Zachary Charles and the toilet adventure

Zach loves to play in the bathroom. I try to keep the door shut, but sometimes it gets left open and he gets in there. Last week Zach was playing with these plastic things. I don't even know what they are (drawer brackets?) and somehow flushed one down the toilet. It totally got stuck and Matt was out of town, so I was left with a clogged toilet.

So I pack up both kids and take them to Home Depot to get a toilet auger in hopes that it will help me get the thing out of there. But of course, no such luck. So I begin to take apart the toilet. However the thing was so lodged in there that I couldn't get it out and I had to wait for Matt to get home and he cut it out of the toilet!

The thing was about 4 inches tall and 2 inches wide. What a stinker!

This was a multiple day event.

It's a good thing Zach's so cute because that was the grossest thing I have ever done!

He loves green smoothies!

Zach is pretty content to play and wander most of the time. But he sure does like to get into things! Love my Zach!

Emmy's Adventures

Sometimes I have a hard time keeping this girl busy! But here are a few of her adventures.We met Elsa and Anna at the water conservation park party.

We love the zoo!

And the aquarium.

Yesterday she was riding her scooter down the street in the rain in her pjs singing "Do You Want to Build A Snowman" at the top of her lungs! Ha!

We are both ready for preschool to start in a couple weeks!

Kids Annual Pictures

Tour of Utah

When the Tour of Utah comes to town we usually try to go and watch one of the stages. This year, the starting line for one of the stages was at IMFlash, where my brother was doing an internship. They had a big party to send off the riders, and we went. We'd never been to a starting line before....we had mostly just watched somewhere along the route. Anyway, it was fun to see all the team busses/cars arrive and the riders get out and get ready.

There were a few big names this year, so I tried to get glimpses of them as they came out of their team busses. Jens Voigt was super friendly and chatted and signed autographs and took pictures with people when he came out. That was pretty cool!

Some of the other riders weren't as friendly, so we just had to get pictures with their bikes instead.

They had balloon animals, face painting, other booths, etc. before the start of the race. And here was the send-off!

The best part was that after the riders started, the team cars whipped around that corner so fast behind them that I was afraid the bikes would fall off the roofs. It was hilarious! Anyway, it was a great time at the Tour!

Cousin Levi

Since Nathan and Jessica watched our kids a couple months ago when we went to Indiana, it was our turn to watch Levi while they went somewhere. Emmy was pretty excited to have someone new to play with. One day she packed him a "picnic" and they had to eat it outside on a blanket.

And she insisted on riding in the middle of Zach and Levi in the car.

He was so good and our kids loved having their cousin come and stay for a couple of days.

Update

Matt is still looking for a new job. His company is moving to Florida early next year. We're not sure we want to go. Right now he's got offers in Connersville, Indiana; Layton, UT; and in Florida (or Boston); and one in Dayton, Ohio. We haven't really felt good about accepting any of them yet. I don't know if it's not the right time or not the right job, but we're still looking. He's got an interview in upstate New York this week and Phoenix in 2 weeks.

We are going crazy! It's like a roller coaster...it seems like a new location is a possibility every other day. Some days we feel like moving and other days we just want to stay here. Hopefully the right opportunity that we both feel good about will come up soon so we can get our lives somewhat settled again! It's hard being in limbo.

6 Years

Last week we celebrated our 6-year anniversary.We have both been completely exhausted and stressed lately so it was really nice to have a short little getaway. I tried to plan really relaxing stuff since we didn't have much time to be away.

We went to dinner at Tuscany over in Fort Union. The place itself was fantastic. We ate out on the garden patio and it was really nice. My food was not so great, however. If you ever go there, don't get the pork chop! But Matt's lasanga was good and our dessert was really good!

Then we stayed overnight at the Castle Creek Inn, also in Fort Union. I stumbled on this place several years ago and have been wanting to stay there ever since. It's really a castle! And it has these cute gardens and royal-themed rooms. We stayed in the Rapunzel's Tower room. It was so cool and very relaxing! And they had breakfast the next day in the dining hall.

The next morning we went to the temple and then got massages! They put us in a "foot soak" while we were waiting for them to be ready for us and I thought Matt looked so funny in his "foot soak"!

But the massages were awesome! And then we had to go back and get our kids. But it was soooo nice to be able to actually relax for a bit. We needed it so much. And Happy Anniversary to us! It's been a great 6 years.

Zach's a crack-up and a Sunday afternoon

We went to dinner the other day and Zach's favorite thing to do at restaurants is play with the straws and dip them into a cup of water. He was cracking us up with this walrus face. Ha!

Last Sunday afternoon we were bored and so we headed up to Temple Square.

It was hot, but it's been forever since I've been inside those visitors centers so it was fun to show Emmy the Christus and other things inside the centers.