Crap!

For those of you who don't know Zack, he is super smart. Like already smarter than I am smart. He's four years old and can already read. This is not because he has a mom who spends hours every day working with him. No, he pretty much taught himself.

Well, apparently he also knows how to write now. He came downstairs yesterday and told me he wrote crap. I said, "I want to see...show me." Sure enough, there on his etch-a-sketch is the word 'crap' obviously written by Zack. This brings conflicting emotions. Amazement that he was able to sound the word out and also able to write letters that I've never taught him. Shock at the choice of the first word he ever decides to write (other than his name). Why in the world did he decide to write 'crap'?!! I wish I could know what was going through his head. He really doesn't say it much, but apparently I do. Anyway, let's hope the next word he writes is not a four-letter word. I love kids!

Our Own Backyard

We are blessed to live in beautiful Midway. The most beautiful valley you could ever live in. Anything you like to do in the great outdoors can be done within about 5 minutes of our house. If you feel so inclined to make a huge long drive of, oh, an hour, then you can be in the Uintahs. Yes, we live in paradise. I tell Jake that there's nowhere we could ever buy a cabin that would be better than where we live. Anyway, I digress...

This weekend we went camping in the Uintahs. We met the Browns and some of there friends up there and had a great time. It was so, so beautiful. Going there is soothing to my soul. We set up our huge tent, and then Jake was off to fish. This just in...Jake Jorgenson, of Midway Utah, caught a fish! He actually caught multiple fish. As much as he loves to fish, he's usually not too lucky in catching fish. Hopefully this will be a turning point for him:)

We had fun around the campfire. The kids love eating more than their share of marshmallows. The night was super cold, but we all survived it quite well I think. The next morning we packed up and headed to Cliff Lake. The kids love to hike and really do quite well. I carried Kate in the backpack and she informed me that she was a good hiker. Right. We got to a beautiful lake and broke out the climbing gear. Yep, we got to rock climb while looking at the beautiful lake and mountains. It doesn't get better than that. The kids loved climbing around on the ground and the adults loved climbing up the wall. A great time was definitely had by all.

PS If this plug for Midway fills you with longing to live here, please talk to me and I'll be happy to help you out. The more the merrier.

Locks of Love

So, I did it, I chopped my hair. And I do mean chopped. I've been thinking about doing it for a while now. Jake tried to talk me out of it, but obviously he wasn't successful. I decided if I was going to cut that much off I might as well donate to a good cause, so I gave most of it to Locks of Love.

It's still a little shocking to have hair this short. I've had short hair before, but not this short. I think I'll like it more when it's grown a couple of inches. I wanted short, but not quite this short. I don't blame the hair lady though. My bangs were still growing out and this was my longest front layer. Kind of exciting though. It's really nice not to have so much hair always in my way. I think I'm going to like it.

I'll tell you all what I told Jake. If you can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all:) Jake didn't say anything when he saw my hair. I think he's warming up to it though and he's admitted to having somewhat of a love-hate relationship with it. I think I like it, but if I look to close at the back then I start to hyperventilate. Change is good, right?

By the way, sorry I look so retarded in this first picture. Oh well, you get the idea.

Boating

Our family loves to go boating. We got a boat last year. It's nothing huge or super nice, but it works great for our family. The kids love going fast in the boat. They also love tubing- even Kate. Zack's decided he likes going over bumps on the tube, but only if he doesn't get water in his mouth. Jake's good at everything you can do boating. I finally figured out how to get up on one ski. Now I'm just trying to figure out what to do once I'm up. We live super close to Deer Creek and Jordanelle, so we just hop in the boat a couple of times a week when Jake gets home from work. If any of you ever want to go boating just let us know. We'd love to take you!

Kate's Birthday

The Terrible Two's! I guess it's official. Kate's now two, but she's been acting like a two year old for awhile. She got some fun presents. She's very into Dora and princesses. She loved walking around in her dress ups and told me she was ready to go to church. Maybe if I let her wear what she wanted to church she would act better...probably not:)

Terrible two's aside, I love having Kate in our family. She oozes personality. You can't be around Kate for very long without laughing. She's always had her own, very distinct personality. We love it. I can't wait to see what else this crazy girl will bring us.

Camping at Strawberry

Last weekend we went camping at Strawberry Reservoir. It was our first time there and we had a lot of fun. The kids loved making and eating s'mores and we all had fun sleeping in the tent. On Saturday we spent a few hours on the boat while Jake tried to catch a fish. No luck in the fishing department, but we all had fun. It's a really pretty lake and quite big. We'll definitely go back.

PS Sorry about all of the slide shows. The pictures from our camera are such big files that it's way faster for me to upload them to a slide show than to try to do each picture one at a time. So sorry for all of the moving pics.