this picture to rotate. So turn your head. The kids played a bunch of games and had a riot. Here's the 3-legged race.

Gunnie sack (pillowcase) race. This was a favorite.

The bean bag toss. Kids went first.

Then the adults went. It got a little crazy.

One of the bean bags ended up on the roof. Big and little man got to retrieve it.

It was a fun party. In addition to our family, my Grandpa, Aunt, and cousins joined us. It was fun to get together with them. Two of my cousins have babies just younger than Baby H (one with twins). It was fun to let all of the girls play. They are all adorable and I of course didn't get any pictures. Oh well, next time.

Imaginations at work.

I wonder why when imaginations are at work, messes are bound to be made. The boys are definitely creative. On this particular day, we were getting ready for a (pretend) party. Big man got plates out for everyone.

And then proceeded to make lunch for all-peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (on Ritz crackers), carrots, and capri suns. Great fun.

Baby H is a little monkey. I was hoping we could be in the crawling only stage for a while. She moved right into the climbing and pulling herself up stage.
Don't you love her little belly hanging over the couch :)

It's been a fun and busy week with more to follow this upcoming week.

Lamb Day and other fun.

Yesterday was my 8th annual Lamb Day in Fountain Green. It's always fun to see Jeff's friends and family. I just don't understand why it has to be so blasted hot. The kids had a great time at the parade. They got enough candy to last weeks. We also spent some time at the Hanson home with friends and family. The rest of the afternoon was spent in the park. I took the boys to play some games. They got lots of fun prizes (most of which are already broken) After that they played on the playground. The nice thing about the playground is that it's completely shaded. I pushed big man on the swing for what seemed like forever. After a while he said, mom I'm going to throw up. He threw up on the grass. I think he got a mild case of heat stroke. We poured some water on his head and gave him lots to drink. He was fine after that. Poor little dude. It was a fun day, but I was sure happy to have air conditioning both in the car and at home.

In other news, Baby H is finally crawling. She never did the army crawl like the boys. She went straight to hands and knees. It's fun to watch her. She's also pulling herself up on stuff. She's a little monkey :) I will get some pictures this week!!!

Last week for family home evening, we tried something fun to help the boys clean up their language. Apparently my mom did this with me and my brother when we were young. Now their language is not horrible, but definitely not nice words for little boys to be saying. The word of choice around here is 'poop'. I wrote a bunch of words on some word strips and put them into a bowl. There were both nice words and naughty words on the strips. The boys took turns picking out the words and deciding if it was a nice word or a naughty word. The naughty ones got thrown in the garbage.
They had so much fun with this activity that once it was over, big man wanted to do more. He got out his markers and paper and wanted to write some more words. "Mom how do you spell penis? Nothing like spelling out words like this for your son to throw in the garbage. It helped for about a day, now big man is back to his 'potty mouth'. Any suggestions from you experts out there???

Duh...

So we've had a busy and awesome week and I haven't used my camera once. Last night Jeff and I went to his best friend's wedding. 31 years, 1 month, and 17 days in the making. It was awesome. It was a beautiful wedding, and we had a wonderful time visiting with his family and friends. It was fun. Really wish I had some pictures.

During that same exact time was our neighborhood parade and carnival. My parents were nice enough to take the kids for us. We didn't have to twist my dad's arm too much because he got to ride on the fire truck with the boys. I don't know who was more excited-my dad or the boys. They ended the parade at the park down the street from us, got sprayed by water, had snowcones and popcorn, got prizes at the fish pond, and then returned to grandma and grandpa's house. It was a busy night. They all had a blast and were totally exhausted. I think my favorite is the toy whistle Little man got at the Fish Pond. What were they thinking :)

Today I learned that I'm grateful for power. The power went off right around the time I was going to start making dinner. I promised the boys we could make banana bread muffins as well and that didn't happen. I couldn't defrost anything in the microwave. The house was too hot to sit n without the air on. I couldn't vacuum, play on the computer, or even use my laptop. I realized that I am spoiled. We ended up sitting in the shade in our front yard watching the "nice workers" down the street fix the power. It was kind of nice to just sit and relax with the kids, but at the same time, I felt like I should be doing something.

4th of July

We had a great 4th of July. We spent the weekend with Jeff's family. The boys had a lot of fun with their cousins. I didn't get pictures of the whole weekend, but here are a few highlights. We went for a picnic and 'nature walk'. Here are six of the nine grandkids on the Hansen side of the family. The other three now live in Hawaii. Maybe next year we can visit them :)
Uncle Andy with all of the boys.

Big and Little Man exploring the stream. It was blazing hot this day.

On the 4th we went to a neighborhood kid's parade. They had a fire truck there that led the parade. The boys got to pose before it started.

At the end of the parade, the fire men hooked up their hoses and sprayed the kids. They also let the kids try it out. Big Man had a BLAST.
Little Man on the parade route. It was quite a long parade for those little legs. He did really well.

We had a fun weekend. It was fun to spend time with family and to take a break from the every day routine. Now it's back to work :)

Riverton Carnival

We've had a very busy week. The festivities began on Wednesday evening when we went to the Riverton City carnival. We went last year and the boys had a blast. This year we went with cousins and grandma and grandpa as well. Everyone had a great time.

Baby H didn't want to miss out on the fun. I took her on the merry-go-round and she LOVED it. She cried and screamed when it was over and I took her off. She's getting so big.