My trip to Philly and New York

In August, I was fortunate enough to be able to make a trip to see Natalie and her family in Philadelphia...ALL BY MYSELF!!!!!  Jim had the week off and was able to stay home with the kids so I could go.  We had a great time together and I hope we will be able to do more sister trips in the future.

I arrived on Monday evening and we headed to Natalie's gym to go to a BodyStep class.  Seems like a really weird thing to do upon just arriving, unless you know me and my obsession with BodyStep and then, it seems perfectly normal. ;-)  Great start to our trip.  We then headed to Natalie's apartment where Taylor had dinner all ready for us when we got there.

On Tuesday, we spent the day in Philadelphia just seeing the sights.  Taylor, Hannah and Maddie came with us until after lunch and then Taylor took them home so Natalie and I could make it to all our attractions a little faster.  After seeing the sights of downtown Philly, including, of course, the Rocky steps, Natalie had an activity at the church for the primary.  We got home from that at about 9:00 pm and then proceeded to plan the next day of activities in New York City.

ROCKY!  And, yes, we did run up the steps just like Rocky!

Elfereth Alley...the shortest inhabited street.

Independence Hall and The Liberty Bell

The Love statue downtown Philly

Me and Benjamin Franklin on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania

The Love statue on the campus of University of Pennsylvania

On Wednesday, we left Philly at 4:30 am to head to New York.  We planned on driving to Staten Island and take the ferry over to Manhattan, but somewhere along the way, our directions led us astray...not me...the directions. ;-)  So, we just drove into Manhattan and parked for the day.  It actually worked out better because we didn't have to worry about getting to the ferry in time to make the last one of the day after our show was over.  New York is awesome!  I loved every bit of our day there.  There was so much to do and we managed to do a lot of it in just one day.  We even got to see Mary Poppins at the end of our day and there is just nothing like Times Square at Midnight.  I wish we could have stayed another day, but now it gives me the opportunity to visit again and take Jim with me.  I think we made it back to Philly at about 2 am.  We were pretty tired, but it was worth it.

The Manhattan Temple

View of Central Park from the Belvedere Castle 

Cheesecake from Carnegie Deli

 Natalie and I waiting for Mary Poppins to begin

After two days of pure running, we decided to just relax on Thursday.  In the after noon, though, Hannah wanted to show me the zoo and all her favorite animals, so we went there for a couple of hours.  The zoo in Philadelphia is really nice.  My favorite part was feeding the Lorikeets...they just sat on our arms and drank their milk out of a little cup we held up to them.  I think Natalie had three of them on her arm at once.  Very fun.

The Lorikeets

Hannah was pretty excited about feeding the Lorikeets.

These are the two cutest monkeys I have ever seen!

Friday, Natalie and I went to the BodyPump/Step combo class that she goes to every week at the YMCA.  Loved it!  It was 1 1/2 hours of exercise at it's best.  As you can see, I'm a bit of an exercise nut and pump and step are definitely my favorite classes.  In fact, and don't tell my husband this, I booked a later flight so that I could go to this class because Natalie raves about it.  We went downtown around lunch time that day so that I could try the famous Philly cheese steaks at Pat's and Geno's.  These two places are right across the street from each other and have been featured on various food shows, so, in honor of Jim, I had to try both and see which one I liked the best.  From there, it was almost time for me to head to the airport, but Natalie had to have me try one more Philadelphia treat...water ice or Italian ice.  It was sort of like a slurpee, but thicker and not as good.  I would take a slurpee over a water ice any day, but I just had to try it once.

This was a wonderful trip and I'm so glad I was able to spend this time with Natalie, Taylor, Hannah and Maddie.

Hallie's 12th Birthday!

I'm still way behind in my blogging, but I have made the goal to catch up by Christmas.  We'll see how I do.

On August 3, my Hallie turned 12 and joined me in YW as a beehive.  I think she is really thrilled that I get to be in there with her. ;-)  She was more than ready to be out of primary and thrilled that she didn't have to be in the primary program this year.  I think last year she just stood up there with an "I can not believe I have to be standing up here" look on her face the whole time and didn't really sing a word, even though it looked like she might be singing a little bit.  I think the highlight of being in YW so far was that she was able to do baptisms for the dead about a month after she turned 12.  She really enjoyed being in the temple and serving the Lord.

She continues to have a very lively personality and isn't afraid to speak her mind and let her opinion be known.  She has always been this way and I really wouldn't have it any other way.  Its what makes her who she is and I think she is pretty great.  She works hard in school--straight A's all through sixth grade and again the first quarter of seventh grade.  She played volleyball this year and did really well.  She had one of the best serves on the team and played well all around.  I'm very proud of her!

One of the pictures I am posting is of her birthday cake.  On it, I wrote "Frip on Tuesday".  What is the word Frip, you might ask?  Well, the story goes that, once, Jim and some of the kids were playing Boggle and someone wrote down the word Frip.  They all knew that it wasn't a word, but Hallie and Kenedy thought it was the funniest word they had ever seen.  They started using it to replace just about any word.  Hallie says the definition of "frip" is...whatever the frip you want it to be.  She is so crazy!  For awhile, she and Kenedy used it all the time, but I haven't heard it used in quite some time.  Maybe it has been retired.  One can only hope.

For Hallie's birthday, we went to the Mongolian grill for dinner.  We go to one by Jim's office, so we met him there right after he was done with work.  He surprised her by having her new bike put together for her when we pulled into the parking lot.  She was very excited!  I think she had a great birthday and she deserved it.  I love my Hallie!

A couple of Hallie's friends came over one day and curled Hallie's hair.  Isn't she beautiful!

Happy 7th Birthday Lexie!

Our sweet Lexie turned 7 on July 22.  Kenedy and Hallie were at Girl's Camp on her actual birthday, so we celebrated by going to Red Robin the next day after they got back.  My Lexie is the sweetest little girl who always tells me she loves me and still loves to snuggle with me.  She is playing soccer again, loves to read, draw and sing.  She also started taking piano lessons in July and is picking it up really quickly. She is a bright light in our family and brings joy to us every day.  Love you so much Lexie!

I love the "missing front teeth" look in this picture...very cute!  Jill took this picture while we were in Bend in June.

Kenedy's 14th Birthday!

On July 7, Kenedy turned 14!  I can hardly believe it has been that long since our first precious little baby girl was born.  She has brought so much joy to our family and I am so proud of the amazing young woman that she has become.  She is such a kind, thoughtful, smart, beautiful, funny and talented girl.  She is an amazing example to her five siblings and we are so blessed to have her as part of our family.  Love you so much, Kenedy!

We celebrated her birthday in Utah while we were on our summer vacation, but neglected to take any pictures of the party that we had.  I'm not sure what her loser parents were doing during the party, but they weren't taking pictures. :-)  However, she took a ton of pictures both at Bear Lake and at Girl's camp, so I thought I would share some of those.

Love this picture of McKay, Hallie and Kenedy.  

 

Ashley, Kenedy and Hallie going to see Eclipse 

 Kenedy, Larissa and Kelsey at Girl's Camp

This must have been taken on the first day of Girl's Camp...you two don't look dirty or tired...yet! 

Love the tu-tu...oh, and by the way, there are two people that have climbed onto your back.

Bear Lake fun

Madi and Kenedy

I think this picture taken with Elder L. Tom Perry and his wife was actually taken on Kenedy's birthday.  What a great birthday present!

Idaho and Utah vacation

The last week of June, the kids and I headed down to Idaho to see my side of the family.  Brent and his family were already there--all the way from Egypt--along with Natalie and her girls--all the way from Philadelphia.  We were the next to get there and then Mike and his family came the next day--all the way from Chicago.  We definitely have an International family right now.  :-)  It was the first time mom and dad had all the family together in about 3 years...minus Jim and Taylor who had to work and Paul who passed away 2 1/2 years ago.  

Mom rented a Clubhouse in Soda Springs that we stayed at for three nights and it was a great family reunion.  We went swimming every day, played kickball, tennis, volleyball, rode on the 4-wheeler, ate lots of good food and just had fun being together.  We also had a great talent show where all the families had something to perform...complete with a push-up contest with Mike, Brent, Jarrett and Dad.  The kids, especially, had a lot of fun just being together and being goofy.  We all live so far away from one another and they didn't waste a minute of their time together.  It was so great to see them get along so well.  They are all such amazing kids.

Mike and his family headed off to another family reunion with Debi's family directly from Soda.  Then, the rest of us headed back to Idaho Falls.  The next day, Natalie had to fly back to Philly with her girls and Jim came to join us for the rest of our vacation.  We spent the 4th of July in Idaho Falls, were able to watch their incredible fireworks show on the river, then headed down to Utah to spend a few days with Jim's sisters and mother.

On our way to Utah, we dropped Kenedy and Hallie off to spend some time with the Gillettes at Bear Lake.  Then proceeded to Salt Lake to Jan and Craig's house.  We were able to go to Lagoon with Tyler, Kim and Sully which proved to be a very fun day.  It was Cooper and Lexie's first time at an amusement park and they had a great time.  I couldn't believe how many rides they were willing to go on...of course, it helps that we didn't really tell them what kind of ride was coming up when we knew it would probably be a little scary.  :-)  There were definitely some they didn't want to ride again, but for the most part, they loved it.  We spent part of the next day in Orem/Provo area and the kids got to go swimming at the community pool by Kim's house and mom and I went to the BYU bookstore.  This was on Kenedy's birthday, so that night, they returned from Bear Lake and we had a BBQ to celebrate her birthday.  The poor girl had strep throat at the time, but I didn't get her to the Dr until we got home.  We had a great time in Utah.

Swimming in the pool in Soda Springs

4-Wheelin' fun

Okay, all of these pictures are pretty much the same, but I've learned that you just can't leave anyone out.  Lots of fun on the 4-Wheeler!

We have lots of summer birthdays in our family, so mom and the Brent House kids made a bunch of cupcakes and we had a big birthday celebration.

Cousin fun

Hallie was a very good sport and let Rebekah put makeup on her. ;-)

These kids logged a lot of miles on the bikes while we were there.

All 15 grandkids...love these kids!

The Dean and Gloria House family...we miss you, Paul.  By the way, who's that blond girl on the left? Let's just say, some people in my family weren't diggin' my blond hair. ;-)

We just barely got this taken before the rain and wind started.  It turned out pretty good considering all the little kids involved.  I love my family!

LAGOON!!!

Sully on the airplanes.

Cooper looks thrilled to be on the airplanes.

Sully and Lexie on the Ferris Wheel.

Cooper on the Ferris Wheel.

Tyler was so great to hang out with his cousins much younger than him.  I think they all had a great time together.  

The last ride of the day.