Happy Birthday Chad

So I have been such a slacker with posting lately. Chad's 33rd birthday was on the 12th. I think he had fun. I had the evening planned for a while and made it a surprise for him. He had a few enrollments that day but I had asked him before hand where he was going to be. I do this a lot so it was not so suspicicous. Anyway, I had some friends of ours meet me at the airport so they could drive the van home, and I rented him a fun car for the day. (the one he got was silver)

So I sent him a text message saying I was outside and needed to give him something for his birthday and it would only take a second. He went and looked outside looking for the van. The receptionist was like 'Who are you looking for?' He told her he was looking for his wife in a black van. She said, 'Is that her in the convertable Solstice?' Yup that was me. He came out and I gave him the keys. It was a kind of a girly car (but they were out of vettes and I couldn't afford the Lotus), but it sure had a lot of get up and go. When he went back inside the receptionist thought that I bought him the car. If you know Chad of course he let her believe that for a little while.

When he got home, we went to dinner at Johnny Rockets with Todd and Anna, and Justin and Preeti. We had a good time. We then went to a place to go big band swing dancing. From what I found online it was this 'hoppin' place and really pretty big. I think they did that so that they can get more blood there. It was a very small dance studio. We did a bit of dancing more like country swing than big band, got the wierd looks from the locals because we weren't 'doing it right'. Then headed off to Cheesecake factory for some birthday cheesecake. I think he had a lot of fun. He got to drive the car to his flag football game the next morning, so he fit in a little more with the crowd in Scottsdale that he plays with.

So Happy Birthday Honey!! Sorry it was so late posting about your fun day. And I am a loser and had my camera with us the entire night, but never took any pictures.

Labor Day Weekend

Well we had a bit of excitment last weekend. We have been having some great storms come through at night and really cool it down. Which we LOVE! But last Friday night I think the storm was right over our house. When we went to bed it seemed like we had a huge fan club outside flashing pictures with how much lighting we had. It was right on top of each other. We had 75mph winds (or at least that is what the weather guy said). I think I may believe him because the wind was blowing so hard it physically shook my house. We were laying in bed and our bed would start to shake. It was a little unnerving. But it seemed to calm down around 4 am or so. Apparently Savannah sleeps like a log because it didn't wake her up at all, but Charlotte on the other hand was up every hour and a half. So needless to say Chad and I definately wanted to sleep in. 7:00 am rolls around and someone is repetatively ringing our doorbell. For those that 'really' know us, I am not a morning person. My awful ways have rubbed off on my husband over the years as well. If I owned a shotgun, I think I would have answered the door with it in hand. I was a very onery bear. Well it is our next door neighbor who honestly gives me the hibbidy gibbidties. He wanted to let us know that his tree got blown over in the storm into our driveway. He didn't want us to not see it and try to run over it with our van.

yes I know you are all jealous of my neighbors 'beautiful' car and wish you too could have a boat like that parked next door to your house all the time. It does move though. Once a week to go to Wally World.

Um.... Hello, I think we would have seen it. It is kind of hard to miss. I can just see it now, Chad backing out of the driveway and saying, "I don't remember a tree being there. Oh well I think I can back over it." So we spent most of the day cutting it up and hauling it away. Then the dump closed and we still had 2 loads to bring. So we got ready to go to the DiamondBacks game to watch them get spanked by the Dodgers, since one of Chads nice clients gave us free tickets. Yes it was sad, but I so love that field!! I love that I am not melting when I watch a baseball game. There was one lady who jumped onto left field and tried to run across the field. She was immediately tackled by 3 guys hard. It was pretty funny. But honestly was it worth it. It is a $1000 fine, plus you get arrested?





Last week I also had an old friend come over for a play date. My good friend from Jr High Amanda Mason (North)! She moved down in June?? I believe and we got together to catch up and let the kids play. Her older two were in school so she just brought Hunter. It was good to see a familiar face and catch up on our families and friends. It is fun how we can still catch up even though it has been many, many years since we have seen or talked to each other. It is sad that we get going in life and loose those contacts and connections. I am glad that we were able to get together and hopefully we can get together more often.

Savannah took this picture. She did a pretty good job!

Warning Nudity!!!





Yes, but just a little Charlotte baby bum. If you can even call it one. She has no junk in her trunk that is for sure. Our little carpet crawler loves to be naked. The second you take her diaper off she wiggles away. Daddy is not too good at keeping her down to strap another one on her as quickly as Mom and she has such cute cheekies!!





And a few pics of Charlotte and Big Sis Savannah. She found the little car and was desperately trying to get on. When I put her on it she was so excited, and kicking her feet. Had to take a picture of the big grin. One of these days I need to get a good shot of her fangs. Yes, you heard me right my daughter has fangs. She has her two bottom teeth, and two on the top but they are not her two front teeth. She has the two teeth next to her two front teeth broke through. She has had them for about a month so I was thinking the two front ones would brake through but no sign of them. We think she should be a vampire for Halloween if they haven't broke through yet.

First Day of School

So today was Savannah's first day of Preschool. She is going to Miss Holly's Preschool. She was so excited to go. Ever since we got her into preschool and told she was going she has been asking non-stop when it starts. She would start to cry because she wanted to go to school. Last night I told her she had to go to bed early so we could get up for school in the morning. We got done with dinner, had FHE, scriptures then she went and got her jammies on, teeth brushed and was ready for bed. Chad and I told her goodnight and told her we would see her in the morning. It was 8:30pm. About a half hour later we hear footsteps upstairs. The toliet flushed and those footsteps did not go back to their room. Chad told her to come downstairs. She made it to the landing and I could tell she was about to cry. I went up and asked her what was wrong. She said she was sad because the sun was not coming up. Chad and I tried so hard not to laugh. She finally fell asleep and was up ready to go in the morning. We took some pictures and were off. When we got to school, all the kids were so excited. It was fun to see them all. It was not too hard for me to leave and say good-bye. (Am I a bad Mom for saying that?). When I came back to pick her up all the kids were wanting to show their moms their stuff right away. They had a treasure hunt and learned all the rules of preschool. It should be a fun school year. Savannah and Miss Holly

Waving Bye to Mom

Savannah and Semanee after school

Little bit of Summer Fun

We went up to Flagstaff the other weekend to get out of the heat. It was 98º at 10am when we left Phoenix. When we arrived in Flagstaff it was 78º. So much cooler and nicer. We really enjoyed the day just hanging out as a family. We went to the childrens museum up there but it didn't really seem too 'children' oriented. But we had a good time looking at Dinosaurs and such. We really enjoyed the smell of pine and the scent of the upcoming storm. It rained on us really hard while we had dinner. The temp dropped to 58º so we got to see if the heater, heated seats, defroster and all that jazz worked in the van. It was a nice day. But we had to come home again. It was a little scary driving home since it was it was downpouring and there was so much water on the freeway. But we arrived back in Phoenix around 7:30pm and it was still 101º. We enjoyed the cooler weather while it lasted.

Here are the girls in the tub. I know Savannah is getting a little big for tub pictures but since she and Charlie take tubs together I still needed to get those pics of her too.

If my life was a movie, what would the soundtrack be?

So, here's how it works:
1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc.)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that's playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the "next" button
6. Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool!

Opening Credits: Every Breath You Take - UB40
Waking Up: Feels Like Tonight - Daughtry
First Day At School: Fireflies - Faith Hill
Falling In Love: Forever's as Far as I'll Go - Alabama
Fight Song: Fun, Fun, Fun - Beach Boys
Breaking Up: Georgia Rain - Trisha Yearwood
Prom: Happy Working Song - Enchanted
Life's OK: Home - Daughtry
Mental Breakdown: How Bad Do You Want It - Tim McGraw
Driving: How Forever Feels - Kenny Chesney
Flashback: I Loved Her First - Heartland
Getting Back Together: If You're Going Through Hell - Rodney Atkins
Wedding: Jump, Jive & Wail - Brian Setzer Orchastra
Birth of Child: La Tortura - Shakira
Final Battle: Kill Myself - Tim McGraw
Death Scene: Man I Feel Like a Woman - Shania Twain
Funeral Song: Mayberry - Rascal Flatts
Credits: On My Own - Les Miserables

Some actually fit, that is so funny. Others not so much. So there you go ... Anyone want to buy the soundtrack of my life????

Consider yourself tagged if you haven't done this one before and you'd like to.

Pioneer Day

So I am almost a month late on posting. Things have been a little crazy here and I have just been a little lazy with the posting. In honor of Pioneer Day I took the girls and a few friends from the ward and we went to the Pioneer Museum here in Arizona. Wow, it was 110!! We were melting. I had no idea it was so big. We could see if from the freeway but didn't know there were so many buildings up there. The kids had fun but were really hot. They got to see how a nail was made at the blacksmith. They had fun with the 'water fountains' that were more like sprinklers. I went to see if the water was cold and it shot like 30 feet. It really helped the kids to cool down. Once we were cooked we took them to McD's for an ice cream cone. They do some shoot outs and such when it is cooler so we will have to head back in the winter when we don't melt. But a good way to honor those mighty pioneers that settled here in AZ. I am glad that I was not one of them at the time. I think I would have killed over without any A/C!!!

Some of the pics I just got into the mood of the old west and loved the old stuff. Sorry if you think they are dorky but I think they are cool. :)

The kids on the steps of the 'band stand'.

This is the nail that the blacksmith made for the kids!

I just loved this sign! Luckily we did not come across any.

So there is a little bit about our Pioneer Day!

Charlotte

These are Charlottes 7 month pictures. Or well they will have to do as 7 months since she is already 8 months and I didn't get around to getting real ones. So this was us having fun in her room with the camera. I love black and white can you tell??

Our Summer Vacation

Okay since Savannah is playing at a friends house, Charlotte is sleeping and the house is 'mostly' clean, I guess I will write about our great trip we had. I need to put a disclaimer in here that this will probably be a long post. We were gone for 2 weeks.

We started off a little, shall we say LATE. We left Friday June 27th at 10:30 PM. I were trying to leave at around 8 but that obviously didn't happen. All was going well and the girls were sleeping, until we got to Kingman were we saw that gas was $3.99 a gallon so we thought we had better top off here. Since the car stopped moving the girls woke up. Charlotte wanted to eat and Savannah was rested from her power nap and wanted to watch a show. Once we hit the dam they were both out again. We switched drivers somewhere in Vegas and we were off again. Chad was sleeping and I was trying to drive awake. About 30 miles north of Mesquite I had to pull over. It was 4:45am and I was sooo tired. But the car stopped so Charlotte woke up. I nursed her and calmed her down until about 5:15. I then laid down on the back seat. But then the sun comes up at the crack of dawn and I look at the clock and it is 6:45 AZ time so I needed hit the road. I am good with an hour and a half of sleep right. Once I start into the gorge Chad wakes up. I was indeed envious of his 4 hours of sleep. We get to St. George to pick up our hitch hikers and Dave said we could sleep if we wanted. Nope we were blazing through to Idaho. We had some breakfast and we were off.

I didn't sleep on the way to Pocatello, because lets face it I cannot sleep in a car when Chad is driving. We get in to Pokie around 6:30pm and have an enjoyable time with my dad and Theresa. The kids had fun on the swing and we just enjoyed being out of the car. Dad made us stay up until 12:30am watch these shows he had recorded about this castle they saw while in France. Don't get me wrong I love history and thought they were great, but I was sooo tired since I had only slept for an hour and a half the past 48 hours. We enjoyed our brief stay in ID and would have loved to stay for church but his church was at 1 pm so we hit the road up to Montana.

We finally got there and we were greated by man-eating mosquitos. These things were on steriods. They would leave HUGE welts. We had such a great time in Montana visiting with the Ludvigsons and the Carrolls. Savannah loved being able to actually go outside and play without worrying about cars flying through the neighborhood or melting in the heat.

We went fishing at the McCaymies Ranch. While driving out to the pond, I asked Les how many acres he owned, he said 'Oh last time we checked around 8,000.' How would that be? When we reached the pond/lake Savannah said 'Look its Swan Lake!!' Can you tell we watch the Barbie movies at our house. It was great. On Savannah's second cast she caught the biggest fish of the day and we grilled it up right then and there. Chad kept trying to get her to hold it after he had gutted it. You know in the gills. He finally bribed her with something to do it and as soon as Chad let go she let out a blood curling scream and dropped it. We had to laugh, she is so girly.

We went to the Great Falls Parade on the 4th of July. It was fun, but wow there are a lot of interesting people in Great Falls to put it nicely. Kandra said all the 'Carnies' moved into town and are kind of taking over. Chad and his brother Kevin said if they ever move back they are opening a tatoo parlor since everyone seems to have on up there.

We then decided to float the Smith River. We had so much fun. Since we were kind of short on tubes we had the 'mega chicks' take some of the younger ones with them. Savannah was with Chessa (15) and she was so funny. Savannah kept saying she was cold so Chessa had her hang part of her legs in the water then hang onto her. But Savannah was hanging on to her boob half the time. Chessa was such a great sport (We call them the Mega Chicks cause Chessa is 5'8", and Jennika (16) is 6' not for other reasons). I had Charlotte with me in a little raft and she loved that there was a little bit of water in it. She splashed in it and kept squaking with delight. Chad on the other hand, walk/swam most of it. He was helping out his dad and everyone else who seemed to get in trouble and was without a tube. Tenella about drown the newest addition to the Wright clan Cache (5 wks) when her tube flipped and the two of them went under. He was attached to her in a snugglie. Thankfully he was okay. We all had fun and it was great weather. At $800 an acre (by Chad's sisters 450+ acre ranch) we may buy a bit of land and build a cabin one day.

After a week of fun in Montana we journeyed down to Salt Lake. We had fun going to see Kung Fu Panda and Wall-E. We also spent and afternoon with Melanie and the kids at Thanksgiving Point. Mom and Marianne were there as well playing hookie from work. The kids had a great time feeding the animals, especially the donkey then he started to bray at them when they started to walk away. Savannah had a great time riding the ponies too. It was such an ordeal since we didn't ride them at that moment. Patience my young patawan. I did really feel for one of the little nanny goats. Her udders were so full they were almost touching the ground.

Notice how I am just now showing up in the pictures? I was on camera duty the whole time in Montana so according to pictures I was not on the trip.

We took one afternoon and went to up to the cemetary to see Chad's moms grave. It has been a while since Chad has been there. It is so quiet and beautiful. It was nice to finally see the headstone complete with all the pictures on it. Larry did a great job. The deer herd had quite a few new additions. We saw 4 fawns there.

We also stopped by to Jeremy and Britany's to see their latest addition Jensen. Savannah had fun walking around there house snapping pictures. It sure was a great perspective of the house through a 4 year olds eyes. We wished we had more time to play while in Salt Lake but we had to get going back down to St. George. Our next trip we will try to spend more time in Salt Lake. Savannah loves playing at Grandma's house but doesn't too much like the kitties.

We arrived back down in St. George on Friday and just relaxed at Dave's house. Savannah was excited to go swimming but I think she completely forgot all that she learned at swimming lessons. I think Charlotte was happy to be in a quieter home so she was finally able to get real naps. I was happy about that too. Saturday night we left the kids in Dave and Kiera's care while Chad and I went out to Tuachan to see Les Mìserables. We were on the front row. Wow!! It was great. It was cool how they were able to use all sorts of animals and fireworks since it was outdoors. Javier was really good. I think he did the best. We really felt like we were 'in' the play since we were so close. If you happen to be in St. George now through October I highly recommend going to it. We couldn't have asked for a better night. It was around 75 degrees with a light breeze and had just rained about a hour before it started.

We then journeyed home Sunday and arrived home far too late. 2:30am Monday morning. I think we have all been trying to catch up on sleep ever since then. We had a great time and wished we could have spent more time with everyone that we saw and also to spent time with those we didn't get a chance to see.