My big fat Shepherd family pool party

Every year my Grandma throws a big birthday bash for all the grandkids. This year she rented out a swimming pool for us all. It was great!

Emmy loved swimming!

Especially because Rivers was there!

And what is a Shepherd family pool party without a synchronized swimming routine?

Yeah, we are dorks.

Festivities of the 4th

This year I had big plans to do all the fun stuff for the 4th, like do sparklers, go to the carnival, have a BBQ, and go tot e fireworks. Well, Emily decided to get sick that day, so my plans backfired. Luckily we were still able to do most of the stuff...it was just spread out throughout the week.

A couple days before the 4th we were tending my cousin's kids and so we broke out the sparklers. They had a ball! 

Azilyn fell asleep before we thought of doing the sparklers, but Emmy and Tolson LOVED them!

They kept wanting more.

It was so fun to watch them enjoy the sparklers.

We did make it to the carnival and we let Emmy pick one ride to go on. She chose the carousel. She would wave at me every time it came around.

We had  BBQ with some of my family on the 4th, but left early since Emmy wasn't feeling too well. She was doing better the next day so my parents wanted to take their grandkids to the zoo. Emily had a fit for a few minutes about Olivia riding in her stroller, but other than that they all had fun.

The tiger came right up to the window!

They sure do love their grandma and grandpa!

Happy 4th of July!

Getting old

So I just turned 33. That just seems really old to me. I don't know why, but it seems so much older than 32. My dad just retired. I'm not old enough to have a retired dad??!! And I just bought one of these...

Yep. Now I'm officially old. I own a minivan. You know you're old and responsible and all that when you spend all your money on a minivan instead of a vacation. But I am excited to have it. We got a really great deal on it and I am LOVING the extra space. Now we can fit our stroller! Yay! And I don't have to sit with my knees up to my chest in the front seat! Double yay! (We had to scoot the front seat all the way up to fit Zach's rear-facing carseat in the Civic.)

Speaking of the Civic, although I'm glad to have the van, I'm sad about getting rid of my little blue Civic (Chester). It's been a great car and I have loved it....we've had a good 6 years together.

So long, Chester....you've been great! (Anyone wanna buy him?) Now we just need to figure out what new van's name is.

Heel clicks

Zach takes after me in loving heel clicks! It cracks me up how he claps his feet together like this!

I also love how much he loves playing toys these days.

That's my boy!

13 for Dean

As I mentioned before, I ran the American Fork 1/2 marathon last Saturday with some family members and friends. We wore our IronDean shirts in honor of Dean. (He won, by the way, so he is going to Kona!)

Anyway, I had originally planned on running the 5K, but a couple of weeks ago I got the crazy idea that I could run the 1/2 marathon so I switched. I talked my friend Caron into doing it with me.

We had to get up at 3:30 a.m. to get on the bus by 4:30 that took us up the canyon to the start line. Ugh! That is one thing I do not like about races!

Anyway, despite my lack of training, I felt really good and kept a pretty good (for me) pace up until Mile 8. Mile 8 was hard, but then I got a 2nd wind or something until Mile 12.

Mile 12 was hard, but I kept going and then I saw this sign...

Dean had to have another surgery last week...let's hope he recovers well so he can start training for Kona!

And it gave me just enough "ooomph" to finish up. My final time was 2 hours and 35 minutes. I probably could have done it 5 minutes faster, but I had to take 2 potty breaks.

I actually kept up with my Dad and Nathan until my first bathroom break at about Mile 5.

And Matt, Allison, Jacob, and Jessica did the 5K.

And....there was Kneader's french toast at the finish line! Mmmmm....best post-race food EVER!

Anyway, it was a fun race, and one I'd definately do again.

And I don't think I did half bad for not having trained...not my best time ever, but not my worst either! (I really only did one long run of 8.5 miles before the race).

8 Months

 Mr. Zach turned 8 months last weekend! At 8 months, Zach...

-loves to clap his feet together
-can sit up
-likes to hold things in one hand and bat them around with the other hand
-has a cute little grin on his face most of the time
-is doing better at sleeping through the night...he's almost got it! (He slept over at his grandma's house a few nights ago and has been doing pretty well ever since)
-can roll over both ways
-likes to play with his toes
-loves to eat
-likes his sippy cup (he NEVER would take a bottle...)
-loves to watch Emily do whatever she is doing
-loves his mommy
-is doing better with the spit up issue
-usually will take 2 good naps a day (hallelujah!)

Here are some cute pictures of my little cutie...

Although Zach was a difficult baby, he has really mellowed out the past couple of months and has become quite delightful. He is content to sit and play with his toys (as long as I am in close proximity), he smiles and laughs often, and he is sleeping a lot better.

And he really does love his mommy. A lot. He starts to whimper whenever someone takes him from me or if I walk out of a room. Or if someone else gets him up from his nap. And his faces lights up when his daddy gets home too.

Iron Dean

My next-door neighbor growing up was diagnosed with brain cancer last summer. It came as a shock to everyone because Dean Bullock is...well...a Bullock! He is just about the healthiest, fittest, most amazing athlete I know! Their whole family is. They run marathons, do triathlons...and make it look easy! Seriously, I would probably be able to keep up with any one of them for about 10 seconds before they left me in the dust.

In fact, when Matt and I got married, Matt always joked and called the Bullocks "the Joneses" because my Dad always talked about them and running and how we could never keep up with them in our races. Ha!

A bunch of the Bullocks at the last St. George Ironman

Anyway, Dean and some of his kids started doing Ironmans awhile ago. Yeah, awesome! (I pretty much died in my marathon, let alone doing a 2.4-mile swim and a 112-mile bike ride BEFORE running a marathon.)

The mother of all Ironmans is the Kona World Championships (it's like the Boston Marathon of triathlons) and Dean has dreamed of going ever since he started doing tris, but hasn't quite been able to qualify or win the lottery entries. Watch his video here and let him tell you his story. You'll be inspired, I promise! He's in the finals of the Kona Inspired contest. If he wins, he gets to go to the Kona Ironman! Go, vote for him. Support something awesome.

I am running the AF Canyon half marathon this Saturday with a bunch of family members and friends...we are all running in honor of our neighbor Dean. This is a race that raises money for local cancer patients. And...Saturday is the last day to vote. Just do it!