50 Days of Summer

Last week was so cold here.  We are getting a bit of a break from winter this week though.  I think it is suppose to get up to 70 today.  I never posted about this and decided that I really wish it was summer today.  This last summer I made a jar of different ideas of things we could do.  I was very worried that the summer was going to be so long without school.  It turned out to be so much fun and we actually did not have enough time to do the whole jar of 50 things.  The other reason I made the jar was so I made sure I spent time doing things with my kids.  Have you ever had a day where you get so busy and have so much to do, that when you finally get them to bed you realize that was the first thing you actually did with them all day?  So here was our summer.

1. Make a Fairy Garden

2. Backyard Obstacle Coarse

3. Rock Painting

4. Play Lego Board Game

5. Play in the Pool

6. Put on a  Play (We picked a book and made a play out of it.  They pick Silverlicious)
7. Paint Butterflies using symmetry


8. Car Wash

9. Make Cloud Dough

10. Make Fruitloop Necklaces

11. Grow Pumpkins

12. Play as many board games as you have time for

13. Sandbox Scavenger Hunt

14. Make Cookie Bouquets and take them to friends

15. Redneck Waterbed

16. Pamper Day (Dress up, makeup, paint nails)

17. Build a Lego land

18. Have a Picnic (Our library had Eric Litwinis come and read his books, Pete the Cat, and we had a picnic.  They provided snow cones.)

19. Go to the Movies (We saw Brave)


20. Make Jolly rancher Lollipops

21. Balloon Tennis

22. Play BINGO with Movie (We watched Tangled)

23. Cousin Sleepover

24. Water Balloons

25. Mini Marshmallow Construction

26. Make Cookies (We put skittles in them)

27. Visit Dad at Work

28. Racetrack with tape all over

29. Bath time with Glow sticks

30. Write names with Licorice

31. Fruit Cocktail Math

32. Make Dirt Cups
33. Go to Storytime

34. Go to Museum

35. Play in Sprinklers in the Backyard
36. Splash Park

37. Make a Music Video (I could not get the video to upload.)
38. Make Pizza
The ones we did not get to do:
39. Take Pictures at the Temple
40. Pick up Trash at a Park
41. Backyard Campout
42. Sidewalk Chalk
43. Homemade Angry Birds
44. Go to the Zoo
45. Cloud Watching
46. Go on Night Walk with Flashlights
47. Feed the Ducks
48. Heated Crayon Art
49. Decorate Shirts or Hats with Puff Paint
50. Make Jell-O Jigglers

December Celebrations

We had a really great December.  Very, very busy.  We started with our ward’s Christmas Party with a visit from Santa.

Katelyn and her best friend Emily

JuJu was scared to death.  We had to have the screaming pic though.
Sadie had a preschool Christmas program that was about Santa’s toys.  She did a great job.  She new her part and was a horse and a music box dancer.

Johan, Caden, Sadie, Ella, Lily, Harrison, and Maddox

Sadie with Ms. Lori
Katelyn had a holiday party in her class.  They decorated cookies.

They also had a first grade program where they sang.


They were totally awesome.  I was so impressed with how many songs they learned and how amazing they were.  It was a little hard to listen and not get teary especially when it was the week after the horrific shooting in Connecticut.  They were all the same age as these kids.

We made and decorated houses with my sister’s family.

We opened presents with my parents.

Juliette took the opportunity to do grandpa’s hair.

We celebrated with Grandma P and Ashton’s family.
Christmas Eve we went out to eat with my family and my Grandma Thompson.


We took a ride on the mall train.

Christmas morning we opened our presents.



We had my parents and Sarah’s family over for Christmas dinner.

We hope you all had great holiday season.  We here are trying to get over having the 6 day flu.   Juliette and I are finally feeling some what normal again.  Sadie and Katelyn are still in the middle of it.  I will be happy when I don’t see Kleenex’s all over my house anymore.