All About Her

Mia was recently baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  We had lots of wonderful family come to town to celebrate this special day. 

Proud Parents

Papa and Grandma Cardon

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Grandma and Grandpa Oyler

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All the cousins on the Oyler side.

Mia had an arts and crafts themed birthday.  Here she is with her paint pallette cake.

All Mia's fellow crafters.

Painting sun catchers.

Frosting their own cupcakes for dessert.



Mia played her first season of soccer.  The jury is still out on whether she loves it or not.



Last Hoorah and the Beginning of Another School Year

I am a little bit proud of the fact that something actually grew in my yard this year. These dahlias have been so fun to watch grow and bloom over and over again. I thought I should share and gloat a bit by posting a picture of one of the blossoms. Thanks for humoring me.

All our beauties on the first day of school. Such a fun/sad day.

Mallory all ready for her first day in first grade. That's right, I have 3 in school all day. It has been eerily quiet around here this week. We miss our buddies but are enjoying our somewhat casual days while they are away learning.

Mia is in second grade and looking quite darling if I do say so myself.

Libbie proving that we aren't getting any younger. Time has gone too fast! She is in the fifth grade this year. It seems like yesterday that I was in the fifth grade.

Grandpa flew in for a quick visit last weekend with perfect timing to catch one of Libbie's games.

Jake and his girls paid us a visit recently while Hannah was on a little trip. It was fun to do a few things together including pizza, a splash park, and the zoo. Grandma Jill and Courtney even joined us for our trip to the zoo on one of the hottest days of the summer. We won't talk about how the orangutans scarred me for life. Horrendous I tell you, horrendous.

Cutest turtle we saw at the zoo for sure.

Good thing this picture turned out decent. We waited in quite the high-stress line to get it. A lady got after us for letting our "out of control son" ruin the picture they were trying to take. Only, the boy ruining their picture wasn't our son. Ha ha. So when we couldn't locate the kid's parents anywhere nearby, Jake tried to help everyone out by removing the child and started to look for someone he would know. Lucky enough, the boy's clueless dad was looking on at the whole thing unfolding from about 500 feet away and just wasn't saying a thing. Some people and their children...

Mia perfecting her leap over one of the sprinklers.

Molly

Jake and Little Junie

Claire and Annie



On our way to the splash park in Herriman, we spotted the "Up House" and had to take a quick detour.

Slipping through my fingers

I can't believe we only have two weeks until school starts again. Summer goes waaay too quickly in my opinion. Though I won't miss the nearly constant arguing that happens during the break, I will miss seeing my girls more often and having them around for some extra company. There's just nothing better than lazy summer nights and hot summer days. Here are some pictures of our recent activities.
On Sunday Claire and Mallory wanted to be twiners in these dresses and with their hair dos. Which reminded me that Libbie and Mia did the same thing so we had to take some pictures. And I threw in a throw back of the older girls too. Awww. Quit growing now! Before I get really depressed I better stop writing...the end of summer approaching and my kids are getting old. Barf.
Mallory and Claire in the dresses.

Libbie and Mia in the dresses.

Libbie is looking so grown up lately it's creepy. And Jaren is looking...well creepy in this picture. Ha ha.

Libbie took this funny picture of Mia before church the other day.


One afternoon when we had Caden and Macy over we went to a little splash pad. "Little" being the key word. As we pulled up the kids said, "This looks boring." While I do think they had some fun, it certainly didn't last very long. But here are some fun photos of our time there.





Nathan ordered an x-large pepperoni pizza from one of our favorite pizza joints. When he went to pick it up they said, "Oh, you are the one." "The second one tonight to order an 'Oh my heck pizza!'" We were wishing they would have told us this information when he ordered. The box barely fit through the door to our house. Here is Mia showing you her "I am afraid of this pizza it's so big" face.

We had a fun Pioneer Day celebration at our house when Grandma, Papa, Rachel, Brennan, Caleb, Marci, and "the boys" came for a visit. After some backyard baseball and an ice cream treat, we went to the front yard for some serious sparkler action.





Aunt Rachel corralling Jaren during all the sparkler fun.

Summer Stuff

We headed to Idaho City for the annual Smith/Palmer reunion over the 4th of July. We love the facility/location so much - beds for everyone, awesome kitchen with a walk-in freezer, a giant bell the kids loved to ring, and amphitheater, basketball court, horseshoe pits, perfect gathering place, a playground, and nature all around. Aunt Sydney planned lots for us to do including balloon making by Tad, fingernail painting by Mikki, painting t-shirts by grandma Jill, skits by Aunt Dawn, Bingo by Aunt Cherie, Minute to Win It by Jake, Hannah and us, Karaoke by Smitty, crafts by Angie and Heidi, Pinata by Syd, tons of good food by all, a parade in town, and THE MOST INTERESTING FIREWORKS I HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED IN MY LIFE provided by Idaho City (let's just say I feared for my life and my lungs for over an hour). It really was so fun, and I count myself so blessed to have all these people as part of my heritage.
Aunt Cherie was the master at this game...

Libbie and Desiree working hard on their Minute to Win It challenge.

Some intense games of speed/knockout/lightning/bump were played.

Even if Jake is being a total dork in this picture...just look at his little gal Junie Bug.

I just adore these pictures of my sweet aunts helping my children. So precious.



Jaren was first to take a whack at the pinata.

Here the kids are all excited about our sleeping quarters for the next few days. Jake, Hannah, their girls, and my mom were all patient enough to bunk with us crazies. We are quite the challenge to sleep with, but we survived none-the-less.




Our kids spent a great majority of their time on this swing set. Claire and Annie swung on the horse swings pretty much constantly. Here some of them are looking super sweet. Look, even Nathan couldn't resist.




Who doesn't love a popsicle on a hot, summer evening?