Thank You, Christie!

Go here to see more of the pictures from the photo shoot. Christie is such a talented photographer and we really appreciate her doing this for us. Jake and Nathan had so much fun playing with her. By the time she left they were calling her "Aunt Christie!" She is doing our family pictures next month and I can't wait!!!

Happy Birthday, Jake!

Jake turned six years old today. It's hard to believe that my oldest child is only two years away from being baptized- where has the time gone?

Here are six things I love about Jake:

1. Jake has beautiful blue eyes and an infectious smile. He is such a handsome little boy.

2. Jake gives the best reactions. When you find something he likes, no one gets more excited than he does!

3. Jake is very lovable. He loves it when I rub his head. If I stop, he puts my hand back on it so that I will keep doing it! He gives the best hugs and kisses.

4. Jake is very polite. He always uses please and thank you and even says excuse me when he burps!

5. Jake loves school. He is always excited to go and is very well behaved there. He loves positive praise and gets lots of it!

6. Jake tries really hard. As he is getting older he is becoming more aware of his challenges and he is trying really hard to compensate for them. I am so proud of all of the progress he has made this past year both academically and socially. I hope he has another great year!

Last Saturday we had a friend birthday party for him. This was the first time we invited who Jake wanted instead of all of our friends and their kids. A couple of his best friends from school came and then some of his cousins. Jake is still talking about his friends, Kevin and Michael, that came to his party. I think it meant a lot for him to know that they came just for him. He wanted an animal party so we put little animals on each of the cupcakes and decorated with animals everywhere.

I asked Jake what he wanted to do at the party and he said he wanted to do the waterslide. Excellent. So easy for me! I love this picture of all of them climbing up the slides.

Jake and his friend, Kevin.

Some of my family came to help out with the party. It was such a hot day that when the little kids got out to eat and open presents, everyone else got in to cool off a little (or at least their feet)!

Sunday we had my whole family over for dinner to celebrate all of the July birthdays. It was a little crazy having 30 people in our little house, but it was still fun. Abbey read Carli's spotlight for Jake which is always a highlight for everyone's birthdays.

All Jake kept saying he wanted for his birthday were animals and cars. So my parents got him two big tubs of animals and about 50 little cars with a case to put them all in. Jake loved it! He was so excited when he opened them!

Jake spent the rest of the night playing with all of his new toys.

Today was Jake's actual birthday. He started the day with his birthday balloons in bed (it's actually our bed since he came in and slept with us last night)!

Jake then went to school and I brought pencils and yogurt popsicles for his class at snack time. Jake was pretty excited to have his classmates sing to him and to have Nathan, Max and I there.

Tomorrow is Jake's last day of Summer School. This is his teacher, Ms. Geer. She is so nice and such a great teacher- I hope he gets to have her for a full school year.

Tonight we had pizza for dinner and then Jake opened up his presents. One of his favorite gifts was a bubble machine. It is so awesome- you just push the button and it blows out tons of bubbles! I'm not a big fan of standing there and blowing bubbles for them so this is the perfect solution!

We then played some games and sang to Jake for the third time! This was the first year that Jake has really gotten into his birthday. It was so fun to see him get excited about everything and actually have an opinion about what he wanted to do.

I love him so much and hope that he has another great year!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JAKE!!!

Jake shares his birthday with my dad who turned 58 today! My mom and my siblings all surprised him and took him to Gandolfo's for lunch. They just opened Gandolfo's down here and Jon and I have already been there several times. It was one of our favorite places to eat in Provo and we were so excited when we heard it was coming down here. If you haven't been there- GO! You will love it. It was fun to spend a little bit of my dad's special day with him. He is the best dad and I hope he had a very Happy Birthday!!!

Go Angels!

Jon and I have been wanting to go to an Angels game this season, but haven't had the chance yet. We were looking up the schedule last week and when we realized that the Yankees were coming to town we knew we had to go! I was lucky enough to find a good deal on tickets on Craig's List since the game was sold out.

This was the view from our seats. It was such a good game. The Angels came back from a 4-1 deficit and won 10-6!

We felt dumb asking someone to take our picture so we just tried the hold the camera yourself thing and it turned out a little better than the Lakers game picture (not much, but a little better)!

It was such a nice night to just sit and relax and watch the game. Hopefully we can fit more games in this summer!

Waterski Trip

We spent a couple of days waterskiing the beginning of July at Lake Mead. We stayed at Sam's Town Hotel in Las Vegas. Besides the casino, it was a fun place for kids to stay. They had this cool waterfall with fake animals that moved and 'came to life'. They also did a little water/laser show each night. They had a good food court and a bowling alley- what more could a kid want?!

After the first day of skiing we drove across town to Cafe Rio (so worth the drive) and then took the kids bowling at the hotel.

Jake got so excited whenever he knocked any pins down!

Nathan and Laney are such good friends!

It was 10:15pm by the time we left and Max was SO TIRED. My mom was a good sport and sat and held him while we bowled.

The first day on the lake was awesome. We rented a party boat so that all 30 of us could go out on the water together. Between that and my parents 2 boats we almost all fit! The water was perfect and we all got a good ski run in.

When it was our turn to be on the party boat we took turns tubing with the kids since the boat didn't go fast enough us to ski behind.

This was the first time Jake has done anything behind the boat- I was so proud of him!

We all went separately and got 4th of July pedicures before the trip! Clockwise from top: Carli, my mom, me and Holly.

The second day on the lake we didn't get the party boat so instead we set up on the beach. Besides it being really hot and rocky, the kids still managed to have a good time! Jake just wanted to throw rocks the whole time- we had to watch out for the big ones that thankfully never hit anyone!

Max and his cousin, Trevor, just hanging out on the beach!

Later that afternoon we packed everything up, put the boats back in storage, stopped to get frozen custard on our way out of town and drove home. I love waterskiing and can't wait until we go again!

4th of July

The 4th of July continues to be one of my favorite holidays. I love everything about it- the warm weather, the patriotic colors, the parades, the BBQs, swimming, fireworks, patriotic songs, etc. We started off the day going to our ward's annual 4th of July Breakfast. The boys were so excited to decorate their bikes and ride in the bike parade.

Max loved wearing his hat and riding around in the wagon.

I have to give credit to Jon for helping the boys decorate their bikes and the wagon at 7:30 that morning since we got home at midnight the night before from our waterski trip (pictures to come). They did a great job!

We couldn't get the boys to leave after it was all over- they just wanted to keep riding around in the parade!

Our attempt at a family picture!

After the ward breakfast we came home and the boys and I made our traditional sugar cookies. They're really into making silly faces in pictures right now!

They helped me roll them out and cut them into stars. They then helped me frost them.

The finished product (okay, these are the ones that I frosted, but I did let them frost a few)!

After the cookies were done we headed up the street for our annual neighborhood party. The boys rode in another bike parade. This time all of the kids lined up and then rode up and down the street at the same time instead of calling them one by one like they did at the ward party.

Jake and Nathan were a little confused by this and they just sat there for a minute while all of the headed down the street! They finally figured it out and rode around for a while.

They then had a water balloon toss and Jake and Nathan got 4th place- thanks to a balloon that wouldn't pop no matter how many times they dropped it!

I made my traditional flag cake to take out to my parent's house for dessert. Unfortunately they ended up making homemade ice cream and everyone got full on that. So we ended up just dividing the cake out at the end of the night for everyone to take home- bummer!

We then headed out to my parent's house for swimming and a BBQ. The kids swam for hours. Nathan had fun playing with Laney and Jack the whole time.

This is how Jake jumped into the pool every time. Thank goodness for his life jacket that absorbed some of the pain from the belly flop! By the end of the day Jake's poor little eyes were really red and swollen. I think we might be taking a break from swimming for a few days until they get better!

Max and his cousin, Scotty, had a great time swimming together in the little baby pool.

Love this smile!

Max discovered that he loves BBQed corn!

My dad said that when he was a kid he and his brothers would always fight over who got to lick the paddle after they made homemade ice cream. He finally got his chance and he had the face to prove it!

That night we headed out to Christy's house in Ladera Ranch and watched the fireworks from her backyard. While we were waiting for them to start Will had fun pushing Max in the little car- it was so cute!

We all hung out in the backyard until they started and once the first firework went off Jake freaked out as usual. So Jon took him up to Christy's bathroom and played on the iphone with him so that he couldn't hear anything. We were really hoping that this would be the year that Jake wouldn't be afraid of the fireworks, but no such luck!

Overall, it was a busy, fun filled day. I feel so blessed to live in America and enjoy the freedoms that we have. I always get a little teary eyed listening to Lee Greenwood's "Proud to be an American" song because it makes me feel so lucky and proud to live here. I hope that everyone else had a happy and safe 4th of July!