Ward campout

We made it to the ward campout this year.  I was grateful to have Austen there to help set everything up and take everything down and they carry it to where the cars were parked.  I had told the boys we were going to go, but it would have been a lot harder on my own...we'll see if we make it next year.  One blessing I have found with ward campouts is that all of the ward does pitch in to help you when you need it.  Even this year with having an extra hand I still forgot a number of things but someone always was their with what I needed.  It was nice to escape from the heat for a little bit and enjoy the cool air and the beautiful scenery.

Uncle Austen

We have loved having Uncle Austen here with us at our home.  He came back with us from LA and found a temporary job here, so he has been able to stay with us for a little while. The other day we went fishing for a little bit just before Alden had chess club.

Calvin got this birthday card in the mail from Aunt Becca and was so excited. He has a stuffed animal Murkat that he carries around with him everywhere.  It was fun to get a card with murkats on it from Aunt Becca.

Benson is getting bigger and bigger, it has been fun to see how much he is able to play with his brothers now.  He loves it when they include him and have him play with them. Here he is playing with the marble works.

Uncle Austen has been a big help with the boys, he went to Phoenix with us to help watch the boys while Michael and I went to the temple and I had a doctors appointment.  Our car ended up having trouble so this is a picture one of the boys took while we were waiting to find out what was wrong with the car. It was nice having an extra helper in the waiting room.

The end of our time in Utah

Saturday morning was the Fuller family reunion.  It was neat to get caught up with so many of our cousins.  It was also neat to see Michael's mom line up with all of her siblings in order and have them tell stories of things they remember from growing up. We played a number of fun games and got to visit with Grandma Fuller. It was a great reunion!
Benson was very excited about the balloons. I think I may have written this before but Benson loves balloons. He had been a little sad/ frustrated because they served pizza for lunch and he loves pizza, which he can only eat when I make it since he is allergic to wheat and milk. Benson couldn't understand why he couldn't have any but once he got a hold of the balloons everything was okay again and we were able to go and join the rest of the party!

Sunday we left early in the morning our first stop was Monticello, where we had planned to go to church but the website was one hour off on the time for Sacrament meeting so we missed it.  It worked out that we got to take a walk around the temple there and then go sit and eat our lunch in a nearby grassy area.  We read scriptures together and visited together. It was a nice stop.  We then headed on to La Cholla, Arizona on a Navajo reservation.  They have a canyon there that we were able to go walk around and visit and then we spent the night in that town.

Monday was the end of our trip, we drove on the the Petrified Forest.  I was surprised at how neat the forest was.  We were in the middle of the dessert but you could easily see that this land was not always desert as there were many huge logs of petrified wood everywhere.  It was neat to be able to see that things really were different here at one time.  Along with all of the petrified wood it was neat to see all the mounds of dirt/sand and how so many different colors are in those layers.

That finished our trip, we finished driving the last 4-5 hours to our home.  Most of which was actually through mountains and was a pretty but curvy drive. Michael was a great driver for the whole trip! He did a great job getting us around.  I was very grateful to be able to have him with us for this last trip of the summer!

Utah trip continued

Wednesday we visited BYU. It was a quick but nice trip.  It is always fun to walk around campus and show the kids where we went to school. We met up with all of the Shurtz cousins at the Bean Museum and the cougar eat.  We then went with all of them to a trampoline place.  The boys had fun jumping around! 

On Thursday Michael and I got to join all of the Shurtz's and go the temple. Later on in the afternoon we met up again at a church to hear Michael's uncle Gerry talk about his life and his travels.  It was neat to hear about the Lord's hand in his life and all the places he has been able to go to.  Below are some pictures of the kids during the time Uncle Gerry was speaking. We realized if we waited to clean until everyone was done we would be there all night. So I rallied all of the cousins together to help get the clean up started. They did a great job!

I love being in Utah for the 24th of July! We all loved watching the parade with all of our cousins and later that night we met up with them again for fireworks!

During the day we went back home to my home there in Salt Lake where we helped with the annual garage cleaning.  During the cleaning Alden and Calvin had a great time making and shooting rockets with Andrew's rocket launcher.  Michael and I have decided that we need to get one of those, it is great entertainment!

Benson enjoying his favorite of all foods- Popsicle. We love the Ruby Red brand and/or the outshine popsicles. We've been out lately at our house and so Benson was super excited when Grandma brought home a big box of many flavors!

Utah trip

 Our good little travlers.

 We left after Michael got off work on Saturday and made it to Vegas late that night. Sunday we went to church with Nathaniel and Jeanine and family. After church we continued onto St George were we ate dinner and went for a nice walk. We are grateful to have so much family along the path to Salt Lake!

 Monday morning we left St George and made it to the Todd's cabin where we were created by all of the Shurtz's! One of the boys favorite things while we were there was the zip line.

 It sure was beautiful there and was the perfect temperature. One of Benson's favorite things was the wild raspberry bushes. I can't get him to eat raspberries from the store but he couldn't get enough of the ones there!

Random pics and cousins come to visit!

Benson loves to color, it is fun to have him sit down and color for a little while!

This picture above was taken by Calvin and normally I would have just deleted it but I realized that it is a picture of me helping the boys finish up their pillows.  A number of months ago Alden and Calvin had done all of their chores for a number of weeks, for their reward they got to pick out any fabric they wanted to make pillows.  (Alden had been wanting to make pillows for a long time...really he had wanted to make them with the intent to sale them.  It started after a trip to Ikea where he saw all of the pillows and how much they were and he was so excited to make his own and sale them.)

They both love their pillows that they picked out and then sewed by hand!

A couple of random pictures of these cute pj boys! It is so fun to see all three of them playing together.

We felt so blessed to have Michael's sister and family come to visit! It was a quick but was fun to show them where we live, nice to visit, and fun for the boys to have some cousins to play with!