1st Swimming Trip of the Summer!

Make a Smilebox photobook

What was going to cost $5 ended up costing $23.00 because they now require children 3 and under to have swim pants and a swim diaper (even if they're potty trained). So, I had to buy those specialty items for my girls. Their smiles made it all worth it!

Jaxon walks early!

GO JAXON!
We were at the Cracker Barrel Restaurant waiting for our food when Jaxon decided to entertain our table with a little walk. We love Jaxon and his good parents!

Malia walks!

We haven't seen Malia for so long, and it was so exciting to see all the things she can do now. She walks like a pro! Lily and Amara just love Malia. I think Malia has a good time with them too because she is always smiling.

The Amatuer Video of the Amazing Fieri Race

At the Lauret Family Reunion this year, dad planned an "Amazing Race" complete with challenges,clues, and a little creature named Fieri. We had a lot of fun completing challenges and collecting ingredients for the Pasta Throwdown.

The challenges consisted of 1- Photograph wildlife (with Fieri in the picture), 2- Compass Course to find Gold (a medal), and 3- Build a Rocket and launch Fieri so he gets 30 seconds of air time. That turned out to be more difficult than anyone expected because Fieri either kept forgetting to jump out of the rocket or his parashoot kept malfunctioning. Good thing Fieri has infinite lives!

The ingredients went into the Pasta Throwdown, which was dinner for everyone. Our team (the winners) made Radiatore with a chicken and 3 cheese tangy tomato and herb sauce w/ roasted zucchini and yellow squash side dish. There was also a Carbonara w/ green beans side dish (Cheryl and Dave's team), and a bow-tie artichoke heart and asparagus alfredo (Spencer and April's team).

WHAT A BLAST! Thanks dad for your planning and all the good food and fun times! You're the best!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

April's tooth

Weird story... April woke up a few days ago with something sharp in her mouth. It turned out to be her tooth that had chipped! Weird!

A Day at the Lake

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Collage of Emmy

This is my beautiful niece, Emmy. Good job Hayley and Scott!

One year ago...

It was almost a year ago that I gave birth to Amara and we moved to Roosevelt. One photo is Lily when we moved. The other is Amara a few days old.

Two years ago...

I was reflecting on what life was like 2 years ago when we were living in American Fork with Steve's parents, when I came across a picture of our adorable Lily. My, she has grown in 2 years! She is still just as sweet and cuddly.

I found some smiles

Paddleboating

Well, paddle boating was an adventure with our 2 girls. Lily is between us (you can't see her because our life jackets are enormous. We couldn't sit Amara down because her life jacket would cut off her oxygen. Try paddling a boat while holding a kicking baby a foot in front of you and keeping your eye on the 3 year old so she doesn't climb overboard. It's an adventure (and because of the discomfort, our family lasted only about 10 minutes out on the water)!

Lily almost attempted the "BIG swing"

At the Christensen Family Reunion, we did a ropes course and there was a big swing. Lily thought it looked fun until it was time to climb the ladder- then she would have no part of it.

Amara's 1st B-day Cupcake...a month early.

Steve's mom decided to celebrate Amara's birthday as one of the activities during the family reunion since all the family would be there, so she bought a tiny cupcake for Amara.

Family Pictures from the Christensen Family Reunion

Aahhh... pictures. Steve hates them and Lily wanted people to know that she's not a big fan of them either. We got Lily to smile in 1 of the fifty we took. She's so photogenic, even with tears in her eyes!

Amara conducts "Twinkle Twinkle"

We taught Lily how to conduct music when we sing. We showed her that the faster she waves her hand, the faster we sing. Well, Amara picked up on it, and while we were singing their bedtime songs last night, both girls began to conduct our song. It was cute. So I wanted to see if Amara would remember how to conduct this morning, and it appears that she remembers!

A Good Morning Serenade

Lily's vocals are hot! Lily asked me to listen to a song she made up this morning. I loved it so much, I asked her to sing it for our blog. Besides changing the lyrics and the tune, the song is exactly the same. As a side note, my cute daughter, Lily, blessed the food last night and she also prayed, "bless Amara to calm down." Amara was whining for food while Lily was praying. It made Steve and I smile.

Bye Bye frogs...

This past weekend, Steve and I (Lani), decided now that the frogs were frogs, they were starting to really stink. So, it was off to the reservoir to give them a new home. Well, having never been to the particular reservoir we were going to (Bullock or Cottonwood), we got lost. Luckily, we found a small convenience store/gas station (Shirley's). So, we stopped and I went to ask for directions. When the clerk found out that I was going to be setting some tadpoles and frogs free, she asked if she could have them. She explained that she has kids and they just love to play with the little frogs and she has a ditch by her house that they live in. I happily gave her the entire habitat. So, our frogs have a new home.

Sorry there's no picture. I brought my camera to take a picture at the reservoir, but I gave the frogs away unexpectedly and forgot to snap a pic before I gave them away.

ALMOST frogs!

Here's my attempt to show you the ALMOST frogs basking on the rocks. The frogs really blend into the rocks, so good luck seeing them. They're really cool and cute in real life.

They grew!

We were gone for a week or so and my neighbor watched our tadpoles for us. When we came back, they had grown a lot. The littlest tadpoles seem to have front legs, whereas the larger tadpoles are fat and front-leg-less.

Should I Stay or Should I Go???

Rock it Dad, Deb, and Heather! We were finishing off our Calzone night with a fun round of Rock Band.

Calzone Night with April for FHE

We love April and Spencer for inviting us all over for dinner tonight. Our calzones were filling.