Trip to Washington

August 4th we flew to Spokane to visit Scott's parents. Here are some pictures from our 2 week trip.

In a nutshell we....
We visited Scott's parents in Deer Park.
Then drove to Silverdale to visit Scott's Aunt Marcia and her husband Greg.
We visited their son Chris in Everett.
Then took a ferry to visit their other son, Mike and his family in Bellingham. (I had never been on a ferry so I found this to be most exciting.)
Scott, the boys, and I took a day trip to see Olympia, Lacey, and Lakewood. (Scott was raised in this area.)
We went back to Deer Park for a day before heading to Hamilton, Montana to see Scott's Great Aunt and Uncle, LaRose and Marshall.
Then back to Deer park for more visiting. (We decided to break the traveling up would be great for the boys...didn't want to do too much driving all at once.)
Scott's Sister, Kammi, and her son, Ryan, came to Deer Park to visit us before we left. We flew into San Diego on August 17th. We had a great time!!

August...we are almost all caught up

Summer school ended July 30th :) We headed down to Encinitas (San Diego) to see my parents. (It is a 2 1/2 hour drive.)


We went to the Wild Animal Park, on Saturday, August 1st. You know how I said we got those season passes for the Zoo?? Well, the Wild Animal Park is a different location with different animals and it is all included in the same season pass. We enjoyed it, even though it was soooo hot.


Here is our little family :) Jacen was hiding from the camera.

My parents (I thought it would be good to get some pictures in the shade....I wasn't thinking about the shadows)

A Cheetah at meal time. There were three of them and they each went to their cement platform to receive their meal.





Monkeys...a baby and its mother saying hi to the crowd.

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A picture of a look down into the Journey into Africa tour. We took the bus tour to see all the animals in their large living spaces. Animals such as Rhinos, Giraffes, Ostriches, Long horn Sheep, etc.

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When we went to get our stroller....I saw this and needed to snap a picture.

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The large Lion on top of a Jeep. I can't believe how big he is. This has got to be my favorite picture!

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On August 3rd, we enjoyed a day at the beach with my Sister Blythe and her kids (Siena came along too). It was Brycen's first time at the beach. He loved it. Unfortunately, the pictures that we thought we were capturing didn't come out. Blythe's camera is somehow broken. Jacen had a lot of fun jumping waves with his dad and cousins. The kids also had a blast playing in the large hole that Scott dug for them. We all had a great time.

End of July

Scott having 3 day weekends is super nice! I was ready to spend one weekend at home doing all my "honey do list" items. This finally happened the 3rd weekend of July. However much I wanted to go to the beach I was needing a break from all our trips.

The 4th weekend of July we headed to Payson, Utah. Mike, Scott's nephew, was receiving his Eagle Scout on Saturday, July 25th. On the way we stopped in St. George and visited my Aunt Lonnie, and cousin Jen (and Uncle Don and the boy cousins too). That is where we stayed on Thursday night. Friday Jacen got to see all the animals :)

We got to make a special trip to meet Ethan Elmer. My friend Eliza had him only 2 weeks before our visit. (Brycen was just over 5 months.) I am sure their size wont be so extreme next time we visit.

Annie is only 4 months older than Jacen. They enjoyed all the visiting time, because that meant that they got to play, play, play.

We also saw Holly (my sis) and her family. We crashed at her house that night.

Then on Saturday we were off to the Court of Honor. Here is a picture of Mike and his parents.

Jacen loved the microphone. He was totally okay with being up in front of a crowd of people. Half of which he didn't even know.

Some of his cousins joined him in the fun.

It was great to see all the family. Then we were off to start the trek home. We stayed at my Aunt Betty's house in St. George on Saturday night and went to Sacrament meeting with her.

We stopped off to see my Grandpa in Vegas.

We also started a new song on all our travels to help Jacen along...it was to the tune Who Let the Dogs Out (thanks to Sea Worlds Pet's Rule). It went something like this:

Who let the dogs out, woof, woof, woof, woof.

Who let the dogs out, woof, woof, woof, woof.

Who let the pigs out, oink, oink,oink, oink.
Who let the pigs out, oink, oink,oink, oink.

one of my favorites is

Who let the rooster out, cock-a-doodle-do

Who let the rooster out, cock-a-doodle-do

lets just say any and everything Jacen wanted in the song, Scott made work.

Jacen would specify the animal and the song would go on and on, he just loved it. We were just thankful that it helped the last 30 min of our road trip. We have since used it tons :) All I can say is I am thankful for a creative husband!!

On the Way to Utah

Okay, get ready for POST OVERLOAD. I have been wanting to post our Summer events for awhile now. I thought to just skip them...but I just couldn't because with a husband that is a teacher, our summer is when we go places and do things :) I was determined to get a ton of posts up today. I think I did rather well :)

For the Second weekend in July we headed to St. George, for a Family Reunion. On the way we met up with the Pilgrims in Las Vegas. We met at a park so Jacen could get out and stretch his legs. Then we went over to Circus Circus (where we would be staying for the night) to watch some free Circus Shows. Jacen is really into Acrobatics and Dancing lately so we thought he would enjoy it. This picture was taken at nearly Midnight.




This is a guy juggling. He had up to 9 tennis balls and he went up and down the stairs as well...of course I didn't get that on the camera.







This act was very interesting. (I have been trying to attach it for 2 days now and have no idea what the issue is.) If you have 6 1/2 min...it will really get you by the end. These people change their outfits in seconds. Justice had a theory (which I am sure he is so excited that I am sharing with all of you) that they really didn't have any clothes on and that it was just the lights that changed. Really it is crazy, especially the very last one.

I just remembered that our camera battery died on this vacation. Jacen was contently looking at all the pictures and watching all the movies on our camera as we drove. We went to charge the battery when we realized we brought the charger for the video camera on accident. We used other peoples cameras for pictures and need to get ahold of them. I guess this is a good place to stop for now. Saint George was a family reunion for my family. We also shot up to Payson, Utah as well that weekend.

San Diego Zoo

Scott taught Health at Summer school again this year. He enjoys teaching health and loves that he gets students that are looking to get ahead, rather than those that have failed. Summer school is only Monday through Thursday and he was home by 12:30. How could you go wrong??

The first weekend in July we went to the San Diego Zoo. If you live in the area and have not been....you need to look into it. We were able to get both of us Season Passes for a total of $69. The kids love all the animals.

Here is a Mommy Koala holding her baby. I thought it was adorable.

There is a new home for the Elephants. It is much bigger than were they used to be.

The Bears were awake this time around. Here is a Black Bear.

Soccer Camp

My Brother, Chuck came up for a week, with his dogs. Chuck and Scott put on a Soccer Camp from June 22-26. (Scott coaches the Varsity Girls Soccer team, and Chuck played College ball.)

Here Jacen is with Chuck, Spike, and Early Girl. Jacen spent a ton of time in the back yard with the dogs that week. Spike is a small dog...I am so glad we thought to put the dogs in the garage--we have coyotes here!!

We went to watch Uncle Chuck and Dad play some soccer. It was the last day of the camp, so they were scrimmaging to use the skills they had learned.

Here we are showing our support.

Annie Play

My Niece, Siena, and Nephew, Lofton, were in their elementary school play Annie. We took a little trip to go see it. They live 1 hour and 15 min or so from us.



Siena is the second one from the Left. She was an orphan.














Lofton played Rooster. They both did a great job.







Their oldest sister, Kiera, graduated from high school in June, as well. Her graduation was a week before the one here....so that should have been documented before our Summer really began. Kiera is attending BYU-Provo :)

Sea World & San Diego Fair

Also in June we took advantage of our season passes to Sea World (before they expired in the middle of the month).




No Sea World trip is complete without seeing Shamu!! If you enlarge the picture you will see the trainer in the air.

A picture of Brycen to document that yes he does come with us when we go. I know the last few posts of Sea World you would think that we didn't have him with us.





Pets Rule is Jacen's favorite show. We had to make sure we went to the show every time we went to Sea World. Here a trainer is jumping rope with her dog.

Jacen actually walks a ton at the amusement parks. We still bring the double stroller because he still takes naps. Here Jacen and dad are walking out of Pets Rule. He was the happiest kid.

My parents with Brycen.

This is part of the Cirque De La Mer Show. It is amazing how strong these men are.

We saw the Polar Bears.

A cute picture of Brycen sleeping.

We also went to the San Diego Fair, twice, with my parents. We parked in a free lot and took a free bus shuttle to the fair. The boys loved the bus ride!

The first time we went to the fair from 7pm-11pm. It wasn't the plan...but when we tried to go that morning we were stuck in aweful stopped traffic. The free parking was FULL. I guess everyone wanted to go on "$2 day". We decided we would go to Sea World and try the fair when it was later in the day. It worked out great. The park wasn't full at all by 7pm.

When we went the second time it was a whole day trip :)

At one point Brycen was so tired...and wanted nothing to do with being in his carrier in the stroller. My mom was walking around with him like this. It looks like she is going to drop him. He really was so comfortable.

Jacen the Tomato Man. He loved putting his face in the little hole. So many people were commenting on how cute he was with his little face in the hole while I took a bazillion pictures.

The second time we went to the fair we decided the carseat was not coming along. It was Brycen's first time sitting up in the stroller, he loved it :)

I don't know what it is about the fair that I love really....I guess it just has to do with growing up always going :) I love walking around and seeing it all.

Our Summer Part 1

Now that I am getting back into my regular routine, I have no excuse for not posting. I am going to try my best to catch you up on our eventful Summer.

In June our friends the Palmers moved to Tennessee. We spent lots of time hanging out with them before they left. (Jacen asks us at least 3 times a week to go to their house...and I am not over exaggerating. When we tell him they are in Tennessee, he says "they play tennis". )

Here Jacen is dancing to Dance Dance Revaluation, at the Palmers house. He really gets into it.

Here he is playing Guitar Hero (or Rock Band). He really loves playing with these guys. He also loves their Legos and castle. Not to forget, how much he loves it when they bounce him really high on that big exercise ball, or push him in the Lego container that has wheels :)

We attended a get together for Zach's graduation. He was the Valedictorian...Way to go Zach!!

Here are Nic (above) and Jon (below) loving Brycen. These were taken at their farewell party. My boys love and miss these guys


The Palmers actually spent the night here Thursday, June 18th and started their trek to Tennessee on Friday.

A story to remember:

Nic and Jacen were playing "running" (as Jacen likes to call it) aka chase around the house, on Thursday. Jacen must have twisted his ankle when jumping into our sunken Living room. He would cry whenever he would put weight on it. We were stumped because we could twist and poke his foot all day and he wouldn't cry...but as soon as he put his weight on it, he would be all tears asking us to carry him. We carried him around most of Thursday and when it continued into Friday we decided we should take him in. The Doctor did find the one spot that was sore to the touch. It was actually really neat to watch the doctor communicate with our 28 mo old (at the time). When he asked Jacen where it hurt Jacen pointed to the opposite foot. I was thinking, it isn't that foot...but the doctor said, "right here but on this foot" (picking up the other foot). Jacen said yes, and sure enough that was the spot. He could eventually put weight on it but still wouldn't walk until Sunday or Monday. Thankfully it wasn't anything serious :)