August and Back to School!

Right before school started we went on a last minute overnight trip to Tucson at Lowe's Ventana Canyon hotel to stay with Dustin while he had a work conference.  The whole trip was crazy-the AC in our car went out right before the trip and Maylee ended up with an earache and threw up all over the hotel room.  Luckily my Mom was very kind and kept Maya with her so we could enjoy the trip.  The kids loved it though and that's all that matters!

The day before school started ended up as another muddy mess.  Mikayla asked if she could fill up a bucket with water to play in the sand and I said she could.  I went inside to feed Maya and when I came back outside Mikayla said she "filled it up".  I naively thought she meant the bucket.  Not the whole yard filled with water.

This picture is the epitome of the two girls' personalities...

Back to school!  Mikayla started second grade and she had the same teacher as last year, at the same school as last year so she was ready to go and it was a tear-free day for all of us!  Yay!

Her sense of style is definitely U.N.I.Q.U.E. to say the least!

The kids found more mud at Mammy's house.

The solar eclipse!  I kept Mikayla home from school to watch it because they were just going to watch it on TV and that didn't seem as exciting to me.  Then we went to Target in Sierra Vista and had a blast goofing off with each other.  And found a pool on clearance.

With so much rain over the Summer the ditch didn't run very often and the kids were really excited to see water in it again.

Maya turned 10 months!

I've been doing a little bit of preschool a couple days a week with Maylee and Daxton and it's been really good for all of us.  Good for me to spend one-on-one time with them and they have been loving the activities.

Maylee has always refused to do ballet, but on the first day of ballet this semester she declared she was going.  Her shoes were way too small, but she was really excited about going.  Afterward she declared it was really hard and she was probably going to be sore!

Uncle Dillon's Wedding

Uncle Dillon married Demi Kempton on July 27, 2017 in the Gila Valley, Arizona Temple.  Other than being hot, hot it was a great day.  It poured on their reception at Mammy and Pappy's house the next night though!  Mammy made all the girls fluffy dresses out of the tops of overalls and layers of lace.  The girls thought they were pretty spectacular!

Small Town July

I LOVE Independence Day and Pioneer Day here.  The small town parades and festivities are so much fun.  I especially love how the youth put out flags in front yards (as a fundraiser) so as you drive around town you see flags everywhere lining the roads.  In between the holidays we got ready for Dustin's brother's wedding and enjoyed being outside when the heat wasn't too much to handle.  I'm pretty sure my kids were born to be country bumpkins or rednecks or whatever it is they are because they spend as much time naked and/or in the mud as possible and that's just grown exponetially since moving!  They love it and that makes me happy.

I took this picture of my gas mileage to remember how lucky we are to live close to so many grandparents.  I filled up with gas, stopped by my parent's house, went to great grandparent's house, then when I got to Dustin's parent's house after that I had only gone a total of 9 miles.  If we'd gone to my grandma's house it would've only added a few miles to that total.  We are so, so blessed.  Most days we see at least one set of grandparents.  How many kids are that lucky?!

Daxton wore some of Papa's dress-ups and sported his new air gun from Grandad for Pioneer Day.  He was feeling pretty good!  Dustin ended up driving the youth's float for the parade. The theme was "homegrown heroes" so the youth dressed as plants and flowers and were the next generation of homegrown heroes.  A man in our ward (Zack Mayberry) contacted my Mom and asked if he could honor my Grandpa, Max Kartchner, as a homegrown hero by leading an empty saddle in the parade.  It was very touching.

At the foot rodeo Mikayla shocked us and asked if she could do ribbon roping.  Well, she got up there and they let the calf out and it was covered in poop and huge.  Of course that would be Mikayla's luck!  Dustin and his brothers dressed the calf.

And a just "another day in the life" picture.