Gardening with Great Grandma

Ava and Violet are lucky enough to have two great grandmas living close by. Great Grandma Lucas came over and planted some flowers and herbs today. It was hot, but well worth it.

Notice Ava's beautiful "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" outfit. I've been working on moving Violet up to her 12 mo. clothes. Ava found and opened the box and selected this dress. She put it on like a coat over her striped shirt. How lovely.

Ava in Action on Memorial Day

Every Memorial Day in the Rochester Park there is something called the Heritage Festival. Basically good music, craft booths, and a whole huge hands-on area for kids to play in. Our friends Steve and Jared were playing in a band so we went to see. Ava loves dancing to music, so here she is with her friend Morgen!

Swim Lessons

Ava and Violet's final swim lesson was on Saturday. They both completed 9 weeks of swim instruction! Tyler and I had to help them in the water of course, so it was a great family activity each Saturday for a half hour. Each girl passed, although the irony was that Violet got more passing marks than Ava. Ava has a strong preference for swimming with Mom or Dad and not the instructor (minus one point for Ava). Both girls also are not comfortable being submerged in the water (minus one point Ava and Violet). Violet pretty much just held on to us the whole time and gave a few kicks. Ava loved to kick and move her arms in circles. She also practiced holding the barbell and kickboard. Both girls also were able to climb in and out of the pool.

Mr. and Mrs. Speirs

Last weekend we went to the wedding of Rachel and Jacob Speirs. In case you don't know what "1082" stands for, it was the group name for Tyler's friends from BYU, and Jacob is part of that group. Hence, the name for his business. It was so nice to see friends we haven't seen in a long time. The whole time we were being convinced to move to Ca. There was a heatwave and we didn't have to wear a coat or pants for six days straight. Now nearly all of these friends live in Ca. To see all the pictures click on the link below ...

paxventures.shutterfly.com/action/?a=8AYs2rFw5at2K6

If you attended this wedding and have pictures of us, please email me .. our camera died after the temple, so I would love to have some more pictures of us. Also you'll see a new link on the side of the page for photoshopped pics. I'll try to upload some new ones every so often. Any picture on this link you can also download or purchase. Photoshop is fun, but it takes a lot of time.

"I want Vilet's bet"

Tonight Ava wanted to sleep in Violet's bed. They played for an hour and when I came in the room the mobile was toppled over, the light was on, and the door to the bookshelf was broken. They were also sweaty?!? This was after I fixed the mobile you're supposed to take down after they're 5 mos. Oh well, Violet never has it on or plays with it.

But I like Archuletta

Here's how I see American Idol shaking out:

Point Archuletta - Good looking, young, probably a lot of little girls voting for him. I see him making maybe pop hits, but more adult contemporary/top 40 hits. Most consistent.

Point Cook - When he's good, he's really good. Reminiscent of Chris Daughtry, and everyone probably thinks he should have won looking back. He also has a lot of raw musical talent as far as arrangements that work.

Minus Archuletta - Messed up words once. Kind of boring in the past couple shows, although he wasn't boring last night.

Minus Cook - Song choice last night. Collective Soul?? He totally dated himself on that one. His performance was really terrible in my opinion.

Conclusion - I'm more likely to buy an Archuletta CD. But I would buy Cook's singles. I already had Imagine stuck in my head from the plane ride because I downloaded it from iTunes. But on the same token, I downloaded Cook's Billy Jean. They're already both stars.

"Boogers Stuck"

Ava was playing with a mechanical pencil eraser and some legos while I was re-living my childhood reading Corduroy Gets a Pocket. At the end of my second read through - Grandma came into the room. I looked over and Ava had her finger up her nose (as most 2 year olds do). I asked if she need a tissue, she said,"No, boogers." So I said, "Let's get a Kleenex." Then she said, "Boogers Stuck."

During the whole half a second in which this conversation took place I was thinking of what she was playing with. Grandma asked if she had a lego stuck in her nose, and of couse I thought no. So I looked up her nose and sure enough there was a little while round object stuck.

Grandma and Grandpa, KC, Audrey, Riley, Spencer, the missionaries and a new member all came into the kitchen and Grandma and Grandpa seemed to have a plan. They had a weird look on their face .. and when I realized someone had to blow on Ava's mouth I realized why. So after I learned what to do, I held Ava, leaned her back, blew on her nose and held closed the open nostril. After a hard blow, the eraser flew across the room and a booger landed on my face.

But it was out! No emergency room visit! Apparently Grandpa learned to do this in his Child Development class at BYU. Thank goodness for BYU Child Development!!

Amy's birthday!

It's rare that we take pictures when we're out together, so I borrowed Amy's pictures to post. Amy has been a best friend literally since we were three. She's getting married in August and we're so excited! Here's her with Dan
Me, Amy and Heather ...
Me and Tyler. Tyler is super excited he finally has a hat to wear again.
We went to Sagebrush Cantina in Lake Orion. This super burrito fed me and provided a dinner for four the next day. It was great!