My Babies

One seems a bit more content with the situation than the other...

More of July

Let's see.  It's technically October, but I'm posting that it's the end of July.  Eternally playing catch up.  :)

There were so many fires all summer long that it made for some interesting sunsets.  I love the Mt. Timpanogos Temple spire peeking up through the trees.

I finally tried green smoothies on my kids.  I wouldn't say they loved them, but if they will eat them and not complain that's good enough for me!

I can't remember why they all slept in the same twin bed, but it's cute.

Love my boys!

Venturing out with all six kids when Nate is out of town is rare for me.  I can do it and we survive every time, but it's hard so I choose not to most of the time.  We treated ourselves to some frozen yogurt after going out in public and behaving well.  Yay for us!

How can you resist this face?!



Uh oh!  Carston (lives across the street) and Haley went through a kissing phase.  Had to nix that fast.  Now we just have blackmail for the future.  :)

McKenna and Eliza bejeweled themselves.

Shaggy little Maggie.  You need a haircut....

Note to mom:  NEVER let Dad tell the doggy groomer how to cut her hair. :(

 

Maggie also got spayed a day after her infamous haircut.  Poor girl!  Can't have babies AND looks ridiculous. She may never forgive us!  (She's wearing a onesie so she won't bother her stitches.  And she's lying like that because she thinks I'm going to rub her belly.)

Nate and I went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's  pioneer concert with my parents and my sister, Janice.  We also met up with and sat with Nate's parents.  Believe it or not, it was Nate's idea to go and get a little culture in our lives.  It was a fun evening.

School is starting in a month and I FINALLY got Haley to write her name.  We will work on lower case later.... for now I'm just happy she will write it at all!

 

Tye had a little scooter accident.  He hit a bump in the driveway and face planted on the cement.  That kids has smacked his nose more times in his short 7 years than I have in my life time.  I hope one day we don't find out it's been broken... I really don't think it has, but at the rate he's going it's bound to one day.

 

It's a blurry picture, but Austin is such a happy little guy.  Love him!

Sweet sleeping baby.  (Ignore the mismatched bedding.)

Summer thunderstorms.

Mom having a lazy summer morning.  Disney channel can entertain.  Too bad it can't make breakfast!

Trampoline fun!  Hopefully nobody breaks a bone.



Alaska

Nate went to Alaska for work.  But when he's in Alaska it's not all work and no play like most of his other trips.  He went with Rick, Ryan and another brother-in-law, P.J..  They visited a reindeer farm, fished, and fished and probably fished again.  It was a long week for me, but we all survived and I'm glad Nate got to have a bit of fun.  Alaska is like no other place.  Beautiful every which way you look.


The kids made a welcome home sign for Nate.  We were so excited for him to be home!

 

Ear Tubes: The Sequel

Eliza got tubes in her ears just before she turned 1 year old.  They worked and ran their course.  Then the ear infections began again.  So a year and a half later we decided to go ahead with a second round of tubes and also an adenoidectomy.  Nate was out of town, but I just wanted to get it done so we went at it alone.

At first Eliza wasn't too happy.  I was so sad she was feeling sad and scared.

That all changed when she got a purple monkey and Dora stickers.  We just played and giggled until it was time for her surgery.  She went back with the nurse just fine and I waited for her return.

The nice thing about this type of surgery is it is quick and they bounce back in no time.  Eliza took a long time to wake up.  I tried everything to get her to wake up.  She would sort of open her eyes, but never for more than a second or two.  Then all of a sudden it was like a light switch.  She was awake.

We headed to my sister Shelly's house to pick up the other kids, but on the way Eliza got sick and threw up.  Luckily it was just apple juice. I was wondering at that point if I had made the right choice to do this while Nate was gone.  I had plenty of people willing to help.  I just hate being "needy".  It turned out fine, though.  We ended up staying at Shelly's for a couple hours and by the time we left Eliza was acting like nothing had happened to her at all.  And she never did later or the next day.  It was a success!

One Year Older...

I turned... ahem.... another year older.  33 to be exact.... if we must be "exact".  Do we HAVE to be exact?  I'm actually fine with my age.  For now.  Nate was actually in town.  It's about a 50/50 chance he won't be according to my statistics.  Nate was a bit creative this year.  His suitcase broke and he just used whatever we had stored away.  With how much he travels, those suitcases didn't last long and our supply quickly dwindled.  We were down to a couple dufflebags.  I hate using dufflebags.  So I was pleasantly surpirsed to get a set 4 suitcases.  Now I just need someplace to go!  Nate put a little note in each suitcase to keep me searching through them.  I found shoes in the last smallest suitcase.  His little notes were so sweet.  I'm a lucky lady.

(One of the kids was in charge of the camera... I think that's Tye's head.  It looks Tye-ish.)

Heartbreaking

Austin can seriously break your heart in an instant.  He curls his little lower lip down and he's got you wrapped around his finger.  Anything you want you can have, buddy!  Luckily he will quickly turn that frown upside down and all is right and well with the world once again.

Baseball

Well, more like machine pitch, but it's baseball.  Kaden and a bunch of his buddies were all on the same team.  They rocked!  Lot's of home runs.  Undefeated... although technically there is no score kept.  Come on!  Everyone keeps score.  It was a lot of fun to watch.  Kaden was "Mr. Consistency".  Always hit.  Always got on base.  Always scored.  He even hit one home run!  I'm not sure if he'll decide to play little league, but I quite enjoyed watching him play and improve, even if it was 100 degrees!

Swensen Reunion

Three family reunions in a week and a half.... that's got to be some kind of record, right?!  I'm sure it's not, actually, but it made for lots of laundry and craziness for me.

The annual Swensen Family Reunion was held up at my brother-in-law's parents' cabin up past Heber, July 5-7.  We had to leave Nate's family reunion in the morning to go home and pack back up for this reunion.  It would rain then clear then rain again the next day.  It made for some fun 4 wheeling mud!

We had, if I remember correctly, three 4 wheelers and two side by side thingies (yep, that's their offical name, I'm sure of it!).  Those things were running non-stop!  The kids had so much fun riding the trails and getting beyond dirty.  There was a zipline that everyone between the ages of 7-40 mastered.... maybe not mastered, but attempted and lived!  The landing was the tricky part... Do you skid?  Do you run?  Do you flop like a fish?  I saw all three so I'm still not sure which is best. :)  My parents didn't give it a try, but we really wanted them to be around for the next reunion so we didn't encourage them.  Hee hee!  I'm sure they would have been just fine. :)  It was a fabulous time and we love the memories we made.

A little brotherly love.

My brother ended up with a flat tired on the trailer he was pulling so naturally as we were all leaving the canyon we stopped one by one as we saw everyone pulling over for something. It was like a reunion all over again!

How many men does it take to change a flat tire???  Your guess is as good as mine!



Bishop "Reunion"

I call it the Bishop Reunion, but I'm not sure anyone else does.  It was the only big activity we did with Nate's family this year so therefore it qualifies as a reunion. :)  We were planning to stay up at Mutal Dell in American Fork Canyon July 4-5, but then something terrible happened...

{view from my front porch}

A wildfire started in Alpine, July 3rd and they closed the canyon as a precaution.  So plan B was put in place.  We usually have a sleep out in Nate's parents backyard around the 4th of July so we just opted for the usual tradition.

Swimming, games, face painting, outdoor movie, yummy food (of course) and great company. We love reunions!... so much in fact that we had to leave this reunion and pack up for the next one.