I thought you said you were blogging

Jeff informed me tonight that he thought I was blogging. He's watched me on the computer but then can't figure out why he keeps seeing Cole's toes on the blog when he goes to see what embarrassing thing I've written now.

I tried to explain that for history's sake that I have been blogging and back dating the posts so they are in chronological order.... just in case I ever get around to printing another blog book. I'm weird. I like things in order. He said that's cheating.

So to prove him wrong, and give him a chance to, as he says, double check the accuracy of the events, here are some of the "new" posts.

• 80 Reasons We Love Grandma Allen
• British Invasion {Saying Goodbye}
• British Invasion {That Famous Preston Night Rodeo}
• British Invasion {Bear Lake}
• British Invasion{Wildlife}
• British Invasion {Yellowstone Day 2}
• British Invasion {Yellowstone Day 1}
• British Invasion {The Cabin}
• British Invasion {Lower & Upper Mesa Falls and Feeding the Fish}
• British Invasion {Bear World}
• British Invasion {Bees Game}
• Pearl's Art Camp
• Bear Lake
• Premature Sparkulation 
• Heaven Help Me
• Ride up to the B
• He's not very good at cooking
• Art Party
• Family Pictures
• Safety Night at the Bees Game
• Tball Tears
• After School Program
• Totally Awesome Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Party

There are plenty of shorter posts in between, but these were the major ones I thought Jeff would want to look at. I still have our trip to Jackson WY to blog about, but I think I'm almost caught up. And now everyone can see that we've been busy!

Picture perfect

It just so happened on Sunday that we all wore matching clothes. OK, so I might have purposely picked the colors I wore once I saw what the kids and Jeff had put on.

Anyway, I begged Jeff to take some pictures of us. One, so my children remember they had a mother when they look back on our photo albums and two, because, well we were all clean and happy.... at the same time.

Not exactly what I had envisioned but these make me smile.

And then laugh.

And finally, wonder how on earth our poor dog has survived the boy. 

 

Pickleville Playhouse

One of our most favorite things to do in the summer when we go to Bear Lake is to go to a play at Pickleville Playhouse. A truly unique, fun family experience that you don't want to miss.

Especially if your name is Pearl.

That girl LOVES Pickleville Playhouse! I took her and my niece Ruby to Beauty and the Beast this summer. {I am not above bribery to win favorite parent/Aunt status} Kurtis and his date tagged along too... well, we tagged along with him, 'cause he drove.

And then the highlight of Pearl's summer, our family went to "Who Shot Juanito Bandito." Oh my heck {as Fern says}! I was in tears - tears people! Even Jeff giggles during Juanito. Of course I find it super awesome because I know Juanito personally... he was our Student Body President at Sky View. Every year, Juanito Bandito gets rewritten for a new adventure and there's even Christmas shows. My kids leave telling Juanito jokes and saying, "I'm gonna choot you!" to everyone.

Epic hilariousness! Epic.

So if you're ever in Bear Lake, you have to go to Pickleville.

80 reasons we love Grandma Allen

My Grandma Allen, Orel Kay Lee Allen, turned 80 today.

She is awesome!

We had a surprise birthday party for her. Well, kind of a surprise... Grandpa had to get her there, with buckets of KFC chicken. I'm sure she figured it out. She's a smart lady.

I'm such a slacker and bum when it comes to birthday presents. I used to be a lot better at planning ahead, but not this time. Although in my defense, I had told everyone I was planning to make a Texas cake for her loooong before the party was planned. It's tradition. My Grandma loves Texas cake and ever since I can remember, she's always asked me which part of the cake has the most frosting. She's even been known to drink the leftover frosting on occasion.

So instead of a present {well, besides the cake}, I picked up some poster board, frantically emailed all of my cousins and family who weren't going to make it, and collected 80 things we all love about Grandma. I made my cousin, Nichelle, write the Happy Birthday part on the posters. She's artsy and crafty and ubber talented with stuff like this.

Here's the final list. Although I did have more than 80 things I'd collected from everyone. It was fun to read how many of us had the same memories with Grandma or the same traits we loved the most. I personally like the #1 reason the best - anyone named Kay must be awesome {I wrote that one!}. This obviously, also makes me her favorite. 

The fam-damily.

{Natalee and Blakely}

{The newlyweds... Nichelle and Eric}

 {The cake-ivores}

{Blakely and my Aunt Cara}

{Grandma with the only Tullis family around, Tim and Megan, while the rest of their family gallivants around Europe for the year}

{My Uncle Weston, Nicole and her squeeze... can't remember his name, but I like him}

I think every picture of my brother, Kurtis, is like this. People are going to think he has issues. 

But Anberlin is adorable as always!

The boys quickly lost interest in talking and started a rousing game of keep-away from Uncle Kurtis. 

{Pearl with her crazy flowers}

My parents got my Grandma a picture of her childhood home in Panaca. It was framed really nice and she was just tickled with it. Funny side story. For her birthday, my Grandpa told her that he would take her anywhere, ANYWHERE in the entire world that she wanted. You know where she picked? Panaca, Nevada. Podunk, nothing to do, hot as Hades, town Panaca. So funny!

And Jeff got her a box of sparklers. She giggled. {Read about the inside joke here}

It was a great evening, perfect weather in beautiful Cache Valley to celebrate the life of one amazing, fantastically funny, sassy, smart, kind, spiritual lady. I love you Grandma!

Piggy toes

Found this picture on my phone. An apparent mishap playing games.

 

I hope I always remember how cute little toesies are. 

Shark Bait Ooo Ha Ha

I decided to get Pearl a pet Betta fish for her birthday. Because we need another stinky animal to feed and worry about.

I thought it would be educational and teach her some responsibility. Little did I know, Jeff would soon claim Pearl's fish as his favorite pet. Why? Because he doesn't have to clean up poop, it doesn't make any noise, and no wet dog smell. And wouldn't you know it but Jeff has trained that dumb fish to swim right up to him in the same corner to eat. One pellet at a time as I've been told numerous times when caught feeding him wrong.

Meet Shark Bait, middle name Ooo Ha Ha.

I still think we should have called him Jaws in honor of "my" Betta in college. I say "my" loosely because Jaws was technically my grandparents' fish. When they left on their mission to Nauvoo and I moved into their house for 18 months, I inherited him. He was in this vase with a plant in it so it got really gross, really fast. My grandpa made me swear I'd keep that dumb fish alive until they got home. And when I'm given a challenge, I usually live up to it. That poor fish barely hung on until they got home. It probably didn't help that I avoided cleaning his tank or that he narrowly missed a horrible death down the sink's disposal {I made Jeff grab him because his flopping around always crept me out}. But I kept him alive. And the day my Grandpa came home and I proudly showed him I'd kept Jaws alive, he laughed and said, "Girl, I wanted you to kill him! I hate that fish!"

Maybe Shark Bait is a better name after all.

True love

True love is spending an hour driving from Smith's to Walmart to Target back to Target and finally Chevron in search of Jeff's favorite lip balm. And then buying all but one on the shelf... I figured another desperate soul might come in after me. Admittedly, I did take his last one a few weeks ago but still, I love that man!

Swimming lessons

I sure hope this little monster learns to float on his back for 10 seconds by himself soon or we'll be stuck in the red swim class forever!

Candy dishes and the temple

We took the youth to the Ogden Temple open house. I've been pretty lucky to have gone through eight temple open houses {that I can remember}... Las Vegas NV, Bountiful UT, Mount Timpanogos UT, Nauvoo IL, Orquirrh Mountain UT, Draper UT, Brigham City UT, and Ogden UT. I love seeing all of the different and unique features in the temples.

The Ogden temple was beautiful. I loved the vintage white color of the granite. It was just gorgeous against the blue sky.

And the before and after renovation on the Ogden UT temple can't be beat!

 

{Image curtosey of the Desert News}

Not only did I get tickets for the Young Women and Young Men, but I drug my own family along. And yeah, we can't get a single picture of the four of us all looking or smiling at the camera or in this case, with the actual temple in the background.

My parents were married in the Ogden temple on November 17, 1978 on a very snowy wintery day! My Dad's family wasn't active in the church and the Logan temple was closed at the time. So he drove down to the Ogden Temple with a friend for his own wedding. When I found out the open house was happening and that the re-dedication was going to happen on my Mom's birthday, I took it as a heavenly sign to get them tickets for the open house.They don't have any pictures of them at the temple on their wedding day, so I told them this was their chance!

Cole was so funny about the open house. He kept asking what things were and Jeff obliged his many questions with answers like, "that's a door. Those are stairs. Yes, that's a picture of Jesus." Cole was super pumped to know the temple had drinking fountains on every floor and in every spot a little boy could get thirsty. When we got to the Celestrial room, he asked us, "Why is there no candy in the candy dishes?" Meaning the fancy, decorative, well, candy dishes. It was HILARIOUS! And when he found out Grandpa, Grandma, and Uncle Kurtis has finally made it, he decided we were going to go through the temple again. So back we went with Cole as our personal tour guide {now that he'd seen everything}. He explained to my Dad that you get to watch a movie in the temple {the endowment session}, there were lots of drinking fountains, and that there was no candy in the candy dishes in the Celestrial room. We laughed! And to be quite honest, it's a very good question/observation... in fact, I submitted a comment card for President Monson to see.

Kurtis and I decided to send Kimmy a temple selfie so she knew she was missing out on the fun. Oh, did I mention she up and got married?! What the?! To a guy none of us know? After she moved to Colorado? Yeah. Kind of weird but it made me laugh and smile... so Kimmy. Oh, and so she wouldn't feel bad about not being with us, we also took an ice cream selfie after the open house. You know. When we walked over to Farr's Ice Cream for a treat {along with everyone else in town}. And stayed too long, having our car get locked in the temple parking lot! Oops.

We watched the "super moon" rise over the mountains behind the temple... it was a beautiful way to end a lovely evening!