Mack Park

At least once during the summer, we always end up at Mack Park in Smithfield. It is such a beautiful park with lots of trees and shade. The kids think it is so much fun to play in the creek that runs through the park.

I have to admit that the water is really cold. I kept trying to convince Cooper to swim in the water, but when I stepped in to take some pictures with Clayton, my feet went a little numb. The kids enjoys walking up and down the creek. Its pretty shallow so they are safe for the most part. Cooper had a good time throwing rocks into the creek and following his cousins around.
Clayton didnt' know what to think about the water. We tried to dip his feet into the creek but he would whine after a few seconds. He liked watching the water cascade over the rocks!

Cub River Guest Ranch

While Sherrie and Brian were up visiting, they spent a night up at Cub River Guest Ranch and we we able to go up and spend the day with them. We took Sherrie and Brian on a 4-wheeler ride. They rented older 4-wheelers which ended up kind of crappy because they were unsteady and didn't have protective plastic over the engine. Marilyn let me borrow her beautiful yellow wheeler and we had a great time. Thanks Marilyn!

We were trying to go over to Paris Ice Caves, but some of the switch backs were steep and had drop offs on the one side. This frightened Sherrie enough that she jumped off her wheeler and didn't want to get back on it. So, Brian would drive his machine up the hill, park it, run down the hill, ride Sherrie's machine up the hill and Sherrie and Micaela walked up the hill!! We decided to keep going a little further in hopes that the path would get more steady, but it didn't. Sherrie also ended up burning her hand on the engine, so they headed back to camp and we took Wesley up to the caves. He did really good considering he was in the hospital that same morning for an asthma attack! The scenery was beautiful and it seemed like we were on top of the world at one point. Mom was nice enough to watch my boys and Annika while we were gone. They had a great time playing beneath the willow tree and in the nearby creek. Thanks Mom for spending time with my children.

We have had such a fun time this summer doing all sorts of activities. On some of our down times, the kids have enjoyed going on small four wheeler rides with Aunt Jocelynn. Clayton loved mowing the lawn with Jocie. In fact, if I went up to take him from her, he would completely turn away from me. One of our favorite activites is to sit on the blanket under the trees. Almost every night when the sun drops behind our home, we will bring the blanket out to sit on. Its nice to be able to just relax and enjoy the kids.Cooper thinks it is alot of fun to climb the big tree out in front of Grandm a Coopers house. He gets a little nervous when he wants to get down, but he still loves to be in the trees. When I was young, we had a tree in our backyard that was a perfect "climbing" tree. We spent many a day up in that tree and I would climb very high come to thing of it. I am surprised my mom was not worried about it. Oh well...it was a great childhood memory!Here is a picture of Clayton in Papa's hat. I thought he looked so adorable in it. When I hold Clayton is my arms, he will whip his head around to the front of my face and look me right in the eyes...and it has a little grin on his face. It is the most precious things ever...in fact he loves to have eye contact with people.

Jaden just turned 7 and he had a very fun and exciting birthday party. They set up their big blow up slide and the kids had a blast playing in the water. They would go flying down the slides! Happy Birthday Jaden! Thanks for all the fun!
Clatyon didn't know what to think about the water (it was freezing) so he hung out with mom and Grandma Hatch. He enjoyed the otter pops and cupcakes though!
They also got to play in the shaving cream and Cooper had a great time covering his body in the cream. Steph put it all over a table and the kids could be creative with it. Great idea!

Time With Grandpa

While grandpa was in town, he took Cooper up to Beus Park in Ogden. Cooper helped grandpa look for moss. They had a great time walking around the lake and Grandpa showed Cooper some baby green apples that he could eat. They stopped on the way up to get a corndog. Cooper told grandpa that he wanted 2 corndogs...one for himself and one for grandpa. Grandpa also bought him some Bug Juice (when we told him that Cooper wanted Bug Juice, he thought he wanted mosquito repellant). Thanks, Dad for spending that day with Cooper. He had so much fun with you!

Clayton also loved being held by grandpa. In fact, in this picture he just sat there and cuddled grandpa, which he does not do very often. He wouldn't even come to me!

Happy 85th Birthday!

My Grandpa Cooper turned 85 years old this month and we are so blessed to have him in our lives. He is such a great example to each one of us and we have much to learn from him. Grandpa's mother was a Green and they lived in "Greenville"(named after his family). It was known that some of the nicest people ever to live on the Earth came from Greenville. And I believe it because my grandpa is one of the most loving, gentle and kind men I have ever met.

We had a big celebration for Grandpa down at the square in Wellsville and it was so much fun to spend time with our family while eating good food. You know there will always be awesome food if Grandma Cooper is coming to the party!
We were able to snap some pictures of Grandma and Grandpa with their great-grandkids, grandkids, and my mom and uncle. We missed Uncle Lynn there at the party. Its been a year since Lynn passed away but we know that he is busy in heaven and that he has been here with us at certain times throughout this past year.

Finally Friends

Clayton and Landon are exactly the same amount of years apart as Jaxson and Cooper, but it is funny to think they are that close because Clayton is a baby right now. They are now starting to really interact with each other, especially since Clatyon is more active now and crawling around alot.

Landon loves to play with Clayton...gives him toys, takes them away, rubs his head to make him happy, feeds him food, screams at him to make him laugh....and tries to pick him up even though Clayton is almost as big as he is!

Life is so SWEET!

While mom and dad were down here, we decided to take a tour of the Sweet Candy Factory in Salt Lake City. This is where dad gets his sugar free cinammon bears, so he wanted to go restock for the next year. They took us through the factory and showed us how they make salt water taffy, cinammon bears, orange sticks and jelly beans. Did you know the insided of a jelly bean is tasteless? Did you know that it takes 1 week to make a jelly bean from start to finish? Anyway, we had a good time and it was very interesting.

I Am Proud to Be an American!

This year, the fourth of July fell on a Sunday, so they celebrated the fourth on Saturday the third. Bryce and Jared had to go to a couple of parades to advertise for Alpine and then we met at Red Robin afterwards for some awesome burgers and fries. I always get the Royal Robin, which has a fried egg on it. YUM!

Later that day, mom and dad came into town from Texas and we spent that evening over at Jacqui's eating burgers and letting the kids enjoy the pool.

That night, we went down to the town of Hooper and watched the fireworks. Cooper enjoyed the fireworks and Clayton would look up at them every now and then but the loud noise didn't seem to bother him. It was nice to sit and listen to the patriotic songs play as we watched the fireworks and thought about our great nation. During times like these, you can't help but think about the trouble that we are in, as a nation. It makes me sad, worried, and leaves me questioning what will happen to America in a few years from now. We have the devil, himself, running our country and all we can do is have faith and pray that we will continue to be blessed by our Heavenly Father.

GOD BLESS AMERICA! LAND THAT I LOVE!