Summer with friends

We have had a great summer hanging out with our friends.  Here are some pictures of what we've been doing.

We went to the field near our house and played soccer with the neighbors grandkids.  That was a bug net on my head, the sandflies were really bad.  We played soccer the day before and Kali improved so much.

Kali played with these wonderful girls when we were in Edmonton.

 This is our camper van, Tessa and I took the kids to Elkwater provincial park for the day.

 And we got ice cream.

Here are the kids LOVING the van, they had so much fun.

My friend Eliza came to visit Medicine Hat, I loved it.  Her son is so cute. This is at the park by the leisure centre.

 This is my friend Scotia, just downing Spencer's Rootbeer.

Cousin Teagan after his mother gave him a makeover.  It was at our family reunion in Magrath.

I Love Summer.

I love that school starts in 9 days too (but who's counting?).

Spur of the moment

Last night, after dinner, Spence and I were trying to figure out what to do... "Let's go to Havre, and stay over night."  What a great idea, I can't remember whose idea it was, but I'll take credit.  In 10 minutes we packed the car with a sleeping bag, 2 pillows, our passports and some clothes and got on the road; the border crossing closed at 9pm, so we had to hurry. 

Havre, MT is about 2 hours away, they don't really have much there except a bunch of bars and casinos, but they have a Super Wal-mart.  We bought a bunch of junk food, all the neat stuff we don't have here.  I loved the drive, it was 2 hours of time with Spence.  I loved shopping with him, he pretended to be interested in the things I like, I tried to do the same.  We are really cheap, so we found a parking lot and slept in our car, it was just as romantic, I loved it. We walked around the town a bit and shopped at O'Reilly's and BIG R, Spence got the second to last camping accessory he has ever wanted... a small stainless steel camping teapot (the last thing he wants is a MEC double hammock... it's in the mail).   On our drive home we stopped at Elkwater provincial park and got ice cream cones at the old gas station,  I completely recommend it.  For $2.50 we got HUGE cones, I was actually FULL after eating it. 

Tomorrow we go out to pick up Kali, I miss her so much.  Having 4 brothers and sisters for a week is probably doing her a lot of good though.

I love the Farm!

We've spent a couple weekends at Spencer's parents farm lately, I love going there. When you're there, nothing is pressing, there's little stress and we watch movies and play outside. Spencer helped with dinner one Sunday and wore his mothers apron, I had to snap a pic.



This weekend we rode bikes in the prairie trying to avoid cactus, it was a blast. We fertilized and watered Moms trees, rode the 4-wheeler and Kali rode grandpas horse "apple sauce".










Kali is at Spencers brothers house this week playing with her cousins and we are alone. Kali hasn't even called us yet, I think she's having too much fun. Spence and I have had fun together, but we sent this picture to Kali letting her know we are missing her.



The caption we sent her was: "Hi Kali, we miss you lots. Just eating boring sandwiches for dinner."

Can't wait to see her on Sunday.

Side note: I missed Kalis first week of swimming lessons, dang it! I did this last year too.

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Wearing the bangs

I found some pics on my camera from a couple weeks ago.  Spencer's bro and his wife came home from China where they had been living for almost a year; they brought home a headband with bangs attached, we all had fun with it.  It goes like this:

this one was just for fun.  Dad and I dancing to the car.

Busy but FUN!!

We have had a busy last couple weeks. 

I have worked at Wood Visions for a little over a year and have finally learned how to build cabinet boxes, it is so fun.  One day I hope to build some things for our home.

Kali's birthday was this past week and I threw a party for her.  A small party that turned into 10 kids was chaos, but a complete blast.  We played some minute to win it games tailored to 7 year olds, jumped on the trampoline with a bunch of soap on it, the kids threw water balloons and shot eachother with water guns. There were a few who cried when their parents came because they were having so much fun.  I love parties!!


We went camping this weekend with our friends, the Delgados in Cardston at the Lee Creek campground, I recommend it to anyone.  We drove our "new to us Camper Van", and it rocked.  It makes camping so much more fun, and the drive is a lot more fun.  We went to the temple and Spencer's Mom was serving in our session, it was really special to be there with her.  I love the Temple.

Life is great, I can't wait for the summer holiday to start for Kali.  I look forward to going to the beach at least every week, doing some geocaching, and playing with friends.  I LOVE SUMMER!!

I love Las Vegas

 The Torries went to Las Vegas for spring break and we didn't go to he77.  It was a super fun trip, we drove and stopped in Logan, UT and Cedar City, UT to visit family.  We really needed a break from the long winter, and found super hot weather and some sun in Vegas.  Spencer served his mission there and got to see some of his old friends, it was awesome, I love Vegas.

We stopped in Salt Lake and had fun checking stuff out at Temple Square.  Kali was super crazy-hyper, it made it a bit difficult to completely enjoy everything.

 

Kali found a large statue of Sponge bob, it totally looked like he was looking at her.  She was very excited.

We went to M&M's world and Kali was yet again SUPER excited, she wanted to buy everything.  We actually gave her an allowance of $5 per day so she could make all her own decisions with her own money.  Her first purchase at the Disney store brought on major buyers remorse, but she got over it by the time we got to the M&M's store.

On our first full day, we went hiking in Blue Diamond, we saw wild Burros and made an inukshuk on the trail.  We hiked up and down and up and down along a nice trail, it was pretty hot and Spence and I got sunburned a little.  We all loved being outside though.

 

On our next day, we went biking at Cottonwood, it was Kali's first time on her mountain bike and using hand brakes.  She did great on the asphalt but struggled on the rocky terrain, it made for some great scars though.  Spence biked from there to Blue Diamond while Kali and I geocached and pet a wild Burro.

When Spence was a missionary he loved biking Red Rock Canyon, this was a hike we did and the Red Rock mountains behind us.

We met up with Spencer's first companion and his family on our last night in Vegas.  It was one of the funnest times, they are the Falks, Jesse is from Airdrie and he just graduated from Dentistry and Lindsey is the greatest girl, I wish we lived closer to them.  They took us to the best restaurant called Robertos taco shop, I just can't get enough of Mexican food.

After dinner, the Falks took us to the Bellagio fountains and Kali made some new friends.  They were giving out free hugs, she loved it, and they let her join them.

At the end of the night we went out for "Luv it frozen custard", it was right near a strip club and a really scary convenience store with the guy behind the bullet proof glass.  The custard was great, the company was fabulous but the ambiance.... was not.

We had so much fun in Vegas, I wish we could have stayed longer.

My Birthday

Kali decorated my birthday cake for me, it says: "Mom Happe Brthday", I had to bake it for my own birthday, can you believe it?  I'm sure it's better than what Spence could have made.  He made some bread last week and missed the yeast... it was a brick.  He invited my friends over for a party but made me buy all the food, prepare it and buy my present.I really liked the party, it was so fun to hang out with some friends.  We ate lots of great food, played some games and found out about some of Trevor's celebrity crushes.  I also loved when Erin came over during the day with a cupcake tree full of chocolate cupcakes infused with buttercream icing.  We played Super Mario Brothers Wii and she helped me pass some levels in the 8th world that I couldn't have done without her, she ROCKS at games.

Yesterday, still in my birthday week, we went to the farm had a roast beef dinner, watched MegaMind and played cards.  I really appreciate Mom Torrie, she is so kind to me, I really love that woman.  Ryan & Tonya came over to with the kids, they made me cards and bought me a huge Lindor chocolate bar.

I love my birthday, it's my favorite day ever.

p.s. I got a new calling today at church:  Second Counselor in the Primary.  I was a little surprised and overwhelmed, we'll see , there are some super great girls that I get to work with.