Where did July go?

Today is the 23rd of July. Of the 23 days this month I have only been home for 9 of them. Of the remaining 8 day in the month I will only be here for 3 of those. I am worn out and I am sure that it is only going to get worse by the time the month is over.

We made a quick trip in for Grandma Rasmussen's birthday party on July 12. We found out only a couple days before the party but I felt the need to go in and see her. I was very glad that I did. By doing this we were able to drop the kids off at Spencer's sisters where they spent the week we were gone to UREA Youth Camp. It made it easier to get there on Monday, but made it a little more difficult to get them home. The teens that we took to the camp were great. When I wasn't suffering from lack of sleep I also had a wonderful time. The only bad thing was that it was the first time Spencer and I had been away from the kids and we were in different rooms. Next week I will be at girls camp. Three of the girls that were at the UREA camp will also be at girls camp. I really am looking forward to going to girls camp. It helps that one of my friends is the camp director and the district young women's president is also my friend. It is going to be fun. However, Heather is lucky I told her that I could go. She called me Friday as I was on my way home from the Youth camp to ask if I would be able to go. I hadn't gotten a full night sleep in a week. I hadn't even made it home and she wanted to know if I would be willing to go to girls camp. She had been asking for the last two months if I wanted to go, but I really didn't think that I would be able to go and she had found enough ladies to go that I wasn't needed. And then last week she had two leaders cancel on her. I kind of had the feeling when she was teasing that I would end up at camp.

Family Pictures

I have to give a shout out to the lady that took our pictures. I just love them. There are so many pictures and I just love them!!! http://natalieheiner.blogspot.com

Here are some of my favorites!!!

And these are just a few. I love these ones because they just catch my boys so wonderful. Most of them we are not looking at the camera. I love that because it just looks like moments caught out of our lives. Again thanks Natalie!!! http://natalieheiner.blogspot.com

4th of July

We had a good fourth. The kids did a better job at the parade this year than they did last year. It did help that they didn't have a two hour gap this year between floats.

The national guard was letting kids climb in tank. Once Bub was in there he did not want to come out. Not even to eat. Spencer ended up taking him back for a second time and he was in the driver's seat for 30 minutes I think. Spencer finally got him up on top of it and I went over to take some pictures.

And we lost Monkey. It took less then 10 minutes to find him, but those ten minutes were pure panic. I should have made sure that more than one person heard me ask to have someone watch Monkey. The one that did hear didn't even see him get off the chair. And then when we got back and told her where he was found she said "I didn't think he would go that far." There was a reason I asked someone to keep an eye on my son even though I would only be fifty feet away.

Fireworks were fun. It did end before the grand finally when one of them went off in the shell. Thank heavens none of the firemen were seriously hurt. And it was probably a good thing for the miss fire because right after that the rain started. I think this is the first time I have ever done fireworks in the rain. It was interesting trying to light things, but the kids had fun and so did the dads or should I say big kids?

Spencer's family pictures

four generations

We should have done this a lot earlier int he evening then we did, but it was still fun. We finally broke out the video camera to catch it they were laughing so hard.

I think we were able to get a good picture of the family. Unfortunately we were missing Cindy so we only got six of the siblings.

Matt and Jen really did a good job getting the yard looking so nice. It was so much fun taking all of the pictures.

Wedding

I swore I was never going to take the pictures for another wedding, but I am so glad that I actually went ahead a took the pictures for Matt and Jen. I loved every minute of it. I do however wish that I had a professional camera so that I could get more pictures. It takes so long for my camera to write the pictures to the card that I missed so many pictures. I did however go and get their camera before the ceremony so I was running two cameras which made is possible to capture more moments.

Jen's daughter Bee. She is such a wonderful girl.

Here is Jen with her Jay walking her down the isle.

The ceremony.

Man and Wife. I just love the light coming down through the trees.
The new family: Matt, Jen, Kyle, Bee, and Jay