8 days, 12 girls, and 3 boys = lots of pictures

We were lucky enough to have Whit's sister Anjeanette and her family come and stay with us in June. What a great way to start the summer. We had so much fun together. Annie has 5 girls so between the two families we had 12 girls. Whit was excited because the number of girls in the house may have been doubling, but because Brittan, Annie's oldest daughter brought her husband, the number of males in the house tripled. He felt pretty good about that.

All 10 lovely ladies Kings for a day.

The Anderson's were here for Father's day. People always tell me how sorry they are for my husband because we don't have any sons, but when I look at this picture and see all the girls that Whitney has to take care of him and dote on him, I just can't feel too bad for him. I think Whitney, Joel, and Troy are pretty lucky guys!!!

We crammed a lot of stuff into the Anderson's 8 day stay.

Of course Annie can't even go on vacation without cutting hair. We were very grateful though.

The girls made Troy spend a lot of time on the trampoline.

Whit was able to race in a crit race while they were here. It was fun for everyone to get to see Whit in action. Maybe now they can kind of understand why a person would choose to spend so much time in spandex.

Old Salem

They were draining the fire hydrants. The girls loved walking in the water.

The cemetery at Old Salem

The Zoo

We made a mad dash to the beach for a day.

There were sand fleas by the millions. All of the girls were cathing them and keeping them in a little pond that they dug. It was freaking me out a little, but the kids loved it.

No beach trip is complete without a huge container of cheese puffs. Penny was quite a fan.

My favorite part of the Anderson's stay was our day in the mountains. We went to Valle Cruisis and Price Lake.

Eliza and Joel developed a special bond out on the lake. Eliza thought her uncle Joel was a pretty neat guy.

Leave it to Joel to find fishing line and a hook in the trees and then catch tons of fish with it. My girls were pretty impressed.

Thanks Annie and Joel for making the long journey to visit us. You truly made our summer. We love you and can't wait until we can come and visit you.

Back to Blogging

I know I took a year long hiatus from the blogging world, I am going to blame it on the 5th kid, but I finally feel ready to tackle the huge project of getting caught up. I am not sure how I am going to do that exactly, but I will do it. My plan is to get caught up while keeping up. I am going to try and post a couple of old posts for every new post. Things may seem crazy and out of order so pay attention to the date. This is the only form of scrap booking that I do so I guess I should post about the last year of our lives. I mean it was a pretty important one. We did add another child to our family. So if any one still reads this thing I promise there are great things to come.

Idaho Trip 2010

As always we had a great trip to Idaho. We went mid August and got back just two days before school started so that was quite a challenge. I love being in Idaho in August though and want to plan on going then every year. It is such a hot time to be in North Carolina and Idaho is so perfect in August. Next time it will just have to be a little earlier in August.

Since it was so close to school starting we decided to take a girls trip to Boise and do some school shopping. It was just like the good old days. We were really sad that Starla and the girls weren't there. Someday we will have to do it with all the cousins, just like we used to when I was young. While in Boise we went to this pool with water slides. The girls loved it.
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We had a combined birthday for all the August Birthdays at Rigby Lake.

Riding the carousel

Warming up at the spray park. My kids are used to swimming in the North Carolina heat so they were kind of wimpy at the spray park.

My favorite thing about coming home in August Raspberries. They are in season in August so every morning I got to eat freshly picked raspberries covered in cream. YUM!!!

We were able to meet our newest cousin baby Sam.

Bear world and the petting zoo.

Mesa Falls

Camping at Warm River

Floating the river

Happy 7th Birthday Lillie

Lillie was lucky this year because she got two birthday celebrations. We were going to be in Idaho and Dad was going to be in North Carolina on Lillie's birthday so we decided to have a little party with Dad and Jane and Kate before we left.

Jaynie the Magician was the entertainment.

While in Idaho we had a combined birthday for all the August Birthdays in my family. We went to Rigby Lake. The weather was a little scary at first, but it turned out to be pretty nice and the kids had a great time in the water.

Activity Days Temple Trip

Jaynie's activity day group went to visit the Raleigh Temple this summer. I let Jaynie take the camera so she could get some good pictures. She had such a great time and it was such a great experience for her to be on the temple grounds and feel the spirit that the temple can bring to her little life.

Jaynie really wanted me to see the door of the temple so she took a picture. I wish you could read the words because that is what she wanted me to see. We think they say Holiness to the Lord, but don't quote us on it. I will have to pay more attention when I go back next time. I thought it was sweet that the doors were her favorite part of the temple.

4th of July

We had a great 4th of July this year. Our neighborhood is so great. We get together for celebrations like the 4th, so it makes it a lot easier to not be home on such occasions. On the 3rd we had our annual neighborhood BBQ and bike parade. The kids all decorated their bikes and rode up and down the street, it was pretty fun. Then we had a firework show with some illegal fireworks from across the border in South Carolina (sound familiar Idaho/Wyoming people). It was a pretty good show. The men decided that next year they were going to have a firework fund and ask all the men to donate to the pot. The women are the ones who came up with the budget this year and the men thought much more of the money spent should go towards fire works.

Sorry about the pictures. I couldn't find the cord to unload my pictures so we used Whit's iphone and the pictures transfer weird when I put them on here.

Decorating the bikes

Riding in the parade. I have a bunch of cheesers on my hands.

Powdered Donuts

One of my favorite childhood memories is the powdered donuts that my mom kept in the freezer for our lunches and snacks. I would love getting them in my lunch, but there was nothing better than eating one frozen for an after school snack. This summer we went to the grocery store and they were buy one get one free so I bought two bags. I think the girls enjoyed them as much as I did as a kid, we went through the two bags pretty quickly. Mom also used to keep frozen snickers in the fridge for Dad, but every once in a while us kids would sneak a taste. I think that needs to be my next childhood memory to explore.

I didn't get close up enough of the girls faces, but they were covered in powder from the donuts. That's the part I didn't remember as a kid, the mess they make.

Tornado Touchdown

Today was an eventful day for Jaynie and Lillie. We had a tornado touchdown here in Lewisville during school hours so the girls had to be on tornado lockdown. They said they had to go out into the hall and sit on their knees and bend their head down and put their hands over their head. When I asked if they were scared they said, "a little". They said they were mostly scared that they wouldn't get to come home because they weren't letting them out of school until the tornado warning was lifted. They ended up keeping them and extra hour.

It made me sad that I wasn't there to hold them and comfort them. That has always been one of my greatest fears when flying by myself with all the girls, that we would have scary turbulence (or worse, but I try not to ever think of the worse) and I wouldn't have enough arms to comfort all of my children at once. I guess this is part of having them grow up and go to school. I can't protect them all the time. That is kind of a hard thing to accept as a mom.

Tired!!!

So I am trying really hard to get the blog caught up before the baby comes and I am dwindling my list, but I don't know if I will make it. That seems to be the theme of life right now. Every day things are getting dwindled off the list, but the list just keeps growing and growing and I am so, so, so tired. The baby is due in 3 1/2 weeks and we are supposed to be moving in the next two weeks. I haven't packed a thing. I haven't washed any of the babies things, or even gotten anything out to wash. I had two showings on our rental house this week and an open house tomorrow and my house is a wreck. I really should be cleaning, but it's 9:30 at night and I still have a lesson to prepare for tomorrow. Which by the way is on optimism and gratitude. Great just shove that in my face right now. My feet and hands are so swollen that it hurts to type this right now, yet here I sit complaining because you know what it feels good to complain. People keep asking me how I am doing and I put on my happy face and say we are fine, but deep down I am freaking out every second of every day about the next month of my life. Whit is spending every free second at the new house trying to get it ready or he is studying for his class he is taking, meanwhile I am just trying not to yell at my kids every second for things that really aren't their fault. I had to sit down with them tonight and explain why I am such a witch right now and I promised them that if they could just bear with me for a few more weeks life will get better. But will it? In a few weeks I will have a new born baby and a brand new house to organize. Will I ever catch up and become not so witchy. I am really starting to wonder???? Maybe I should go read my lesson. I think I need a good dose of optimism and gratitude right now. Life isn't perfect, but complaining about it doesn't make it better or make it go away. The house is still messy and my lesson still needs to be prepared and my feet and hands still ache, but I have it a lot better than a lot of other people so I should put on the happy face and this too shall pass.