Narley

Ragnarley that is!!!!

Just a sneak peak at what I was up to this last weekend!!!!

Happy Dad's Day!

This is another masterpiece from nursery!!!! But it says it all, BEST DAD! Steve you are the BEST dad! We love you!!!!

Impressive?

I don't know about the rest of you...but I was kind of impressed with this do! Okay....that's seriously all I got! Help me!!!! Any ideas!!!!

Roar!

Britney has planned out a summer of fun and adventures! To kick it all off, we joined her at the Zoo! Wooo for the Zoo, we had a blast!

We met the locals....

Brynn and Katy had a great time together, for the most part. I'm having a feelin' that they are going to have a love hate relationship!

Today it was the love relationship!

TJ thought the elephant statue was awesome!

Katy thought it was awesome until it started spitting water from it, scared her to death!!!! Good thing Gage was there to save her!

Her blankie was there to help too......it went right in the wash when we got home!!! Ewwww!

This guy didn't seem to know why Katy and Brynn were so upset at the elephant statue!!!!

And we were lucky to narrowly escape this guy's grips! Whew, that was a close one!

TJ and Gage always seem to know how to have a good time! Love the ear pulling Gage!

Peace in the middle East, and for lunch.....we packed it in and ate at the Asian Highlands!

The oooo, oooo, ahhh, ahhhh's were Katy's favorite!

The Barker family! Does Gage look like a pirate to anyone else in this picture? Ha!!!!

And lastly we played at the water ball. I guess that is what you call this thing? Good times for sure, thanks for letting us kick off the summer with you Brit! Can't wait for the rest of our adventures!

Meet......

Eddie!!!!!

Don't worry he is not ours. My SIL Wendy got him a few weeks ago. I almost thought Steve was going to cry when I said that we could not get another dog (we've tried, it's too hard). Steve is always looking for a reason for a new pet. We always joke that we are going to live on a mock farm one day....we'll have one duck, one pic, one chick, and lots of dogs! Just not today!

Sorry Steve! Congrats Olsons, he is too cute!

After the smash

This is how you have a good time after a cake smash shoot....you clean up in the hose! My SIL Heidi asked me to take some 1st birthday pics of Brynne. The cake was enjoyed by all, and we had a BLAST cleaning up as you can see....

Ha, this hair!!! I'm getting better at doing it....just a bit lazy about that this day!

This was actually Katy's first time in the hose. I think this will be something that we do on a regular basis over the summer. As you can see....Katy's skin is screaming for some sun! But not too much sun....remember the sunscreen kids!

Paige was making me laugh so hard. And may I just say....this is the cutest swim suit I have ever seen ever! Do they make these in my size?

Here are some of my favorites.....

Click HERE if you want to see the rest.

Photography Tip: The garage is your best friend when it comes to lighting!

Believe it or not friends, these were taken in the garage....just inside the overhang. Garages create great flat light and help create beautiful catchlights...like in the eyes as you can see in the first photo. It really helps to open up the shadows on faces as well. Now that it's warmer you should give it a try. Also good to try? A door or window, have fun!

More Forest Gumping

Can I just say that Memorial Day weekend was such a great weekend for free runs!!!!

It all started with my stake 5K.......

I opted to take Katy and the jogging stroller, along with the rest of my ward. Mind you, I have not run with her in this thing probably since she was 6-8 months old!!! I had to wake her up to go of course, and she was not a happy camper. We got off to a good start, all was well, until Katy decided she didn't want to be there. "I got up for this? Are you joking?" If she could talk....these are the phrases you would have heard. We actually ran right by Sheena's house....did we wake you up Sheena? By the end I felt so bad, not only for Katy but for everyone running around me! I swear I ran right behind these two girls for the last mile and a half, ruining their peaceful morning run!!!! Katy was screaming bloody murder at this point!!!!! Faster, faster is all I kept thinking.

It's pretty embarrassing when you are crossing the finish line with people clapping and yet staring in horror at Katy's blood curdling screams!!!! At least I can laugh about it now. Just a sorry for all of you that had to endure that! And sorry to Katy for getting her up, clearly before she wanted to!

Still a bit upset here, but calming down for sure. The treats at the end helped!

The water helped too....

Then my running buddy SIL Wendy called me Sunday night to run the steeple chase with her in the morning. Really I have heard of steeple chases, and to be honest, could not tell you what they are. At least this race made sense seeing that we ran from the Oquirrh Hills Temple to the Jordan River Temple....get it steeple chase? Ha, funny right? It was an awesome run, 5 miles...just perfect. Plus, like Wendy said, we got it over for the day and it was totally free. You can do it in the fall and I think you pay, I guess they just wanted to have a practice run.

We were smart and planned ahead too. I met her in the parking lot of the Jordan River Temple and we drove to Oquirrh Hills. The plan was to have a car at the end so we did not have to wait for the shuttle. We were all rested and stretched up when we walked to Wendy's car and realized that we left her keys in my car!!!! Ha, not so smart after all I guess! We walked to Wendy's house, I took there car home, got ready and we headed back for breakfast. At least they knew why I was late!!!!

Thanks for the good run and the good times Wendy...maybe we'll have to do it again in the fall if we remember the keys!

PS: yes I know that I am wearing the same thing....it did hit the washing machine in-between!!! I guess I didn't realize I grabbed the same shirt and I can't help these are my favorite pants...so lay off!

More excuses to get together....

I seriously love Memorial Day! Not only do we get to honor those who have fought and died for our freedoms, but it's the kick off to summer. Plus it always seems like there is a million things to do all weekend! Chris and Wendy had us all over for a big breakfast....this is becoming a favorite tradition I might add..... and we had a blast. Most of the fun was had on the trampoline. My mother-in-law Joanne is a champ. Not only did she agree to get on the tramp, but she agreed to have Steve bounce her and to top it all off, he bounced her with Paige and Katy!!!! This picture makes me laugh my head off!!!

Grayden just had to get in on the fun too. Again, Joanne, this makes me laugh my head off. I hope you don't mind me posting such joyful pictures of you. I love that we will always have this to look at and laugh!

Wendy insisted that I also get a picture of Grayden jumping on the tramp. She especially loved his PJ + rain boots he put together here. I must say that I agree!

Chuck of course had to come too. I am not sure why but he always manages to rub himself in unseemingly gross things! Did I ever tell you about the dog poop incident at the dog park? Remind me to tell you that one day. Luckily today, it was nothing that could leave a mark. Oh and I'm sorry Chuck is showing his unmentionables here in this picture!

Cassie, on the other hand, was a good dog and didn't roll in poop. Poor thing though....she was diagnosed with a heart condition that will ultimately take her life. I think it's hard for the Olson's because there is no way really of telling if she's in a ton of pain or not, and also how long she really has. But I just wanted to post this to tell Cassie that I love her!

Thanks again for Chris and Wendy having us over!!! Always a good time had by all!

The Great Grandma BBQ

Every year since I can remember we have gone to Grandma's house for a BBQ on the Sunday night before Memorial Day. I don't know if Katy really remembered last year or not....but I can't imagine that she will forget all the fun we had this year!

We played in Grandma Ida's secret garden with Gage and Brynn. Gage decided that Katy was being too slow and helped her down the stairs, that boy is so helpful! Katy didn't mind as you can see....

We played in Grandma Ida's fountains!!!!

She has several of these. The one on the upper deck was the favorite. As you can plainly see.....Katy and Brynn had a blast. It was a bit cooler that afternoon and I didn't even think to bring a change of clothes for Katy. That would have been nice though considering she got herself, and anyone else around the fountain, soaked!!!

Katy decidedly won the "wet onsie" contest we had! We took her dress off in hopes that it would dry. It didn't so we went home in a freshly changed diaper and a jacket, or a zippy as we like to call them.
It was fun to see the Barkers, as they had to drive quite a way to get there.

And we couldn't miss a "Team Katie/Katy" picture opportunity. Although Katy is not too happy about this. Not that you can see it but the fountain is just off to the left here, she wanted to jump in again!

Thanks for having us over Grandma Ida!!! We love you!

More Flowers

As tradition would have it, we also visited the Russell's'. Here is a picture of the gang....

Steve was more than happy to volunteer to help clean the graves, hey he's pretty good at it too!

Beautiful Flowers.

Cute cute Paige!

Grandpa Ferguson

I don't know if Katy much remembered our jaunt to the cemetery last year, but I think she will remember meeting Grandpa Ferguson this year.

We picked up mom and headed for the cemetery. It was good to see grandpa, wish Katy could have met him here.

Cheese..... Preparing to smell the flowers, it's worth doing right....

Awww, perfect!

Thanks for coming to visit great grandpa with us grandma Kerry!

We love you Grandpa!

Fun?

When Nicole and I were running we decided that we needed to go swimming. We opted for the WVC fitness center. We planned on meeting there at 10:00. Good thing we were late because it didn't open until 11:30....weird? Luckily we were able to hang out here:

Way cool kids play area.

Mostly I think they loved the grocery area. But it was like a little city....very fun.

Afterwards? We headed to the pool. Apparently Katy decided to be mortified of the water buckets that would fill up and dump over. No matter where we were in the pool she was screaming bloody murder!!!! I would have snapped a picture of it but every time I put Katy down she wanted to go and jump into the big pool....maybe to get away from the buckets of terror!!!! Nicole and Oakley were good sports, considering! Katy and I left about a half hour later. Hey at least we got Nicole in for free.

Maybe we can try again another time Nicole. Ha, all this after I we were talking about how Oakley didn't really care of the water and Katy loved it.....so much the opposite this day! Thanks Nicole!

Who's laughing now?

Steve laughed his head off when I told him that I wanted coaster cars for my birthday last year.....well who's laughing now?

Look at all the fun being had! They seems to be especially good for making your dogs pull you up and down the street....as illustrated by Jordyn here. Does Chuck look happy? I don't think so!

Jordyn is just lucky I share my best friend with her! Ha, good boy Chuck!!!!