Happy Happening's

A quick overview of some happy happening's:

Our family went over to Mike's sister's house to celebrate our nieces 3rd birthday. She's so adorable! We may have spoiled her but c'mon... look how cute she is. Worth it!

My kids are adorable!

My sister-in-law made Lily and Ducati these Humpty Dumpty toys. They were suppose to be for Easter but like usually I forgot where I put them. But even a delayed gift is still fun. :)

Ducati made her's into a girl Humpty. Creativeness runs in our family :)

Lily and Ducati decorated the bush outside our house. They told me that they missed making snowmen so they made a "Tree-man" instead. I loved it! So I left him there for a few days but then it rained so everything needed to be taken down and washed. But Tree-man's memory will live on forever thanks to this blog.

Mike tried to teach Ducati how to ride her 2 wheeler. Not successful. But at least she gave it a try.

She has the ability; she just needs to get over her fear. In time :)

Since on-line school is over I'm giving myself a chance to make my own curriculum this summer. So instead of following what the online school says to teach I just gathered all my kiddos and give it a try. We did some geography (learning all 50 states). I found a fun song on youtube that I printed out so we can follow it along.

So far they know some states we just need to work on the locations of them. ( A fun little America puzzle has been helping them with their locations)

Lily showing the camera her states song. And Cati below listening to the song.....again.

Then we did a history lesson on the Titanic complete with each kids replica ship made from Lego's.

This might be a fun way to just gather everyone up and teach 1 lesson in history, science, art, etc. and just let them separate for Math and Language Arts. I have a few more weeks to decide if I want to do this sort of homeschooling or the step-by-step programs. Hummm..... decisions, decisions.

Bust & Redo: Father's Day

2 weeks is all he had.

I was a single mom with Mason (5) and Hailey (2). So when Mike and I met he knew what he was getting into. Or so he thought.....

Happy Meals, bedtime stories, Disney movies- piece of cake he says. After all he's the best parent around even though he doesn't have kids. HA! But I believed in him so when we married that's when things got interesting. 

He had no "training" period. No time to get the hang of being a dad. All he could do was jump with both feet blindly into unfamiliar territory. Most fathers I know don't figuratively start running marathons before 5k's. Mike had to be a fast learner. 

Actually we had to learn together. Fast!

And when Lily and Ducati came along this just added to his mix of chaos already. But of course in a lovely way. 

After many discussions came about...

Time outs? Not?

Allowance? Not? 

What sort of chores should be given?

This list goes on and on. Both calm and heated. Don't mention to us eating in the living room. WW3 might break out. :) 

But over the years Mike has taken the label of stepdad and turned it into dad. Just dad. He loves all our kids. Blood doesn't matter to him. His heart is so genuine and generous that he wanted to be involve to the fullest extent he could. On occasion cutting me out for daddy time. 

But I am so proud of him. He's still learning as he goes. So am I. Puberty! This needs a handbook. But aren't we all. He's honest with our kids that on certain issues he has no clue what I do but then reassures them that we'll figure it all out together;as a family. 

So Father's Day is more than just a day to honor dads. It's a day to remember dads who want to be dads. Skip Happy Father's Day- Honor (Your) Father's Day! 

How we honored Mike was sort of lame. Mason and Hailey were with their other dad all day. ( legal thing that he gets Father's Day) so Lily,Cati, and I did the best we could. After church Mike wanted to see a movie. I thought he would have picked his fave which he's been wanting to see Jurassic World. But instead he did the dad thing picked a kid movie, Inside Out. For his dinner he again picked our girls favorite, pizza. Either he's just giving in to them or he's upset. 

And after getting it out of him he was sad about Mason and Hailey being gone. And how crapy their gift was. Mike loves homemade gifts but I admit they failed this year. Notebook paper with a quick ," I love you", and a pencil drawing with no colors. 

So not being content with seeing my husband sad when Mason and Hailey got home we re-did Father's Day. 

Tie garland (me and Cati made)

Signs of appreciation ( we all did) 

Colored cards (kids)

 Bacon Caramel cake. ( from Lily and Hailey)

Snowflake streamer ( from Ducati) 

And a collage picture that we all worked on. 

When he got home he walked into a great big surprise! 

And he loved it! I'm glad he did. Or I would be redoing the redo. 

Mike does a lot for our family so showing appreciation should be on the too of our list but sometimes it's not. But today it was our #1 priority and it paid off. He felt like #1 in our world! 

4 bunnies

Jack Sparrow died last month. He escaped our yard.... Again.... And landed on some garden tools and..... Didn't make it. 

Snow White and Eb knocked boots and she had 6 babies. 2 passed away. The remaining 4 I'm getting pretty protective over. 

This weekend Mike agreed to help me build a safer hutch so for now they are hanging out with me.

Each bunny has their own personality. One is always seeking cuddles or any sort of warmth. 

One is scared of everything. Noise, grass, touches... anything. It'll jump up and hop so fast. It's adorable!

One eats all the time. We call him Happy. Since he's happy to eat. 

And the last one explores everything, it often escapes it's box or the hutch. Another Jack Sparrow in the making. 

Park Play

We love summer! The heat can be exhausting but it's a small price to pay for sun, sandals, and shaved ice. :)

So a goal I have for myself is to step up my mom-game. Instead of having tunnel vision while trying to get my to-do list accomplished I need to pencil in some play time to allow my kiddos to get out their wiggles. So we stopped at some random park near a store for a good 30-minute playtime. 

Mason forgets that he's too big on some playground equipment and gets stuck. But that doesn't stop him. After wiggling out he continued to play.

Hailey soaking up some sun. I think it really helps her soul.

I tried to sit under a tree to reanalyze my list but all I kept hearing was,
 "Mom,Look!"
"Mom, Push!"
"Mom, Watch!"

 So I threw my list in my purse and joined in on the playtime.

 Ducati loves slides!

 I wonder how many slides would fit in my backyard???

 I love her freckles!

I tried to get a cute photo of all my kids semi-clean and while doing so someone farted so I got this pic of all of them going, "Ewww!" Better luck next time, right?

Camera Surprise

After work I plug in my phone upstairs before heading downstairs to bed. So when I wake up I check my phone asap to see if Mike texted me... this is our main way to communicate since we work opposite shifts.
When I looked I seen the camera screen on and found these pics from Lily and Ducati.

I really don't care what they were talking about to make them laugh so hard but I love their smiles. And a moment frozen in time that they do have sisterly love. Great surprise for me! :)

Purr-cered

Ducati took that step and wanted her ears "purr-cered". We've tried this before and one look at the earring gun and she walked out of the store. But she wanted to give it a go so we took her to Claire's and she  fell in love with the Ana earrings. :) This doesn't surprise me since she's my Frozen princess. So a few moments later she checked out her ears for a minute just taking in her bravery, courage, and love of being a big girl. And as she was I told Mike that my little girl is really growing up. He smiled and welcomed me back to reality. 

Converse

A goal i have for myself is for my kids to find/be and love themselves. All of there awkwardness, uniqueness, flaws, flares, awesomeness, and everything that makes them what God intended them to be. So I'm a small influence in their lives.

( I know in the universally way I influence my kids and I always will but it's up to them to be themselves.)  

But then moments like this bring a smile to my heart that radiants to my mouth. Lily dressed herself for church and wore her converse. :)  she's deciding to take a small part of me today and I couldn't be more honored. I love being a mom. 

Family Search World Reunion

One of many benefits for working for the church is knowing about all the events ahead of time to ensure I make it.
So the Family History Library was throwing a party to celebrate family history.

 Unlikely connection but whatever works to encourage people to look into ancestry work.

There were Pacific Island dancers. Scottish Bagpipe players. Story Tellers. Games. Inflatables. And food trucks. Yummy!

The only time I allowed Lily to dance in the street. She loved it!

A few games where everyone is a winner. Our girls got tons of prizes from all the games.

My lovely Lily :) Her smile is so cute!

Another game to play.

 She won all these lei's which just made her day.

 Ducati following the Pacific Island dancers. She's giving her hula a try.

 Watch out! She's bustin' a move!

 Me and my girls enjoying some girl time while Mike is working.

During this party there were people walking around giving tips on how to work on genealogy. And conversing how we're all related if we look far enough.

 Oh and Ducati found some coloring pages. Not sure how she did this but she came back from talking to a senior missionary with a few coloring sheets.

So food trucks have evolved since the last time I ate off one. Ducati was waiting patiently for her $8 waffle from MatterHorn.

 Mike was able to join us during his lunch break. So everyone was happy to have Daddy time.

But Mike had to finish his shift so the girls and I continued exploring.

Which lead us to City Creek Disney store.

Lily and Ducati thought this place was Disneyland since there was so much magical stuff everywhere. They are showing me their princess poses.

So after explaining that this is just the store they were still excited to be there. Plus side was the store was having their Once Upon A SemiAnnual sale. So the girls found some real gems for super cheap.

After a long drive home which we all fell asleep while mike drove here's Ducati showing off all her treasures from the day.

It was so much fun spending time with these two lovely princesses.