Happy Birthday Emily!!

Emily turned 7!!! She had a fun HORSE birthday, and loved it. I did my best with the horse cake, and she seemed to think it was pretty great.






We had three uncles trying to compete for "best gift" (from the dollar store) so they had fun doing that. I think Richard won with his paintable pegasus piggy bank, she's been wanting a "horse to paint" for ages, so she was really excited about that. Although the bubble gum and cotton candy and light-up helicopter thingy went over pretty well too... My mom got her some classic kids books (Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and Pippi Longstocking) and she's been buried in those ever since. And begging me every day to do the painting, which I haven't felt up to yet...

We have the best neighbors, and they brought over a special little cake just for Emily for her birthday!! Emily has gotten pretty close with them helping in their garden and yard, and that was pretty fun. They are amazing.

Happy Birthday, Em, we love you!

Emily loves horses, reading, movies, art, horses, and reading... did I mention horses and reading??? She loves first grade and is doing awesome, and has a great teacher that keeps her challenged, which I love. She's a great big sister and so sweet and kind. We are so glad you are in our family!!!

I forgot to post pictures of the kids playing in the leaves that Lissa took when she was here. So cute!!

My mother-in-law was an agel and came up one morning to help me make applesauce (with the apples from our above-mentioned awesome neighbors). Here are the fruits of our labors! Aren't they beautiful?! I hardly want to open them and eat them now. Thanks Mom (and Richard)!!!

October

October was mostly highlighted by a visit from my sister Melissa and her new baby Zeke! As you can see, he's pretty darn adorable, and she's pretty cute too. :) It was a lot of fun!

As you can see, he was pretty popular...

I got him to laugh!

At first, Calvin wasn't too thrilled with the competition for my attention...

But Zeke won him over in the end!

We went to a pumpkin patch, which was fun, but unfortunately there had been a hard freeze before we could get there, so pickin's were kind of sparse..

They had a little hay bale maze for the little kids, and our kids loved that!!

Halloween!! A puppy, Sleeping Beauty, and a cheerleader!

Calvin was having fun with the clown wig after the party, silly kid.

Thanks for coming Liss, and Ammón for letting them go! We had a blast, and can't wait to see you again!!

Happy 3rd Birthday Calvin!

Calvin turned three!! He had a great birthday and it ended up being pretty much "Cars" themed without it even being planned that way. He wanted a racecar cake, so I figured I'd try to turn it into Lightning McQueen. It sort of worked... Calvin thought it was pretty awesome, anyway.



Check out Calvin's cheesy fake smile. He just started doing it that night--must have been too many pictures for him, I guess!

He was pretty excited about his Cars umbrella, I have a video of him opening it down below. He always wanted to borrow the girls' when it rained, and I figured it would be nice for him to have one that wasn't frilly or fairy-decorated.
It appears that Uncle Gary liked it too...

He also got a road playrug from G&G Pugmire, and thought that was pretty great too. His uncles gave him some matchbox cars that went with it perfectly. G&G Butler gave him a book and a magnifying glass, which he calls his "mirror" and he takes with him just about everywhere.

Oh, the girls thought the rug was pretty cool too.

We were lucky to have so much family there! My dad and sister, John's parents and brothers, and John's aunt and uncle and two cousins who were stopping in on their way back home to Kansas. The cake disappeared very quickly, which was a very good thing! Although somewhat sad, after spending so much time making the blasted thing. But I got pictures, so we're good!

Calvin's present from mom and dad was a trailer truck for all his new cars! So you see why it was car-themed? John "wrapped" this in this big refridgerator box (well, a mini-fridge, so it wasn't humongous, but big enough) that seems to have been part of the present too, since it's now a playhouse by the fireplace. So all in all, a great time!!

And now, some words about Calvin. Wow, how do I describe this kid...? He's sweet, stubborn, independent, loving, thoughtful, determined, adventurous, and a tease all wrapped into one. He throws some major tantrums if he doesn't get to do something--from putting toothpaste on his toothbrush, to naming an animal in a book (both very recent examples)--all by himself. And yet, he's also very thoughtful. My favorite thing is when he comes over to get picked up and gives me a giant hug around the neck and says, "I just love you!!"

It's funny how terrified I was of having a boy. Don't get me wrong, it is different, but it's also such a joy. Calvin is already looking out for me and is definitely a mama's boy. We'll try to work on that as he gets older, but it's pretty fun now. A couple weeks ago I was out painting cabinets doors (yes, still) all afternoon, and Calvin came walking out with my water bottle full of water and ice and says, "Here, Mom, this is for you." I thought at the time that John had sent him out with it, which was oddly thoughtful :) (love you John ). But it turns out, Calvin had gone to John and told him that he wanted to take mommy some water to drink outside! Isn't he the sweetest thing?

Anyway, he tries our souls and fills them at the same time. We love you Calvin!! Our family wouldn't be the same without you!

The opening of the playrug is for Grandma P. since she wasn't able to be there and see him open their present.

Blowing out the candles cracks me up, because he wasn't patient enough for the song to end, he already knew what to do!!

August

I guess I made one Freudian slip on the July pictures. I conveniently forgot my 30th birthday. Bleh. Enough said. Although the cake was good. :) And so were the presents.


In August we were finally able to catch up on some yard work! Here's the tree getting it's finishing touches on pruning...


And with John's parents and brother Gary's help (THANK YOU!!!), we finally got rid of the brush pile, or mountain, in our backyard!! We filled a 17-foot U-Haul truck full to the brim with all the brush we have cleared out of this yard since we moved in. It was nuts. I'll have to take an after picture, I guess, since we have a swing set there now and we love to have our backyard reclaimed!


August was a hard month for Calvin (and his parents) as he was growing out of his naps (*sigh*). He fell asleep at some strange places at about 5:00 when he just couldn't stay awake any longer. And then stayed up til 10pm that night...


And yes, he really is fast asleep in this picture...

AND... School started!!! Emily started first grade and Kimmie started kindergarten! And Calvin just had to be part of things. :)

Emily is doing great. She is so smart and such a great reader. She keeps begging me to go to the library for more chapter books that she can read. She was chosen from her grade to do the "Battle of the Books", a literacy program of some sort. Don't ask me what, they haven't told me yet. She's handling full-day school very well. There have been some rough spots with boys teasing her about going in the wrong bathroom the first week, and some girl friendship drama. Who knew the threesome problems would start so blasted early??? Unbelievable. But she's a trooper and really has been doing very well.

Kimmie is in half-day kindergarten. She absolutely loves it and doesn't even look back as the bell rings each morning. I have to stop her to get a hug good-bye before she goes in!! The three trips to school a day are getting a little tiring, but I'm glad she's having such a great time and learning words and all sorts of things. Today she told me they learned the word "the." I've asked her what her favorite thing about school is, and she said, "Everything!!"

Calvin and I are enjoying some time alone together. He likes to play on the playground after all the kids go into school for a while, and then we meander home and throw leaves and rocks in the canal, play chase, and look for ducks. He's a trooper about making all these trips to school everyday. He loves to swing in the backyard and get the tv and movie choices all to himself for a while. He's even helped me paint a bit, but that will come in September pictures!

At the end of August, my dad and sister Laura came out to visit, which was so fun! Here's a picture of the girls singing with Laura, I think it's "Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam" or something of that sort. They are jumping at having a grand time, anyway. There are more pictures of their visit in the next post, since they were here for Calvin's birthday!!

July 2

And on to the next weekend... Our ward had youth conference up at Vedauwoo (pronounced "VEE-dah-voo") and John took Emily and Calvin up a day early to "help set up" and stuff. Here's what the place looks like, can you figure out why John likes it so much?

The kids had fun scrambling around the rocks:

And managed to wear themselves out. I'm grateful to John Windsor or whoever it was that took this picture, I think it's great! Like father like son: work hard, play hard, and sleep hard.

This is a pepper that we grew!! The only one we grew this summer, but we were kind of excited...

Calvin and Em made a little nest for him in the cooler of all places. I guess that's what you get when you leave the camping equipment out.

And that's July!!

July

Ok, I'm finally getting the July pictures up. There are a lot!! July was our month for family vacations, so here we go. We drove to Utah and spent time with G&G Durrans and Laura & Jason. Lots of fun!! We did sparklers with Laura and Jason and the kids had a ball with that, and playing in the pool! Jason got a crash course in being a dad since Calvin decided to jump to him when he didn't know about it, and he had to rescue the kid! Thanks for being on your toes, Jason! We had some great balloon fights and Laura, I think we still have that necklace you let Emily borrow...

Next we drove up to Idaho Falls and visited my grandma, which I thought I had pictures of but I can't find them... you'll have to talk to Laura, the family photographer, about those I guess. Anyway, this was most of the drive up to Idaho...

Then we headed up to St. Anthony for my dad's family reunion. The weather was gorgeous and so was the area, and we had fun. With my dad being the oldest of 10, it was pretty busy! It was fun to see cousins and how much they've grown up--a bunch of teenagers out late talking instead of a bunch of little kids tearing around the place! Now my kids are the ones tearing around...

Here's Kimmie and Grandpa--this was her favorite perch for most of the time there, I'm guessing Dad didn't mind too much either... hopefully. :)

Isn't it beautiful?? I'm tempted to paint it, but I don't know that I'd do it justice.. Those are the Tetons in the background.

They had a system of ponds down below the cabin that we could canoe through. Here's John and the kids exploring. I did get in and go with them, but I have no proof because I wasn't willing to take the camera out on the water!

Emily stayed out with Dad for a while, she loved it!

Calvin and Grandpa throwing rocks in the water! I wish I'd gotten one of Dad skipping rocks. He's pretty good! And one of my favorite memories is just being out on the beach with him skipping rocks. He's done it at just about every body of water that I remember visiting all growing up. It was so great to be able to do that with him again. I even got one or two to go pretty far! Oh, Dad had to play lifeguard for Calvin too. Apparently Calvin and Em decided to go wading in the pond, and Calvin lost his footing, so Dad had to scramble in shoes and all to fish him out! I'm sensing a pattern with this kid.... Thanks for being on your toes too, Dad!!

They had a pinata for the kids, and of course they loved it. Can you tell which one is Kimme and which one is Em? :) They look a lot alike with their short haircuts now.

This is Kimmie and Grandpa out by the creek, and one of my cousins... I can't tell which one.

I told you being on his shoulders was her favorite perch!

My uncle Dan works for a party store and he brought up an inflatable castle! The kids LOVED it! And John too, it looks like.

Another thing they loved was the huge rec room they had there and these fun bikes and cars and stuff.

Calvin's favorite was the slide!! It was made of formica or something, and the kids went zipping down that thing so fast!! Calvin went down it over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over....

Next stop, Bear Lake!! We had a beautiful drive down through the Palisades to the Butler family reunion... Here's the crew:

Me, John, Dad, Mom, Gary, David and baby James, Angela, Wendy, Jeremy, Richard, and Gabe.

Bottom row: Kimmie, Calvin, Emily, Matt, Ayden and Claire.

Notice how Matt is on the row with all the little kids... fitting, don't you think? ;)

Playing on the beach! And John getting the raft ready for the jaunt on the lake he coaxed me into...

The boys playing Settlers of Catan. What is a Butler family get-together without board games???

Calvin on the stairs. I just thought it was a cute picture.

Emily loves the beach!!

Matt and Claire, showing off the fish they caught! They were little minnows or something..

The kids playing in the water. We could hardly get them out of it.

Calvin! I think his shorts got wet...

Kimmie is examining the fish they caught. I thought this was cute too.

Here's John and I on our rafting adventure! We went quite a ways. I tried rowing on the way back. It was hard! After a while I got tired of John laughing at me and let him row the rest of the way. :)

So there's the family vacation documented!! It was lots of fun and exhausting, just as a vacation should be. I think we got back from that on Saturday, and then the next weekend was youth conference which we all went to as well (I work with the young women). But that's for another post...