Another pictureless, "reflections" post

I know that I am getting terrible at these, but it is 11:00 and I just want to say how much I love going to work. It is the greatest thing to look forward to getting away from the "Walking" that I have to do over and over every day and just wait on people at the restaurant for 5 hours. I ABSOLUTELY love it, it is so much of what makes Geana Geana I cant even tell you. Quite frankly 10 years later I think I am pretty dang good at it too :). I love hearing the gossip, the stories of return missionaries going out on dates, the ones who haven't left counting down, meeting complete strangers that instantly become my friends. I just love it. I even love after everyone is gone cleaning up for an hour and feeling so valuable, like I just made that mess so spic and span.

I feel so lucky that my boss lets me work one day a week and my husband can spend one evening doing what is referred to as "boys night out". Pizza from Little Ceasar's, and a red box movie just for the kids--it doesn't get any better than that! (If you know me it is a good thing it doesn't cost much or it would counteract the work right?)

I wish all you moms out there could have some Mom time like I do, it sure makes me a much happier mom that is for sure.

Reflections

I was sitting at the park the other day in 100 degree weather and I was watching the kids play nicely, getting along, and just being adorable, and I thought THIS is what it is all about. This is what makes life all worth it. This is why I stay home everyday doing the same stuff and loving almost every minute of it. This is why I chose to raise my children in this GREAT city of Plain City. I mean where else could I be sitting at the park, no other soul in sight and around the corner comes a horse and buggy. The kids all stopped what they were doing and waved to the nice older gentleman. I was so happy, so at peace thinking how times like this make it all worth it.
Today as I was thinking about writing this down I was looking at my friends blog who moved to Jerusalem last year and it was on "Just walking", about how we read about great stories of the pioneers all the time, but in reality they spent most of their time just walking. The goal of 1300 miles seemed insurmountable when they got 10 or 15 miles everyday, but they kept walking. (http://www.amysreallycoolfamily.blogspot.com/) --its surely worth the read :)

That is what we are all doing every day, the same things that make our lives complete in order to someday achieve our eternal goal of living back in our Heavenly home. The complete picture is so hard to see sometimes when we are walking, walking, and walking. Doing the dishes over and over, picking up the 100th toy you almost tripped over, putting the child in time out for the 5th time by 9:00 am, and on and on...But then when you sit and really reflect, where did the last ten years of marriage go? When did my boys get so big? Each day may seem to run into the next, but the years surely fly by!!!

4th of July

I love the 4th of July. It means to me tons of family, fun, parades, exhaustion after a sleepless 3rd and a busy 4th, but all in all it is just awesome. We started out with a softball tournament on the 3rd with Shane and some of his friends. They took 3rd (out of 4 :) ) but had a good time anyway. Next came the 9:30 bike decorating that lasted to late into the night for a gal like me, but it was really fun and full of mosquitos in true Plain City style. Then the kids slept out on the trampoline falling asleep around midnight, and getting rained out around 12:15--good times. After the sirens at 6:00 we ate pancakes and headed over to the parade. There were 9 cousins all on their bikes/scooters riding together and afterward getting loaded up with candy. A side note--my mom let the boys pick out their patriotic shirts, not such a great idea, none of them went for red/white/blue, they went for basketball clothes or character clothes, I suppose we should have known better--next year she will probably just buy them and give the shirts to the kids.
After the parade came the fish scramble, which I grew up doing and absolutely love!! My boys both caught one, Braxton with his bare hands, and Dakota using the baggie as a scoop.

Braxton had to get dunked as we were leaving, and wanted to do it over and over. Little did he know he was supposed to be paying $1 each time, I guess the Silverline (drill team) girls that were over it should have told him, oh well he enjoyed himself.

They also participated in a pie eating contest that made Dakota very nervous. He did have fun after the first couple of bites, but didn't even get close to finishing before he gave up on that idea.

This is a photo of us sitting on the sidelines watching the parade. We had cousins come from SLC and spent the night and day with us and overall we had a really great day finished off with a BBQ with our great friends and some wonderfully tasty food from Smokehouse BBQ.

Plain City Baby Show

I entered Cam into the Plain City baby show this year, even though he is 20 months old. I was out of town last year, and for me it is all about having pictures in all their books that I entered them all. It was a little strange because these were 18-24 month old babies, and there were no toys and no interaction, the judges sat at that table the whole time. We just had to stand there and let them look at them, very strange I thought. Needless to say, he won the biggest smile, which he is showing off in this picture. He always opens his mouth wide and says AHH every time the camera is out. This is our little buckaroo on the picture-taking-spot. What a cute little cowboy.