Beach Camping

Our last celebration of the summer (2 weeks after school started), was to make a trip to visit my sister and her husband in Los Angeles and then to go camping for 3 days along the beach in San Diego.  We found a discounted tickets to Sea World for a day too!  Perfect vacation!!!!

Leah and Beth - sisters!!  Leah's due in 2 weeks! 

Uncle Thomas and Aunt Leah with their nephews 

Chad building a sand dolphin on Santa Monica beach.  

The boys promptly jumped on it when he was done.

Kayden - his home for 5 days - the boogie board!!

McCoy - so dang cute!!! 

At La Jolla Cove - snorkeling, tide pooling, etc. 

Chad rented a surfboard for half a day.  He had a blast and managed to catch a few waves. 

Chad helping Boston on the surfboard 

Boston and McCoy in a cave along a beach 

Sunset on the beach

  Sunset from our campsite looking toward the ocean

Azure at SeaWorld with Elmo.  There was no one else in line to see him so he just lingered there.

Dolphin show 

Shamu at SeaWorld

The boys: Boston, Azure, McCoy, Kayden 

2nd and 4th Graders

School started the day after Labor Day and we now have a 2nd grader and a 4th grader!  They both have teachers that they already love and friends in their classes.  Here's some fun pics of their first day of school.

Boston - 2nd Grade 

Kayden - 4th Grade 

Boston is 7!

Boston was able to celebrate his birthday with a lot of family this year.  My parents were in town for the weekend, my sister and family came over, my dad's sister and brother-in-law, and Brendon and Breanna came up to all celebrate with us.

His cake was the Portal of Power from the Skylanders game.  Chad and I made it together.

For the party, we played some outdoor games, chatted and finally (he kept asking) opened his presents.

Summer 2012

Our summer was a blast and a perfect break for the kids off of school.  At the beginning of summer, we made a list of things we wanted to do together.  We changed a few as time went on, but here's our summer list and a few picture highlights.

 Getting ready to hike to Timpanogas Cave

 Camping

 Riding horses at Chad's co-worker's house

 Visiting the Davis County Fair and Utah State Fair

Open house of the Brigham City Temple 

 Water parade on 4th of July with the Sorensen's  (went to Cherry Hill with them as well)

 Movie in the park

Our backyard at sunset.  This is where most of the memories were made!

Prehistoric Mother's Day

Mother's Day weekend was our first camping trip of the summer.  We headed to Vernal, Utah - Dinosaur National Monument - for 2 nights.  The boys always sleep like angels when camping and Chad suggested that we setup a tent in the backyard on days we wanted them to sleep in.  Of course, it also may have been the numerous hikes we took and constantly keeping them busy.  

We saw a lot of dinosaur bones and loved the newly reopened quarry and visitor's center.  We also took some hikes around the area to amazing petroglyphs and a dinosaur causeway (hundreds of footprints) that was on the end of a reservoir.  It was a great weekend and everyone was in great spirits, making for a perfect Mother's Day.