June Kid Stuff

Summer is here!  Andrew is going to swim team every morning from 8-9am for practice.  He has 3-4 meets that will be on Saturday.  This was my request for him to do swim team (since I need something to wear him out!) and he isn't even complaining about going everyday!  Hooray!  He swims with a boy named Keaton and get this - he is the son of my "Brick Oven best friend", Jamee Gibert!  Andrew's a good little swimmer, but he is racing against the boys almost a year older than him, so I'll probably make him do it again next year so that he can compete as one of the oldest boys. His best event is freestyle.

Andrew at the last possible minute decided to sign up for baseball.  He did not love it last year, so I was surprised that he wanted to do it again.  I am pretty sure he did it only to get a new shirt!  On the way home from one of his games, Andrew said to Brandon, "Dad, do you ever want to go in people houses and see what kind of clothes they have?"  ha ha ha   NO, Andrew!  That is pretty creepy, buddy!

This month, Kendall did all things dance with a dress rehearsal and recital.  I absolutely LOVE watching Kendall dance!  She loves it and you can tell.  She is typically the tallest in the class, so they put her right in the middle and she does all the moves pretty well.

Every summer, Grandma Nancy does dates with the kids and Cole and Kendall both wanted to go to Cowabunga Bay, so they went together!  That is one of her favorite places and she says they have the best corndog ever!  Plus they have dip n dots, so it's a complete win!  In fact, she tells us that we can take her on her 8 year old trip to Cowabunga Bay.  I bet she'll change her mind over the next couple years!

I am trying to teach Carson how to watch a movie by himself.  He prefers to sit on someone's lap!  Yikes!! That will not work.  He also loves to lean back when watching shows for some reason and it cracks me up.  I have resorted to sticking him in the exersaucer to keep him still for 30 minutes while I try to get something done.

Nana had her annual garage sale and Carson was such a big helper!  He helped with the cash register and modeled the electric Cobra.  Then he was all tuckered out and almost fell asleep on Nana's hammock in her backyard.

Summer is here!

June was filled with races, recitals, sleeping in, hiking, swimming, saw friends visiting from Arizona and birthdays - exactly what June should be!  

Brandon did a dirty dash with Chris, Morgan and Amber (Morgan's sister-in-law) and they dressed the part and were disgusting both before and after the race!  It was easy to spot Brandon in his yellow helmet and after the race, we saw some dirty dash commercials online and could see him ahead of the  pack at the beginning of the race with his yellow helmet!  He ripped his pants during the race and somehow still had a blast!

One night, Brandon was feeling generous and he let the kids sleep on the tramp and watch a movie projected onto the fence.  He even slept out there with them, but I don't know how much sleep they actually got!  We also went to Funtopia to let the kids get some energy out.  We hiked to Battlecreek Falls and Rachel had the absolute WORST attitude about hiking, so she refused to be in the picture.  She apologized later that night and realized that hiking is not as bad as she made it out to be.  We met Kasey at Lowe's Air Sports when she was in town and we met Karli at Provo Rec Center when her family was in town.  It is so fun to see our friends from Arizona when they come to Utah!

10th Half Marathon

In June, I ran my 10th Half Marathon - completing a life goal that I made in college!  I am SO glad that I did it and that it is done.  On this last race, the training did not feel as fulfilling or fun and I felt OLD!  But I did it and Brandon was a trooper and did it with me (again!).  Scott Murray also joined us and we ran into some local friends who were also doing it.  We did the AF Canyon Race Against Cancer and I loved the course - it started at Tibblecreek Reservoir and ended at Art Dye Park.

Half Marathons & Time Completed:
1.  March 2003 / Moab, UT / 2:03
2.  March 2004 / Moab, UT / 2:07
3.  March 2005 / Moab, UT / 2:02 (w/Brandon 2:02)
4.  May 2007 / Racine, WI / 2:09 (w/Brandon 1:55)
5.  May 2009 / Kenosha, WI / 2:16
6.  June 2011 / Wasatch Back Ragnar UT 14.5 miles (w/Brandon 18.5 miles)
7.  July 2013 / Salt Lake City, UT / 2:38 (w/Cindy)
8.  February 2015 / San Diego, CA / 2:00:32 (Hale girls weekend)
9.  February 2015 / Phoenix, AZ / 1:59:14
10.  June 2018 / American Fork, UT / 2:13 (w/Brandon 2:08)

Rachel turns 10

Double digits!!  Rachel turned 10 years old!!  They watched "The Greatest Showman", played night games, wanted pizza and a cheesecake from Costco - pretty easy!

Some fun facts about 10 year old Rachel:
- got a tortoise for her birthday and named him Kolbie (she is fully in charge of taking care of him and he lives in her room)
- has tons of friends and we always get good reports from her teachers at school
- she is quite possessive of her stuff and her room, the littles know that they are NOT allowed in there
- first purchased soundtracks:  The Greatest Showman & Taylor Swift (her first CD)
- she is very particular about her hair and requests very elaborate hairstyles (sometimes she doesn't approve and we have to take it out and start over or do something different)
- she made a babysitting flier to do some practice babysitting while the mom's try to get things done around the house and she did super great!  The Winward's hired her once a week for the whole summer because she did a great job.  She charges $3/hour.
- she picked out all new bedding for her birthday an got a princess-type canopy for over her bed
- she loves shopping and especially loves anything Nike right now, I don't attempt to buy her any clothes, since I really can't guess what she'll like or not like (ex. she picked out the fanciest pink Sunday dress at H&M that I would have never guessed that she would have liked)
- she LOVES baked goods and chocolates
- We LOVE Rachel!