July 2016

Ward activity-- we played slip n'slide baseball.  

Our best friends from Minnesota came to visit us. It felt so good to be reunited again. Reece and Adam were best friends and practically inseparatable.  Cassi and I were also best friends and spent a lot of time at basketball games, soccer games, scouts, schools activities, brunch with friends, girl nights...and a trip to hawaii! We LOVE the Orme family!

Boys having way to much fun with fireworks!

We have found a lot of fun hikes in the canyons by our home.  It feels so refreshing and is so good for the soul to get out and be in the mountains.  The boys are much happier and get along better when they can explore the outdoors and get all their energy out.

This doll is SOOOOO CREEPY! It was first given to someone at our annual Rochester Christmas party.  We would have epic white elephant exchanges and this was one of the presents.  Its become tradition to try and sneak it into other peoples houses.  Ashley had the doll and snuck it in Cassi's moving truck when they moved from to Kansas City.  When Cassi came to visit us she snuck it under my covers in my bed (seriously so disgusting!). We carefully put it in Max Allen's backpack the following week when he slept over at our house.  Love all our Rochester traditions!

The beautiful crew from Rochester.  I seriously love these families.  It makes me weepy every time I see this picture.  These families mean so much to me.  We were family. We had Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter together.  Us girls met a couple times a month for brunch with the kids who weren't in school yet.  I honestly consider these families-- my family.  I love them so much and it felt magical to be together again.

We had some friends from the neighborhood come hang out for the day. We played in the water, had a lemonade/cookie stand which was very successful, played on the tramp, and ran around wild in the basement. It was a super fun and successful day with the neighborhood kids. This is one of the reasons Mom loves summer.  She loves having the house full of kids, doing fun activities that only the summer brings.

Tanner is the sweetest little helper.  He was in charge of deadheading my flowers.  He took this job seriously and did a great job keeping my flowers looking beautiful!

Kate is constantly putting on and taking off clothes.  If you leave anything on the floor that she can put on-- she will (including the boys underwear) eek!

Tanner and I have fun at our doctors appointment. This was an appointment with the GI doc and allergist.  They are trying to decide if he was EOE or not? I don't think he has it, but they said his numbers qualify him for the diagnosis.  I think he has a high eosinophil count all over his body, including his esophagus (which is what the EDG found).  Anyway, Tanner is an awesome patient. He listens to the doctors and helps them with everything they ask him to do.  He's also super tough with all the different skin issues he has.  He's resilient and tough and I'm so grateful for his strong personality that helps him be happy through all this.

TEMPLE TRIP with the Young Women. I love spending time with these girls.  We took a day trip to the Manti Temple. It was my first time visiting this Temple and I was in awe of its beauty.  I'm sure it helped that I was with incredible YW as well (Mimi Manwarying, Lauren Winn, Rachel Jessee, Makenna and Aubry Lake, Madi La Fleur, Kristen Laurson and Heidi Draper).

Dad worked the night shift and so he came home and decided he wanted to do a quick Costco run before he took a nap.  We were walking past the clothing section and he spotted a big fluffy pink tutu.  He said, "don't you think Kate NEEDS this". Of course I agreed and when we gave it to her she gave Daddy the biggest smile.  I'm pretty sure she has him wrapper around her little finger.

This girl wants to be like her brothers.  If they are outside, then she is outside.  She chases them all over the neighborhood.  She isn't missing out with all the fun and adventures they go on.

I came down the stairs to find this--- isn't this darling!

Bensons best friend Max from Rochester came to visit for a day. Benson was in heaven.  They had a massive water gun fight, played the wii, and spend a lot of time outside being boys. Grateful for such awesome friends.

Daddy's girl.  When Spencer comes home she runs to the door and yells "Daddy, daddy!" and then screams until he picks her up.  She LOVES her Daddy.  If she hears the front door unlocking she always assumes its Spencer. It's so cute.

Kate and I surprised Aunt Clarissa for Colbys baptism in Houston, TX. It was SOOOO much fun to surprise her.  We flew down, rented a car, and were giddy the entire time we were driving to her house.  We spent a couple days at her house hanging out celebrating Colbys baptism and Callie's baby blessing.  The weather was seriously so terribly hot.  I've never experienced humidity like that before.  Kate thought she had died.  We went to the boys swimming lessons and Kate laid down on the cement to try and escape the heat.

Mom and baby Callie.  She is the BEST snuggle baby.

Miller family Goose

I am in love with our Goose.  My mom gave him to us for my 30th birthday.  We dress him up every month.  He's become the mascot of the neighborhood.  We get comments all the time about how they look forward to seeing how the goose is dressed.  One lady told me "one of these day's I'm going to get into a wreck looking at your goose"!   Here are some of our favorite outfits. 

 Our BYU goose got a lot of attention. We put his jersey on for the BYU vs Utah football game.  During the game the Young's put a red t-shirt with a "U" onto of our jersey.  The next day another family in the neighborhood put a "U" sticker on top of the jersey as well.  We decided to join in the fun and took a picture of the goose with it's BYU jersey on and tap it along with a bunch of BYU signs all over their doors.

 Spencer bought this skeleton to put on our tree swing in our front yard.  We were pretty excited about this idea because we thought it would look cool.  As Spencer was going outside to put it on the swing, he got this genius idea to put it next to our goose! I seriously laughed about it for the first couple days every time I pulled into the driveway. I loved it!

Christmas Goose

Reece on his first day of 5th grade

One of my favorites! April showers.

Sweet Tanner with our 4th of July Goose

Boise trip-- June 2016

Boise trips are always a highlight of our Summer.  

We played in Grandma Miller's backyard, went to pizza at the Idaho Pizza Company, grabbed a treat at Baskin Robbins and watched a movie in their basement. We love spending time here. 

 We also spent a lot of time at the Dunkleys house.  We went swimming, took our normal trip to Maverick for a slushy, spent a lot of time riding Grandmas new go carts, played with Myla and had fun visiting with family.

 Tanner played his little heart out.  I found him asleep on the floor in the west wing after a fun afternoon spent in the sun.

 Benson went to his first Diabetes camp with Hodia.  It was a day camp for 4 days in Boise.  He had so much fun. His leader (Dr. Flynn) kept telling me how smart Benson was and how he needed to go home and find more jokes for Benson. He was impressed with his comprehension ability and his zest for life.  Benson made some great friends and loved meeting other kids with Type 1.

We always stop by Burley on our way home to visit our Catmull cousins.  These kids play so well together.  They are creative and happy.  They have been working on making movies together and its pretty entertaining watching them.