strawberry days 2010

  pleasant grove's annual summer festival is strawberry days.  i've posted about this before here and here.   weston has been going since he was a boy and he and i have been going together for several years and now kate has started in on the tradition :)  her favorite part is, of course, getting to ride that carousel.    

 

what a big girl!

we had to take a break for strawberries & cream - weston waits all year for this treat - and look at that, he shared with kate.

  
looking at the moon

tuckered out

kate sneaked out of her room the other day during naptime.  i say sneaked because she is totally sneaky.  she knows she needs to be quiet or she will get in trouble.  of course, i knew she was out of her room, i could hear every move she was making.  lately, i've decided ignoring her is better than engaging her.  anyway, after 10 or 15 minutes, all was quiet except for this rhythmic noise i kept hearing.  after a minute, i realized it was kate snoring so i went to see where she fell asleep.  she made it to the couch, at least!

      

the oddest thing about this is that kate is strictly a bed-sleeper.  if she's not in a bed, preferably her own, she will not go to sleep.  she has only ever fallen asleep on the floor once in her life and never in the middle of play like this.  she must have been one tired little girl!

planting trees

when we finally got settled, weston's grandparents bought 3 new quaking aspen to plant in our backyard.  weston geared up and got to work digging holes for the trees.

 

kate wanted in on the action, so i had to keep her as much out of the way as i could manage

  

the finished product in the morning

bbqs

summer means bbq season!  we usually grill year round, but summer nights are perfect for barbecuing and eating outside.  kate killed time while we cooked by coloring with chalk, assisted by mama kitty, of course.   

summer and skinned knees

it was so nice once the weather started to warm up!  this was one of the early warm saturdays this season and we spent it as a happy family.  we did a bit of shopping in salt lake and then took kate to how to train your dragon.  we all loved it.

 

it wouldn't be summer for kids without skinned knees - shorts & skirts mean exposed skin on those legs!  kate's been sporting bruises and scabs for weeks, now :)

weston went to LA last weekend

so while he was enjoying the nice weather and sunshine, i spent the rainy weekend in monroe with my parents.  cynthia, my SIL, was supposed to be there visiting as well, but she spent the weekend at primary children's hospital with her almost 2 year old son ... bummer.  all is well, though, and i was able to spend a couple days with her family after all.

alex and kate

kate and alex had a great time playing together over the weekend ... well, kate had a great time, alex might have just tolerated her ...

  

goofy kids

pretty blues

   

alex dancing with grandma cottle

i have a really soft spot for watching kate and alex together.  they just remind me so much of me and my brother, alex, when we were little.  the age difference in these two is much bigger than that of alex and me, but they look so much like us that it reminds me of all the photos and stories i've seen and heard about my brother and me...  aww :)

kate's dress

 my mom bought this dress a couple of months back and it was really long on kate.  i looked at it over and over and thought, i really need to re-hem that thing before she can't wear it.  it was, naturally, really easy and only took about 20 minutes (i had to hem the skirt and underskirts).  does anyone else do that?  put off projects for far too long because the thought of the time and energy seems too overwhelming?  then once you get started, you realize just how easy and quick it was... well, i do that :)  so the dress originally hung to her ankles, and even though the photos here look that way, the dress actually hangs to her mid-calf now (not that anyone really cares...)  i took these photos to show weston while he was in la but am just now getting around to posting them (well after he's been home, of course).

  

and this last picture kind of tripped me out a bit.  once i looked through these photos, this one stood out to me.  immediately it reminded me of the photo (below) that my dad took of me, just a bit older. 

what do you think?

colton cousins

while i spent the weekend in monroe, i was able to see some of weston's family.  kate loves playing with her colton cousins - and it's perfect because we are all in the same stage of having kids (on my side of the family a lot of kate's cousins are much older than her)

 

kate and sophie sizing each other up

 

 tickling each other

   

full on wwf going on at this point, we had to break it up

   

grandpa colton and ali

 

 karli

swimming & playing at grandma's

once monday rolled around, the rainy weekend in monroe was gone and the sun was out.  we set up the pool for the kids (by this time, cynthia was here with the boys) and they spent a couple hours in the water.  kate's chin was shivering so much but do you think i could get her out of the pool?  hardly!  

     

i couldn't get kate to walk on the deck barefoot so here she is donning grandma's gardening shoes

after we convinced them to get out of the water, the three of them wanted to play on the swings and slide and warm up a bit.

 

so sorry about the horrible blowing out in these photos - i completely rely on my husband to take the photos in this family :)