A summer with friends

Whew, it has been a week, you guys! Lyla has been sick (ear infection) and not sleeping because of it, our bunny required a vet visit for her eye, and my car battery died and left me stranded with two kids and a bunny in the vet parking lot when it was 97 degrees outside. haha Sounds like a reality tv show! They say bad things happen in 3's so I can consider all of mine done at this point, right?! 

On to some more fun times ...

We have made some of the best friends since moving here, we feel so lucky! I think it is one of the biggest reasons this summer has been so magical! Every day there is something exciting to do or see with friends to come along and experience it with us. Liam has had play dates with his friend, Everett. We'll trade houses back and forth and they are so cute together! They have so many of the same interests and similar personalities so they get along great! Both in love with two different super heroes and ready to save the day!

They also love being outside together! We've done this activity a ton this summer where you freeze things in ice and "excavate" them ...

And it is ALWAYS a good time when Hadley comes to visit us! Make new friends but keep the old! Adding to their engagement picture collection <3 p="">

Our newest best friends, the Cardon family! Lauren and I hit it off right from the start and have spent so many of our summer days together with our kids ever since. She has a daughter about 6 months older than Liam named Avaree, twin boys who are 3 and one of them shares the same name as Liam! The other twin is Ephriam and their littlest guy is 9 month old baby Griffin. I love their family so much! We have play dates in each other's backyards ...

We've been to just about every park in town! This particular day we went to the Village one and were lucky we made it home without one of our kids getting a disease from geese poop or from falling in the pond! haha

Lyla loves Avaree! She calls her "Ree Ree" and it is so adorable! Avaree is so patient with her.
It was a slower start for the boys because Liam and Ephriam were used to playing with each other but now these three are always together ... sometimes teasing each other and sometimes getting along just like best friends!

He has become quite the climber this summer!

We watched the Meridian Dairy Days Parade together and the kids collected enough candy to last for weeks! Lyla loved dancing to all of the floats that had music.

We visited the Nature Center and Lauren showed us this amazing little den that a momma deer kept her babies a few summers back. Walking by, you'd never even know it was there without pulling back some of the bushes! The kids went inside to investigate ...

There is the perfect park right next door that

Making cute fishy sounds!

Over this bridge there were 7 ft long, 100 year old sturgeon in the water below! Absolutely shocked me when we spotted one because they looked like sharks!

I can not believe how big my girl is this summer! Just last summer she was going down her first slide in my lap and this summer she was to do everything on the playground all by herself.

I learned a lot from the man who's kids are playing in the sandbox with ours ... he came to the park with his 2 kids and about 7 buckets and shovels in hands to share. I could tell his kids had become incredible communicates and sharers because of his generosity he was teaching them. I want to pay it for, to be that kind of mom, and to never show up at a park, pool, etc. without enough toys to go around for everyone. I want Liam and Lyla to grow up knowing sharing whatever you has with others not only blesses their lives but blesses your own. You have more love for God's children and a Christlike generous heart. Thankful for that dad's wisdom and kindness!!

One Saturday we crammed in our first annual neighborhood bbq (met so many sweet neighbors that we've had play dates with since ... like an Albanian couple who have two little kids!), wen to the water park with the Southworth's while they were in town, and had a spontaneous girls' shopping night at the Village since Dani was in town running a spartan race! I missed these girls so much!!

Just after they went down this slide together!

I love this picture so much because it looks like Liam is carrying Hadley! haha They are the cutest and so is Rilynn!

Mickenzie is one of my best friends from Pocatello and I miss her so much! Thankful she has family she comes to visit here and she makes time to see me when she does!

Wildly steering this plane at the Children's Museum with her best friend Roey!

Visiting the Watershed and being blown away by all they had to offer for kids and for FREE! They had an entire outdoor complex with water spickets you could turn on and off, a little river to splash in, an area where you could build log teepees, a section you could learn how to weave, and so much more! Inside they had a mini library with books, a fish tank, games, puzzles, microscope slides, stuffed animals, coloring, etc. and an entire museum that taught kids all about how water is recycled in our homes and atmosphere. It was incredible! Lyla loved the virtual reality water/land sandbox!

Testing out the spickets ...

Liam has been into this show called 'Brave Wilderness' lately and learned all about black widow spiders on it so when we came across this metal statue, he was like, "Look mom! They have a black widow spider! Take our picture by it so we can show dad!" haha

The little river to splash in ... they even had river rocks, boats, animals, and other toys to play with in it! Like I said, amazing and Lauren and I could not believe it was all free!

Settler's Park! It is such a fun one but we haven't gone there a ton this summer (only once with Lauren and once with Everett and his mom) because it is so crowded! A lot of day cares or day camps show up there and it quickly becomes overwhelming in a sea of colored t shirts. The kids love it though and they even traded out their old dinosaur rocker for this new space ship one that fits two kids!

Other summer adventures include trips to every splash pad and play ground in town, weekly dates to different libraries, our first swimming lessons, snow cones, as many trips to the water park as possible, splashing in our backyard pool, and very little time spent practicing anything related to school (oops! haha)! A summer with friends is the best kind!!