adios, mi amigos.
tomorrow we are off to san diego for the holiday weekend. my parents fly into l.v. friday afternoon & we'll all drive from here to san diego where we will get to see my brother perform in "mamma mia". can't wait! i'll share all of the details about our trip when we get back home. hope everyone enjoys their last weekend of summer. be safe!

the princess and the pee

once upon a time, in the faraway land of "the meadows", there was a royal family. they lived in a tiny fortress, but made up for it's lack of size by visiting the local wal*mart supercenter often.

one night, queen jenna pleaded with king D ~"we must go to wal*mart as princess lolo is just about out of diapers."

king D replied~ "alas, my beautiful, loving, adoring, intelligent queen, you are right. we must go this evening, or lolo will be forever known as the princess and the pee."

so the royal family, including the recently knighted warrior, zeke, loaded into their silver carriage to avert another crisis.

once there, the queen was approached by 2 peasants with a sign reading "FREE HUGS". with the word FREE on the sign, it was like drawing pooh bear to honey. the hug brought a radiant smile to the queen's face and taught her the importance of being kind to strangers.

MORALS OF THE STORY:

1. don't look a gift horse in the mouth

2. hugs are better than drugs

3. the golden rule ~ do unto others as you'd have done to you

mt. charleston, etc.

check out some of my favorite photos from n8 & d's visit. saturday we spent the better part of the day at mt. charleston hiking. upon arrival we had a picnic & relaxed in the cooler weather. then we got our rears in gear to do the 1.4 mile hike up cathedral rock. see how lauryn was strapped to dennis? she fell asleep on him on the way down the trail. isaac was quite a trooper, hiking the entire distance without complaining even once! he loves nature so an afternoon outdoors was just fine in his book. his aunt & uncle love it too. on their travels they've been taking advantage of the outdoors & hiking whenever possible. one of the photos in the collage below is of isaac with melted marshmallow on his chin...he was completely unaware of it. we made s'mores outside that evening, where isaac fell asleep on the lounger. then the guys decided it was time to cool off for a midnight swim.

the guys jumping for joy at the top of cathedral rock!

sugar & spice...

and all things nice,

that's what little girls are made of.

YIPPEE~they're having a girl!

n8 & d found out the gender of their baby while they were here with us this past week. they did what we did when we found out that lauryn was a girl~they brought a boy outfit & a girl outfit to the ultrasound appt. & instead of the dr. telling them there the gender of the baby, the ultrasound tech. took the appropriate outfit to put in the baby gift bag. then we all went out for dinner that night where n8 & d opened the gift together. since we call lauryn "lolo" they decided to refer to their baby as "lulu" until she's born & given her real name. :)

thanks you two for letting our family tag along and spend your special evening with you!

inside the actor's studio

my brother nathan & his wife deeann were just here in las vegas visiting us for a week. my brother had a few things to teach isaac, such as sword fighting as you see in the pictures. in grad school he had to take a class that taught staged fighting, so he was going through some steps with isaac. isn't it fun to share your knowledge? nate said that someday he'd like to teach at the college level. right now he is part of the cast of the mama mia national tour. he & dee have been driving across the u.s. & canada, traveling with the show. they decided to visit us for a week of vacation, in between shows in costa mesa, ca, & tempe, az. in two weeks he'll be in san diego where we will go see him perform as one of the leads he's an understudy for. can't wait to see it! you can check out nate's website at http://www.knownate.com/ (although he says he needs to update it) and check out their travel blog at http://www.miaandyoua.blogspot.com/ which we tease them about because for 2 people who are computer whizzes, they have a blog that is rarely updated. :) and if you love horses, you've got to see how talented dee is...look at her website http://www.artbydeeann.com/. yeah, they are a very talented couple!

volunteering

today was an eye opener for me. i went along with dennis to help him hand out water to some homeless people. he's been doing this 1-2 days a week for about 2 months with our church's community outreach program, which does this every single day ~ god bless them! dennis went to the church to fill up the coolers with ice & bottles of water, then we were off to park across from the salvation army where we handed each person in line a bottle of water and a cup full of ice. as i'm handing each person their cup of ice, i tell them god bless you & can't help but wonder how they ended up there and what tomorrow holds for them. it makes me realize how truly blessed i am!

celebrate...

...good times ~ come on!

yesterday we celebrated 10 years of wedded bliss. yippee!

book club

since february of 2004 i've belonged in a book club with some girls i used to teach with. we meet every few months to discuss our latest book. we take turns hosting & serving a delicious meal. after having some good eats, a few drinks, & lots of catching up, we are finally ready to delve into the book. here is a list of books (i hope i haven't forgotten any) we've read so far, in no particular order:

wicked by gregory maguire

truth & beauty by ann patchett

the secret life of bees by sue monk kidd

the red tent by anita diamant

the da vinci code by dan brown

the curious incident of the dog in the night-time by mark haddon

one flew over the cuckoo's nest by ken kesey

brimstone by douglas preston & lincoln child

blindness by jose saramago

beach music by pat conroy

a long way gone: memoirs of a boy soldier by ishmael beah

pride & prejudice by jane austen

the books here that i recommend you read are:

beach music

a long way home

blindness (hard to read, but i appreciated it at the end)

my favorite: the da vinci code

if you've read any of these books, please comment on my blog what you think of them. OR if you have any recommendations feel free to post them on the comments as well. i enjoy reading & always like to have a good book recommended by a friend...or someone i don't even know! happy reading!

Feather Boxing - Crazy Cat

this is from my friend ann who lives in california. we went to college together at und ~ go sioux!

MISS INDEPENDENT

go ahead,

i dare ya...

no, i double dog dare ya...

to tell her what to do!

everyday italian.......what??

here are the rest of the photos from our trip to north dakota. we were busy as always, running here & there, trying to fit everything in. we were able to go to the state fair for an afternoon, took the kids to the zoo & some parks, spent time at the beach playing, swimming, & fishing, & had friends spend the weekend with us at the lake.

the day we were at the fair, dennis went to get us an indian taco & the girls working at that stand said that giada (from the food network) had been there just half an hour before him. dennis came back to our table, dropped off the indian taco, shared the news about giada with us, then went in search of drinks. i saw him doubling back & figured he had seen someone pass by in an orange shirt (he was told that's what giada was wearing) & was going in search of her. it turns out he just had to back track for drinks & wasn't going to drop me like a sack of taters for the everyday italian.

summer '07 in ND

p.s. the today show had giada at the state fair to tape a piece for their show airing TOMORROW august 9th. :)

we're back!

we made it back from hot north dakota to hot las vegas. not much difference in the temperature in the two places while we were on vacation. here are some of the pictures from our trip up north. children of the corn!

one evening we took a ride in the jeep to check out the country. isaac had so much fun looking at the crops, farm machinery, seeing deer, hearing all of the crickets, etc. lauryn had fun too, of course. it's just that isaac is so VOCAL about it.

isaac ~ "look at this big hole made by an animal. it's called a golfer."

(a.k.a. gopher ~ golfer, gopher, same thing, isn't it?)

when we got back from our drive it was time to make s'mores! yummy! that is the best part of summer.

list of foods that keep isaac quiet while he is eating them:

1. popcorn

2. ice cream

3. s'mores

thank god for small blessings!