We Said Goodbye....

Yesterday we said goodbye to our first family car of 5 1/2 years (9 for Keith I believe). It was Keith's first car, my first car and our first family car. We had our first date in our little Camry, our first roadtrip together, we drove away in it after getting married, drove home from the hospital after Carson was born, and took it with us on our move to Boise. It's been everywhere with us literally-- two trips from NJ to Rexburg, to Utah and Boise countless times, California, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming (Teton Pass--Yikes!), and all over the crazy mountains in Montana. 238, 847 miles later she finally gave out on us, well, the transmission did and we decided it was time to buy another car. Everyone kept asking us when we were going to buy a new car and we said when our Camry dies, and stayed true to that.We sure will miss the many memories with our little cammy, I can still hear it from miles down the road (haha), for those of you that saw it drive know what I'm talking about. She sure was good to us. 

Not gonna lie I was pretty sad when we came home from bowling and saw she was gone :(

Our little Toyota Camry LE

Some month in 2004- May 25th, 2013--We love you CAMMY!!!

Fathers

This post is a little late but better late than never right? This one's for you Keith, I just wanna say Happy Father's Day to you and to all fathers. I think of my own father and everything that I have learned from him, a couple things stand out especially, my financial brain comes from him, I love everything to do with budgeting and saving money and being frugal. My dad also taught me the importance of the gospel and having a testimony. He has been such a great role model of one who has supported his family, he came from a background where he had barely anything, raised a family of 15 on a teacher's salary and has ALWAYS provided and given his family what they needed. I'm so grateful for his example and what he has taught me about being a parent.

Keith....oh Keith. What can I say, Keith is truly the epitome of a good father. Carson and I are so lucky that he is all ours. There have been several people--family, friends, ward members etc...that have commented on what a great guy Keith is, and any of you that know him know what I'm talking about. I sure love him and am so grateful each day for the person he is. Love you forever and always babe.

Here's a few of my favorite pictures of Keith & Carson, looking at them on Father's Day just makes me realize how special these two boys are.

Carson's Favorite

Carson's favorite song is "Gone Gone Gone," by Phillip Phillips. I would always listen to it in the car or on YouTube and then Carson started requesting, "Gone, Gone, Gone, Mommy." It was so cute. He always asks to listen to it on the radio and I have to explain that we have to wait for it it come on, or he asks to watch the music video if I'm on the computer. I showed him Phillips other song "Home" and I think that one might be his new favorite, although he calls it "Home, Home, Home," instead of just Home. haha What a funny guy. He even made my brother's fiance Holly play it over and over on her ipod in the car, right when the song would end he would say "Home, Home, Home" really loud over and over again till we played it again. Oh it's so cute to see him so fascinated by a song.

32

Keith turned 32 yesterday! We celebrated early on Saturday by having a picnic at the park as a family and letting the little man run around in the water, after a little bit we took Carson to my sister's house (I was so glad he fell asleep for her on the way over), then headed out to Mickey Ray's BBQ for dinner. We got the large meat platter and shared it since it also came with three sides, it was plenty of meat and we had a lot left over for lunch the next day. I had never heard of Mickey Ray's, I guess some guy from Arkansas (shout out to Ruby!) moved here and has lived here for about 12 years and started the Mickey Ray's in Eagle about 4 years ago and then the one in Boise that we went to just opened up. We both loved it and were super stuffed. I loved that they served the drinks in Mason Jars, really made you feel like you were in the South

Half the platter eaten...it looks gross in the pic but it was good I promise!

Right after dinner heading up to Crouch

Afterwards we headed up to Crouch, ID which is in the mountains where we saw Seven Brides for Seven Brothers at an outdoor theater. Keith absolutely loved it, he had never been to Starlight Mountain Theater before, I've been a few times but it's been several years. It was a hilarious show and we decided we need to go back to see Oklahoma in a few weeks. 

source: google.com

Waiting for the show to start---second row/center seats--doesn't get better than that, well maybe, since the tickets were free.

Sunday morning Carson was sick so I stayed home with him and decorated the house. When Keith came home we had our leftovers from Mickey Ray's and skyped his family in NJ for awhile. My sister Nikki and her family came over for dinner....chilli dogs (Keith's request), salad, chips, and soda. Afterwards we had Winco's yummy brownies and ice cream sandwiches and Keith opened presents---new fishing waders, 6-pack of root beer (his fav), and some cash. He said his favorite part though was the homemade card from Carson and I. I even got Carson to say "Happy Birthday Daddy" all on his own, I think it's things like that, that mean the most when you're a parent.  Afterwards we lounged, talked and the kids played. It was a great two days.  Happy 32nd Babe!

This morning (the day after) Carson saw all the decorations still up and he said, "Birthday Daddy," and I said "Yeah, did Daddy have a birthday?" and he yells "Daddy!" and looks around for him. I had to explain that he was at work. It was so cute he remembered and understands birthdays now.

Keith's homemade card with Carson's footprint. 

Fishing Waders!

Say Whaaatttt??

So my youngest sibling Kirk (a.k.a SMACKUS) got engaged over the weekend! I can't believe Smack is engaged! To me he will always be cute lil' Kirk. He's 19 soon to be 20 which is exactly when I got engaged too! I'm so happy for him and Holly, he seriously couldn't have picked a better girl for him. Holly fits so well into the family and knew all 15 names before she even met anyone. She's such a sweet girl and I'm so excited for them to start this new chapter in their lives!

Friday Favorite!

I thought I'd do a post of some of my favorite things currently or of all time on Fridays. Todays favorite is Clump Crusher Mascara from CoverGirl. I seriously bought this because I had an issue with mascara and honestly didn't think it would work but thought I'd give it a try anyway since it has good reviews and is the only mascara I can find that claims to "crush clumps." Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised that it did do what it says so I will definitely be buying again and again.

Top 10 Favorite Things About SUMMER!

Summer is probably my second favorite season, fall being my favorite of course. Summer definitely has so many exciting activities and the weather is almost always perfect which makes it nice for doing things outdoors. I complied a list of my favorite things about summer that I'm looking forward too!

1. The Weather--I love that it's almost always sunny so this makes it perfect to be outside for everything from swimming to bbqing.

2. Water Activities- from skiing to rafting, swimming, tubing, boating the water is my favorite activity especially when the temps get high. Rafting is probably at the top of my list. This summer we're going to NJ so we'll get some beach time in...so excited!

3. 4th of July--I love this holiday! Not only is the 4th a perfect reason for a BBQ but I love all the patriotism and the red, white & blue.

4. No School---Well I haven't had to really worry about school for the past three years now but I always looked forward to summer because I was ready to be out of school and having fun.

5.  Summer Activities- Boise has so many great free activities to do in the summer, from Eagle Fun Days to Meridian Dairy Days, the Boise Music Festival, Art in the Park, Alive after Five, First Thursday, The Museum Comes to Life and many more that make for a great summer!

6. Everything Outdoors- With summer comes the ability to be out and about, some of my favorite outdoor activities include: walks, leisurely hikes, biking, picnics, bbqs, park time, water water water activities!

7. Camping!- Every summer our family would take a camping trip to Silver Creek which is just North of Crouch, ID, they have a natural hot springs and we absolutely loved everything about Silver Creek. We still try to carry that tradition on and as many of my siblings that can make it each year go. We also would go to Cascade, ID for the Lewis Reunion and Bear Lake, ID for the Brown Reunion (my Mom's side) and both of these trips were camping trips too. So we grew up camping each summer, regardless of what Keith will say about me and camping haha.

8. BIRTHDAYS BIRTHDAYS BIRTHDAYS!- June-August alone there are almost 20 birthdays within my family and two more that will be born this year (one in July and August)! Keith's is next SUNDAY!!! Birthday parties are always fun and summer ones are especially fun. So in our family we're celebrating a birthday almost every week with some weeks that have 2-3!

9. Sleeping Outside-- Summer nights are seriously so perfect for sleeping outside. In our family growing up we did this all the time. You had to race to secure a spot outside "in the middle" because nobody wanted to be on the end. My mom would always bring breakfast outside too and we'd wake up to breakfast outside. It was a fun tradition with so many good memories of telling stories or jokes with the sibs, we try to carry it on still and do it in the summers when we get together at my moms.

10. Imagination-- Since school was out we had to use our imagination as kids to keep ourselves entertained, of course having a ton of other siblings to play with helped a lot too, but we didn't go somewhere every day we had to keep ourselves entertained and get creative. My mom of course still made us do chores, practice Math, Science, Spanish, and a few other subjects but when it was play time we as siblings got creative we did things like; made forts in the downstairs basements, made up dances with my sisters (and niece Chelsea-- candy dance haha!), played vote ( we voted on which games to play like fruit octopus, upset the fruit basket, water game etc.), had parades around the house with various "instruments" and bikes, biked into Eagle (about a 30 min bike ride there)--sometimes just to get the free cookies at Albertsons, haha yah we got that bored sometimes, movie nights, lots of hours spent on Castle Hill ( on the the hill in our backyard we built a little village), made water slides and before we got a small pool yes, we swam in barrels that we would fill with water, water ballon fights, play baseball (since we have enough players for two teams), my mom would have us choose a country and we'd research it and teach each other about it and make food from that country, we'd also do things like science experiments and hands on activities. Oh the endless possibilities of free, fun, creative summer activities you can do right in your own home!

What are you most excited about for summer?