the stars have aligned....

would you like to know what my guilty pleasure is? horoscope reading. 

shocking right?

haha... so the other day, i was reading my horoscope (as i usually do in the mornings) while eating breakfast with kelsey and austin. i was reading our horoscopes for the day out loud and it kiiinda worked out perfectly.

austin is an aries (yellow) and kelsey is a libra (green). go ahead.... read them and enjoy.

 bahaha!! how funny is that?! poor austin... getting his parade rained on by kels. 

sigh. i love horoscopes. 

:)

washington fun...

goodness. how do i sum up our fantastic trip to washington? we flew up there to help out aunt nancy with wedding stuff. her youngest son, craig, got married while we were up there and we were lucky enough to be up there for the big day. aunt nancy was in charge of the rehearsal dinner and my family (me, kelsey, austin, mom & dad) were her people... we were the hired help for the whole shebang. it turned out beautiful, ps. we also got some real vacation time in there too. we got to go the coast and boating on the river and we took a drive on the old highway to see the waterfalls. we also got to have a real fourth of july... complete with fireworks... how does it get any better than that? sigh... it was a good trip. we had a great time seeing our cousins and aunts and uncles.

blogging this much stuff is a little daunting... so i just made collages of everything. haha... so here we go....

we really did have a great 4th of july. we had a little family bbq and shot off a butt ton of fireworks (we figured it was a few hundred dollars worth). austin, my favorite little pyro of a brother, was having so much fun! i honestly don't remember the last time we were up in washington for the 4th... austin hasn't really ever had a real 4th of july. he loved being able to shoot them off in the front yard... we just don't get that here in the good ol' AZ.

we also got to go to the rheinlander... our favorite german restaurant in portland. it's definitely a family tradition now.... and we haven't been in years. every time we go, we get our favorite meal... the shnitzel cordon bleu. mmmm!!

we also, thankfully, got a day to go visit the coast. we ate lunch at mo's and then meandered down to seaside to visit the aquarium. it's a hands on aquarium... we got to touch starfish and sea cucumbers and hermit crabs and sea anemones. it was neat. we dipped our toes in the ocean and ran back out... the water is so cold! it was a perfect day at the coast though... it didn't even rain! and naturally we made a trip to the tillamook cheese factory for some squeeky cheese and ice cream.

we also made it to the waterfalls. we took a drive up the old highway and stopped at all the waterfalls (except 1)... it was just dad, kelsey, austin & me, but we had such a fun trip! were stopped at crown point vista... and the vista house (the building) was open. i don't remember it ever being open. it was cool to go inside. we were blessed with beautiful weather again... it was another perfect day.

that afternoon was craig and cassie's wedding. congratulations! (this is the happy bride and groom with isabel and scarlett... jason and laurel's girls.)

it's also tradition to go on a boat ride on the columbia river with uncle dan. he has a super fun boat and it's always a great few hours spent together. we went down to the dam and saw crown point vista and the waterfalls that we had visited a few days before. this day was a little cooler... kelsey and i were both in 2 jackets in the middle of summer! wow! 

what a fantastic trip it was. and now we are back in our warm arizona sun... i have to admit, i don't miss having to wear jackets. lol... :) 

dive, dive, dive....

if you recall... last year we redid our pool. 

it went from that....

to this...

we are still ooh-ing & ahh-ing :)

well... the only down side to our redo was that we lost our diving board. it was kinda broken anyway and we had plans on replacing it, but that didn't happen... until this last weekend.

our year without a diving board has finally come to an end. and we couldn't be happier.

austin got the privilege of breaking it in...

zac might have gotten a jump in there too...

yay for summer!

::

also... my friend danielle made the martha stewart 1234 cake recently and we decided to give it a go too. we actually made it last weekend. it didn't turn out well at all. so... we did it again this weekend and instead of making a cake from scratch we just used a boxed cake mix... it turned out much better. it was delicious.

oh balls....

so once upon a time i got a little puppy. well, this puppy has been growing and growing... and the time has finally come that he get fixed aka get neutered aka get his little puppy balls chopped right off. it's been quite the experience. he was pretty sad looking that first day.... and then we put him in the cone of shame... he's pretty dorky looking. i love it. 

summer fun...

so i'm back to babysitting duty now that i have some extra time on my hands. yesterday, kelsey and i went down and picked up the niece. she was talking about "swimming in the water" all morning long.... so we came back up to our house to go swimming, but if you recall from our memorial day bust hayley does not like the pool yet. kelsey was certain that we would get her in today. yeah. that didn't happen. she still loves throwing stuff in... but she will not get in past the first step [the water goes up to about her ankles. lol]. so instead we kinda just tooted around until lunch time. then she went down for a nap and we all went back outside to tan. it was a fun day. 

chowder is pretty good being outside with us... he just lays in the shade and watches all of us. i still think that he would like the water... especially when everyone else is in it and having fun. it's kinda like the hayley situation... if they'd just get in i'm sure they would love it! haha...

kelsey and i also taught hayley the wow thing... you know when make "w's" with your fingers and put it up to your face and say "wow" all types of sarcastically... with your mouth making an "o" ... you know the one? anyway... it was funny. hayley was doing it last night. we are pretty much the coolest aunts ever. 

and here are a few more funny hayley faces... just because she is so stinking cute!

:)

bowling...

today mom, austin, little zac, and kelsey & i went bowling.

we had some good frames [double strikes, high five mom]... 

and we had some bad frames [double nothings, neener neener tino].

we had some super fast balls [me @ 17.8 mph]... 

and some really slow balls [little zac @ 1.1mph]. 

we had some yummy snacks [popcorn, french fries & pretzels]...

and some scary incidents with coke [ahem... little zac].

haha... anyway. it was fun. kelsey won one game [it was also my worst], but we are all very proud of her! mom is still a beast and had the highest combined score [for the three games]. 

and austin's ball matched his shirt. funny. 

and we got a couple videos of our few strikes [thanks to little zac's wicked fun iPhone]. i think everyone got at least one strike. austin even got a couple left-handed.

aloha...

so... once upon a time, nicole got set apart as activities chairman. we had a lot of good times planning a lot of good activities.... and then she got married and i inherited the calling.

my first big activity was a luau. we have some polynesian boys in our ward who put on a show... they sang and danced and were absolutely fantastic! we also have a lady in our home ward who is hawaiin and did the food for us. she made pork and rice and potato salad. we also had fruit and rolls. it was seriously awesome!

i have to admit, i was a little bit nervous... and a little bit stressed, but it turned out amazing... we had tons of food and tons of fun! i think the approximate head count was 250. from what i hear people liked it :)

i was kind of running around during a lot of it... so my awesome zac took pictures for me (that... and it is his calling. haha)... so, here we go...