Haylie's New Room

We moved Haylie to one of the rooms in the basement over the summer.  It is bigger that the room upstairs, and stays cooler in the summer.  The upstairs room has a big window in it that tends to make the room hot in the summer.  We had to make it a little more enticing to have a basement bedroom so what better than some pink and gray stripes!  Haylie was a great helper and it turned out so cute!

Boise Visit

One of the things I miss most about living in Boise is being close to my sister, Alyson, and her family.  They recently moved to a house in Nampa so we were excited to find the time to get up to visit them and see their new place.  We went the first weekend in August to spend some time with them and to visit some friends from our days there.  The Harwoods have a huge backyard with a playhouse in it.  It was the perfect place for one of Haylie and Rylan's traditional larger than life ideas.  They decided to turn it in to a snack shack.  They hauled all kinds of food out to it and then set up a serving area and an eating area.  It was great fun and even Alyson, baby Adalynn, and I made the trek to eat at the snack shack.  Haylie and Zander LOVE playing with their cousins.  Every time they see them they both comment on how they wished we lived close to them.

Swim Team

When Haylie was little she was probably a swim teacher's worst nightmare.  She would wrap her arms and legs around them in a death grip instead of laying out on the water for them to help her float.  One summer I got her a pair of goggles.  They were like Dumbo's magic feather.  She started swimming like a fish.  In fact, she likes it so much, over the summer in 2015 she joined a swim team. She has learned a lot since being on the team and I have no doubt she is a stronger swimmer than I ever have a hope of being.  Here are some shots of her getting ready for her first meet.  She ended up placing in each event she entered!  Way to go Haylie!  I am glad she has found an activity that she loves to do.

Gearing up to go!

In Lane 2

Going for 1st place

Pioneer Day with Grandma and Grandpa Holzer

Dave's parents, Art and Patti, came to visit us over the 24th of July.  We were able to visit, go to a Pioneer Day parade in Wellington and also a fireworks show in Cleveland.  We have kind of grown to enjoy these small town celebrations and it was fun to take Grandma and Grandpa along too.  I don't know how I didn't get any pictures of us doing any of these fun activities but we did get a couple of shots with Dave and the dogs!  Grandma and Grandpa usually bring their dogs Buddy and Maggie along and the kids love it!  Charlotte loves it too but these dogs aren't all that excited about Charlotte's energy.  They would rather nap and she would rather play. We are always happy to see this part of the family that we don't get to see very often.10+ hours through several mountain passes unfortunately limits our visits with each other.

Summer fun

I absolutely love summer!  Since I am behind on my blogging, I am writing about this right after Christmas and I am so ready for more warm summer days!  This post includes lots of everyday summer fun that we had.  I will explain in the captions!.

This is what happens when cousins get together at Grandma's house...a potato bug maze!

This is what happens when you find that the cement pad your air conditioner is on has sunk about 8 inches!  This caused some contention because two of my garden boxes had to be removed in order it get the equipment in to raise the A/C unit. My plants were never the same.

Haylie was given a cabbage plant at school to grow over the summer.  Here she is next to it before we harvested it.

Haylie hosted a reading party and invited some of the neighborhood kids.  She had a reading hut set up  plus blankets and pillows and snacks to read with.  It was surprisingly quiet as everyone read.

The Little Mermaid

For Christmas 2014, my mom and dad got us tickets to see The Little Mermaid at the Hale Theatre over the summer. It is in the Salt Lake area so we made a fun trip of it.  We went out to dinner and then to the play.  The stage is in the center of the theater with seating all around it.  It can rotate, or be raised or lowered.  It is amazing to watch a play there.  The kids loved it and so did Dave and I.  Another tradition to keep up!

Kayaking

We decided that in the name of family fun we would buy a kayak this summer.  We only got to take it out a couple of times but it was a blast!  We took turns taking the kids out and the dog ended up on just about every ride!  Our first trip our was to Joe's Valley Reservoir.  It was on the 4th of July weekend so it was kind of busy but we were able to find a place to set up on the shore.  We cooked some tin foil dinners, and played in the water until it was almost dark.  We had loaded up to camp overnight but didn't get there soon enough to find an overnight camping spot.  We came home and slept in our beds at home.  It actually worked out great and everyone had a fabulous time!

This is what the trip home looks like after a long day at the lake!

Batter Up!

Zander played coach pitch baseball this summer.  I am wishing we had started him earlier playing baseball, but he had a great time and was able to learn a lot of things.

Go Bees!!

This year Emery Telcom paid for all of it's employees to attend a Salt Lake Bees Minor League baseball game.  It was so fun!  It also really sparked an interest in baseball for both of the kids.  I think we should make this a tradition even it we don't get free tickets!

Lemonade Stand

Every summer Haylie begs to have a lemonade stand.  I always drag my feet because it is a lot of work and they hardly have any customers.  I have been a little more willing since our street got extended and is now a pretty straight shot from our neighborhood to Wal-Mart.  We seem to get a lot more traffic.  Here they are with this year's rendition.  They had fun and made some memories. I have to remind myself that what counts!