Today's Picking

Yum.

Meager? Yes. Delicious? Absolutely.

Thank you, poky raspberry bushes, for allowing me to devour in 1 minute, what it took you months to grow.


Actually, truth be told, it is this guy....

who devours the majority of each day's picking.

See that bowl? I had to fight Logan off with a stick while attempting to preserve these raspberries for a picture. In a matter of seconds after taking this picture, most of those berries were gone. Logan was generous enough to share a few with Mom and Dad.

I think I love our raspberry bushes because it reminds me of my childhood. Growing up, our family (ok, let's be real... my parents) grew a huge garden each summer and right in the middle of that garden was a long row of raspberry bushes.

Every morning during raspberry season my mom would wake me up ( ahem... try to wake me up) early in the morning so I could go out and pick raspberries before the heat (and hornets) set in.

Our family had raspberry picking streamlined. We would use my dad's old black, leather belts to strap empty milk jugs (tops cut off) around our waists, allowing both hands to be free for picking. This extra hand came in handy: for lifting up leaves where the best berries were hiding, for swatting away bees and lots of daddy long legs (ew), for shoeing away earwigs that got picked along with the berries, for picking our noses... ok, maybe not.

My sister would pick on one side of the raspberry row and I would take the other and we would see who could get done first, who could fill their bucket first. Fun times. Fun conversations.

I love raspberries.

Thanks Mom and Dad for growing raspberries and teaching us how to work, even if it meant being around bees, bugs and waking up (somewhat) early. :-)

Nakedness

Logan calls anything that is plain and blank "naked." Not sure why, how or where he picked this up, but oh well.

He's also been carting around his plastic golf clubs and referring to them as "hoes." Whatever.

Well the other day he and his friend were playing in the back yard and he was getting upset because he couldn't find one of his golf clubs and he kept asking over and over, in a loud, frustrated voice, "Where's my naked hoe? Where's my naked hoe?"

I really hope our neighbors weren't outside. Lovely child. :-)

Really?

We've been going to 7 peaks about once a week (two thumbs-up for season passes! Or would it be 8 thumbs up? Or maybe only 6 thumbs considering Lincoln doesn't even know he has thumbs.... anyway, moving on).

So I thought I'd take our camera today to document our fun times. Sounds like a good idea, right? Wrong. Sure I got some great pictures, it didn't take long to discover that water + slippery fingers + camera = bad. Very bad.

That's right, you guessed it. In a camera hand-off between Ben and I, we dropped it into the pool. Lovely. We fished it out at lightning speed, but not before the water could wreak havoc on our little point-and-shoot.

It is currently sitting in a bowl of rice, as we hope and pray for a water-absorbing-miracle. But at this point I'm just adding another $150 to the grand total of bills and other expenses that have piled up recently that will be paid off someday. When it rains, it pours, right? Bah.

Here's hoping for a miracle.

2 months old

Lincoln is 2 months old already. Actually, that was two weeks ago... now he's 2 1/2 months old.

Lincoln at 2 months

He had his check up last Friday and here's how he is growing:

Weight 12 lb 6 oz (75 - 90th percentile)
Height 24 1/4 inches (95th percentile)
Head 39 cm

I'm so glad he's healthy and happy. He really is a content little guy which I'm so grateful for. He's sleeping through the nights and now that Logan is waking up more at 6 am instead of 5 am, we're starting to phase him into his crib in Logan's room. We'll see how it goes!

Logan adores his little brother and is such a helper. This was a natural, spontaneous pose. Logan give his brother hugs all the time and has only hit him once, so far. :-)



I love the furrowed brow.


Logan likes to listen to music with these headphones on and apparently thought Lincoln would too.

I Love Summer

I think the 4th of July is one of my favorite holidays. And one of my favorite parts is getting to sing the patriotic songs. I don't know how many times we have sung, "Grand Ol' Flag" and "America, the Beautiful" with Logan.

There are lyrics in "America, The Beautiful" that I love:

O beautiful for heroes proved
In liberating strife.
Who more than self their country loved
And mercy more than life!

I'm so thankful that there are men and women who love their country more than themselves, enough to give their lives to protect me, what I love and my freedoms. Thank you.

This year we just did our normal things, but they were still as fun as ever.

But first I have to show off pictures of my two fire crackers... Ok, so Lincoln hasn't lived long enough to become quite the fire cracker that Logan is, but I'm sure it won't be long. :-)

Chowing on a funnel cake and listening to live music at Freedom Days in Provo



Watching fire works with Grandma Kaye. For some reason Logan was scared, but sitting with Grandma Kaye made it all better.


Lincoln was there too.... barely.


Sunday night Ben and Logan camped int he back yard. I think this is the first time Logan's camped in the backyard and he LOVED it. He even had his own little tiny lantern (thanks D.I.!).

Here's Logan "helping' to set up


We even got the campfire going and roasted s'mores with some friends


Sparklers. Not realizing it was hot, Logan branded Ben's leg with the tip of his sparkler. :-)


Finally going to bed. Logan crashed hard.


We woke up at 5 am the next morning to go see the hot air balloon festival. We go to this festival every year and love it. I counted 21 balloons this year.

Smokey the Bear made an appearance with his hot air balloon and Logan was obsessed with him.

The other day Logan asked if he could go inside a fire truck that we passed on the road. I explained that only firefighters get to go in the trucks. Then he said, "I'll get my fire boots and fire hat on and then I can go in the truck."

So when we were at the festival we took Logan over to the fire truck and they actually let some of the kids get in the driver's seat - Logan's dream come true.


After the hot air balloons we met up with some friends at the parade.
Meet Alex Lanier.
A VERY patient 9 year old who loves kids. Logan adores him and got to sit with all the Lanier kids at the parade. He had a blast hanging out with the older kids.


Me, Lincoln and Angela


The kiddos

Happy Independence Day! Hope you all had a great and tiring weekend too. Now it's time to recover.

Late Night

I got a lot done today. Wahoo!

I LOVE that feeling of freedom at the end of the day when you know you've checked so many things off of your to-do list that have been hovering for way too long. It's a blissful feeling, isn't it?

That's why I stay up late ( most nights)... so I can be uber productive and check things off my list. Then I can actually play with Logan during the day instead of trying to get things done and being 50% effective. It feels great.

The best part about today is that it was balanced. There was time for exercise, time for playing with Logan, time for snuggling and feeding Linc, time for meals, time for cleaning, time for Primary calls and errands, time for family, time for scripture study, time for Ben and even time for snow cones. Oh and time for So You Think You Can Dance. I love that show.

Balanced days are even better than productive days. Now if only every day could be this great...

Now I'm off to have toast with freezer strawberry jam. Is it in keeping with my current diet? No. Do I care? Slightly. But I just can't stand the temptation any longer. :-)