Upstart Graduation

So many pictures of Ava get taken. She is the joy and delight of our home, as whiny as she can sometimes be. :)

Folding her arms at church!

Poor Mckinley hates wearing glasses so much. We have a yearly check up and are starting to realize she might just have them for the rest of her life. Poor thing.

My wonderful sister-in-law Megan came over and taught me how to make french bread. It was delicious!

Swimming at Elleny's pool! I forgot how deep it was and didn't bring floaties for Tyler and Kallie so they couldn't really reach anywhere. Next time I will bring their floaties. Still had a blast. Best pool ever.

Free slime Fridays at Michael's!

Nothing screams summer to me louder than watermelon. Yummm!!!

Fun at Nielsen's Grove. We have enjoyed so many beautiful weather days this year.

Craft day at Michael's. The kids got to paint terra cotta pots.

I love how Ava eats cereal. She uses the same bowls and spoons as everyone else. She always holds the spoon by the tip and can barely reach it in to her mouth. Always a mess but I love the independance!

Tyler and Kallie were finally able to stop doing their online preschool and go to graduation. They were a little burned out in the end. It was a struggle throughout the year to get them to do it, but oh they learned so much. They are both reading! I'm so happy we found this program and stuck with it. I will totally do it with Ava when she's old enough.

12 Years

Brandon and I celebrated our 12 year anniversary with a bang. We had his mom watch our kids overnight while we went to dinner at Ruby River and then went to see Oceans 8. 

Man, the food was good.

The next morning we were going to go to the temple together but Brandon ended up going on a bike ride with his brothers and I went to the temple for us.

Later that evening we got a babysitter and went to dinner at Zao with his parents and Jason and Shannon, and then we all went to another movie and saw Adrift. It was a great anniversary celebration!

Cabin Fun

So school ended, two days later Mckinley got baptized, and two days after that we headed up to the cabin. Brandon stayed home to work, and ended up being sick while we were gone. We missed him, but had a great time while we were there. The kids just love playing with their cousins and it's so beautiful up there.

The weather was gorgeous. So fun to be able to eat outside.

Kallie made a bouquet of wild flowers to bring home to Brandon. It didn't make it, but the picture did.

Ava was so cute, always trying on different people's shoes and even putting them on her baby cousin Sage.

Helping Ava get warm after she got soaked in the lake.

Bryant showed up with a few of his boys the second day and Tyler had a blast playing with Ezra.

Most of the cousins that were there. Except how did I not get Ava in the picture? Oops.

Mckinley gets Baptized!!

After we came home from Las Vegas we had a few days to relax and then we got to enjoy Mckinley's baptism day. 

Here are some pictures we took a few weeks before her baptism.

She got baptized on June 2nd, along with two boys from our ward. It was our new Bishop's first baptism. She was so happy and the entire day was absolutely perfect. Brandon did an excellent job with both parts. It was just so fun to experience it. And she had such great support.

My visiting teacher brought her this beautiful head piece and candy necklace, and she got a bunch of gifts from other people as well. I'm so sad that I didn't get pictures with some of the people who came to support her. Her cute primary teachers, the Christiansen's, came, as well as her old preschool teacher Robin Scott, the Wible's, Nedra, and everyone from both sides of the family that lives here came. Amy was even in town from Idaho and was there. It was wonderful.

We had amazing weather so people we able to eat out on the deck and the grass. The food was delicious.

Brandon had the idea to make her a candy bar chart for her birthday and then we both completely spaced it so we decided to do it for her baptism instead. She loved it! Such a great day.