Aren't these beautiful? They're from my mom and dad's backyard. Haylie and Mikaela persuaded my dad to give them some and he ended up giving all three of us pretty bouquets! I stuffed them all into this vase and just love how summer-y they make the house feel. I just wish they lasted a lot longer!
Feelin' Hot, hot, hot! My little flamenco dancer! Isn't she cute?
Stuck like glue! Haylie's adorable costume!
Haylie's dance group. They all looked so cute for their dance recital. I love these costumes-they are the perfect color for these little gals!
Mikaela's dance group. This outfit was for their dance to the Tangled soundtrack. Haylie also had another costume for Tangled as well, but I forgot to download those photos. They both did such a good job and they are learning so much. I love watching them perform.
My little dancers. They sure love posing for pictures!
So, Eric decided one fine April day in 2010 that he wanted to try his hand at raising chickens. I was a little unsure about the whole ordeal, but thought, "What the heck, it's not like we don't have the room, and we like eggs." I told him I was all for it. The next day, I come home from work and Eric has five little chicks in a box and he's begun work on what I now refer to as the Poultry Palace. It took him four solid weeks of work, every night, to get this thing finished. It also required the help of four solid men to help Eric move this monster into the back yard.
We now have fresh eggs every day, to the delight of our daughters and our dogs, hours of entertainment chasing the chickens around the garden. I love the fact that they keep the bugs down and they are fairly easy to maintain. Eric asked a store clerk if we needed to give them shots or anything like that. The clerk's answer, "Nope, just food and water. If you see one laying dead in the dirt, don't eat it." Truly a wise man. :)
We have had them for over a year and a half now and have added two more to our brood. It would have been four more, but one of our older chickens is into bird murder and ended up offing two of them. That was fun, oh wait, no it wasn't!
If you ever want to try some of our eggs, give us a call- we'll hook you up!
Easter was fast and furious around our house this year. We didn't even make it to the candy hunt at the city park! Oh well, the girls didn't seem too upset by it so I wasn't going to rock the boat. We stored up a bunch of our chicken eggs (clarification: Eric and I bought some chickens a year ago and built a chicken "palace" in the back yard-see the next blog for more details), and went to work. I was a little skeptical at first about how well the eggs would actually color since our eggs are all brown, tan, green and blue. But they held the colors surprisingly well. 
The girls colored all of the eggs this year. I was given the position of spectator/supervisor this year.
They turned out pretty darn good. Especially considering this was our first year using brown and blue eggs.
Luckily, the Easter Bunny didn't hide the eggs too well. Haylie likes her hunts to be quick and easy. She's not into "hunting".
Mikaela, on the other hand, loves the hunt and kept yelling at Haylie to quit pointing all of them out to her. Silly girls!
I'm still trying to figure out how this rambunctious little ball of energy is already five years old. I'm sure by the time I figure it out, she'll be turning six. She has the most generous, kind, outgoing spirit of any little girl I know. She is sassy and sweet, sugar and spice, fire and ice all wrapped up in a pretty little package. I love her playful nature and spunky personality. She is my little helper. She is always looking to please others and I love her for that. Anyone who meets her is immediately taken with her beautiful green eyes and her angelic smile. Anyone who knows her also knows how fast she can flip her little switch to, as I like to call it, "demon mode". No matter, she captures hearts and keeps them and she has mine and her daddy's forever! We love you, Cricket! Happy Birthday!
She wanted a blue butterfly birthday cake. Since I'm definitely NOT Martha Stewart, this is my sad attempt at a butterfly. Just wanted to clear that up if you were wondering what the heck it was! 
Well, although I swore it would never happen, somehow Eric got me to come to the NASCAR races in Vegas. I'm still not sure how that happened. Here we are at the top of the stadium. Behind us is just a very small portion of the RVs, trailers, and cars that fill up the surrounding areas of the speedway. It's like an ocean of vehicles. 
Here are a few pictures of the racetrack. I wish my camera was sophisticated enough to get a panoramic view of the track-it's quite impressive. I've been told there are several tracks that are so big it's impossible to see the whole thing. We could see all of the track here, but it's still pretty darn big.
This is the front of the track and the view we had of the race. Not bad, huh?
Our awesome friends, Kaycie (in the wheelchair after surgery-poor kid), Stacie and KJ (seated) and Abbie (standing). They made the whole trip so much fun. We love them! 
There was so much to see and do outside of the racetrack. They had trailers for all of the drivers set up to hock their merchandise. I bought a Danica Patrick hat and earrings (go #7!). They had contests and food, all sorts of cars set up to look at, BMX stunt riders showing off their skills and all sorts of alcohol (as I'm sure you can only imagine). Here is my cute dad with the Boost Mobile girls-doesn't he look just like "Weekend at Bernie's"? I love it! He's so funny. Abbie, Kaycie and Whitney dubbed him "Grandpa Jim" and were constantly making sure he was always taken care of. I'm so glad he was there with us.
So, here I am, after all the protesting and promising that I would never be seen at one of these things and I have to admit...not only was it better than I had expected, but I told Eric I'm definitely going again next year. Guess there is a little redneck in me after all.
Every February for the past six or seven years the girls and I have tagged along with Eric down to St. George for his annual building code conference. It's nice to get away from the snow for a few days and pretend it's spring. Sometimes the weather cooperates, sometimes it doesn't, but we don't care because there's NO SNOW! That's the best part ever!
The one thing that seems to work out, however is the outdoor swimming. My girls love to swim and they wouldn't care if it was 10 below with arctic winds blowing in. As long as the pool is heated, they're going in. This year was no exception and luckily for us, the weather wasn't too bad. I think the highest temp was around 66 degrees, but it felt like heaven to us.
We usually do a little shopping at the outlet mall, or go to a movie, but this year was all about the swimming. Every moment they could squeeze in was spent at the pool. It gave me time to work on my non-existent tan (I repel the sun), and catch up on my reading list. 
Now, if only I could figure out a way to get one of these in my yard...
