July 4th Weekend Craziness

If anyone knows the Anderson brothers you know that none of them like to be left out. This weekend was no exception. It seems like whenever two brothers get together, the rest of them can't help but join in. The only brother missing was Scott's family in North Carolina. We missed you guys! Ryan's family was here from Arkansas, Ricky's from Arizona, Marc's from Idaho (soon to be North Carolina), and Brent from Spanish Fork. Shad's dad also made it up from Arizona with his wife Kristin. It was one busy and fun weekend.

Our weekend started on Thursday. I was frantically caulking the touching up paint in our newly finished bathroom (pictures to come...) making it ready for guests. My mom helped out and brought up Haken's cousin Taylor to play all day and keep him occupied. Thank Heavens! Love my mom! The bathroom was finished just in time for Ryan and Lindsay who came up with their 2 youngest kids (the 2 "olders" stayed with their friends in Springville). Haken had a ball with them all day Friday and then slept on the tramp with them (first time ever!) that night. He actually stayed outside all night. I half expected him to get scared and come inside. He seems to get along really well with the older kids. I'm a little sad to see him growing up and not needing me so much...but only a little. That night Ricky and Nicole also got in late from Arizona after driving all day with 3 kids in the car. Poor Abi (or should I say, "poor parents"?) was so sick throwing up the whole way. They sure were troopers and we are glad they came! They ended up spending the first night in a hotel to keep the sickness to a minimum for everyone else. Thanks!

Saturday was a crazy fun day. Brent came up with the girls from Spanish Fork and Marc and Jenna came from Rexburg. All the boys went golfing at Sherwood Hills in Sardine Canyon and had an eventful (to say the least) round of golf. At the house we had a day full of slip n' sliding....

Popsicles....

Meeting new cousins....

Lounging...

and playing made up games in small spaces....

Haken was asleep for most of the afternoon, so he didn't play too much in the water.

Sunday Ricky and Marc's family stayed and went to church with us. The great thing was that every family had their own bathroom to get ready in. So nice! It was a busy day at church for Shad and I, but it was great to finish off the day relaxing with family. We also had a great game of baseball where the Dad's played against the little boys. * I got it on video but no pictures.

Monday we all headed down to Provo and went to the Freedom Festival for a bit, picked up awesome hamburgers at a burger joint in Springville, and headed to a park to mess around.

It was SUPER hot and HUMID, but everyone still had a great time.

Annie was a great little babysitter for me.

Everyone was so ready to jump into the pool at the hotel Ricky and Dad were staying at for the night.

The water was really cold. Jack wasn't a fan

Terrified Haken

The boys played a serious game of ball in the pool. Not without some small injuries.

Comparing their "happily married" bellies

After swimming we went to Brick Oven Pizza (YUM!) and then to the Springville cemetery to see Shad's mom and say goodbye to all the fam. That night we stayed the night in Lehi at my brother's house and saw my new nephew Riley. Adorable! It was a fantastic weekend!

Visiting Grandma Glenda in Springville

Jack and Ryan had a rocky start at the beginning. Ryan couldn't look at him without getting "the lip" at first, but I think they were all good by the end of the weekend.

Jack loves grandpa!

Birthday boy....11 days late

Whew! I can't believe it has taken me this long to post about Haken's Birthday. Ok, maybe I can...Summer has really thrown me for a loop already! My little boy turned 4 years old on June 13th. He is such a big kid now! Sometimes I look at Jack and think "there is no way that Haken was once this small!" Haken was pretty lucky and actually had 3 days where we celebrated his birthday. The first was at Grandma and Grandpa Evans' house the week before his birthday. He shared a birthday party with uncle Cam whose birthday is 2 days before his.

Can you guess what is in this big box from Grandma and Grandpa?....

...It was a REAL Jr. set of golf clubs. Daddy was just as excited as Haken!

Of course he had to go outside and test them out while we were there with the huge bucket of practice balls from Grandpa. He loves those clubs! Thanks Grandma and Grandpa! He's gonna be pro one day just because of you!

Here they are... Aren't they the cutest things you have ever seen? They are so tiny! The heads on the drivers are as big as normal golf clubs with tiny little shafts. So cute!

I had to take a picture of them next to Shad's golf clubs just so you could get an idea of how tiny they really are.

The next celebration was on his actual birthday. The circus came into town for the day so we bought tickets and went as a family. I don't remember ever going to the circus as a kid, although my parents said we did. I think I was too little to remember. I don't know what I was expecting, but it was...fun I guess. I think everyone needs to go to the circus at least once in their life, preferably as a kid. I'm glad that Haken got a kick out of it and enjoyed it. I think I was ok leaving the last 15 minutes to go and feed Jack in the car. Maybe I would have enjoyed it more if I didn't have a headache from the very beginning.

Here is "Mr. Showboat" in front of the circus tent

Outside the tent they had animals and rides that you could pay extra money and ride. I'm glad Haken wasn't insisting on riding the elephant because it was an extra $6. I kept waiting for the animals to be in the show but they weren't...kinda lame.

Haken did like riding the little pony outside before the show. I know he liked it because most of the time I can't get an honest smile out of him for pictures.

Riding the little train...in the caboose....by himself.

Waiting for the show to start in the tent.

The last (thank heavens!) celebration was Haken's birthday party the next day. I'm glad we did it on this day because it FINALLY warmed up to the high 70's so we could have a water party in the back yard. I debated over whether to do a birthday party for him this year. A lot of his friends had birthday parties this year and he was invited. After each one he would tell me about how he was going to invite them to his birthday party. So, after all that build up, I couldn't disappoint him. It really wasn't too much work and I think it turned out to be a success. He has made so many great friends in the last year so I thought this would be fun for him. We invited 10 kids (7 boys and 3 girls). I had a kiddie pool, a slip n' slide, and the trampoline with a sprinkler underneath set up. I also filled up 150 water balloons. We played one game with them and then the rest were gone in like 2 minutes with an all out brawl. I think the biggest hit of the party was the water squirters I bought for all the kids. They LOVED shooting each other, but didn't like it so much when they got hit themselves, funny 4-yr-olds!

It's amazing how many kids fit in that little pool!

Figuring out how to fill up their squirters.

Next Haken opened presents and they each "bumped" him on the head with their gift.

I love this picture. It really shows you how excited Rylee was to give Haken his bubble gun. The next day he called to see if Haken could come over and bring his bubble gun to play. So cute!

His "HUGE" forklift from Everest.

Last we had cake and ice cream. I had big plans to try and make Haken a cute train cake with fondant and everything and then just decided to go 'easier' and do cupcakes. Leave it up to me to make it harder though......I ended up molding little race cars out of fondant to put on each one of the cupcakes. Pretty much took 2 hours the night before to make them. I have never worked with fondant before, it gave me an appreciation for some of the amazing fondant creations I have seen. I think it turned out ok and the kids were excited that they could eat the cars. In retrospect however, I think I would have rather bought the cute Disney "Cars" cupcakes they had at the store....

The cake was actually in afterthought because I had extra batter and didn't want to make any more car cupcakes than I had to...

Perfect little kids eating my not so perfect creations...

The highlight of the day was when we finally gave Haken our gift to him. He has been riding around a little trike for the last year and we decided it was time to get him a 'real' bike. My awesome friend gave us a bike that was just perfect for Haken. We tried to get him to learn without the training wheels first, but he insisted on putting them on because he wanted to be able to really ride it. I guess they will come off when he is ready. For now he is just loving cruising along with me as I push Jack around in the stroller.

I think he had a really great birthday. He is such a sweet little boy to have in our family. I'm so glad that he came into our family 4 years ago. I think birthdays and parties aren't just for kids, I am grateful for the opportunity it gives me as a parent to reflect on how much he has changed and how grateful I am to have him in my life. Love you Haken, my sweet big boy!

Joy school Days

I have been meaning to write this post for a while and have just now got to it. This last school year I decided to start a "Joy school" (precurser to preschool) with the kids Haken's age in the neighborhood. I was determined to give him a chance to interact with other kids, hoping this would give him an outlet of play time every week and me a break for an hour or two. I think it turned out to be a success on both regards.

We had a group of a bunch of boys and one girl (our cute Dani). They met once a week on Wednesdays from 9:30-11:00 AM and we switched off houses, taking turns doing the lesson. I don't know how much the kids really learned, or what they will remember about the last year, but I think they had a great time anyway. The best part about it was that it was FREE and I only had to teach every 6-8 weeks and even then the lessons were pretty low key (like 45 minutes, activity and all). Mostly the kids just wanted to play. Isn't that really what kids need at this age anyway?

Here are a few highlights from the past year (or at least what I was there for):

October

Our first field trip was in October (compliments of Mailee). We went to a pumpkin patch and farm just outside of Tremonton. The kids each got to pick their own pumpkin and we saw a few animals on the farm. We had string cheese and beef jerky as a snack as we looked and talked about the cows; I thought that was cleaver. Afterwards we went to a beautiful private park on the farm and had pumpkin cookies while we played. The kids loved it and the weather couldn't have been better.

I loved watching the kids pick out their very own special pumpkins. Of course we had to set a limit on how big they could be since they had to carry their own. The boys wanted the biggest ones they could find.

If one kid climbs the fence, they all have to. Typical.

Mailee feeding the kids like little birdies, squirting water into their mouths.

March

The next little field trip was in March, again compliments of Mailee (I think maybe she was the only one brave enough to take the kids out). I wasn't there, but my friend Shauna came along to see how the Joy School thing works for her son Kason next year and took some pictures for me. They learned about all the different parts of a bus and then got to ride around the block a few times. Haken was sooooo excited to finally get to ride a school bus after seeing them pass our house a million times. He asked me when he will get to ride one to school.....I'm afraid maybe never since we live like 100 yards from the elementary school. We'll see buddy...

Doing a puzzle together all about transportation

April

In April I had the preschool right before Easter at my house. It was a fun one to do. We read Easter stories, talked about the Easter bunny, made bunny ears and then had "bunny food" (vegetables). We also colored coffee filters shaped like eggs and made them tie-dye and had JELLO beans for a little treat. I think the bunny ears turned out to be a big hit. Haken had them on all day hiding eggs everywhere, pretending to be the Easter bunny.

May

May marked the end of the school year and our Joy School. We had a closing social on the 25th at Park Meadows. We had potluck treats and played a great game of tee ball (thanks to Elijah's cute grandma for bringing that!)

I love the snow boots he insisted on wearing that day. 3-yr-old's crack me up!

Elijah's grandma was so much fun. She could run circles around those 3-yr-olds! It wore me out just watching her.

Everyone was so great that participated in the Joy school! I am glad that it was a success. Now comes the real preschool class next year. I can't believe how this year flew by! My little boy is not so little anymore.

Ticks

Last weekend Haken and Shad went on a Father and Son outing for our ward. They were supposed to camp at a park that our stake owns, but unfortunately it was underwater since it is right along side the Bear River which is over flowing right now. They ended up staying at a ranch by the dry farms in Snowville (about 30 miles north of our house) that someone in our ward owns. Shad and Haken were the first ones to get there. Shad was supposed to help with the dinner, so they went early. Haken got to ride a 4-wheeler before all of the crowds showed up and they went on a nice little hike exploring the grounds. For dinner they had dutch oven and roasted marshmellows. It was a soggy night, but luckily our good ol' 2 person tent (the best buy ever at $15) held up just great and kept them dry. Shad didn't sleep much, but Haken snored the night away. They got back the next morning and Shad got right to work on finishing the bathroom. A few hours later Haken came inside for lunch. Shad noticed a black dot on the base of Haken's neck. At first he thought it was a sticker or something, then realized it was a TICK! The first thing he did was get on the internet to see how to properly take it off. The first step was "do not panic!" Shad already was a little panicked but I think after reading the rest he was able to calm down. The best thing to do is to grab a firm hold with tweezers and pull. Luckily the tick hadn't burrowed real deep, so Shad was able to easily get the tick off and drown it in alcohol. What a relief! They hopped in the shower and as Shad was washing Haken's hair he found another one!! Shad didn't have any ticks, but I guess Haken was low enough in the sage brush and bushes that the ticks could get to him easily. Luckily his blonde little hair doesn't hide them too well. I took a few pictures of the ticks in the jar, but they are kind of hard to see. They really are ugly looking red guys. They had a great time...even with the tick incident.

You can't see them really well. Taking a picture in a jar is pretty tough with all the reflections.

Before they left for the campout. Haken was so excited...can you tell?