Strawberry Days

We did the Strawberry days thing this year. Well... actually we just did the rodeo and the parade but we got to do it with cousins so we were totally happy.
Plus, strawberries and cream. That is all

Ok so Im pretty sure Im going to have my hands full with my Ikey boy when he gets a little older. You see that position he is in? It looks like I just snapped the photo at a weird time. Not so. He was just talking to his cousin Grace and eating a sucker one minute and the BAM!! the next minute he is frozen in this position because a pretty girl is dancing in front of him. He stayed in this exact position until the pretty girl moved on and he came to his senses.

Lets Take it Back

I have lots to write about, including the birth of our newest addition. However we are gonna take it back to pre-baby for a minute.

This summer has been full of fishing, sunshine, friends and cousins. I can't think  of a better combination.

We spent a few days fishing Strawberry.

Pep even got to go on an over-nighter with his dad. Just the two of them. He was SO happy. Plus they met up with his cousin Wyatt which was just the icing on the cake.

Grandma Naugle got a little pool for the kids. Its been a lifesaver. Endless hours of fun... plus a few sunburns.

Im not sure why the snail had to go on his head. It literally left a streak of green slime in his hair. 

And of course we have spent as much time as possible with Aunt Gayle. The kids think that being able to harvest their own food is the greatest thing to ever happen so we put them to work as often as we can. 

Plus... Pep practically caught a flipping humming bird! Do you see it!?

Don't worry this is not the end of our summer adventures. There will be more to come shortly.

Sometimes When Your Turning 7...

Sometimes when your seventh birthday is coming up an you tell your dad that you want to go camping for your birthday, he takes you to Montana.

Andrew had a trip to Montana to go fly fishing with a friend all planned. The plan was that he would return home on May 30th (AnDee's birthday) But when she told him that what she wanted for her birthday was to go camping and fishing, we figured, why not take the whole family? So we did! And we liked it!
We spent most of our time just exploring. Despite what the locals were all telling us, no one got eaten by a bear. In fact, we never even saw a bear. It was terribly disappointing but that couldn't keep us down because Montana, especially the western end, is incredibly beautiful.

 We stayed for about 5 days and then headed home but we couldn't make the entire trip without having a few breaks and what is a pitstop without a little fishing?

When we made it home, the girl was spoiled by her grandparents. She got this intense new scooter from Grandma and Grandpa

On the Cowley side it is tradition for Nanny and Poppy to take each kid out on their birthday to get dinner and let them pick out their own gift. This tradition generally starts at age 5 but since we have been in Illinois for AnDee's last 2 birthdays, this was her first time. She was in heaven! Bet you can't guess what Nanny and Poppy got her...

And even though it was a day late, mom made her the cake she requested (chocolate with banana pudding in the middle and white frosting with strawberries cut like roses)

This girl... I can't even. Honestly, I have no way to tell you how amazing she is. She is essentially the perfect child and Im not being sarcastic in the least. She is sweet and considerate and helpful. She loves her brothers (even when they aren't the nicest) and is her Mama's bff. She is a daddies girl and an animal whisperer. She is strong and athletic (incredibly so) and yet she is not afraid to be girly and gentle. Simply put, she is amazing and I couldn't be any more proud of her.

Sometimes I feel like writing. Sometimes I don't. I haven't in a very very long time. That is why I keep posting posts such as this. A mess of things that are important and should be remembered in detail but all they get is a little picture and a sentence or two if Im feeling generous. I sure wish I could snap out of this but until I do...

Somehow I missed this and Im not sure how but last month this happened..

 We hatched our own little baby ducks. We had 12 eggs and 11 of them hatched. 11! And they just keep getting bigger!
What? you don't bathe with ducklings? Weird.

 They are now almost full sized ducks with full sized duck voices instead of little cheeps.

We also got new bunnies.

The weather is definitely warming up so our snake friends have come out to play. Yay??

What makes the warm weather even better is that warm weather equals fishing!!

 Also... 60 degrees is naked weather, right?

We spent a day or two helping clean up Granma Naugle's yard, which we  couldn't complain about cause, you know, fire.

 They are awesome little workers.

 The poor dogs got all tuckered out while working on the yard so they snuggled up and took a nap together. Sweet, right?

We celebrated Andrew's birthday... well... sort of. Andrew was up at a wood badge training so we didn't get to actually party on his birthday but  we did make him a giant ball of rice crispy treats, which was all he asked for.

However, last week my amazing parents watched our kids for a couple of nights so Andrew and I could go down to St. George together.... alone... no kids... for the second time since we had AnDee! We called it a happy birthday/Mothers day trip.  It was super fun. On the way down we took a detour to Panquitch lake. Holy guacamole that place was gorgeous! But still a little cold..

And unfortunately for us, the fishing wasn't great.

However, we made up for the bad fishing when we got down to St. George and spent a couple of days  (or hours really) fishing Quail Creek. 

It was a blast just hanging out together, doing something we both love and being able to just talk and not stress about the kids' poles or keeping them fed and entertained. That being said, we missed them terribly. Our kids are the coolest. 

Pep Boy Turns 5!

Say what?! 5?! How in the world did this happen? As usual... its breaking my heart but I have to admit that I absolutely adore the little man he is turning in to. He is funny. Like super funny. He is a tease. He loves being outside and jumping on the tramp. He is a hard little worker and is almost always willing to do whatever you ask of him. He loves to ride his bike and is just about jumping out of his skin to go fishing now that its warming up. He is particular and unique in the way he does and says things. Its refreshing to see him stand outside the "norm" and be completely confident in it. I simply adore him, even on our hard days.
For his cake this year, he asked for a "Halo" (video game) cake. He wanted it round and chocolate with strawberries in the middle and "with blue".  There was no way in this world that I was going to be able to make this cake completely edible and so I did what I do best... I stuck an action figure on top.

He asked for a bike and a fishing pole for his birthday. He got both but his bike is a little big still so for the time being he is stuck using AnDee's old one. He's a champ though and isn't complaining.

To kick his birthday off Grandma Naugle got us all tickets to ride the Heber Creeper with our Naugle side of the family. Unfortunately Peps favorite cousin Wyatt got pink eye that day so their family couldn't come. But we enjoyed the company of Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Jake and Aunt Raquel and Uncle Stevie. Uncle Stevie is definitely the favorite Uncle on that side of the family so guess who Pep spent the entire evening with?

We hardly even got any pictures. Pep was not interested in hanging out with us because Stevie is much much cooler.

I think the highlight of his birthday was the fact that he got to go out to lunch with just mom and dad AND to a movie (Batman vs. Superman) with just dad. The poor kid hardly ever gets any one on one time and it was so so good for him to be the center of attention for once.
Man I love this little kid! He makes me a better person.

Last Day

Its the last day of March and guess what? Im writing my 3rd post of the month. So they were all written in the same week. Don't judge me.
I have a few pics from Andrews phone that needed to be added to this months blog posts. So here you go.

Ike's hair is officially long enough to pull back in to a pony. His grandparents LOVE it when his hair is in a ponytail and never make any comments about him needing a haircut. Ever. (that was extreme sarcasm if you didn't catch it.)

The girl and the dog hug a lot. Im not sure how I feel about it but they seem to enjoy it so..

This kid constantly loses one shoe. In fact, he lost one in the field yesterday and we still haven't found it. He just comes wandering in with a shoe missing on a regular basis.

The kids have gone crazy with archery lately. (yes, real life bows and arrows cause we are good parents) Im super impressed with both of them (Pep and Buggy). I had my Activity Days girls (8 and 9 years old) try to shoot with the same bows and not a single one of them could even draw them.

Sometimes when you spend the day shooting bows and chasing down your arrows you get real tired and fall asleep at 7 p.m. like this...

We hiked the G. For those of you that have done this hike you already know how awesome it is that ALL of my kids hiked every step of this journey. We never carried or helped any of them. For those of you that haven't done it, I assure you, you should be really impressed.

Before we went to St. George the boys got knew hats. They both love them. Its hard work to get Pep to take his off.

This a a pic of our kids watching E.T. on the way home from St. George. They are completely obsessed. Watching them watch the movie was way more entertaining than actually watching the movie itself

Ok.... this time Im really done. March is over and I accomplished my goals. See ya next month.

Thats a Wrap

Im going to go ahead and do my typical throw-all-my-pics-in-one-post to wrap up March before March is over and I have to worry about April.

Some days I love that AnDee has long wavy/curly hair. Some days I hate it. We have been trying to make the best of things lately and have been experimenting. Some times we succeed, and some times we fail. We don't document the failures...

This dude learned how to ride a bike in about 30 seconds. Seriously, his very first try and he was off.

We have spent some time up in the foothills exploring. These kids are awesome little hikers.

Pep got hit in the eye with a board while they were working on their fort. All in all he came out pretty lucky. No real damage and hardly even any bruising.

We got to spend some (more) time in St. George (yes, again. Don't judge us. We like it down there) This time we got to go with Aunt Amy and the boys!

I hired a sherpa... actually he worked for free. It only took us about 2 hours to travel approximately 1 mile. We did get to see some silk worms in action though as well as some Indian ruins, so I feel like it was successful.

We spent lots of time playing in the water. 68 degrees seems like water playing weather when you are coming out of winter... and Im a good mom so I just let them go for it.

We also spent a lot of time digging??? in the sand.

When we got back, the weather wasn't quite as nice at home as we would have liked but the cold wind made for some good kite flying!

All in all its been a good month. We have taken full advantage of being outside on the warm days and have made lots of beautiful pieces of art on the cold ones.

 Easter was a blast. I have approximately zero pictures of it but we got to do an Easter egg hunt with Gayle on Saturday (they came back with FOUR dozen boiled eggs. Yay??) and had Easter dinners with both sides of the family on Sunday so it was an awesome day full of cousins and candy! What more could you ask for?