Cute Hair!

I didn't have early morning meetings on Sunday so Courtney let me do her hair.  She found a style on a website she liked and we did it.  It was really cute and she received a lot of complements which meant that...I got to do her hair again the next day!!  It is so fun having a girl who will let me do her hair.

This was the finished product the second day.  Courtney calls it her "princess hair."

Sparklers

We had a BBQ with my parents and then went home to light some sparklers.  We aren't huge fireworks people (in fact all the noise of our neighbors was driving us nuts) but we did have fun doing sparklers.  I think I bought these at the dollar store a few years ago and Courtney found them the other day when we were cleaning.

Veyo Pool

Our family LOVES the Veyo Pool.  It is so fun to go up there and swim.  We needed something to do in the afternoon on the 4th so we called around and invited all the kids friends to go with us.  Most people already had plans or were out of town, but Courtney had a friend who was able to go up with us.  Ethan had a lot of fun pestering the girls and making them squeal.  It was so much fun and we found a table that was in the shade with an awning over it.  The girls had some money that was burning a hole in their pocket so they bought a drink, chicken strips and fries to share.  We ordered onion rings and had a great time just sitting in the shade and relaxing.  It was a great 4th activity!

Cute Ethan!

We didn't take anything up to fish for crawdads but plenty of other people were prepared.  The little kiddie pool was filled with all sizes of crawdads.  The kids had time to watch them while Bryan pulled the car around.  It was pretty crowded at the pool when we first got there but a family cleared out and there was a lot more room after that!  I think they must have been having a family reunion or something.

This is a sign that I love at the pool.  I want to make one and put it in my house!

4th of July Bike Ride

We have a tradition of biking to the Sand Dunes in Snow Canyon on the morning of the 4th of July.  This year it was really hot when we woke up so we revised the plan.  Bryan, Ethan and Courtney biked to Unity Park while I drove with the food. Usually we attach the bike trailer on my bike and I pull it while Bryan rides with Courtney on the tag along.  But...Ethan didn't want to ride his nice bike to the park and so he was riding mine and didn't want to pull the trailer so we figured it was a lot easier to just have me drive.  I secretly thought that Courtney wouldn't want to ride home anyway so I drove to give her a ride home.  But I didn't put the bike rack on the van so she ended up biking home anyway.

When they got to the park it was pretty empty.  We ate breakfast: overnight cinnamon rolls, orange juice (the real stuff), strawberries, blueberries and water.  It was yummy.

When we finished eating we got the sports stuff out of the van and played soccer and Frisbee golf.  It was so much fun.  Good start to the holiday!

Blob

Courtney and I made a blob. It's plastic that has been ironed and then filled with water. It is really cheap an easy to make. I bought painters plastic at Walmart them ironed the edges, leaving a small hole the size of a hose nozzle. Then we filled it, duct taped the hole closed and Courtney got on it. It's like a water bed.

We tried to move ours and it got some holes. Next time we will put it where we want it before we fill it.

151515

While driving home from errands today I noticed that out odometer was close to turning to 151515. So I drove through a subdivision so I could stop and take a picture.

Fredonia, Arizona Swim Meet

First off, Fredonia, AZ is small.  And it's swimming pool is even smaller!  It had 5 lanes, which is fine, but the lanes were only half as long as we are used to.  So instead of one length being 25 meters it was only about 15 meters (or something like that).  But they treated it like it was the real length.  So Courtney still only had to swim one length and Ethan had to swim only one lap for his events.

We got them checked in and had their events written on their arms:

 Ethan ended up with a couple more events because he wasn't signed up for the relays but they needed him so they put him in last minute.

 We had a lot of down time so the kids hung out and talked together.  It was cute to watch them just sit and gab and watch the other swimmers.  They had a great time.

 Here is Courtney getting ready to swim.  We had to go and get them both racing swim suits so they would look like the other members of their team.

 Bryan volunteered to be a timer so he could have something to do and not sit around being bored.  He was able to time Ethan a couple of times, I think.  We couldn't believe they didn't have shade for the timers but they gave them free water, hamburgers and hotdogs, so I guess that made up for it.

Here are the videos of the kids races.  I am REALLY working on not yelling because Ethan keeps lecturing me that they can't hear me yelling at them while they are swimming so I might as well not do it.  I know but I get so excited.  They have both improved and did a great job at the meet.  Ethan was on the 15-18 year old relay team and they lost but they held their own with the older boys.  I was impressed with the way both kids did at the meet.

Courtney's leg of the freestyle relay:

Ethan's leg of the freestyle relay:

Courtney's back stroke:

Ethan's back stroke:

Courtney's breast stroke:

Ethan's breast stroke:

Ethan got the free style leg of the medley relay:

Courtney's freestyle:

Ethan's freestyle:

The smaller pool threw all the swimmers off so there were some struggles but they had a great time and did well.  At the end of the day they were sunburned but happy.  And we are getting better at knowing what we need to bring to swim meets.

Courtney has 2 more meets and Ethan only has 1, because of our vacation schedule.  But they are both wanting to do it again next year and Ethan wants to keep swimming during the school year so he can keep up his times and trying to get his "guns and 6 pack" bigger.