July Holidays Coming Up

O.K.  Here we go again.  Links to how we've blogged about July holidays in the past.

July 4 is Independence Day
July 3, 2010- Happy Independence Day
July 4, 2011- Independence Day 2011

July 7 is Macaroni Day
July 7, 2011- Macaroni Day 2011

July 15 is Gummi Worm Day
July 15, 2011- Gummi Worm Day 2011

July 20 is Moon Day
July 25, 2011- Moon Day 2011

July 24 is Pioneer Day
July 23, 2011- Who Wants to be a Pioneer?
July 24, 2011- Pioneer Day 2011


Nichole's Birthday is also coming up in July
August 20, 2010- Barbecue
August 22, 2010- Ballerina Birthday
August 23, 2010- Nicholina Ballerina
August 24, 2010- Build A Bear
July 12, 2011- Musical Elements
July 13, 2011- Avatar Birthday
July 16, 2011- KAT's Kreation- Flower Clips


As you're enjoying your celebrations in July, try this noise-maker from the June/July 2012 issue of FamilyFun Magazine.

I made some for our kids to use during Pleasant Grove's children's parade during "Strawberry Days" (using balloons instead of rubber bands, of course).

New Friends

Nichole and I recently had the opportunity to go to Nielson's Grove Park with a friend from when we lived at BYU and her two little girls.  Nichole and her oldest hadn't seen each other since her oldest was literally a baby.

It was fun how they became instant friends.

Our friends brought bread to feed the ducks (we don't do that very often so this was new for Nichole and she loved it).

The girls had so much fun playing together

even when the sprinklers came on in the flower garden.  Nichole was happy to get absolutely soaked.

I had a wonderful time as well.  It was so nice to sit down with my friend and just chat.  We hadn't seen each other in years, just kept up with each other through our blogs and facebook.  It was great to enjoy each other's company face to face. 

National Chocolate Pudding Day 2012

I told the kids we'd be able to have chocolate pudding to celebrate National Chocolate Pudding Day, June 26, if they cleaned their room.

So it went from this

to this

with a little bit of whining in between and a shout of, "Don't take a picture of me!"

The kids even vacuumed and Jr. gave permission for Jr. Jr. to play with his cars (hence the "after" picture above with toys back on the floor).


Then... chocolate pudding!

Happy National Chocolate Pudding Day.  How did you celebrate?

Happy Birthday, Eric Carle

My friend, Brianna, let me know that today, June 25, is Eric Carle's birthday.  I was so excited since we recently checked out from the library the book, "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" written by Bill Martin Jr and illustrated by Eric Carle.
So to celebrate his birthday, I read "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" to the kids and they had ice cream that we had left over in the freezer.

Thanks, Brianna, for letting me know about this reason to celebrate.

Chris Discovers the Wheel

Big day, June 21st is.  It's my awesome brother-in-law's birthday.  His wife was so nice to send me a picture of him holding a LEGO wheel because guess what.  This year marks the 50th anniversary of the LEGO wheel.  1962, LEGO started including wheels in its play sets.  So, happy 50th anniversary this year to the LEGO wheel, and happy --- birthday to my brother-in-law.  He's my age, so... though I am older by about a month.  Tee Hee.

Oh, and here are some pictures of fireworks taken out our dirty kitchen window tonight just for you, brother-in-law (What can I say?  My love is greater than my photography skills).  Yeah, fireworks on your birthday.  Your dad's not the only one who gets them.

I'll be honest.  I love my in-laws.  Both Jeremy and I agree we were very blessed to marry into such great families.
And great families, LEGOs, fireworks, and my awesome brother-in-law are all great reasons to celebrate.

Rebellious

June 16 is No Orange Clothes Day.  And my rebellious 4 year-old refused to change his shirt.  Sigh.

That's okay though, because June 16 is also Fudge Day and it's Captain Picard Day.

Through fun and facebook, Jeremy and I were able to sync up and watch Star Trek First Contact at the same time with a friend in Oregon.  Another friend (in California) joined us later in the movie.  And synced up his movie so he was watching it at the same time.  It wasn't that hard for him to find out where we were in the movie, because Jeremy and Corey (our friend in Oregon) kept quoting the movie and commenting about it on facebook when things happened.  Marc (in California) also joined in the quoting, so after it was all over, we could look at a bunch of quotes from the movie with comments to go along.

Oh, and I made fudge for Jeremy and me to eat while watching the movie.  It was from the recipe on the back of the Western Family evaporated milk container.  "Old Fashioned Fudge."  Corey said he had fudge to eat while watching as well.

That was fun.
Jeremy thinks it would be fun to do this again.  Maybe have a party with several people/households across cities and states.  Everyone syncs their movie to watch at the same time.  And of course it's fun to have comments throughout the movie, just like watching in the same room.  But no pausing the movie allowed.


Anyone interested in participating if we set that up some time?

What In The World?

 Nichole'  s typing:
Look at this! Is it exciting?!

 It is out!

 A pillow.

Smaller than a penny.

 Two cards.

 

 

Tooth Fairy!     

                              

 A dollar!

I like to shine.

Summer Reading, Here We Are

Last week, I mentioned how we signed the kids up for the Summer Reading Program at the Orem Public Library.  This week the library is doing its kickoff events for the program with Teddy Bear Picnics (storytelling, puppet shows, etc.) tonight at 7pm, tomorrow (Tuesday) at 10am and 2pm, and Wednesday at 10am.  This is all according to the pamphlet I picked up when we signed up.  There are plenty of other activities coming up also, and it's all free.

And hanging up at the library now and all this week is this guy.

Larger than life, as superheroes should be.


Jeremy started EARLY this morning with a chalk outline, er... outline with tape on our floor (took up our living room)

and worked throughout the morning and early afternoon building pieces of this not so little sculpture. 

It took two cars to take all the pieces to the library (Thanks, Nessa), where it was assembled and hung in the children's section.

Did I mention it was big?

The KAT's Meow

June 8, 1869, the first vacuum cleaner (for cleaning rugs) was patented.

Jr.:  What holiday is it?
Mommy:  The Vacuum Cleaner's Birthday.
Jr.:  Should we open the vacuum's presents for it?

Joy Is...

Going on a hike with your family.

Joy is also keeping hydrated and eating brownies afterward.