Traffic School

This video that was shown in traffic school that I attended today was probably the best part of the class. Check it out.

Fun Partay

My friend has two little boys who's birthdays are 2 years and 2 days apart. She threw the most fun party for them a few weeks ago. Like the good friend I am I did not bring my camera and relied on getting some from my friends. You can see her blog here for the awesome shots. She did a cowboy party and it really was such a blast. She had cowboy hats and bandanas for all the kids and all these games set up. My only regret is that I didn't get a shot of my girls with fake mustaches in front of the saloon scene. Lilly enjoyed panning for gold (such a cute idea!) and Sophia enjoyed playing in the "sunburned sand" (a.k.a. leftover charcoals from the dutch oven) until she unfortunately burned her finger. Oops! Thanks again for the great party Erin!

The Latest of Times

Apparently it's been a little while since I've cleared the pictures off my camera. Here's our awesome friends the Belnap's who stayed with us a few weeks ago. We wish they would have stayed longer! Sophia and Emma had a blast together.

This past weekend we went to Wales for Pioneer Day so that we could go to the Fairview parade. It was awesome as usual. We went to the fish hatchery in Fountain Green after the parade. The kids had a total blast! I wish I would have brought my camera. We will definitely visit there pretty much every trip we take to Wales from now on. Let us know when you want to go and we'll stop by the fish hatchery! Here's all the cousins who came swinging on the porch swing.

Grandma Wilkins with the girls.Here's Doug at the parade with the girls just waiting for the candy!

A few weekends ago we went to American Fork's Steel Days Celebration. It was so awesome! We went to the picnic in the park and the kids had a blast. There were all sorts of carnival games for them to play and little rides to ride. Here they are on the train with Drezden.
Lilly even got her face painted.

These next two pictures are a little random. Our stake is doing a humanitarian project right now where they've asked every sister in the stake for make a quilt for the hospital, Papillon House, or humanitarian aid. They patterened the idea after Brigham Young unfurling the yellow banner on Ensign Peak and so they're calling the project "Unfurl the Banner". They want the quilts to be completed in time for the general Relief Society broadcast in Sept so they can display them all. It's a pretty cool idea. Anyway, here's my contribution. It's a crib size quilt so don't be too impressed. My mom sewed the main 4 blocks because they made me want to pull my hair out so she really deserves all the credit.

This quilt is the one I did in a quilt class that I've been taking with my mom since January. The quilt is called "All Roads Lead to Home" and it's the one I gave to Doug's parents for their homecoming. I finally finished binging it (not my favorite part of quilting) today and so it's ready to officially be handed over to them. I had fun with this class and thought the final product turned out okay. My mom got us all signed up for the next class. It's called "Flowers from my Garden" and looks adorable. I can't wait!

Word to the wise

These things are amazing.

Adjustable pipe fittings (although I couldn't find a picture of them) are pretty incredible too. When you've fixed the same stinking leaking sprinkler pipe three times using a hack saw and couplers that don't slide very well, the aforementioned items I discovered at Sprinkler World definitely come in handy. I got the job done in about 1 minute. My hands still ended up covered in blue PVC cement but at least it's fixed (I hope) and our lawn will be dead no more. I ask Doug why we hadn't discovered these things sooner and he responded "because it builds character". I'm considering starting my own sprinkler pipe fixing consulting business. Let me know if anyone's interested.

Sisters-in-law

Friday I went to visit my sister-in-law and her cute kids who recently moved to Utah (which I'm way more excited about than I should be). She had this canvas hanging in her family room and I totally loved it.

The artist is Rodney White and he's done some pretty amazing stuff. You can see more of his work here. I'm pretty fond of this one.

My sister-in-law picked up another one from Target that says "It'll cost nothing to dream and everything not to". I totally love them!

My other sister-in-law did a recent post about her trip to Utah and all that it entails. If you want to see pictures of me in the stocks and some pretty cute ones of my kids hiking you can click here. Enjoy!

Happy Stuff Lately

So aside from everything my kids did last week, a flat tire, washing my cell phone in the washer, and getting pulled over this morning things have been good so far. We've had some fun friends in town for the weekend and have been having a blast. On Saturday we headed up to the grotto up Payson Canyon. Doug decided it would be a good idea to walk back to the waterfall.
He got a little bit wet.

Lilly decided to take a bath in the pool of water and she got a little bit wet too.

Here's Sophia and Emma. They have seriously had the best time since she got here. We've even let them sleep in the same room and they've done great!

Here's Sophia getting ready for the hike.

These are in reverse order so the next shots are from the 4th of July. Here's Sophia with grandpa and grandma Wilkins. They reported from their mission to their home ward yesterday and it was fabulous! They invited all returned missionaries who speak portuguese to come and sing Called to Serve. They filled the front of the chapel. It was really neat. They both did a fabulous job speaking and it was fun to see so many of their missionaries! I can't believe they had so many come. It was awesome.

Kids getting ready for the home firework show.

Doug and Sophia pretty excited about the show.

I brought this cake to dinner. My friend had it on her blog and it looked too good not to make. There's chocolate cake on the top and bottom and a layer of brownie and cheesecake in the middle. Although it probably belongs on this blog, it was delicious!

The day before the 4th we went to the balloons in Provo. It was so fun!

I can't make this stuff up

So I was downstairs today printing some stuff of the computer and Sophia came running down and said "mom! Look what Lilly did to my leg" Her leg was covered in what I assumed was nail polish so I ran upstairs to observe the damage. Sure enough she had a bottle of nail polish and she was painting herself as well as the bathroom floor. Luckily she was using our nice decor towels to wipe it up though. Seriously? What is with my kids!?! Do they not remember we're trying to sell our house? I'm not sure anyone wants to buy a house with ketchup and milk stained carpets and beautiful bright red nail polish stained tile grout! Apparently my goal to give them more attention has not taken effect yet.

And it continues...

So after I calmed down yesterday and while Sophia was taking a good 2 hour nap I decided to have some lunch. I went to get a fork and found that each slot in my silverware drawer was filled with ketchup. I kept waiting for more ketchup surprises throughout the day. I really am a mean mom though. I wouldn't let her have ketchup with her eggs for dinner. Have I no heart?!

Today I was out watering my flowers and chatting with a friend on the phone. Sophia and Lilly were watching a show and drinking cups of milk. I came back in and found little dribbles all over the table, chairs, bookcases, plastic bicycle seat, etc and thought, "Lilly must have accidentally spilled her milk a few places". After I found a big dribble on the couch and then looked at Sophia and asked what that was all about. She replied "at least I didn't put it on that" while she pointed to my Brazillian table runner." I told her to go to her room and she kind of shrugged her shoulders and walked away. I told her to clean her room and that if it wasn't done by the time aunt Leda and uncle David came over she wouldn't be getting any dinner. She came out after a few minutes and said, "but maybe I don't want any dinner". She then chastized me for not cleaning up my room and for missing a few toys when I picked up the living room. Raise your hand if you think I'm not giving my child enough attention. I definitely know where my focus is going to be for the rest of the summer (or at least the next few days).

It wasn't very funny

This morning I was outside working on a stupid sprinkler pipe that has been leaking pretty much since we moved in. I thought I has already fixed it once and then we noticed it was still leaking the other day. I'd been out there for about an hour and was still getting nowhere with the pipe (I made the last cut about 1/4" too short and so I have to wait till Doug gets home (I already walked the girls to the hardware store once) to get more couples and pipe). Anyway, after that failed attempt I came in to check on the girls. Sophia had piles and piles of wipes soaked in red stuff and was madly trying to clean up piles of red stuff I looked around a little more and found little ketchup dollups all over my counters, floor, table, couches and pillows. I pretty much freaked out. I looked around even more and found she had put a nice little dollup in every serving bowl that I have on shelves in my living room. I also noticed there was a nice big dollop on the table runner my mother-in-law gave me from Brazil. At that point I pretty much lost it. I know that it was something I should have just laughed at but it was just not one of those moments for me. I told her to stay in her room for the rest of the day and that I was going to throw away all the ketchup in the house (or at least take away her ketchup priviledges for awhile).

While I was cleaning it up it got all over the carpet and everything. I was so frustrated. I asked her why one earth she would have ever thought that was a good idea. Her response: "I thought it was funny". My response to her response: "It wasn't"

They're Home!

Today was a fun day for us because we got to welcome home President and Sister Wilkins! They've been serving in Sao Paulo Brazil for 3 years and we were so happy to see them come home! It seems like just yesterday that we were hugging them goodbye and shedding happy tears but when you think about all that has happened (7 new grandchildren (they only had 9 when they left), a wedding, new son-in-law, lots of moves, etc.) they were gone forever! We headed over to their house this morning with 2 dozen yellow balloons in tow to get the house ready for their welcome home!

We made it to the airport with only a few minutes to spare and were happy to greet them off the plane. It was so good to see them again! Here's the President meeting his new son-in-law for the first time. We were all doing okay until Leda burst into tears and said "this is my husband dad". We all kind of lost it.

I wish I would have taken more pictures. I'll have to see what I can get from everyone else. All the kids wore their Brazillian soccer jerseys that Grandma gave them last summer and all looked so cute.

Pulling into the driveway.

We took a lot more pictures inside but of course we left out camera in the car. Once again, I'll have to see what I can get from other people. We did get one big group shot that I think turned out pretty nice. They brought back some fun things for the kids. They gave each one a notepad and pencil. The notepad had Brazil's national anthem written on the back. They also gave them some Brazillian change and a clay whistle. They also gave the girls dolls that a sister down there made for each one. They're so precious. We have some lucky girls!
They also gave these cute table runners to the girls. She said she had a really hard time finding things that were actually made in Brazil and not in China. She said these are pretty common down there. I thought it was cute.
Back in July my mom and I started taking a quilt class. The first time we went we were told the quilt we were making was going to be called "All Roads Lead to Home" at that it'd be done in July. I immediately thought that it'd be such a great homecoming gift for Doug's parents. Unfortunately we have one more class this month so I'm not totally finished. I gave it to them anyway and I thik they enjoyed it. I can't wait to get it totally finished. I wish I would have taken a picture with them and the quilt. I'll be sure to get one when the quilt is totally finished.

After all the welcome home festivities (which included enchiladas, applesauce, cottage cheese and Root Beer (all things they missed)) we went to my cute nephew's T-Ball game.

Is he not the cutest T-baller? Lilly enjoyed the game too.

Yesterday I got to take my cute niece and nephews to the park so that their mom and dad could pack. We are so happy for them but also so sad that they'll be moving to Pennsylvania next week! We're excited to have more family on the east coast but like I said, we're sad to see them go. The kids had such a great time playing together. They are so cute and so well be-haved!