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It's always so great to get together with these girls! Back in August we went to Gloria's for their amazing dessert & caught up with each other before Kim moved to Lehi :( Such a fun night (and such an awkward photo! haha It's the best we got!)

mcbride's berry patch 2014

I love this place!!! I know I've blogged about it before, but McBride's Berry Patch is a little piece of heaven to me. Picking raspberries reminds me SO much of my grandparents (they had an incredible raspberry patch in their backyard in Rigby, Idaho) and though I would need to refine my green thumb, I think this would be a dream to do in retirement. 

This year, the Horton's joined us & I'm so glad they did!! We always love getting together with them & picking (and eating!) raspberries while doing that was an extra bonus :) If you live in (or near) Utah County, GO to McBride's next year! We make sure to go every single summer & I look forward to it every year! So family-friendly & deeeelicious.

// Can you spot the giant butterfly in the bottom right corner?! //

// The boys! //

// The berries! Yummo. //

remember this photography: graham's newborns

Krista is probably getting sick of taking pictures of us, but hopefully not, because she is amazing!!! Zach & Krista came down two weeks after Graham was born & brought dinner and took pictures. What a combo. (We love you guys!!) If you are in the area and need pictures taken, Krista is your girl!

She had so many tips & tricks up her sleeve for photographing newborns & Graham cooperated so well. I absolutely love these pictures, and know that we will cherish them for a long, long time. Thanks again Krista.

Doesn't he look so angelic?!?

My goodness we love this little guy.

time out for women

i was able to attend the time out for women in salt lake this last november with my good friend natasha (if she looks familiar, you may have seen her on ksl recently. her sweet little guy isaac has been struggling with a serious case of pneumonia for the last month and a half; and he's back in the hospital 

:( keep them in your prayers!!)

it was awesome! i've been to time out twice before (ogden & richfield) but this was by far my favorite event. the entire program was outstanding. hearing from sheri dew (one of my favorites!), ann romney, hilary weeks, s. michael wilcox, and sandra turley (just to name a few!!) was just what i needed. plus, spending it with natasha was the icing on the cake. she is one of hilary weeks' biggest fans so it was a treat to sit next to her and hear hilary live.

plus, bonus!! i won a $150 gift certificate to sweet salt clothing (i honestly couldn't believe it when i won!) so i definitely scored the jackpot. this was right after our house flood so it was especially nice to be the recipient of such an awesome gift!

thanks for inviting me natasha!!

hee haw farms

it's nice to see pictures from the fall when there wasn't snow covering every inch of the earth! that's the real reason i've saved up these posts until now ;)

back in november we went with our great friends, the hortons, to hee haw farms. i think it's safe to say we all loved it. a giant box of corn to play in, a mini train, a huge slide, animals to feed...it was a dream come true for the kids (and dads!)

 

fish lake {year three!}

the weekend before halloween we were able to head down to fish lake for some much needed rest & relaxation. this is the third year that we've gone down to sam's cabin and even though so much effort goes into coordinating schedules, meals, etc...i am so glad that we've been able to make it work. i hope it's a tradition for the next 20 years!! ;)

we ate so much good food, had a corn hole tournament on the back deck (the boys had multiple late into the night...they are a bit obsessed!), stayed up way too late playing games (spot it!!) & talking, and spent time in the great outdoors (this year the weather was the nicest it's ever been). 

how grateful we are for such awesome, fun friends!!

we love you guys.

// this year two additional couples joined us but they were only able to stay for a day & we didn't get a group shot with everyone. the amount of children has definitely increased since we started coming. this year with everyone there was a total of seven!! //

and mostly because i can't believe how small avery was when we started coming, here are links to the past two years for your viewing pleasure: 

// year two //

// year one //

football season: the amateurs & the pros

football season is in full swing! unfortunately, i'm not a huge football fan...but i think it's fun to attend a game or two during the season. thanks to some sweet hook-ups, we've met my quota of two games and they have both been free!! can't beat that!

first up: juab high!! nothing like good, small-town high school football games! it actually is fun when we know half of the players (and at least two are in our ward!) we sat by chris & nell and ate wayyyyyyy too much sugar:

we also got to see the coug's play (even though it was freezing!!!!!!) our football buddies came with us (chris & lynelle) and we had a great time. is it bad to admit that i mostly went for the free food?! oh, and to be with my hubby :)

// a very blurry picture of some of our favorite people! one of these days we'll get a good one! //

i had to walk around during half-time (i may have eaten a little too much!) but we unintentionally found ourselves greeting the boys back on the field. it was fun to be amidst all of the college kids...made us feel "young" again! haha.

now that i've got two football games under my belt, i am good to go until next year! :)

picking corn in the fields

not only did we get a chance to pick raspberries this summer, but we spent some time in the corn fields as well! our ward boundary covers everyone who lives "out in the fields" (aka the farmers!) and boy, do we have some talented people in our ward. 

the rindlisbachers head up the church welfare farm in nephi and they do an incredible job. they invited whoever wanted to out to the corn field to pick extra corn and we jumped at the chance. we were a little hesitant at first (so many yellow bugs! and we were first-timers!) but avery, danny, and i quickly caught on...with max being a little on the stubborn side. 

the corn was delish and it was a pretty awesome family outing.

win win.

mcbride's berry patch (the best berries in town!)

remember how much i love mcbride's berry patch???

  (see last years post here)

well, i love it and i hope to go at least once a year for the rest of my life. our summer was slightly crazy, but we were able to go once with some of our good friends from nephi. sadly, i didn't get a picture of our whole group but i think it's safe to say we all enjoyed ourselves (though it did get extremely hot!!) 

ave's bucket stayed consistently empty, while her shirt got messier...and max filled up a bucket and then spent the rest of his time chasing brek around. :)

st. george getaway

we have got a pretty amazing group of friends who live two hours from us (and some even further!) since there are a bunch of us, a lot of time usually passes between when we can all get together. but, we've made it a point the last few years to get together at least once during the year and this year it worked out that we could all make it to st. george for a weekend getaway!

we left thursday afternoon and we could not wait! 

// "selfies" in the car! :) //

// love this handsome fellow so very much //

the weekend pretty much consisted of staying up wayyyyyy too late, eating lots of good food, swimming all day long, playing scum, ticket to ride, and new this year: corn hole. (it is all the rage, in case you didn't know.)

swimming was especially awesome for two reasons. 1) it was within walking distance (like, a two minute walk!) and 2) danny bought the kids goggles!! kids in goggles=the cutest thing. EVER. 

// cafe rio in between swimming sessions. so yummm //

// our sleeping beauty at the pool //

// love me some kids in goggles!!! //

// avery mistook this corn hole as a different kind of hole...if you know what i mean! oops! //

// max took the above two pictures :) he is turning into quite the budding photographer! //

// swimming and playing all day long can wear you out! the three oldest kids zoned out in front of elmo for a bit while we snuck a few more games in! //

friday night we all went out to dinner (all sixteen of us!!!) to anasazi. the presentation was really neat (they bring you partially cooked meat & a 700 degree "rock" to finish cooking it on)...but it's not the most child friendly place :)

and then, after dinner, danny & i snuck away to see mary poppins at the tuacahn amphitheater for our 5th anniversary!!! (our friends kindly put our kids to bed. thanks again!) it was AMAZING. the backdrop is incredible. the singing was wonderful. the entire thing! ahh. not to mention, i'd forgotten how great the story mary poppins is! i loved it.

// i stole this pic from lauren's instagram. thanks lauren! //

saturday night while the guys were out playing corn hole (until 3 am!) the girls were home chatting and at about 1:30 we decided it would be awesome to pull a prank on the guys. we tried to think of everything (it's been so long since i've thought about pranking!) and what we eventually came up with totally backfired, but we loved it. it felt like girl's camp all over again :)

// the idea was that they would have to come through the front door, since all other doors would be locked. we checked the garage door multiple times, but somehow half of them got in since it wasn't totally shut! the half who didn't make it in, went around to the front and were faced with shaving cream on the handle, a failed attempt at saran wrapping the door (that is hard to do!), and tons of cups, bowls, and pie tins filled with water. we piled up trees and furniture behind the water making it "impossible" to come in...but the guys easily jumped through.

lame.

oh well, we all had a good laugh (it was 3 am after all!) 

the next day, we cleaned up, said our good-byes, and were off.  thanks so much to dave & sarah for hooking us up with a place to stay! and everyone else who made it happen. we love you all!!

on our way home, the kids were antsy to get out and run around so we decided to stop at cove fort to stretch our legs. the sweetest lady missionary tracked us down and promised to give us a short "10 minute" tour (which turned into a 35-40 minute tour!) but it was actually really neat. the inside of the cove where they actually lived was beautiful (i wanted to move in!)

whew! and that is how we spent the weekend before school started!!

 can't believe summer flew by so quickly!