Tanglewoods

Mayci's extracurricular activities this summer were so fun! Probably more fun for me and my fabulous friend Randi;) We signed ourselves and our girls up for mommy and me singing and gymnastics out at Tanglewoods. We bought our girls matching leotards, but never got a picture with them wearing them, oh well. We started out with singing time. Honestly when Randi and I talked about doing this I was all for gymnastics. I thought Mayci would love it. I was sceptical about singing. I didn't think Mayci would sit, or interact and to put it mildly just plain be a little turd. Boy was I wrong!! She did a swap on me and loved singing, and was a pain in my butt for gymnastics. As you can tell from the lovely picture of her throwing a fit a little further down. Eventually she got it:) We had so much fun with Kari(not sure how you spell it). We will definitely be signing up again soon. Thanks Randi for persuading me to do it

I love that my mom's tongue is hanging out as she's trying to lift my daughter up..lol. If you didn't think she was big, my mom is sure making her look that way;)

Walking the beam, her favorite!!

This is the picture I was talking about. I had to physically restrain her. You didn't get a turn until you were sitting in your spot. Mayci had no intention of sitting and staying in her spot. Enter big bad mama;)

She wasn't too sure of the microphone at first, but towards the end she would grab it out of your hands! She may be a performer some day;)

July 4th

We went up to my dads for the 4Th. Nothing too fancy, just some wasted money on stupid Utah fireworks. Most of ours were done in the light because the kids were tired and couldn't wait any longer. Mayci, once again, was fearless!! Not sure where she gets it from. She instantly wanted to hold sparklers, one in each hand, and she wanted to hold them herself. We had a fun time!

Yes, this is a picture of my daughter attempting to eat out of the dog dish. No, I did not let her succeed. I just had to capture the moment for future black mailing;)

St. George

It's a tradition with my mom's family that every summer we take a girls week and go to sunny St. George. Well, this year was no exception:) We were sad that not all of the girls could come, but we still managed to have fun without them;) This was Mayci's 3rd time going to St. George. I was nervous about the traveling, but she did so good. As long as she had a movie to watch she was an angel!! We did a TON of shopping at the outlets. I think they have the best outlet shopping EVER!! I always come home with a ton of steals for everyone. One of our favorite things to do while visiting is view a couple of shows at Tuacahn. This year we watched 'The Little Mermaid, and Grease'. The Little Mermaid was by far the better show!! I would pay to see that again in a heart beat. Mayci loved the mermaids. When Ariel received her legs Mayci kept saying "Bernade um bach, which translates into Mermaid come back". Then whenever Ursula came out she'd shake her finger at her saying No, No!! It was seriously the cutest show ever. We also did a ton of swimming. My Mayci is fearless when it comes to water. That can be a good thing as well as a bad. It was pretty hard entertaining two 2 year olds. I decided to go to Wal-mart and grab some goodies. A coloring book, 2 packages of play dough, 2 mini Mrs. Potato heads and a whole bunch of pop its firecrackers. That seemed to do the trick. The end of our trip was quite an adventure. We went home a day early with Darren and Sheena because Darren had to be back to go to work. I've never been to Zion's and it was right there so we decided to hit it on our way home. Grandma and Grandpa came along for the ride. When we were through Grandpa had given us directions to get back on I-15. It was suppose to be faster than back tracking the way we came. Don't worry that it put us 2 hours over our already 5 hour drive. We had one cranky passenger and that was Dan. He was terrible!!! He got so mad and frustrated. My attitude was that there was nothing that could be done so why waste energy over it We had a wonderful time and can't wait to go back next summer. He claims that he's never going again. This was the first year that the guys came down for the last 2 days so that they could see a show. All in all we had a wonderful time. I can't wait for next summer so that we can go back.

All the girls

Doing more pop its. Mayci thought it was hilarious!!

This was the chef

King Tritan

Mayci was deathly afraid of Scuttle.

This guy did an AMAZING job playing Sebastian. The accent was right on.

Yes, technically Mayci has been kissed by a prince. Prince Eric was more than willing to kiss this little Princess:)

I was able to get some reading time in. So relaxing:)

She wouldn't throw the pop its, she had to gently set them on the ground and then stomp on them. Silly girl:)

She really was having fun, even though this picture doesn't look so.

We visited Grafton where my Grandma Smith's Great Great Great Grandpa founded. He actually built the house on the right. The building on the left was a dance hall.

While in Zion we were starving and decided to find somewhere to eat. To our dissapointment, they really had nothing:( So we settled for wonderful gas station food which we ate across the parking lot on the church grass. Hot dogs and nachos....YUMMY!!

Even thought today is Father's Day, we celebrated it with my dad yesterday. His work schedule made it impossible for us to visit him today. I was kind of glad in a way, so that I didn't have to worry about splitting time between him and Dan. It worked out great!! We had a BBQ with a salad, 7-layer dip and chips. Towards the end of dinner while we were all just sitting at the table visiting, Jaxson decides to come in from outside stands at the end of the table by Kisty and pukes! Disgusting, I know. We all just sat there in amazement, because we didn't know when it was going to stop. Seriously, it just kept coming and coming and coming. Like someone turned on the faucet and ran it dry. He gets worked up sometimes and does that. It seriously felt like time was frozen, except for him. Once he was done Dan ran into the front room so that he wouldn't gag. Sheena and I ran outside. I ran to make sure Mayci didn't come in and walk through it. I think Sheena ran so that she wouldn't puke:) As we're playing outside waiting for the mess to get cleaned up I hear Dan yell from the window to get Mayci. Apparently she had pooped so severely that It was running down her leg, and in the process she had touched it. So on top of puke we had a nasty, disgusting messy poopy diaper of Mayci's that needed changing. We couldn't go inside, so Dan went around the front to bring me her bag. She didn't want to let her butt touch the grass while we were changing her diaper, but that's what you get given the circumstances. Kisty said we should have hosed her off with the freezing water and then maybe she wouldn't do it again;) Once everything and everyone got cleaned up, we headed in to relax. Dad and I had a brilliant idea to bake cookies on the grill. We didn't want to heat up the already hot house with the oven. Our first pan pretty much melted, flat as flat. Our second pan looked good on top, but were completely burnt on the bottom. Our last and best pan of all baked perfect!! We had a good time just laughing as we did it. We put all the burnt ones on a plate and told the kids that they could come up and eat as many cookies as they wanted. So they hustled upstairs, grabbed a cookie and it didn't take long before they had disgusting looks on their faces while they're spitting the cookie out. It was so hilarious. Dad and I thought we were pretty funny:) We can now say that we're expert cookie bakers on the grill!! It was definitely a Flint party to remember:)

I LOVE this man so very much!!! He is truly my best friend and I don't know what I would do without him in my life. He's such a hard worker and will do anything for me or his kids. I'm so thankful to have a day like today to celebrate all Dad's do. I love you Dan Thornton!!

This was Dan's gift. We filled three of his bottles with sunflower seeds, pretzel m&m's, and Charleston chews.

Our display of burnt cookies. These are all burnt!! From the top they look delicious. I had to turn a couple over so you could get the whole effect.

This one's my daddy's. He had the same things filled except instead of Charleston chews, he had Swedish Fish.

My friend Randi and I made these adorable gifts for the wonderful men in our lives. We're pretty proud with how they turned out. Plus the shirt and tie card was icing on the cake. We're pretty crafty. Probably the most craftiest people ever..............................NOT!! We sure had fun doing it:)

This summer has been consumed with working in the yard. There are so many broken pieces that need to be fixed, and I'm not sure we have enough time to get to them all. So mom and I try very hard every day to at least do something. This was a day of doing something. Needless to say, Mayci is such a big help!! It got quiet while we were working, and this is why. She made her way to the sprinkler and decided to play. She was too cute and having too much fun to get mad at her, so I let her continue to play:) Love this girl so much!!

So apparently I haven't posted any of my coupon deals lately. Man, I'm such a slacker!! Better late then never I guess:) This is what I've accumulated in the last month. Call me crazy, but I find myself taking a look at our stock pile all the time:) Just standing there arms crossed with a huge smile on my face. It brings me such joy!! It brings me even more joy to share it with everyone that I love. That was my purpose in starting this in the first place.

This is only half of the cereal that we purchased. It ended up making each box just $.50. The popcorn was $.67 each, and the hamburger buns were $.60.

This was a sweet deal. Kent's actually paid us $5.77 to take all of these pickles and dressings out of their store!! If anyone needs pickles, hit me up:)

Three pack of dial soap were $.10 each, and I got three of them for free. Poligrip, Gillette body wash, carefree pads, and reach floss were free as well. Gillette Proglides were $.87 each. The magic erasers were $.50 each.

Pasta, Lunchables, and toothbrushes were free!! They ended up paying me $5 and some to take the Nivea lotions.

Wipes, air wick, Similac, Fixodent, Thermacare, and Advil were all free. Little swimmers were $2.00, and wheat thins were$.67.

Now that I've started I don't think that I'll ever stop!! And for those of you who are wondering.....why is she getting stuff like Fixodent, and Poligrip? She doesn't need it. Well, we do. My father in law uses it, so we grab it to help him out. As far as the Similac goes, NO, I'm not pregnant. It was free and I donated it to charity. I'm not one of those crazy couponers who buys crap they don't need. I buy what I know we'll use, or that my family/friends use and then spread the wealth.

Mayci's 2nd Birthday

Mayci was surprised with this fish tank for her birthday. She loves 'Finding Nemo', so we knew this would be the best gift for her. She received 2 goldfish which she named, Nemo and Marlin. Also 1 blue beta named Dory, go figure huh?;)

There's a small opening on the top of the tank that water mists through from the bubbling volcano. Apparently Mayci likes the feel of it;)

I can't believe that I've had my precious little girl in my life for 2 years now!! I'm sad because she's growing up way too fast, but I'm elated to know that we have many many more years to share together. Yesterday was her birthday and we celebrated with an Umizoomi party. A lot of you are probably going "Huh?", right now and that's okay I completely understand. It's a new show Mayci watches on Nick jr. Check it out if you have a chance, it's adorable. I'm so thankful to have been blessed with such a sweet little girl. Don't get me wrong, she's definitely a spit fire, but I wouldn't take her any other way. My life just wouldn't be complete without her in it. She makes me laugh, she makes me want to pull my hair out at times, she makes me slow down to appreciate the little things that go unnoticed. She's my tinky-bug, punkin', nemo lovin', independent, bowl full of sass little girl. And you know what? I wouldn't trade her for anything else in the whole entire world!! Happy 2Nd Birthday Mayci!! We love you oh so much:)

Aunt Sheena made this for her. SO cute!!

Blowing out her candles all by herself

all she ate was the frosting, go figure;)

Look, I'm in Bot's belly belly screen