Yes, You Can Have a Fun Summer Even Staying in Utah

And we did. Have a fun summer, that is, by just staying in Utah. I have been such a slacker about posting all summer, and while I could claim being pregnant as an excuse, really that's only been the past 9 weeks. Mostly, I've just been lazy. And since summer is officially over now that Labor Day was a week ago, I figured it was past time that I tackled the mammoth summer blog. Sorry for the length. Most of these things really should have had their own posts.

Here's a whirlwind overview of how we spent our summer:

Two visits to Farm Country up at Thanksgiving Point. Miriam was much braver around the animals on our second trip.
Dinosaurs, dinosaurs, and more dinosaurs! Adriana has been obsessed with dinosaurs all summer. Besides a trip to our local BYU Dinosaur Museum,
we also visited the big Dinosaur Museum up at Thanksgiving Point (made even more exciting because Kendall took that day off of work to go with us),
and the Dinosaur Park up in Ogden.
The summer also brought the infamous castle bed that our wonderful friend, Marcie, originally built for her kids and then passed on to us. It took two days of building, and I still have lofty plans of painting it to be a "princess castle" (with dinosaurs on the shields, per Adriana's request). That one, at least, I can blame on being pregnant. I've found that paint fumes and morning sickness don't mesh well for me. It's a pretty awesome bed, with a platform and step so even Miriam can climb up safely, turrets, and even hidden compartments for storing treasures behind the shields. Thank you, Marcie and the Jones family! (I just realized that I haven't really taken any pictures yet of the castle bed, just a few of kids playing up on top. I'll have to remedy that soon.)

Another big event this summer was Uncle Ken came home from his mission in Fiji! Mom and Dad were able to go over there to pick him up (and spend a few days in Australia while they were "in the neighborhood"). We love having Uncle Ken so close, just a few blocks away as he's going to school at BYU.
With Ken's homecoming, we also got to see my sister, Marie, and her two kids who came out for about a week and a half. We filled up every moment that Marie was here. Some of the highlights from her trip were doing a session in the temple (the first time all of the siblings in my family had been in the temple together), visiting the Discovery Gateway children's museum in Salt Lake,

attending Education Week, Adriana's first sleepover with Evelyn at Grandma and Grandpa's house,
and just getting time to visit. It was also nice that Grandma Jeanne and Grandpa Dave were visiting at the same time. Lots of fun family gatherings, including a trip to Tucanos for Kendall's birthday.

Those were the highlights. Of course, we also had trips to the library, six birthdays (Adriana, Grandma, Grandma Jeanne, Miriam, Grandpa, and Kendall's big 3-0), our 8 year anniversary, time spent playing in the sprinklers and on the slip 'n slide in the backyard, my first canning experience (19 quarts of pears!), a garden keeping us busy, play dates, trips to the park, popsicles, and lots of fun, lazy summer days.