Folsom Zoo

I bought a groupon for the Folsom Zoo, which is cute little zoo that they have rescued animals and put them there. So it is small, but with me taking the kids myself, it was a good thing. We went on a nice cool day so we didn't bake in the sun. I brought the double stroller, but that ended up being only used to carry our stuff because Russ wanted to be out looking at all the animals and Annie woke up and wanted to be in the baby bjorn. It was really fun with Russ because he loves to look at animals and he would see them and say "WOW!" He is really expressive and I love it.

 

One of the favorites was the Peacocks. You could hear the peacocks wherever you went because they are so loud. It was really fun too because Nellie just did a report on Peacocks at school and has become slightly obsessed with them and for her it was so neat to see them up so close. Especially because they were not in a cage and they were just wandering around.

We loved the bears because our Russy is our little bear and he gives the best bear hugs! He will just squeeze you so hard! I love it!

Russy thought it was so cool to be so close to the animals.

This guy was just wandering around and Nellie was just beside herself.

Here is the mommy and baby Peafowl.

The three little bears

Me and my babies. I sure love these little monkeys.

I love love love being a stay at home mom and being able to take my kids and do fun things together and make memories. I hope they always remember how much fun we had and how much I love being with them.

 

Annie Girl

June 9, 2013 our sweet little Annie girl was blessed.  Her daddy gave her such a sweet blessing.  She is such a perfect addition to our family and it really feels complete now that she is here.  She is our little caboose.  

 Such a perfect little family.  I couldn't have asked for any more than this.  It was always my dream to have five kids and now I do!

 Daddy and his baby girl.  She will probably have him wrapped around her finger.

 Annie looked so pretty in her dress, and I am glad that I got good use out of it.  It was such a beautiful dress that Kevy's grandma made, I would have been sad it it had only been worn one time by Lizzy.Now it is special that all the girls got to wear it. Now all their girls can wear it too!

 She got to wear the booties they all have worn, that my great grandma Bower made.

It was nice to have family here to help celebrate it.  My sister Erica and her daughter Grace, who isn't pictured were visiting, so it was great to have them here too.

Annie is just starting to get to the fun stage.  She is the sweetest thing ever!  She is so so good.  I can't believe that I was blessed with such a good baby.  She is really quiet and has a very calm nature about her.  I think she is going to be an observer.  Just kind of content to stand back and watch. She is starting to make baby noises a lot and has started to giggle.  Which is of course the cutest thing ever!  She loves her swing  alot and I know if I can't hold her i can put her in her swing and she is totally content.  She is now starting to like her toys and starting to grab for them.  She even rolled over, which was probably a fluke.  At her 2 month appointment she was 10 lbs. 1 oz.  so she seems to be following her sisters growth pattern and is going to be a little thing.  I don't mind though, I like having small girls.  She sleeps great at night, I put her down at 9 and then she wakes up at 3:30 or 4 and that is it.  It is great!  She has even started sleeping through the night the last two nights, so that is awesome, but it probably won't last and that is okay.  She is still so little to be doing that.  I really can't believe how much she completes our family.  We love her so so much!   It is starting to get a little sad to think we are now ending this stage in our life.  But really exciting at the same time to think our family is all here with us now! 

Sum Sum Summertime!

We sure look forward to summer every year. It is is fun to be able to be lazy and not be hustling to get to school and all that other stuff.  The kids love being outside and doing all the fun activities we do during the summer.  We have a kids summer pass at Blockbuster so we get some fun kids movies to watch and the girls like playing out on  the tramp with water.  We have a family in the ward that lets us use their pool, but it is really cold so the kids don't do very well with it.

One of the things we love best about summer is going to the library. It is so fun to go and get books and read them together and to do the summer reading program and get lots of fun prizes..  The library had their big kickoff for the reading program so we took the girls to it and got them signed up.  They also had some activities, and they had some reptiles that the kids got to see and hold.

Lizzy had fun holding the snake. She has such an adventurous spirit, I love that she will try lots of new things

Nellie is not very adventurous but she wants to be like Lizzy, she pretty much was like hurry and take the picture mom while I am touching this snake, so that it looks like I was brave.  Hey I think its great that she did it at all,  I wouldn't have.  Jane didn't have any desire to do it at all.

They gave the kids these little jelly belly hats  to decorate because the theme this year is Cooking..

Russ discovered this giant train table and he was happy as a clam to play on that the whole time which made me happy to not have to worry about him running and trying to keep track of him.

The last day of school I wanted to make it a big deal for the girls.  I want my kids to feel like I am excited to have them home for the summer, because I am!  Yes by the end of the summer we are all ready for the kids to get back into the structure of school, but I love the end of the year and the opportunity to be with my kids and do lots of fun things together.  So Jane and I surprised the girls with these decorations outside so when they walked home they would see it and get excited.  We also made so really cute watermelon cupcakes that the girls thought were really fun. I love having girls because they recognize the efforts I put in and think it is really neat.

I had to throw in this picture because this is case and point of why I don't let Nellie  serve her own food.  Our ward has a potluck in the park once a month and I decided to let the big girls get their own food and this is what Nellie served herself.  She really has an addiction to junk.

Lizzy was gone with her cousin Grace and the others were feeling a bit left out, so I took them to the splashpad and boy was that fun to watch Russ.  That boy loves water like nothing else.  He kept running in and getting drenched and then running back to me just laughing and squealing.  It was seriously one of the cutest funniest thing I have ever seen.

 Nellie and Jane found a bunch of water balloons someone left and were trying rather unsuccessfully to fill them at the water fountain.

I could seriously not get over how cute this boy was.

Jane is very timid with water.  She really doesn't get in much, just kind of danced around the outside.

Nellie usually is more into it too, I think she wasn't this time because she didn't have Lizzy with her getting her in there.

I just really loved this picture of these two taking a breather together.  So cute.  We have had a good start to the summer!

Santa Cruz

The kids have really been struggling with the fact that we are probably not taking a vacation this year.  Lizzy keeps telling me how all of her friends are going all these different places and she isn't going anywhere.  So we decided that it would be fun to take a little mini vacation Memorial Day weekend.   We went down on Friday night and stayed with my parents and then we went Saturday to Santa Cruz and then Sunday we went to Church with Grandma and Grandpa.  Friday I got all the kids and everything packed.  Kevin packed his stuff before work and I packed everyone else stuff.  I tried to have the girls pack their own stuff but after looking through their suitcases all I found was a bunch of stuffed animals, books toys, a harry potter robe and a pair of flip flops a shirt and a pair of pants.  So I had to take over. They just couldn't understand what was wrong with their packing.  I thought Lizzy would do a good job packing her stuff so I let her but that was a big mistake because she didn't pack any shoes and all she had to wear was her tennis shoes.  So that night when we got back from Santa Cruz I had to go to Walmart and get her some sandals for church because I was not going to let her wear her ugly black tennis shoes with her dress.  On Saturday we got up and headed to Santa Cruz.  I really don't know if we should take a vacation anyway this year because Nellie asked close to 50 times how much longer until we got there and it is only a two hour drive.  Russ wouldn't go to sleep the night before because it was in a pack and play crib and he hadn't been in one in a while. He was crazy that night!  So during our drive he was awful!  He was making the MOST annoying whining noise almost the whole time.  Anne was amazing as usual and slept pretty much the whole day, thankfully! So by the time we got there Kevin had officially decided no more vacations for us this year.

 We were happy to get there and get to the Boardwalk.  Santa Cruz is so much fun because it is like an amusement park right on the beach.  The other great thing is you can pay by the ride, so we just rode a couple of rides and then went to the beach afterward.

 Russ is just a little into his Peps as he calls Pepsi.  Yes Kevin has gotten another child addicted to Pepsi.

 Grandma got a dippin dots for all of us to share and the girls loved it.

 Russ with the men.  He sure likes the guys.  It was fun to go with Joe and Grandma and Grandpa.

 The girls waiting in line for the ride. We went on an underground train ride and it was fun that we all could go together. After that Joe took the girls on a haunted house ride while I was nursing Anne.  The girls loved it, but Jane was a little scared.  She is so funny though because she just seems so much older than she is because she wants to do everything her sisters do.  Then we went to the beach which was just about 100 yards away.  It was a blast.  It has been a few years since we took the kids to the beach and it made me realize we need to take advantage of the fact that we are only a couple of hours away.  The kids LOVED it! So much! Russ is a wild and crazy man.  Kevin had to be one step away from him the entire time because when a wave would come he would go running full speed into it. It was the cutest and scariest thing ever!

 Janie has become a bit timid and she hung out most of the time in the sand.  She did go in the waves a bit and actually got taken out by one that face planted her in the sand, but she didn't cry at all. She was super brave, but she didn't go back in after that.

  Lizzy LOVED the beach so much!

 Nellie too!

 Annie slept the whole time at the beach in the stroller.  I put her on a blue towel so it would be comfy and Russ tought it was his blue blanket and was freaking out that she had his "gi" as he calls it. It was funny.

 Lizzy and Nellie were frealess!  That water was freezing!  It was only about 70 outside and the water was ice cold, but they didn't care.  I love it!  I love having kids and watching them just absolutely LOVE life and enjoy things the way that only a carefree child can.

 Russy was playing in the sand after Kevin decided no more water and he had a bit of a runny nose that day and so he had some pretty sandy boogers.  It was lovely.

We had such an amazing day.  We decided we need to go back again very soon and stay a couple of days this time.