End of Summer

We had a pretty enjoyable summer.  It has seemed so freakin' long with me being so hugely pregnant, but now that the kids are in school I feel like it flew by and I had all these good intentions to be so fun.  I think I was maybe fun sometimes, but there is always room for improvement.

E had two sessions of swimming lessons this summer and did just great.  Sammi had to wait until she turned 3 to be able to have lessons too.  It was a long two months to wait, and I felt so bad for her when she cried hysterically through her entire first lesson because her teacher was a 6'3" man.  He turned out to be just wonderful with his class of 3 little girls and played Ariel with them every single day.  Sammi was in love with him by about day 2.  She has been on a little bit of a shy streak lately which is sometimes frustrating but mostly cute and silly.  It is just a different side of her that is emerging as she is getting bigger.

Sammi and her swimming teacher

Our teddy bear picnic

I love how little kids get so excited over the smallest things.  This day we spread a blanket out in the backyard and had lunch and they got to bring their stuffed animals for our Teddy Bear picnic.

35 Weeks

We have spent a lot of time riding bikes.

Sammi has spent most of her time painting with water on the driveway.  This attracts the neighborhood kids like no other.  I can't take credit for the idea though, my Grandma Draper used to let us paint her entire back porch with water and it kept us occupied for a very long time.  Genius.

 We have had lots of jammy-playing mornings.

We had a few little fun trips.  This is the only picture I got of our Residency retreat.  They took the residents and all their families up to Newpark Resort for 2 nights and we had so much fun all together.  The residents had some meetings, but the spouses all got to hang out with the kids and take them swimming and bike rides, and then they scheduled a night out on the town for the wives while the residents all got to babysit the kids. :)  It was a blast.

 We had about 2 naps the whole summer.

 We impersonated The Joker with our birthday makeup kit a few times. 

Overall, a pretty successful summer!  Bring on the school year!

He's Home!

After two long years, my little brother Brad is home from his mission to Milwaukee, Wisconsin!  The wait at the airport seemed about as long as his entire mission.  We were all excited for him to come, and excited to spent the whole weekend together as a family.

Here is Steph venting about having to be the one to hold the yellow balloons.  That's what happens when you are the youngest. :)

Ashley and sweet baby Rowan

Scott and Dad

The kiddies on various Apple devices waiting for Brad to get off the plane.

Mom and Elder Johnson

Nat, Dad, and Sammi reacquainting with Uncle Brad

Mom, Dad, and Brad

Me, the kids, and Brad

  After we picked Brad up from the airport, we headed home, got Cafe Rio, and celebrated his and Natalie's birthdays.  The next day we headed up to my parents' new house in Midway and spent the day and night there.  Ben was able to join us once he was off work.  We started in on the list of movies Brad has missed since his mission, and introduced him to Italian sodas.

The next day we helped my mom get ready for the after church get-together, and went to Siegfried's Delicatessen for some delicious German food.  That evening we got to see little Rowan blessed at Ashley's grandparents' house.  Emerson and Sammi love baby Rowan and kept asking to hold him in his handsome little outfit.

Scott, Ashley, and Rowan

Sunday was a busy day with Brad speaking in church and the party afterward, so we just enjoyed time together and socializing with aunts and uncles.  Our little fam headed back to Provo, and Scott flew back to Ohio the next day.  We were lucky to see Ashley and Rowan and Natalie for a couple more weeks until they all had to go home and get back to regular life.  It was so fun to be all back together for a weekend, and we are looking forward to hopefully seeing everyone at Christmas again!

Kansas City

Ben and I got to take this awesome trip to Kansas City for the AAFP recruiting fair.  We both thought it would be fun, but we never anticipated how fun it would be to spend time with a few of the residents and faculty and spouses from Ben's residency program.  My family was nice enough to watch the kids for 3 days while we were gone, and luckily I don't think they drove my mother to start drinking, so that is a plus. :)

We started off the trip with a 7:20 am flight, just me and my new long-lost twin sister Marci.  The residents had their tickets paid for, so it was up to the spouses to buy our own and we opted for a cheaper flight that luckily arrived within 20 minutes of theirs.

We went to lunch, checked into our hotel, and then spent our time being mostly support staff and getting the booth set up.  We had a few eventful trips to CVS Pharmacy with Michelle (the residency coordinator) to get ice and drinks for the booth where an albino black woman told me I would indeed be giving birth within the next week, and that I was huge.  She then proceeded to seek confirmation from other customers about how hugely pregnant I am.  Thanks.

At the conference I got roped into an ultrasound at another residency's booth because they could see I was obviously pregnant.  I obliged because it was a 3D ultrasound and it was free.  Plus I figured I would never see those people again.  I didn't anticipate that hundreds of people would gather when they saw there was a live person on the table.  I tried to not feel self-conscious about my stretch-marked disgusting tummy, but it is what it is.

After Day 1 of the conference, we headed to a baseball game with a few medical students who were interested in the Utah Valley Family Medicine Residency, and Ben proceeded to begin passing a kidney stone.  FUN! I actually felt really bad for him because he was terribly ill and we had to leave the baseball game pretty much 5 minutes after we got there because he could hardly stand.  Plus the food catered from Hooters didn't really help much. (If people ever tell you they go there for the food, they are lying.  It is terrible food.)  Michelle drove us back to the hotel and insisted she would be fine driving back to the game, but I would have been nervous to do it in a strange city with no directions.  Luckily she made it back, and only went the wrong way down a one-way street once. (Much better than I would've done.)  Ben loaded up on some good medicine and slept for awhile and I tried to be supportive as he wallowed in pain.

The next morning we went to breakfast with everyone and Ben was feeling much better.  Then Marci and Neal and I partied it up after stopping by the booth to drop off ice and candy.  We headed to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Fine Art and had a blast.

These were little cricket-fighting cages and gear.  It was a real sport in China at one point...

This is Marci and her boyfriend.  He is made of wax, but we couldn't tell if he was real for the longest time.  It was super creepy.

Me and a giant shuttlecock.  They had these all over the lawn of the museum.  We never found the badminton racquet though that would've matched.

After the museum, we were all game for shopping, so we went to the County Club Plaza where Marci and I enjoyed some lunch and magically found our way to a chocolate shop.  Just one of the many moments where we were eerily identical in what we ordered.  Neal did some shopping on his own and met up with us later to head to the Lego Store and Crayola Store.

We were thinking we would have just a leisurely day perhaps with time for a nap before dinner, but we were hard core.  We made it back just in time to freshen up and meet everyone for a lovely dinner at McCormick and Schmick, where the food was delicious and we topped it off with this beauty of a dessert.  I give you the chocolate bag:

The word "bag" doesn't really scream elegance, but the dessert was divine.  I can still taste the white chocolate mousse inside.  It almost made me weep, it was so enticing.  After that, we headed to a movie...at like 10:00 PM!  I told you we were hard core.  It was so weird to not have time constraints with kids and to not have to rush home to send the babysitter on their way.  There were many discoveries made during our dinner and many inside jokes about monogamy, having kids together, crying over dessert, and catty-corner.  I just can't help feeling that we are so lucky to be working with such awesome people.

We headed back to the hotel, and Ben was up in the night again with kidney pain, so he slept in while I went to breakfast with everyone, and then was luckily feeling well enough to help with the booth for the last day.

Neal and Marci and I headed to the Kansas City Temple to look around, and then went back to help clean up the booth and get things packed to ship home.  Then we headed back to the shopping center with everyone to kill some time before our flights left.

 

Everything appeared to be in order with our flights, until mine and Marci's got delayed and almost cancelled.  It was very long and horrible ordeal which involved us having to run through the concourse to catch our connecting flight (picture a 33 week pregnant woman doing that and try not to laugh...or cry...) and me trying to not give birth on the plane once that little jaunt brought the contractions on pretty intensely.  Pair that with the horrible realization that there was no way my bags made it onto the plane unless the luggage men were magicians (they were not) and we were pretty ready to be home.  Overall, I was just so glad I wasn't traveling alone and that I had a good friend to pass the time with.  I finally got my bags the next day at about 4 pm and luckily everything was there and undamaged.  Plus the kids were pretty excited to see us, so that made everything much better.  We sure missed them too.

July 24th

 We celebrated July 24th like real pioneers!  Luckily my mom had these cute pioneer clothes in the costume box at her house.  That cute little skirt and bonnet that Sammi is wearing were mine when I was about her age.  They thought it was pretty fun for a few minutes, but I made them stay in their clothes for my own selfish entertainment.

 We made butter!

 Ben and my dad were doubtful that it would work, but boy were they wrong!  They were messing with my mom who happened to throw me a pioneer birthday party when I was about 7, and she is an expert butter-shaker.

Then we humored the boys and went fishing in the Uintahs.

 Steph caught a fish!

 And Grandma kept the girl warm since it was actually pretty chilly up there.

We were really feeling the lack of bathrooms.  Sammi may have had to leave a little something under a tree...perhaps even the same tree her mom left something under when she was about 3 as well.  Overall though, a very successful Pioneer Day.

Three!

We snapped a few pictures of Sammi while we were at my parents' new house in Midway for her big birthday!

I love this picture of E.  He was just being silly, and I snapped one picture of him and it turned out darling!  Those are his golf clubs slung across his back.

Sammi's 3-year-old interview:

My favorite food is: cake

My favorite thing to play is: Ariel

The best show is: Ariel

The coolest person on earth is: Ariel

The thing I am most excited about for school is: wearing my backpack

The thing I do best is: be Ariel

If I could go anywhere in the world, I'd go: to Kindergarten

My favorite color is: pink

When I grow up, I want to be: Belle

My favorite song is: Song of a Bird (My Heavenly Father Loves Me)

My favorite book is: Rainbow Fish

Three words that describe me: smart, pretty, happy (with help)

When I was little, I used to: bite my Ariel

My favorite season of the year is: Fall with the leaves

The best thing about me is: I like to play with my friends

The snack I like best is: fruit snacks, banana, pineapple, popcorn, raspberries

One food I dislike is: Black raspberries (blackberries)

My best friend is: Kennedy (cousin) & Emerson

If I had one wish, it would be: a pineapple

My best memory is: Meeting Ariel at Disneyland (with help)

Sammi's 3rd Birthday

The beautiful birthday girl

 The day finally came! This sweet girl has been counting down ever since I had my birthday because she knew hers was next!  It was the most magical day for her, I think.

Emerson had a few little jealousy issues leading up to her birthday because he feels like his birthday was FOREVER ago, but it really helped to have him in on some birthday secrets because he felt important.  He was really good on the actual day and only had a few 'harumph' moments where he was jealous it wasn't his birthday.

Daddy had been on call the night before, so it worked out nicely that he got home around 8 that morning and was a good sport to take naps in between the birthday festivities.  We went to see Despicable Me 2, and then had lunch at Brick Oven before heading up to Midway to spend the rest of the day with Grandma and Grandpa J and Steph up there.

Almost time for presents!

It's time!!!

E being excited for her

She was so thrilled with her presents!  When she opened her bike she kept saying, "I can't believe it.  I can't believe I have my own bike!"

 Here she is with her loot.  Sparkly pink shoes, new colored pencils, Ariel doll clothes, a big-girl booster carseat, Ariel Duplo Legos, a new bike, helmet, and a darling Sofia the First doll from Uncle Scott & Aunt Ashley.  She is one lucky girl!

She couldn't wait to have cake, and when the time finally came she was ecstatic.

This was almost an epic cake-fail.  I tried to do big purple rosettes around the side, but the frosting just fell off and melted, so I ended up having to smooth it around and toss these candy pearl beads on that I had in my cake decorating stuff.  At that moment it became a "special Sofia the First cake".

As I said, thrilled.

Doesn't it look like all her dreams are coming true at this very moment!?

After she ate the frosting off the top of her long-awaited cake, she got to open her presents from Grandma and Grandpa J.  She got little princess dolls with the awesome clip-on clothes.  It was a gift to make girl and mother happy because she can change the clothes herself!  Such a magical day.

*The next morning she woke up and asked if it was still her birthday.  I had to tell her no, but then she looked worried so I had to reassure her that she was still 3 and still got to keep all her presents.