We've got some sweet neighbors who treat our kids like grandchildren. Back in June they were nice enough to invite us to come along with them and their official grandkids for a day of fun and exploration at the zoo. We jumped at the chance and had a great time!  The meercats were so fun to watch! Emmie got a real kick out of them. We thought the art they had on display was super cool. The artist used garbage she collected from oceans to make huge creatures! They were actually really pretty and also great for I spy. We got to ride the carousel and the train. We had extraordinary luck in the big cat sighting department. Look at the tiger! We'd never seen it before!  The snow leopard was snoozing in a very visible spot. And you will never in a million years believe what happened in the bird show. Our bird-loving Brynny got chosen as a volunteer to hold an actual dove! It was the greatest day of all our lives! Th...

In May we found ourselves with Grandma and Grandpa all to ourselves for a day! Woohoo! They were up for an adventure, so we headed to Salt Lake City to visit the Tracy Aviary. It had been a long time since we'd been there, and it was a lot of fun. Look how close Bryn is to this owl! Teeny tiny ducklings! Awww! This Andean condor was born the same year as my dad! There was a fun play area by the condor. Pelicans! We got to see a group of people feeding them. They'd throw fish at them and it was crazy to watch them catch the fish in their beaks. A golden eagle. Bald eagle. Look at the size of those eggs! These sandhill cranes were so cool to watch. They were guarding the eggs carefully and even used their long beaks to flip them over a couple times. Checking out the flamingos. They had some really cool solar "trees" that collected energy from the sun, and also provided shade by the flamingos. They had...

Well I officially cannot keep up. Our summer is going well. We're having some lazy days and some crazy days. We've gone on a couple small trips, our bodies are getting nicely bronzed, and that about sums it up. Here's a collection of pictures from the past few months. Here's Addison presenting his "all about me" poster to his class. I got to help out at field day. Love these cute little guys! We planted some flower boxes, and also our garden. Unfortunately we had a late frost and lost about half the flowers and all our tomatoes. So we did a redo (at least of the tomatoes). Addison's cabbage, Leo, that he got at school. We have enormous earthworms at our house! Heavenly Father has really blessed us this year already in the garden department. Our garden area is a hill, so we build raised beds in order to create a flat place to grow stuff. We wanted to expand and add a third planter this year, but had no funds to...