My Birthday!

"Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that people who have the most, live the longest!!" - Father Larry Lorenzoni

My birthday was a Sunday this year and I was very anxious all day. The last 3 birthdays I've had have been marked by the loss of a pre-term nephew, a fatal accident to a teenager neighbor and a serious accident to a business partner. One can understand my worry. But Steve wanted to make it a happy day for me, so after church, he took me and the girls for a picnic up at Squaw Peak in Provo. When we got there, it was a bit windy but that proved to be a good thing because there were 4 paragliders waiting to take off. It was fun to watch them take off and fly around above us. I learned a lot about paragliding too. These guys were hoping the winds would carry them up to 17,000 feet and clear to the Point of the Mountain Flight Park! It was a fun treat. Then after our picnic we went for a little hike. When we got home, the kids played out back a bit and then they went with Steve over to visit the Taylors while I talked to my brother on the phone. When I went over to visit, the Taylors, Chilcotes and Hansons surprised me with a yummy chocolate cake and an ice cream grasshopper cake. A fun, happy, safe birthday.
YEAH!!

Capital Day

Not my favorite pages ... they are kind of crazy looking, but it was a fun day. The Utah State Capital hosts an annual Capital Day. They invite the public to come tour the Capital Building and participate in a variety of events - games and crafts for the kids, a scavenger hunt/Bingo game, a variety of vendors, concerts, etc. We wanted our girls to see the Capital Building so we thought we'd try Capital Day. The kids got small Liberty Bells for playing a game outside then we went in. The girls made towers out of toothpicks and gumdrops (supposed to be learning about how domes are made) and then we wandered around to see the different rooms and find all the items on our Bingo game. They thought the building was pretty cool, but I think only Alyssa understood what the Capital Building is and its significance It was a fun day.

One last day of water fun!

As summer came to a close, we ended by going to the Olympic Fountains at the Gateway in SLC. Steve and I love the history the fountains remind us of and all our memories of the Olympics. And the girls LOVE the fountains. This year was no different.

DigiScrapbooking

I've been able to do a lot of digital scrapbook pages recently and am really enjoying it. I'm not great at it yet, and it still takes me awhile to do a page, but I'm getting the hang of the software and getting a better grip on what elements and papers I have so I know what to use. :) Here are the pages I've done this past week or so. They are all from August ... and I've blogged about them already so they are kind of duplicates, but I wanted to share the pages. And of course, scroll to the next blog entry because that one is new and contains 2 pages I did for Jessica's 1st day of preschool. Sniff, sniff ...

The text in the scrapbook pages is basically what I blogged before ... so if you want to read it, just scroll down to the blog entry. :)

Preschool Kid!

Its official! With Jessica starting preschool at Eaglecrest Elementary this year, I'm home by myself 4 days a week for 3 hours! What to do with my time!? SMILE!! No wondering here! I'm always busy with work or scrapbooking. I'm really enjoying it and she LOVES preschool. Here are the pages I scrapbooked of her first day of preschool.

Text on the second page says: "Jessica started preschool a week after the other girls started school. She goes Tues-Fri from 9:10-12:00. Steve went with me to take Jessica to school. We walked her into class and waited until the teacher was ready to start class. The entire time I was choked up. I've never cried when I sent my kids to school ... but I did with Jessica this year. I was glad Steve was there because I would have really cried. We're moving to another new phase in our lives where I no longer have a little one home all day. Jessica was so excited to go and didn't look back when it was time for us to leave. All grown up!"

6 new tonight!

I posted 6 new blog entries tonight - plus this one! :) Love to blog. It truly is my therapy. It helps me enjoy the moments of my life and the fun times we have as a family. On nights when I'm just exhausted, worn out and even a little frustrated with my kids, I love to blog because it helps me unwind and it reminds me of those little moments that bring me so much joy. It also allows me record those moments. Then in the heat of the day when I just want to scream because they aren't listening to me I can stop and read my blog and smile a bit more - of course, that is usually after I've done my screaming. :) Anyway, enjoy the pictures and posts!

Birthdays at My Parents'

Its tradition ... celebrate birthdays at my parents' house on Sunday afternoon. In August, we had 3 birthdays - my neice ( Meghan) turned 15, my dad and me (remaining ageless!). :) Here's a few pics from our afternoon. Not sure why I don't have any of my dad getting hsi gift ... we all chipped in and helped my mom buy him a compost tumbler, something he's wanted for awhile. My dad is a BIG gardner and has been my whole life. He has always enjoyed gardening and done a good job at it!

This first picture is of Jess and Taylor with Meghan - using grandpa's new laptop! Its something they've wanted for a long time so my dad decided to buy it for himself the week before his bday (as his gift) - not knowing my mom had gotten the compost tumbler. :)
After dinner is present time!

I had serious red-eye in this picture but it was one of the only ones I liked of me.

My dad ...

The birthday people with the cake.

Hike to Cecret Lake

I have really fallen in love with the outdoors this last year or so. If I had my way, I would honestly hike or camp every weekend. I've just loved it. I love being outdoors. I love being active. And I love seeing the beauty of the place I live. I feel so blessed to live in such a beautiful area with the mountains just a few minutes away, we have so many beautiful places to explore.

We had planned to do a bigger hike with my sister and brother-in-law the weekend school started (Aug 22nd) but they had scheduling conflicts so Steve found this one for just the two of us. Cecret Lake (pronounced Secret - we think - it was also spelled differently in several spots) is up above Alta. The campground and trailhead is down a dirt road. While we were hiking we were under the ski lifts of Alta part of the time. Its amazing to imagine how deep the snow is in the winter in this area. But the snow is what creates Cecret Lake. The lake is an isolated lake created from run-off water and has no other natural sources in or out. It has nothing living in it as it completely freezes every winter. Actually, there are salamanders that live in and out of the water, but that was it. Not a bad hike - probably just a mile or so each waybut Steve and I took a detour on the way in. We went looking for a couple of geocaches and probably added another mile to the hike, making it close to 3 for us.

On our way up, we saw some mooses (meese??). There were 3 of them not too far from the road, really cool. Unfortunately, my camera was in the back of the car. :( But we saw plenty of other beautiful things that I did capture on the camera. This is just a few of the pretty flowers we saw ... I told you I love the beauty of outdoors!

This wasn't long after we started - I thought it was a really pretty area just off the trail. I love how the rocks just jut up out of the growth of flowers, plants and trees. It provides such a cool contrast.

This was a BIG HUGE SLAB of rock. Steve thought it was the coolest thing on the hike. I wished I could have taken an aerial shot of him standing on it, but this was the best I could do! You can only see about 1/2 the slab in this picture.

More scenery ...

The view from the big slab.

The lake ...

Us by the lake - and look at the mountains in the background .. so pretty! For some reason when I look at this picture, I almost feel like Steve and I were digitally added, but we really were there - at an altitude of almost exactly 10,000 feet (we were actually above 10,000 for a little bit while looking for a geocache, but this was just below that). Have to say, it was my first hike to an altitude that high ... other than flying, I don't think I've ever been that high.

It really was a beautiful hike and great date night ... Thanks Steve for planning it!