County Fair

There's nothing like a hometown county fair...

I am still trying to figure out where this chicken's eyes are...

These are the cleanest cows I have ever seen.

Emma went on this hang glider ride at the midway carnival.

I love this shot! Rebekah was so excited to pet the rabbits.

Nothing says white-trash like a good old fashion demolition derby. :) Clay had no desire to go to the fair until he read that there was a demolition derby.

During the derby we made faces at the camera.

Spending the day together

We took a little day trip adventure today.
Here is the Potomac River.

We took White's Ferry into Maryland and drove up to the Temple. It takes an extra 30 minutes or so to go this way, but it was a very pretty drive through lots of farm land.

Strange flower at the temple.

The gang sitting on the temple steps. The temple was closed for cleaning, so we thought it would be a good time to take the girls to see the temple and visitors' center.

Sew Magic

Here's a couple things I have been up to:

These are burp cloths I make for baby showers. They are really easy, but look nice. All you need are some thick cloth diapers and ribbon. Then you just sew the ribbon down both sides of the cloth diaper. Viola! You have a pretty burp cloth. :)

My friend Angela made Emma's mu'u mu'u while we were in Hawaii. I took the left over fabric and make a matching mu'u mu'u for Emma's doll and a skirt for Rebekah. Emma is SO HAPPY to have a matching dress for her and her American Girl doll.


It's amazing what you can accomplish while your husband is away! ;)

Fun at the pool

I took the girls to the pool today with several other families from church. It is so nice that we all live so close to each other. Emma always has so much more fun at the pool with her friends. Emma is the one with pink goggles and no ponytail. Her friends are Olivia, Nate, and Elizabeth.

Youth Conference

Clay was a chaperon for our Stake Youth Conference. That means, I did not see him from 7:00 am Thursday til 5:00 pm Saturday. He was with this group of boys the entire time. We also had a group of girls staying in our basement each night. There were almost 200 youth involved in the conference, doing several different service projects all over the county. Clay had a great time with the boys, and I am glad to have him back home.

Dutch Wonderland

Dutch Wonderland is a cute amusement park for kids located in Lancaster, PA. We have heard great things about this park, but this was our first time actually going. The girls loved it! Emma was tall enough to go on everything, and since Rebekah was just a hair above 36" she could go on all but 4 rides. It is really geared for young kids, maybe even more so than Disneyland (gasp! did I actually say that??).

Funny thing, the park is surrounded by a moat of sorts and on the other side are cows and corn fields. Pretty crazy. What I loved most about the park is that it has LOTS of mature trees providing shade just about everywhere. So we never got too hot. And there really were no lines at all. Maybe we had to wait for the next set of cars, but it never took more than like 3 minutes. One of the employees told us this was pretty normal for July, but August gets very busy -end of summer rush.


Emma on the Sky Ride.

Wiggle Riders. Emma and Rebekah wanted to buy one for themselves, but they didn't bring $80 with them. Too bad.

Pony ride was $5 which Emma did have with her. Rebekah said she wanted to ride also, but when Clay picked her up to get on the pony she started screaming, so we got her $5 back.

Cool slides!

This was the most annoying ride ever! The kids had little buttons to push that made a really loud buzzing noise. I don't even think Pandas like honey!

We are allowed one goofy shot.

I LOVE this picture b/c Emma and Rebekah are laughing together! Just too cute!

Getting her practice in now. I let Rebekah drive the whole way, she did great!

By far the girls favorite was this dumb Silo Slide. Every time we went near this thing they had to slide down 10 or 20 times before we could move on. Did we really spend $30 so you go on a slide? We could have stayed at home to do that. I mean, it's a slide. You climb up the spiral stairs inside the silo and then slide down on the outside. Whatever.

Play day

Emma has now perfected the art of "pumping" herself on the swing. Yea! No more pushing!

We went out for dinner. Afterwards we stopped to play in the water fountains. Rebekah liked to just sit on the fountain and wait for it to turn on.

Wolf Trap

I took the girls to Wolf Trap to see some dancers from Hawaii, followed by SteveSongs from PBS. Wolf Trap is unique in that it is an outdoor center for the Performing Arts and it is also a National Park. They had a great time, however you aren't allowed to take any pictures during the performances.


While taking the VERY LONG walk back to our car, we saw this butterfly.

Now, tell me if this is not the BIGGEST hibiscus you have ever seen!

Pool time

Summer wouldn't be complete without a few visits to the pool.

Emma with her friend Savanah.

Three little princesses

My best friend Rachel and her family came stayed the night with us on their way back to California. The girls had fun playing dress-up together.

Maya

Happy Fourth of July!

We had the Rosenlunds over for a barbecue. The kids ran around the yard playing with the water toys.


We also brought out the bubble machine which is always a huge success.

Here's Hallie. She is pretty happy just watching everyone else.

Evan and Rebekah running through the sprinkler.

Melinda & I -notice her twilight shirt ;)

Clay & Jeremy, matchy-matchy

Yes, we armed all the kids with sparklers!!

Emma looking very cute.

Spencer was captivated by the fireworks.

Waiting for the big show