4th of July weekend

 I love this time of year where you get to watch the fireworks, hangout with family and friends, have bbq's, and enjoy the nice weather.

 I started the weekend off on Friday by watching the Logan fireworks. My family and I wanted to try a new spot and it was just perfect. The view was great and we didn't have to deal with all the traffic of trying to get home. It still wasn't the same as being up by our normal spot, seeing the fireworks close up and hearing the all the music.



Saturday:

  Natalie and I met up by her house to play tennis. It was super hot outside but we had a blast playing. We later met up to go to the cache valley cruise in parade.

 Natalie has never been before, and we were lucky enough to have great seats, front and center. 

 I was trying to get a lot of the cool cars, but they were going to fast to get a good picture of them. These were the only good ones I got with out being super blurry.

 After seeing the same cars over we decided to grab some dinner. We headed to A&W and it was super packed, I guess that's the place to be after the cruise in. It was fun to see some of the cars that were in the parade parked in the parking lot. I should of taken pictures of them but I didnt. 

Sunday: 

  My family and Dale's parents got together for a BBQ over to Cam and Dale's house. All the food was amazing, everyone did a good job at making it so yummy. I should have taken a picture of all the food, but I was more enjoying the eating part of it then looking at it. I thought it would be fun to make a 4th of July dessert in honor of the 4th of July. It turned out better then I thought it would. I can't take credit for coming up with the idea though I just found it on a website.



   We all ate to much food so we layed around and visited. After a while we played a usual game of sunday croquet.  Dale was the lucky winner of the game.

Stella was even trying to play with us.

all we need is Katie to be in the girls pictures. We missed you guys.



 The boys brought some fireworks and they put on a little fireworks show for all of us. Some fireworks were a little more then what we were bargaining for.



Monday:

 We started the day off by going to the scout breakfast. Bryant was one of the cookers and I couldn't pass up taking a picture with his hair net on.



 Later on in the evening me and a bunch of my friends went up porcupine dam.  Some of them got in the water but I didnt want to play in the freezing water. The campsite we were at had the prettiest water fall so Nat and I hiked up the trial to check it out.

  I had good laugh when I heard Natalie freaking out after she just walked right into a spider web. By the time I got down I was still laughing cause she was trying to shake the cob web off her hands. She finally just pulled it off and had the most discussed look on her face. :)

 We all brought tin foil dinners and while they cooked some people set up their tents to camp over.

 Jake did a good job watching our tin foil dinners

 As Natalie took this picture, she was making a comment on for such a small tent you need 4 people to put it up. Nice work James, Lauren, Matt and Hillary.

  After Natalie and I got done eating we realized we forgot to take a picture of our tin foil dinners. We ended up taking a picture of Matt's food so you can see someones tin foil dinner.



 Once we had the fire built up again, more of our friends showed up. Lauren brought her ukulele and played some music while a few people sang. Of course a camp fire is not the same with out yummy smores. The rest of the time we just sat and visited, and laughed really hard.

 Lauren and Trent singing

* I can't take credit for any of these pictures, Natalie was my great photographer for the night. Thanks Nat.

Happy Birthday Cambria!!!!

Happy Birthday Cambria!!!!! I am so grateful for the example she is in my life. She has taugth me so much and is one of the best moms out there. I can always go to her if I need anything and she is willing to help. I am so lucky that we are so close and that she is one of my best friends. Thanks Cam, for everything :) Love ya



play house...

For about 7 months my dad and the boys have been building "the dream" play house of all play houses.



Years back our family built a play house, but as my brothers got older they grew out of the old play house and wanted a new one. So they came up with the design and of course my dad was happy to help. They used the old wood from our fence and the play house turned out amazing. It pretty much has everything you can think of... well for boys. From trapped doors, to a secert door, and to a swinging door, perfect for nerf wars and whatever boys do :)



the swinging door



the secret door

the trappped door



The boys have been out there for hours, even in the worst weather, they go till they can't keep going. All the boys friends were cheering as Bryant hammered in the last nail. I think everyone is a little excited to spend a lot of their time in the new hut.



Since its so big I can't just get one picture of the whole thing so I had to take a couple on each side. Good job dad and boys, it looks great :)



the slide still has to be put back up view from the south side



view from the west side



 

view from the east side



the view from the north side

  Here is a couple of the inside, I could only get the two walls cause the other two have big windows and nothing would really show up. I teased my brothers that I was going to put curtains up on the windows, they were strongly against that idea. They made sure to tell me that, "its a guys hut, nothing girly can be in there."





Best Friends

This quote is so true and I love it. There is nothing greater to have then best friends, I'm lucky to have some of the best friends in the whole wide world.
This week has been a great week getting to spend time with my best friends. Tuesday night Natalie, Kelsey and I got together and made no bake cookies and watched Step Up 3. We were having such a great time that they decided to spend the night.



Wednesday morning my mom made us a big breakfast. Later that night Kelsey invited me to her family friends house for dinner. She made all these Albanian dishes from her mission, that were really good :)  I haven't seen the Hardcastles since Kelsey left so it was great to hang out and visit with them. We later went country swing dancing. Natalie met us there and after dancing we stuck with the tradition to go to Taco Bell and get nachos. We ended up getting actual meals and just sat and laughed the whole time.  Thanks Nat and Kels for being such great friends and for all the great memories we have had.

Memorial Day!!!

For Memorial Day my family and I stuck with the tradition and headed to Malad for the day. It was a little weird this year cause it was just me, the boys, baxter and my parents.

 I enjoy going to decorate my Grandma and Grandpa Wards graves and spend time with my mom's family. When my Grandma Ward was alive we used to have a big BBQ outside and family would stop by to eat and visit. We don't do that anymore, but this year my mom's aunts and some of their families came up and wanted to decorate graves all together.

It was freezing outside so we all met up at subway and had lunch together.



All my mom's aunts and their families left, so we went around Malad to see if there was anythig new. We stopped at my uncle Steve and Cindy's house and visited with them along with my aunt Michelle and Brent and their family and my uncle Gary. It was a lot of fun to hang out with my cousins and to see my family. :)

                                           



Suprise visit...

Friday night I really didn't have anything planned, so I was just enjoying some tv. My brothers friends kept coming over to see if they could play. I thought that it was one of their friends knocking on the door for the hundreth time. Boy was I in for a suprise. :)

I opened the door and..............

Yep thats right, Kelsey was on my porch coming to visit me. It was so weird to see her at my house and I was so freakin excited. I was a little nervous cause I didn't know how she would be after being home 7 days from the mission. It was like she never left, we sat and visited and she is the same Kelsey as before. We went to our friends house to suprise them and sat and visited forever. It's weird to hear her speak Albanian and loved hearing all her funny stories. We ended up visited way late, so she spent the night at my house. It was so great to see her and I can't wait till she moves back up here so we can hang out all the time. I think the highlight of my night was when Kelsey says, "That's where babies come from? I knew I should of taken astronomy." Jordan was quick to say, " um you mean anatomy?" Oh man never a dull moment with Kels around :) 



The boys had given Kelsey a little welcome home gift, they had been holding on to till she got back.





Happy Birthday Buggie Boo!!!!!

Happy Birthday Bug!!!!! Today was my little sisters birthday and I can't believe she turned 20. I'm so glad that we have such a great relationship and that we are such close friends.There is never a dull moment when we are together. She always knows how to make me laugh and is always there for me when I need something. Love ya Alyse, thanks for being such a great sister and friend.