Hello again and welcome to another Blackburner. This time we will be reliving summertime starting with July.
As cases have continued to go down, we took a chance and chose to go hang out with our family for the 4th of July weekend. We went to my aunt Lisa's house, and while there shot fireworks. My aunt also had some silly string for the young kids to play. Our kids didn't get the idea, but they seemed to have fun with it.
A couple of weeks later we had the fun of going to little Cottonwood Canyon and camping as a family. While there, we hiked to bridal falls and back (well Enna and I did-the rest them stopped short of it because it was hard to get down up and back up). They really seemed to have for a good time, even if they immediately crashed on returning by car (they were too exhausted to finish the walk). We were able to find a seesaw constructed of two long trees, and the kids had fun jumping up and down on that. The trip was a little rough with the baby because of sleeping in the pack-and-play in a tent, but we made it OK and everybody survived the three days with good memories.
The last week of the month was packed with some fun things. The first thing of that week was the blessing of a new niece. Miss Charlotte was blessed on that last Sunday of July. Due to that lots of people were in town, so we were able to enjoy time with my side of the family with a dinner, some games, and just chit chat time. It was also during this time that the first word popped out of little Erick’s mouth and guess what it was-Mama! Ryan heard it and called him a traitor because all the rest of the kids’ first words was Dada. My mom said, “let Ashley have her moment”. I just laughed. I’m glad we are starting to hear words from him. Let’s just hope he does more talking than just mom and dad.
Finally, the month ended with the fun of riding the “Heber Creeper” train. It was something that Ryan and I had done when we had first gotten married, and we thought it'd be fun to do it again. So, we took all our kids, plus Emily and her family, and my mom and we went to Heber for a fun family activity. The kids really enjoyed it and they loved dancing along with the fiddle and singer player as they performed their song. Afterwards we went to a train themed restaurant, and the kids pointed and were transfixed by the train that was driving around our heads.
As August began it was time to start getting ready for the next year of school. However, there was still a little bit of summer left to enjoy. One of those things was helping our neighbor when they went on vacation down to Saint George. For about four days, we were responsible for our neighbor’s cat. We went over to their house and made sure the cat had food and water, and then we would play a little bit with their toys (with permission of course). This gave the kids an excuse to get out of the house, but also had a chance to teach them a little bit about responsibility.
We also got the opportunity to spend time with Ryan’s side of the family as his sister Kamee made a rare appearance down in Utah. Using the excuse of everyone being in the same state, we had a BBQ at his brother’s house. The kids enjoyed playing with all their cousins (and their cousins’ Bunny), and the adults had fun chit chatting and catching up as we hadn't been together for at least six to nine months.
Wanting to take advantage of the nice weather and the fact that we had no school to deal with, we squeezed in one other camping trip. This time, however, it was in a cabin so that made things a little bit easier. It was at a site called Mia Shalom, which was usually reserved for reserved for young women for their girls’ camp. However, because of the pandemic, they hadn't had a whole lot of wards signing up, so there were spots for families like us. We spent about three days canoeing, hiking, playing outside, and just letting kids have fun in the fresh air. My favorite memory we made there was during our canoeing trip portion of the camp. While on the lake, Enna found a lizard and she decided to call it Freddy. Thankfully, we did convince her to leave Freddy behind, but the fact that she enjoyed picking up the lizard and checking him out was fun.
As soon as we returned home, it was time for a big birthday. Our girl is 7! Can you believe it? 7 already. She enjoyed getting a brand-new bike and lots of toys that she could build with her hands. She's quite the architect.
Soon enough August began. And with that came the end of a project which has been going for over two years: the finishing of our basement yay! Only thing left to do was to lay carpet. We had already picked it out, put in the order, and made the appointment, so now it was just waiting for the day. On the day in question, the installation took about three to four hours. But when it was finally done, we all enjoyed going down together and running around in the new carpeted space. Now all we had to do was move the furniture down into the new rooms. That took a couple weeks, but once it was done, it was nice to have additional space. Especially on days when Ryan had to sleep during the day for work, because I could just send the kids down there. And they didn't have to be as quiet as they did when they were upstairs. The older girls also loved their new bedroom which was good as I had worried they would be a little scared. Yay for major project done!
In other news, it was time to begin the adventure of potty training again. I knew training would be a bit more difficult this time around as there were two trainees the same age (aka no break for mom). Especially when one of those trainees was a boy. Thankfully, I wasn't having to train them both at the same time Celeste was pretty much all the way there having been more interested to start earlier. This time, however, would be a little bit different as it was now Dallin’s turn. He seems to be interested (at least a little bit) this time around so hopefully that helps us.
We ended August with two kids entering school. One as a kindergartener and one as a second grader. Although both were excited, they were also a little sad to see summer ending. We'll see how the year goes, specifically for us at home now there's two missing during the day-well at least for half of it anyway.
September brought the twins 3rd birthday. As part of that birthday, they each got a new bike. They were both over the moon that they got to have a new bike, and promptly went outside to ride them. Only a few more months in our little twinos will be going to primary! It's hard to believe. It was fun seeing them opening their gifts and being so excited about it.
We also introduced Erick to his first sucker. He didn't get to eat it all by himself because I was too afraid he would stick the stick all the way down his throat so I was there holding it, but he did get his first taste of it and boy did he love it! He kept shaking and trying to grab the stick every time I would take it out of his mouth. Another kid that is growing up so fast.
As another part of his growing up this month, he also received his first haircut. I was amazed how before his haircut he looked like he had brown hair and then after his haircut he looked blonde. I couldn't believe what a difference that removing all that hair made-it was like a whole different kid! We even made jokes that it wasn't the same kid simply because he looked so different. So much for having my brown-haired kid. Oh well, they all got the brown eyes, so it works.
Well that does it for us for this quarter see ya for the holidays!
As cases have continued to go down, we took a chance and chose to go hang out with our family for the 4th of July weekend. We went to my aunt Lisa's house, and while there shot fireworks. My aunt also had some silly string for the young kids to play. Our kids didn't get the idea, but they seemed to have fun with it.
A couple of weeks later we had the fun of going to little Cottonwood Canyon and camping as a family. While there, we hiked to bridal falls and back (well Enna and I did-the rest them stopped short of it because it was hard to get down up and back up). They really seemed to have for a good time, even if they immediately crashed on returning by car (they were too exhausted to finish the walk). We were able to find a seesaw constructed of two long trees, and the kids had fun jumping up and down on that. The trip was a little rough with the baby because of sleeping in the pack-and-play in a tent, but we made it OK and everybody survived the three days with good memories.
The last week of the month was packed with some fun things. The first thing of that week was the blessing of a new niece. Miss Charlotte was blessed on that last Sunday of July. Due to that lots of people were in town, so we were able to enjoy time with my side of the family with a dinner, some games, and just chit chat time. It was also during this time that the first word popped out of little Erick’s mouth and guess what it was-Mama! Ryan heard it and called him a traitor because all the rest of the kids’ first words was Dada. My mom said, “let Ashley have her moment”. I just laughed. I’m glad we are starting to hear words from him. Let’s just hope he does more talking than just mom and dad.
Finally, the month ended with the fun of riding the “Heber Creeper” train. It was something that Ryan and I had done when we had first gotten married, and we thought it'd be fun to do it again. So, we took all our kids, plus Emily and her family, and my mom and we went to Heber for a fun family activity. The kids really enjoyed it and they loved dancing along with the fiddle and singer player as they performed their song. Afterwards we went to a train themed restaurant, and the kids pointed and were transfixed by the train that was driving around our heads.
As August began it was time to start getting ready for the next year of school. However, there was still a little bit of summer left to enjoy. One of those things was helping our neighbor when they went on vacation down to Saint George. For about four days, we were responsible for our neighbor’s cat. We went over to their house and made sure the cat had food and water, and then we would play a little bit with their toys (with permission of course). This gave the kids an excuse to get out of the house, but also had a chance to teach them a little bit about responsibility.
We also got the opportunity to spend time with Ryan’s side of the family as his sister Kamee made a rare appearance down in Utah. Using the excuse of everyone being in the same state, we had a BBQ at his brother’s house. The kids enjoyed playing with all their cousins (and their cousins’ Bunny), and the adults had fun chit chatting and catching up as we hadn't been together for at least six to nine months.
Wanting to take advantage of the nice weather and the fact that we had no school to deal with, we squeezed in one other camping trip. This time, however, it was in a cabin so that made things a little bit easier. It was at a site called Mia Shalom, which was usually reserved for reserved for young women for their girls’ camp. However, because of the pandemic, they hadn't had a whole lot of wards signing up, so there were spots for families like us. We spent about three days canoeing, hiking, playing outside, and just letting kids have fun in the fresh air. My favorite memory we made there was during our canoeing trip portion of the camp. While on the lake, Enna found a lizard and she decided to call it Freddy. Thankfully, we did convince her to leave Freddy behind, but the fact that she enjoyed picking up the lizard and checking him out was fun.
As soon as we returned home, it was time for a big birthday. Our girl is 7! Can you believe it? 7 already. She enjoyed getting a brand-new bike and lots of toys that she could build with her hands. She's quite the architect.
Soon enough August began. And with that came the end of a project which has been going for over two years: the finishing of our basement yay! Only thing left to do was to lay carpet. We had already picked it out, put in the order, and made the appointment, so now it was just waiting for the day. On the day in question, the installation took about three to four hours. But when it was finally done, we all enjoyed going down together and running around in the new carpeted space. Now all we had to do was move the furniture down into the new rooms. That took a couple weeks, but once it was done, it was nice to have additional space. Especially on days when Ryan had to sleep during the day for work, because I could just send the kids down there. And they didn't have to be as quiet as they did when they were upstairs. The older girls also loved their new bedroom which was good as I had worried they would be a little scared. Yay for major project done!
In other news, it was time to begin the adventure of potty training again. I knew training would be a bit more difficult this time around as there were two trainees the same age (aka no break for mom). Especially when one of those trainees was a boy. Thankfully, I wasn't having to train them both at the same time Celeste was pretty much all the way there having been more interested to start earlier. This time, however, would be a little bit different as it was now Dallin’s turn. He seems to be interested (at least a little bit) this time around so hopefully that helps us.
We ended August with two kids entering school. One as a kindergartener and one as a second grader. Although both were excited, they were also a little sad to see summer ending. We'll see how the year goes, specifically for us at home now there's two missing during the day-well at least for half of it anyway.
September brought the twins 3rd birthday. As part of that birthday, they each got a new bike. They were both over the moon that they got to have a new bike, and promptly went outside to ride them. Only a few more months in our little twinos will be going to primary! It's hard to believe. It was fun seeing them opening their gifts and being so excited about it.
We also introduced Erick to his first sucker. He didn't get to eat it all by himself because I was too afraid he would stick the stick all the way down his throat so I was there holding it, but he did get his first taste of it and boy did he love it! He kept shaking and trying to grab the stick every time I would take it out of his mouth. Another kid that is growing up so fast.
As another part of his growing up this month, he also received his first haircut. I was amazed how before his haircut he looked like he had brown hair and then after his haircut he looked blonde. I couldn't believe what a difference that removing all that hair made-it was like a whole different kid! We even made jokes that it wasn't the same kid simply because he looked so different. So much for having my brown-haired kid. Oh well, they all got the brown eyes, so it works.
Well that does it for us for this quarter see ya for the holidays!
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