Happy Birthday June

My June is three years old!!!! I can hardly stand it that my girl is getting so old. My mom use to tell me that she was going to put a rock on my head so I would stop growing - now I want to say that to June. She is such a big girl, and my best helper. She learns so quickly and I am impressed with the stuff she knows everyday. Here are a few things about June right now:

• She loves to watch movies/cartoons (mickey mouse clubhouse, Dora, Thomas the Train, Princess and the Frog, Mermaid, Tinkerbell, etc.)
• She has a new love for library books and she still loves all of her own story books.
• Everyday she wakes up wanting to go swimming, and could stay in the "hot pool" all day.
• She has a great imagination and loves to pretend. I love to just sit back and listen to her talk to her toys and dolls.
• She loves her brother and calls him Jackie. Although, sometimes she is a little rough with him.
• Every night she wants me to snuggle with her in her bed and we sing princess songs together.
• She loves her Dora jammies
• She hates getting her hair brushed, let alone letting me do anything with it.
• She is kind of sassy and bossy (but that just comes with being the oldest!)
• The girl loves hot dogs and broccoli
• She is very social and loves to go play with her friends
• She is her mom's best buddie

Here are a few pics from our birthday celebration. This is first thing in the morning looking over all her presents. Sean had to go into work at noon, so we had a little breakfast birthday party with him. June even got to open a few presents before daddy left. Here she is with her new bubbles!

Later that day we had to run to Walmart and I let her play on the toys there. She always wants to do this, but usually I don't want to, but on her birthday she got her way.

We went to the ward playdate and brought cupcakes for all of the kids. June loves playing at the playground with the kids.

After the park June helped me make her birthday cake. She loved to lick the spatula, but got pretty messy while doing it.

Since one of June's favorite foods in hot dogs, that is what we had for dinner. Brett grilled them outside for us, and we ate out on the patio, so it was very pleasant.

For her birthday cake this year I made 6 mini 3-tiered cakes. It was my first time using the pan, so they didn't turn out exactly how I pictured them in my head, but they were still cute. Here June is blowing out her candle.

The next night we had another birthday cake because Sean wasn't there on her actual birthday. It was just a normal chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, so nothing fancy there.

I am so blessed to have this little angel in my life. She brings me joy each day and it is incredible how much I love her. Happy 3rd birthday to my beautiful June!!!

Visitors!

Sean's twin brother and his wife Margaret came down and spent a few days with us in Yuma. I was so excited to have somebody coming to stay at our house. When you live in a place where your whole family lives nobody ever comes to stay, but now that we live about 1000 miles away I think we will have a few more house guests. We had a great time with them and we want them to come back soon. We spent a lot of time in the pool out back. We even made up a great version of pool baseball. Sean didn't have a lot of time off of work, but when he did we went to Famous Dave's and had some delicious barbecue. One of the days that they were here we headed over to San Diego. We stopped at the temple only to be a little bit disappointed because it was all covered in scaffolding (they were power washing and painting it). This was the only part of the temple that wasn't covered up. It is such a beautiful temple, but it looked a little funny to us.

We also went to an aquarium that was just off the coast - I think it was called Birch's Aquarium. They had lots of pretty fish to look at and some interactive things as well. Jack thought the fish were pretty mesmerising

June got to touch a starfish with the help of Aunt Margaret.

There were some sharks there too. Not as big as this one we are in here, but cool non the less.

After the aquarium we headed over to the beach. Thanks to Margaret's GPS we were able to find a great spot. Here are my two beach babies just enjoying the sand.

This is me headed out to play in the waves. The waves on this beach were pretty big. We saw quite a few surfers out in the water. I just love having waves crash over me and trying to catch them and ride them into the shore.

June once again loved the sand, and this time she even had rocks to play on.

I didn't put Jack in the water this time (he got too cold last time) but he was content to just sit there and watch all of the action.

After playing in the waves I was pretty covered in sand. My hair was a mess. If you look closely you can see it caked to my hair. I have washed it several times now, and I can still feel sand on my scalp.

It was wonderful to have Brett and Margaret to play with, and I was so happy they came out of there way to be with us. Hopefully they were just the first of many visitors that come our way.

San Diego Trip

A couple weeks ago I really wanted to go on a little family vacation to San Diego, and because Sean loves me he agreed. It had been 15 years since I had been there, so I was excited to be going back. We took the kids to the zoo. It is a massive place with all kinds of cool animals. My favorites were the giraffes, elephants, and the polar bear. June liked the flamingos the best - she kept reminding me that they stand on one leg! It was a lot of fun and I think the kids liked it. Here is June standing on one leg with her favorite animals.

Our next stop was the beach. Really this was my main reason for wanting to go to San Diego. I love the ocean, and I have been longing to go back. It had been 8 years since I swam in "the big blue." It was Sean and the kids first experience with the ocean, and we had a great time. Here is my Jack relaxing on the sand.

Jack got pretty cold after being in the water and wanted to be held after that. I didn't mind - we just walked along the beach and found sand dollars.

June wasn't really interested in the water, but she loved the sand. She made sand castles, but her favorite thing was when dad made her into a mermaid. She LOVED it - I think she really thought she was a mermaid.

310 to Yuma

Sean finished up at the Academy in New Mexico on April 7th and on April 8th he flew home to Idaho Falls. We got to spend one week together in Idaho. We spent the time visiting with family and friends and saying goodbye to our beloved Roberts II Ward. With the help of Kim and Lisa we were able to load our things from the storage unit into the moving truck and I packed up all our things that we had taken to my parents house. It was a very full moving truck to say the least. It was hard to say goodbye to our families, but we were excited for out new adventure.

On April 15th we pulled out of Idaho Falls and headed south. We stopped in Provo to visit my brother Stuart and Kathryn. It was Sean's first time meeting his new sister-in-law. Then we continued on down to St. George. We stayed at my Aunt Leslee's house and got to see my cousins Jarom and Kambria and both of their sweet families while we were there. After a little tire trouble with the moving truck we hit the road again the next day. It was all new territory for me from south of Las Vegas. Sean drove the moving truck the whole time, and I drove our car with the kids in the back. Both June and Jack were great travelers. I don't think I could have asked them to be any better. We pulled into Yuma around 7:30 pm and we all were so excited to be there! We explored the house (which is very lovely) and went to get a quick bit to eat. Then Sean and I unloaded the entire moving truck by ourselves. The truck had to be back the next morning, so it had to be done. Surprisingly it only took us 1 1/2 hours. It took us days to unpack all the boxes and to get things looking more like "home," but we are loving being here. The ward members have been very welcoming and nice and our neighborhood is great. The warm weather is the best part - swimming, long walks in the evening, breakfast on the patio, wearing shorts everyday - I am falling in love with Arizona.

Here are some pics of our trip. Sean and the kids ready to say goodbye to Idaho for awhile.
June and Jack right after we pulled into our new house!!!

My handsome man happy to be out of his car seat and able to move around.

Me, exhausted after unloading all of the boxes out of the moving truck.

The next day when we got to go for our first swim in our very own pool.