End of June Cookin' & Campin'

Cory's Family is way into dutch oven cooking, something I had never even heard of before moving to Utah, but his family rarely still ever eats dutch oven due to all time it takes to prepare and cook. This year, however, it has been made a goal that we will do it once a month all summer long.  No complaints here!

In spite of how delicious the dinner was my AWESOME layered drink was our kids still had little to no interested in it all because the neighbor had their dog out and my kiddos just wanted to play with him.

After dinner we had some unplanned water fights which Phoebe got soaked in, luckily we had her pjs with us, and a tug-o-war with Dennis vs 6 of his nieces and nephews.  I think the kids with the help of Uncle Jason won in the end.  Amber and Alan also made their delicious homemade ice cream for dessert which is what my kiddos loved the most!

As I am a Den Leader in the Scouts, last week I was able to spend a day with my Wolf and Bear scouts at Cub Country. The camp I took them too this year was Superhero Adventure Camp.  The theme was a bit "special", but the boys still loved every minute it. Here are all my cubs minus one with their senior boy scout leaders for the day.

June's Date Night: Christmas in Hawaii

For June's date night I came with the theme of Christmas in Hawaii. I also chose to make this another group date and invited several neighbor to join us. I and one other set of neighbors came dressed in festive Hawaiian wear.

To celebrate the Christmas part of the date I made each couple a stocking with both Christmas and Hawaiian goodies.  Each couple also make yummy goodies that thy normally only serve at Christmas time, I made hot chocolate, but seeing at it was 90 degrees I made frozen hot chocolate. Lastly, we had a gift exchange where we actually ended up with 2 useful gifts: and nice beach towel and Christmas CD.  

The whole night Phoebe was having a HUGE meltdown tantrum that she couldn't join us downstairs in her Hawaiian wear, so the next day I decided to dress them all up in their Hawaiian wear and take pics. Phoebe was really exited and smiled like a fool; Cami on the other, hand was a bit putout with me and the only time she didn't have a grumpy face was when I finally gave them all fruit snacks at the end. Oh well, I can't make everyone happy all the time and even when Cami is grumpy her faces still make me laugh.

Finally Swimming June Away

It took forever this year for it to finally warm up enough to have pool parties so we have have partied hardy ever since. Last week Aunt Charisse hosted the Fergy swim party. Most of the kids enjoyed two pools and lots of water fights.

My kids, however, are not into the fun wild playing as everyone else is so they mostly enjoyed the swing set and shady areas to rest.

At lunch were treated to Uncle Jason bringing us all yummy pizza and bread sticks!

Later as the temps reached 90+ we all cooled down by enjoying Popsicles under the shade of the tramp.

I love the swim parties for a couple of reasons. 1. It gets us out of the house where the kids can play and I can talk speak to someone who isn't 3 or under and 2. It wears my kiddos right out for good naps & early bed times. 

4 Under 4

I never thought of having 4 under 4 as a major ordeal until we had Sophie and social services then flagged us as a high risk family and made a special visit to us in the hospital.  Don't worry nothing major was wrong, we just had to spend sometime explaining to the Sally the social worker that we did have a support system and lots of family around to help us out. I actually laughed about the situation and the fact Social Service came and sought US out as high risk especially after seeing and listening for 4 days to the total disaster of a the mother who had a baby next to Sophie in the NICU (now that's a funny/scary story, but one example of her... she had a c-section and then she still had to ask if the baby came out vaginally or out of her tummy...the large scar across your belly & pain isn't a giveaway?!?). Anyway back on topic,  every time someone finds out we have 4 under 4 they always ask how we get some activity done. Well here are a couple examples of how we function doing common tasks.

Shopping by myself with all 4 looks like this :

Going on our daily walks:

 

For the most part we just keep the Typhoon Trio & Sophie home to destroy the place. If you can get use to the fact that commonly one or more are crying 1/2 the day, 4 under 4 is no more than just a big messy crazy family.

IT'S A MIRACLE!!!

I have always struggled it is cam to cooking with yeast.  Most every attempt ended in a fail so bad that I often described my bread by telling Cory. "If I threw this bread at your head they would never know what killed you they would only know you died of blunt force trauma." Not even joking my stuff was truly that inedible, although Cory would usually take a couple of bites 'cuse he loves me that much and he knew I tried.

Well that all changed when a light bulb flipped on in my head when I made homemade doughnuts with my Mother-in-Law and I finally understood how to work with yeast. since then I have made 2 batches of bread sticks and homemade pizza which all turned out perfectly.  YEAH , hopefully my days of yeast fail are behind me and I can finally make all those yummy things that I book marked as someday recipes.

The Future's so Bright I Gotta Wear Shades

When Phoebe was 1 she HATED "sunny eyes" it wasn't until the following summer that she began to appreciate not being blinded by the sun. The twins, however, LOVE their sun glasses and will wear them anytime they find them around the house. I think it is so stinkin' cute I laugh every time I see them walkin' around with their shades on, as you can tell by all the pics.

Heaven Help Us (Sophie)

So I have written before that Sophie is the most patient baby in the world...well let me once again reiterate that with this example.

As I was emptying the dish washer Josh and Cami were helping me by stealing out bowels, which I thought they were just playing with. I didn't know they were secretly decorating their sister with them. Sophie didn't even make one peep while the twiners were being mischievous in their doings. I just saw this after I came out from cleaning the kitchen  

Fathers Day '11

This year for Father's Day I decided to do a cut idea I found out in the crafty blogisphere, the Father's day countdown calendar. For our purposes I called it The 10 Extra Days of Dad & for each the 10 days prior to Fathers day we gave Cory a small gift or card.

Here are 4 of the gifts Daddy received as part of his Dad's Day countdown; dressed up Whoppers for a Whopper of a Dad, caramel corn to the greatest POP around, a couple of fishies by Josh and Cami & a cute interview/drawing about daddy completed by Phoebe.

 On Fathers day morning this is what Cory came down to. No he didn't get a new suit, only a new tie.  The suit is one Cami peed on 18 months ago (her first week going to church) and has been laying dormant ever since in our closet waiting to be dry cleaned. Cory also got a couple of cooking gifts, a doughnut pan I used to make homemade doughnuts that morning and a twinki pan that I made homemade Ho hos with.

Sophie Marie also chose to celebrate Fathers day by making her first appearance at church with her daddy.    

For dinner I made one of the yummiest Steak and Mango Salad!  (Another great recipe out of my Mother's Day cookbook.)

The desert took me a while to make and when I did finish my ho hos & they tasted better than they look especially pictured. So if you are curious about those I will refer you to the post I got it from because they look less like poo and more like a delicious ho ho. Oh well it's the effort that counts in my cooking world sometimes, daddy enjoyed them all the same.

Where's My Butter?

We have been having issues with Cami's that we have never experienced with Phoebe, that is, this little poop is too tall and can reach too much. In the last couple weeks Cami has learned she can reach up to the counters from the floor. She often grabs things off the counter as I am trying to make dinner or in this case she stole the butter I had set out to make breakfast with and made it a meal of her own.  She ate right through the wrapper and every.

1 Month

On June 5th, our wee Sophie turned 1 month old.  I can't believe a month has passed already; she is growing much too fast for my liking.

So far her sibling have LOVED having their itty bitty "Baby Sophie;" she is adorned with kisses at least 50 times a day from he twins and Phoebe asks to hold & feed her about 10 times a day.

This little one gets up only 1-2 times a night and for the most part is even a fast eater and then quickly drifts off to sleep again. Sophie is one of our most patient babies and will sit/lay awake in her bouncer or crib without  needing immediate attention. She loves to go on walks, she snuggles in her pouch and immediately drifts off to sleep. The only thing I don't love about this wee one is that she is already growing out of her newborn clothes as you can see by how much leg is showing in her pics.