Sunday, August 16, 2009

Grandma & Grandpa's 60th Wedding Anniversary

The last weekend in July we spent the day in Ashton celebrating my Grandparent's 60th Wedding Anniversary. It was great to see cousins that I haven't visited with in years! My Grandparents have built a new home on the Ashton Reservoir and it is so nice and relaxing there. The view is amazing of the Teton Range. I'm so blessed to still have my Grandparents here and that my children are getting to know their Great-Grandparents. I look up to them and their example of 60 years of marriage! Way to go Norman and Carol:)

Tristan and Aly playing on the same swingset I played on as a little girl with my Grandpa. It's really, really OLD:)

Grandma Park talking with Annie


My Uncle Charles is always great at entertaining the kids. This year he brought up a rocket that they shot off numerous times. My boys love Uncle Charles so much...he is always taking them on adventures and carving walking sticks while hiking with them.



Getting the rocket ready to launch!

Florida Vacation

Rob and I celebrated our 17th Wedding Anniversary with a trip to Florida. Rob had a conference for work, and I basically slept and relaxed for 10 days. It was great! We spent lots of time in the sun and playing in the pool and ocean. Plus, it was nice to get away just the two of us. Thanks Mom for watching the boys for us!!

We flew into Orlando and went to the Orlando Temple on our first day. The temple and grounds are absolutely beautiful there.

We had lunch at Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville. The food was great, but the atmosphere was so much fun. We watched the indoor volcano erupt and loved watching the trained parrot.


We spent two days at Universal Studios Orlando. Of course, the entire time we were thinking, "Man, the boys would love this..." but, we had a great time. Here we are with Shrek. Notice the ponchos...it rained EVERY day! Not just normal rain, but flooding rain. So, we spent a lot of time in our ponchos with soaking shoes.



The Jaws ride was pretty entertaining. Here is Rob up close and personal with the "big guy" himself.


This was probably the funnest ride of the entire park. It's a huge roller coaster that ends with an amazingly long drop right into the water. I loved it! Too bad the line was about an hour long to ride it or we would have done it a few more times. We also spent an evening at Downtown Disney where we ate dinner at Gloria Estefan's Latin restaurant "Bongos" (sooo yummy!) and also toured the travelling Princess Diana display. It was awesome to see so many of her treasures and beautiful gowns. I learned so much about her and her life. This was probably one of the highlights of the trip for me. If you ever get a chance to see it, DO!


This is my amazing sis-in-law Cathy! After spending five days in Orlando we drove down to Ft. Lauderdale to visit family. We spent a day in the Florida Keys snorkeling with Cathy. What a blast! I have some really awesome pictures of the snorkeling that I will post later! I am so lucky to have awesome sisters-in-law! Cathy always makes me laugh and she is one of the most kind, giving people I know. Thanks for the great times Cath!



On our way out to the reef to snorkel, we passed numerous multi-million dollar homes on the beach. Some day when I grow up I want to live in one:)


After snorkeling we had lunch at an amazing seaside restaurant. The food was delish and the view was awesome!


Here are my sisters-in-law Bonnie and Cathy. We stayed at their house while in Coral Springs. They have a beautiful home and a pool! The beautiful woman in the center is Rob's mom Micky. It was great to visit with family.


Here is my bro-in-law Stephen, my father-in-law Len and Rob.



We spent our last day in Ft. Lauderdale at the beach with my sister Katie and her two boys Boston and Charlie. Boston and Rob had a blast swimming in the ocean.


Katie, Boston and Charlie at the beach.


We are planning on taking the boys to Florida in January or February to visit! I can hardly wait to be back at the beach enjoying the sun!

Rob with his wonderful parents!


4th of July

Our 4th of July festivities started out with the traditional parade in Menan. There's nothing like small, hometown parades with John Deere tractors, chocolate milk, and lots of horses. After the parade we headed to Idaho Falls for the "biggest firework display this side of the Mississippi". We set up "camp" at Freeman Park and grilled hamburgers and hotdogs for dinner. The fireworks were amazing (as always). The 4th of July in Idaho is probably one of my most favorite days of the year.

Anxiously awaiting the parade


Josh, Jill, and Katie waiting for the fireworks to start at Freeman Park in Idaho Falls.




Tyler playing the saxophone in the Menan parade. He is the fourth one in. We were on the wrong side of the road to get a really great picture.




Tyler playing frisbee with Connor while waiting for the fireworks to start.



Playing frisbee



Tristan and Kaden beating the crap out of each other with their "light sabers".


Baby Kole (Steve & Erin's)



Steve and Josh sharing their vast knowledge of "nothing" with Tyler.




Addie discovered the yummy deliciousness of Oreos:)




It's always a Riot

Another Smith Family Reunion activity was spending an evening at The Riot Zone.

Connor and Rob had a blast at the mini-golf range. Rob will never admit it, but I think Connor pretty much whooped on him:)

Look at those skills!


Racing go-carts has become an annual ritual at the reunion. The poor Riot Zone employees just cringe when they see the whole bunch of us coming. If any of you know my brothers, all rules are obsolete when it comes to seeing who will win. Here is Jill getting in on the fun.



Stephen learned to drive in Canada, so he just likes to think he's pretty cool while losing the majority of the time.





Tyler has participated the last few summers in the race. I just pray he survives once they get out on the track.





Here's Jared coming up on Josh. I think Jared cheats because he tends to win a lot of the time. Of course, he does drive in Utah, which gives him extra experience points.




I think Mark is blaming his loss on the heavy duty Mountain Dew he drank prior to the race, obviously impairing his racing ability.








This picture pretty much shows the intensity of the race from start to finish.








Abbie and Bryan sliding on the inflatable toys. Bryan absolutely loved this slide. He would giggle all the way up and laugh hysterically as he came down. He is so cute!









Tristan and Kaden on the inflatables!










Smith Reunion

The annual Smith Family Reunion was held the last weekend of June here in Idaho. It was so fun to have all of my siblings and their families here. The entire weekend was a blast and my mom put so much work into making it a success. Thanks mom!

Each family had matching shirts. My mom set up an "Amazing Race" game. We went for a hike at Cress Creek and had to find random nature items and photograph them. We would score extra points if one of our "team" was in the picture. Here are Rob and the boys pointing out a wildflower. Every shot of Connor that day has him rubbing his stomach. He was lucky enough to get the stomach flu which rapidly passed from cousin to cousin, making the weekend "really" enjoyable. But, despite the vomitting and stomach aches, we still had a blast.

Here we are sitting on a bridge at the beginning of the hike. I am so blessed to have such an awesome husband and wonderful boys.


Here are all the Smith cousins. It is IMPOSSIBLE to get them all to smile and look at the camera so, this is as good as it gets.

My kids (red) Tyler, Tristan, Kaden, Connor

Jared's kids (light blue) Abbie and Bryan

Aaron's kids (green) Aly, Annie, Wade, Wyatt

Mark's kid (pink shorts) Tennyson

Steve's kids (white w/blue sleeves) Kurtis, Kylee, Kole

Katie's kids (yellow) Boston and Charlie

Jill's kid (in Tristan's arms) Addison


My kids are so lucky to have such awesome cousins. They all get along and can play for hours on end together. I love watching them!



Take me out to the ballgame

The majority of our summer has also been spent watching the boys play sports. Connor and Tyler have played baseball and Tristan has played AYSO soccer. I'm such a wonderful mother that I only remembered the camera for one of the gazillion games we cheered on all summer! So, here are a few of our little stud baseball man, Connor.

Connor is a natural baseball player. He absolutely loves to play and really is good. He's already being recruited to play on a travel team next summer and he's only 8 years old. I'm sure there will be plenty more baseball games to cheer through for him:)

While most kids his age were happy to just hit the ball, Connor was hitting homeruns clear out in the field. He always slides into home too, whether he needs to or not. What a character!


He is just so darn cute!



Sweet Summertime!

It may appear as though I have fallen off the edge of the Earth, but I'm so busy being a full-time nurse, mom, and wife, that I don't have a lot of free time to blog. I will try to catch up though. This summer has been very busy and fun for our family. We started the season off by spending Memorial Day at Heise freezing our butts off. They had just filled the outdoor pool and the water was a whoppin' 50 degrees. We had a great time though.

Tristan
Tyler


Connor

Kaden