Birds of a Feather Flock Together

Connor is working on getting his Bear Badge in Cub Scouts right now.   He only has a few more requirements left. One of them was to visit a zoo, aviary, aquarium, etc. in order to learn about different kinds of animals.  We had never been to Tracy Aviary in Salt Lake, so we decided to go there one evening last week.  We had no clue what to expect, and--to be honest with you--my expectations were not very high.  But, we absolutely loved it & had a great time.  The aviary takes in injured birds that can no longer fend for themselves in the wild & gives them a nice home for the rest of their lives.  So, I guess it's kind of the bird version of a nursing home?  Anyway, it was a lot bigger than I thought it would be & there were lots of cool birds & exhibits to look at.  First we stopped at The Rare Bird Exhibit...

Not sure what the bird behind Cohen in this picture is called, but what is up with this kid & his random poses he does for the camera lately?

Here are the boys with a talking parrot we found & fell in love with.  Connor & Cohen apparently wanted to show how shocked they were to meet a talking parrot...

Vivvie couldn't get enough of the birds.  Here she is pointing at a couple of vultures...

The boys couldn't take their eyes off these bald eagles.  Neither could we...

There was no cage over the top of them.  In fact, many of the enclosures were totally open.  Because many of the birds are injured & can't fly, they don't have to put a top on their enclosures.  It was very cool & almost made it feel like they were still (sort of) in the wild...

We were fans of these birds.  They were very pretty & walked with quite the little strut too...

The aviary had several places where you could actually walk into an enclosed area so that you were right there with the birds.  There were all sorts of small birds flying through this enclosure & they let the boys get really close to them too...

There were also several peacocks just roaming the grounds.  The boys walked right up to one & it was calm as could be around them.  Unfortunately, my phone had died at that point so I didn't get a picture of it.  I did get a pictures of one peacock that was taking a little snooze on top of one of the buildings...

They also had my favorite birds there--Flamingos...

When I was in 1st grade, we were given the assignment to do a research paper on an animal or bird that our teacher assigned to us.  My assignment was the flamingo & I have loved them ever since!  I'm pretty sure the last time I saw a flamingo in person was at the San Diego Zoo when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade.  We don't run into flamingos often here in Utah.  Go figure?!?  So, I was pretty excited to see them.  Viv really liked them too.  They are the prettiest birds ever.

So, that was our trip to Tracy Aviary.  We absolutely loved it!  And--bonus--it was completely F-R-E-E!  Pass of All Pass holders get in free to the aviary on Monday evenings.  If you haven't been there yet, you must go. The kiddos (and parents) absolutely loved it!  --Lindsay

Aiden's T-Ball Season

Aiden's t-ball season came to an end a couple of weeks ago.   It was kind of nice that his season didn't start until after Connor's season ended because if they had been going on at the same time, I would have never left the ballpark.  However, because it started right after Connor's season ended, it felt like baseball season went on FOR.EV.ER.  We've been going to 1-2 (sometimes even 3 or 4) baseball games each week since the beginning of April.  That's a LOT of baseball!

Aiden had a great season.  He tried his hardest every game & really enjoyed it.  Here's his official picture for the season...

And here he is with his team.  Yes, my child is the one with the weird expression on his face...

Aiden's coach ended up being a guy that I went through the journalism program with at BYU.  He was my editor during the one (and only) semester that I wrote for The Daily Universe (BYU's school paper).  Small world, eh?

Here's some pictures of Aiden's last game of the season.  Yes, it was the only game I remembered to bring my camera.  Here he is batting...

And fielding a ball...

And running to 2nd base...

He did great every game!  This was a big improvement over last year when he was more interested in wearing his mitt as a hat & pulling grass out of the field.  Yay!

While he played, we all chilled out & cheered him on from the sidelines--oh, and of course took random pictures of each other...

Connor discovered the art of prank calling.  He found out it doesn't work so well now that there is this niffy thing called "Caller ID"...

Here's the team doing an end-of-game cheer...

Aiden getting his participant's medal...

Yep, he's #1...

So now, we are officially done with baseball games for awhile!  To tell you the truth, I was glad to see the end of the season come.  I know by winter I'll be longing for those long, lazy evenings at the ball field--but right now, it's just nice to not have to run to games or practices all the time.  Nice season, Aiden!  Way to go buddy!  --Lindsay

4th of July

Yes, I'm finally blogging about the 4th of July...on the 24th of July.   Well, at least it's not the 24th of August, I guess.  Our Independence Day was another fun one.  We started out the day with our tradition of eating breakfast at McDonald's & then heading down to the big parade in Provo...

The kiddos love this parade, and I think the adults secretly like it too.  Especially Poppy who likes to yell at all the politicians.  He can be quite entertaining--and even more embarrassing.  We found our usual favorite spot--at the corner of 1st South & University Parkway, right by the courthouse & across the street from the Provo Tabernacle/soon-to-be temple.  Usually we meet up with our good friends the Skinners at this point, but they bailed on us this year to go to Seven Peaks instead.  We missed you Skinners!  Here's Viv, Cohen & I waiting for the parade to start...

Once it did start, the sirens were a little loud for Connor's liking...

But Cohen & Aiden were totally unfazed...

After awhile, my mom & I walked around the bizarre with Vivvie and found some cute jewelry & a darling little hand-crocheted dress for Miss Viv.  Then we found a shady spot on the courthouse steps to watch the parade since it was too hot for us along the street.  Here's Vivienne watching the parade from the shady steps...

After the parade was over, we headed back to Nana & Poppy's house for some lunch & some fun.  Poppy had planned several little activities for the kids to do.  First, they started with bubbles...

When they got tired of blowing their own bubbles, they decided to let the fan on the air conditioning unit do it for them.  They would stick their wands over the fan & hundreds of bubbles would be blown straight up into the air.  It was pretty awesome actually...

After bubbles, they moved on to the water fight.  Poppy had blown up a bunch of water balloons for the boys & filled up several water guns.  Each boy was given a chair for his "base" where they kept their balloons & water guns.  Then Poppy yelled, "ready...set...go" and they were off...

Vivvie appeared to want in on the water fight action too.  Unfortunately, each chair was empty of weapons by the time she got to it...

The boys were soaked from head-to-toe by the time they were done...

This year was my turn to work 4th of July at the station, so I said goodbye to the fam & headed in mid-way through the afternoon.

At that point, Mike & the kids met up with Mike's parents at the big park in our community for the annual 4th of July party.  Our HOA puts on quite the little shindig for all the residents each year on the 4th.  We had never been to it before, but decided to try it out this year.  It was lots of fun!  They had yummy food, lots of games, blow up waterslides & bouncehouses for the kids, bingo for the adults, and live music...

That's Connor & Cohen inside an obstacle course bouncehouse...

Looks like Aiden made it through...

They had a dunking booth as well...

And Connor got the chance to sit in it while Cohen tried to dunk him...

Looks like he got him...

Here's Aiden & Cohen trying out one of the blowup slides...

And Grandpa (sporting a new beard) hanging out with Vivvie in the stroller.  I can't tell if Vivvie is laughing or crying in this picture.  I've looked at it several times & still can't tell.  I do know that she's playing Peek-a-boo though.  She always puts her hands on her head, but never covers her eyes.  Then she takes her hands off her hand & yells "Der she is!"  It's super cute.  I love it...

That night, they drove down the street from our house to a place that has a great view of the entire valley & watched the big fireworks show that Thanksgiving Point puts on every 4th of July.

It was a great day!  We love this country & feel so blessed that we have the opportunity to live in such an amazing land where we have the right to "life, liberty & the pursuit of happiness."  Happy birthday America!  --Lindsay

My Job Doesn't Suck

My job has some fun perks from time-to-time.  A few weeks ago, I got to ride in this sweet little thing...

Yes, that's me sitting in a $300,000 Ferrari...

Yes, that's a 3 plus 5 zeros after it!  I found these pictures on my phone & decided I should post them so that there would be proof I actually had the chance to sit in a car like this.  It was so amazingly nice, and smelled delicious.  I also got to sit in a $150,000 Maserati, but didn't get a picture of that.  You can see it in the background of the first picture though.  So, now my question is who in the heck buys a $300,000 car?!?  Geez Louise!  --Lindsay

Our Best Summer Ever

A couple of my college roommates do what they call the "best summer ever" each year.  It's basically a plan for their summer so that they & their kids can deal with the boredom that tends to come with those long & lazy summer days.  They plan weekly themes & then do different art projects, science experiments, field trips, etc. based around that theme.  Each year, they seem to have a great time.  I've thought about doing the same thing, but my kids are a little older than theirs...and I'm pretty sure--since my kids are big time social butterflies--that they would think I was trying to torture them if I told them we were going to do an art project rather than playing with friends.  But, I wanted to do something to make sure this summer was a fun one with lots of great activities that they would enjoy.  When I was thinking about this back in May, we were having some serious sibling rivalry & fighting issues.  Well, okay, we always have those issues--but they seemed to be really bad in May for whatever reason.  So, I decided to combine my "best summer ever" with some behavior requirements.  Mike & I called a family meeting, and together--with the kids--we came up with our plan for our best summer ever...

First of all, we came up with some rules.  The kids actually came up with most these rules on their own...

Then the kids decided on some rewards that they would like for obeying those rules...

And then they came up with some consequences for not obeying the rules (and the consequences that the kids came up with were actually a little more intense than the consequences I was thinking of, but--shhhhh--don't tell them that.)  And, yes, I realize I spelled "consequences" wrong.  I was the only member of my family not to win a school spelling bee.  Sigh...

The plan was to break the summer up into two-week periods.  At the beginning of each two-week period, the kids would decide what reward they wanted to work toward.  Then, for each day they obeyed all the rules, they would get a tally mark.  For each day they didn't obey the rules, they wouldn't receive a tally mark.  During the two-week period, the kids had to accumulate 10 tally marks in order to receive the reward that they had picked.  So, that meant they could only lose 4 tally marks during the entire two weeks in order to still get the reward.  We have been keeping tally sheets like this one for each reward.  As you can see, the boys have barely made it sometimes...

This program has been working like a charm!  It's amazing the power that one of those little tally marks holds, especially when a child has already lost a few & is close to losing the reward.  They willingly do their chores, reading minutes & are actually getting along fairly well with each other!

The first reward the kids wanted to work toward at the beginning of June was a trip to the movies to see Madagascar 3.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, we don't take our kids to the movies that much.  We're more of a Netflix & Redbox kind of family.  So, going to the movies--especially when it involves getting popcorn, drinks & treats from the concession stand--was really something to work for.  Of course I didn't take any pictures of our first fun little reward, so this is all that you get...

The kids (and the parents) loved the movie & highly recommend it!

The next reward--which the kids worked toward during the second half of June--was a trip to the splash pad...

This place is only about five minutes from our house & is tons of fun.  I don't know why we don't go there more often?!?  They have the actual splash pad and then they have a little lazy river as well.  Viv wasn't so sure about the water at first.  What's new, right?

But, the boys jumped right in and had a blast...

Vivvie eventually warmed up to the water a little bit, but only when it didn't shoot any higher than her belly button...

Connor's favorite place was right in the middle.  Yes, he's in there--somewhere...

Cohen & Aiden enjoyed karate chopping the water...

And after being pummeled by water in the middle of the splash pad for what seemed like forever, Connor finally took a break in the little lazy river...

Here's the cute little scaredy cat again...

Oh, and those towel super heroes that we encountered at the beach in California showed up at the splash pad as well...

When it was almost time to head home, Vivienne finally decided that the water was okay--as long as Mom or Dad was right by her...

She even played in it a little bit & walked right through it a couple of times...

It was such a fun day!  It was so fun that we've decided that we need to go there on a regular basis, not just for a reward.  The kids and I are planning to head back next week in fact.

The latest reward that the kids have been working towards (for the beginning of July) was a campout in the backyard.  That campout is actually happening right now as I type.  I'm (obviously) roughing it indoors with our little princess while the boys & Mike sleep outside.  Darn!  {{Please note the sarcasm}}

The fellas couldn't decide if they wanted to sleep in a tent or sleep on the trampoline, so they actually combined the two & pitched the tent on top of the trampoline.  You also get a sneak peek at our almost completed backyard in this picture too (a post on that is coming later when *everything* is finally done)...

See, I told you--the tent is *really* on top of the trampoline...

After their "camp" was all set up, Connor & Aiden invited a couple of their friends over to make s'mores around the (still-not-complete) firepit...

Crazy kiddos (and Dad)...

After that, the friends headed home & our family just hung out around the campfire for awhile.  Love these silly boys...

Then Mike & the kids played duck-duck-goose (sorry for the crappy picture quality)...

And freeze tag in the dark...

And then it was off to bed.  I just stuck my head out the backdoor a few minutes ago & everything was quiet as could be, so I think they're all already asleep.

So, that's what we've been doing to make this summer "our best summer ever."  And, it really has been.  The kids are happier & so are the parents, plus we always have something fun to look forward to.  I think this will probably become a new family tradition of ours.  Although, next year, I think we'll probably try to do a reward each week rather than every two weeks.  Two weeks just seems like a long time to kids.  And, if we're doing one reward a week, that just means more fun things to look forward to!  I think we'll continue with the two-week periods through this summer though since that's what the kids are already used to.  Right now, they are currently working on earning a trip to Lagoon at the end of this month.  Hope they can make it!  I can't believe the kids head back to school in about a month!?!  Where has the time gone?  --Lindsay