::just us girls::

We planned on a MammaChloeDay just to get a few errands run--nothing too special.

We started out at the hair salon.

She brought lots of stuff so she wouldn't get bored--cause it takes a while.

she did a pretty good job entertaining herself...

--talked to ALL the stylists--spun in most of the chairs--touched lots of the products--ate lots of their Hershey's Kisses--poured lots of her own water--looked at lots of artwork--looked at lots of jewelry--played with my phone--colored--read her books

Since we were already downtown, we made plans to stop by and visit Grandma and Papa and get a mini tour of the Smith Building.


then Billy and his boys met all of us here for lunch...


it's so good!!

Look at that food!! How 'bout that brownie?!!?

Then Billy suggested we all take a little walk around Temple Square

and we're so glad we did--what a great day for it! The weather was so warm and it was beautiful out!

We said a few times during the day how we missed Dadduh and the Bubbas, but we also said a bunch of times how it was fun being just the two of us. I remember walking into Tai Pan, Chloe said "Mom it's fun being 'just us girls'."

I couldn't agree more.

::a movie wiss dadduh::

No major plans tonight.

Just a popcorn & a movie.

...but how can you really enjoy a movie without a fort??

the fort construction...

the "pop co-ihm" preparation (and a little bit of the consumtion)...

Coopie was a little scared of the sound of the popcorn maker--can ya tell??

...the movie viewing, fort enjoying, and popco-ihm consumtion...

...all wiss dadduh.

::uh oh yard::

So, I was leaving the house this morning to go volunteer at Chloe's school, and when I was backing out of the driveway, I noticed there was water running out of our yard onto the sidewalk. I called Jennie (who was babysitting the little boys for me) and asked her to check the inside of the house and the outside faucet (where we hook up the hose) to make sure nothing weird was going on. She said nothing was wrong. I called Matt, and he called and had her check a few more things.

Long story short, we were scared it was our main water line into our house, and so we (actually our neighbor) shut off all water for about 3 hours (until Matt got home from golfing-haha).

the water...

the problem...

turns out, after they dug up a way bigger hole than they really needed to, it was just our main sprinkler line (whew!). It was a pretty easy fix (a clamp had just come loose).

the fix...

just a little tightening and adjusting and it was back together

now for puttin' the yard back together...

...hopefully it'll grow back together and we won't even notice ;)

BIIIIIG thanks to Matt's dad for helping, and to Susan for delaying the weekend getaway a bit to loan Richard to us :) And a big thanks to Jennie for babysitting this morning and checking on all the water stuff for us. Love you guys. Don't know what we'd do without ya :)

::snack friend::

Portie got to be snack friend at preschool yesterday...

...he took Buzz Lightyear fruit snacks & juice, and his "scary dinosaur" for show and tell.

Me: "Was it fun being snack friend?"

Port: "Yep"

Me: "What did you do?"

Port: "I helped da teachih, I was da line leadih, and dey wehen't scahed of my dinosau-eh"

::arrrrrr!::

This weekend we celebrated Grandma Kitty's birthday with lunch here...

it's a new restaurant with lots pirate stuff to see and games for kids (the food's a little eh, but it's a cool place).

It happened to be "National Talk Like A Pirate Day," so we all got free drinks if we threw out a "Shiver Me Timbers" once in a while.

They sang to her cause she was "the birthday girl" I'm not too sure about her, but the grandkids loved it!

She got some icecream from the pirates and a few little gifties from all of us.

After Matt and Kevin left for the BYU game, we headed over to the arcade inside the restaurant. The kids all LOVED it. They played some whack-a-shark, skee ball, shotgun shoot, need for speed, and some other ones.

After that, we headed over to Billy and Suzie's new apartment. They just moved into a duplex, and it's super nice. It's much bigger and their yard is BEAUTIFUL!! They'll have much more room for when baby Mia gets here.

So...the cousins loved playing together (as cousins often do :) ) and the grown-ups kind of just talked.

It was nice.

We're glad we were finally able to get together for her birthday (which was back in August!!)

::whoops::

Do you believe I accidently got them the same shirt?

I must've really liked it.

::peach days::

This weekend was Brigham City's Peach Days...

We raced the Peach Days 10K...

...Mom and I walked almost the entire race. We finished in about an hour and a half. It was our longest time, but because of her recent health scare and heart issue, we decided it was safest. It was fun anyways. We got to talk the entire time (which is hard to do when you're running) and we weren't SO tired at the end.

I love doing races with her. We started out running and only got a few feet when she said she had to walk. I was a bit surprised. I knew she wouldn't be able to run very much, but I was still surprised. This is my mom-to me the definition of strength, and here she "can't" do something. This experience was a first for me. She'll get better, and overcome this, but it was a new experience for me (and her too, I'm sure) nonetheless. She kept telling me to go and run and leave her to walk to race, and I said no, I'll walk if she walks. I wasn't going to leave her. We were going to do it together. Then she kept telling me she was sorry to be holding me back. She didn't know how precious the time was to me. We finished 3rd and 4th from last and I wouldn't have traded it for 1st and 2nd for the world.

Because we were so slow, Matt didn't get us finsishing up the race...

...so I reenacted it for him.

We went to the parade right after the race, but none of us are big parade people, so we left after about an hour (it's like a 2 1/2 hour parade!!).

Later in the day we went to the carnival...

...where we enjoyed dutch oven dinners, funnel cakes, carousel rides, fun houses, "dumbo" rides, truck rides.

We love Peach Days!

::L.O.L.::

P- "Mom we need to go to da sto-eh"

Me- "Whyyy"

P-"'Cause we need mo-eh chocolate moek"

Me-"No, cause I'll drink it all and my butt will get too big"

P-"You butt is not big, Dadduh's butt is big"

Me & P-"hahahahahahahahahahahahahahah"

::our preschooler::

Today was Porter's first day of "pweeschoe"

Isn't he cute??

on his way in...

he took a look into his classroom before he went in...

Miss Kim showed him where to hang up his cool backpack :)

he sat on his name

(he thought he was smiling for the camera)


All done!!...

...and he loved it!

He told me all about it...

Me: Portie, tell me ALL about school! Was it fun??

Port: Uh Huh!!

Me: What did you do??

Port: Um, we went in the gymnastics (aka the big gym) and I jump on the hahd (hard) twampoline.

Me: Did you color?

Port: Yep!

Me: What did you color?

Port: I coleh-ed red and black and all kinda sings (things). I did all kinda sings, Mom!

Me: Did you have snack?

Port: Yep!

Me: What did you have?

Port: We had MUFFINS!!

Me: Did you sing songs??

Port: Yep!

Me: What song?

Port: We singed the silly cwockadile one.

Me: Do you want to go back on Thursday??

Port: Uh Huh! Sihsday, I might.

He's a man of few words, but it sounds like he loved it!!

I wasn't as nervous sending him to preschool as I was sending Chloe (no tears this time!!) Probably cause I've done it before, and I know and LOVE this preschool. I know he's safe, the teachers are excellent, and he'll learn a lot.

PS Robyn, I missed you! You weren't there for our 2 hour chats in the parking lot!! What's preschool without my Robyn???

::road trip::

We took a road trip to "Cottawatta" to see Papa Guitar & Gayle.

On the way...

lots of movies, lots of snacks, lots of "how far are we," lots of "scenery" (God bless the Wyomingites because, well, SOMEBODY's gotta live there!!), and a few naps.

Oh...and a 2 hour 2 HOUR delay

a semi caught on fire waaay up the highway, and we were stranded on I80 for a couple of hours.

Papa & Gayle took us to downtown Colorado Springs to see Uncle Wilbur (this fountain guy who plays insturments and water squirts out of them--kinda like the fountains at the Gatway).

We went here...

...where we played on some crazy playground equipment, played in the HUGE fountain, and shared some icecream.

We played at Papa and Gayle's house a lot...

they set up a tent for the bigger ones to sleep in, got them some bikes, sidewalk chalk, lots of snacks, and lots of little toys, and we had a "campfire" and made s'mores.

Chloe and Port's favorite toy at their house was the "roll it game" aka the pool table. Papa played them some tunes, and they both played some games with the kids and cooked for us a lot.

We went here...

...to see lots of cool red rocks. The kids liked walking around looking for acorns, rocks to climb, and places to hide. We saw a few rock climbers, which was pretty fun to watch.

We swam at their pool...

...a couple of times (the weather wouldn't let us swim too long)

...and we loved it!

Then time to head home.

The drive home was almost as "scenic" as the drive there. We hit a bit of weather (check out that rainbow!!), but it wasn't too bad.

We all LOVED our trip to "Cottawatta" and visiting Papa and Gayle. It was a pretty long drive (about 8 1/2 hours), but they did AWESOME in the car both ways (and so did Matt driving-the whole WAY!!)!

Thanks, Papa and Gayle for having us and making us so comfortable at your house!! Love you!