Oh my heart!

I found these on our laptop tonight. Could you not just eat them up!!

OK Already

You've pressured me enough! I'm on facebook with the rest of the world, so you can stop harassing me.

ps. Although it seems fun, I'm still a little confused about how it all works and my first love is still blogging!

We adopted!

Meet Axle. As of Monday he is the newest member of the Rollins Family.

Our other cat Bella ran away a couple months ago and after seeing the kids with the kittens at my sister's house Josh suggested we go to the animal shelter to pick out a new one.

Isn't he cute!!! Too bad he cost us a ridiculous amount of money at the Vet's office today. The little guy is sporting a couple different parasites and has some respiratory thing causing him to sneeze constantly.



And her is a little sneak peak at my kitchen makeover. There is still a lot to do and I'm leaving again next week for my sister's wedding so it will be a while before everything is done, but I'm very excited for it to come together.

Confession

I've been avoiding my blog! Every time I walk by the computer I glance at it quickly and then keep walking a little bit faster.

There's just too much to catch up on at this point but nothing I can leave out. The second half of our trip to Utah. The newest member of our family. The dressers I'm giving new life to. And my kitchen makeover. Somewhere in the mix of that is also the daily musings about my kids...don't let me forget to tell you about what Samm said in Colorado that had me laughing so hard I was crying...and my therapeutic venting about how hard it is to be a mom.

So where do I start? There are too many thoughts blending and mushing my brain together so for today let's just do some pictures from Utah and call it good. OK!

In no particular order...

Firefighter James at the tree museum in Ogden

Following in his Dad's footsteps

Mr. President Josh
The royal family

More horse riding

Some backyard football

Tackling Josh's cousin Todd

My brother Tomas came over for a barbecue

Badminton is serious business in this family

The girls loved playing together. Poor James was outnumbered 7 to 1

Checking out some rays at the aquarium

The kids got to meet great grandma Rollins. They also met their great grandma and great grandpa Wilcox, but I forgot to upload the picture.

Looking out at the Salt lake Temple

Macy did not like taking pictures on this trip

Looking at flowers on Temple Square

The Rollins brothers!

Playing in the fountains at Gateway

Home away from home on the range

No, we are not back home yet. I just had a little down time and thought I would let you all in on what we've been up to.

The first stop of our trip was at my Sister Jenn and her husband Chris's house in Colorado. They live on a huge cattle ranch, and it was a kid's paradise. Josh being included in that.

So many fun things to see and do. But the highlight of the trip for me was being able to visit with my Mom and sister and holding my new niece.

Do you know how hard it is to get little kids to sit still and smile for a picture? In the end it's better to just do silly faces. These are all the grand kids on the Morgan side.

Really, when your up in the mountains the possibilities for fun are endless. Everyone loved riding on the four wheeler, even Macy.

A little back yard jeeping.

Out at the barn waiting to ride the horse.

We didn't know how well Macy would do with the horses since she is terrified of animals, but being around them for a week really helped her loosen up. By the time we left she wasn't running from the dog anymore.

Riding horses at Auntie Jenn's house was all Samm talked about for months.

Josh and Bandit (the horse) bonded quite a bit when Josh rode him on a cattle drive one of the days.

While we were out with the horses, my brother-in-law's parents came out to say hello and his mom brought us some delicious watermelon.

There was a fire pit in the backyard so we roasted marshmallows a couple of times and made s'mores.

Josh and James spied a couple of bucks grazing one evening. There was also a wild turkey spotting one morning.

I guess I need to amend what I said earlier. All Samm could talk about was the horses until she found out there were kittens there.

James had fun playing in the sandbox and dumping it on top of the other kids. I didn't love washing it out of their hair though.

We also took a little drive to the rifle creek falls to do some fishing and exploring.

Apparently Chris will do anything to save his fly. (The fishing kind)

I thought this picture was too cute. Ava is a complete daddy's girl.

There was mucho cave exploring.

And other types of exploring

The waterfalls were beautiful

Macy and Ava found a little creek to play in.

I found this cute little bridge that I wanted to take pictures on, but Macy kept running away.

The Shideler and Rollins families in front of the waterfalls.

We went out in the backyard to shoot guns one night and the kids sat in the back of the truck and cheered.

Josh did pretty good for not having shot a gun in quite a while. (They were just shooting clay pigeons)

Neither of the kids wanted anything to do with the guns at first because they are so loud but Josh finally convinced James to try and then he was trigger happy.

After we were done Josh said "there's nothing sexier than a women holding an assault rifle!" only I thought he said "there's nothing sexier than a woman holding a salt lick!" I was not all that flattered. Then, later when we were looking through the pictures Samm said "Mom, you weren't very good but I was still proud of you!" She's right. I wasn't good at all.

And finally on our last night there Dad sent up a tent for the older two in the back yard so they could camp.

They even had a guard dog.

We had such a great time it was sad to leave, but there was more family to see.

Now we are in the land of mini vans visiting all kinds of family and having lot's more fun.