Since I am a slacker, and didn't have any pics from the 4th of July, I scabbed one from Darby & Chloe's dance teacher.

A slacker

It is amazing! A person would think that with 5 of our 6 kids gone, I should have TONS of free time, right? And here it is JULY 9th and I am entering my first blog of the month.
We have been gone more than we have been home so far this summer. Most of the days we have been home, have been work days (So basically, we have still been gone more than we've been home.)
Let me re-cap the last few weeks.
June 17th: PUPPIES! Yes, 5 beautiful little puppies! I didn't really want them, but here they are and they are as cute as cute can be. LOTS of work, but darling.
Father's Day weekend June 19th-22nd): On Friday night, we went to the Manti Pageant, then slept and Grandma & Grandpa Picketts' house in Redmond, UT. Saturday we picked up Chloe from youth conference, took Darby and Chloe to spend the weekend with their Dad. Ryan and I stayed with the Garcia's Saturday and Sunday nights. Monday morning we went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. (It was FABULOUS!)
The temple is beautiful, and the spirit is so strong. I am so glad to have had the opportunity to take the girls. I wish that Grant, Hayley and Zack could have gone too. Even without being dedicated, it is so apparent that the spirit of the Lord is present. No words... just awesome!
Monday was Grandpa Bracken's 75th Birthday, so we came home and had cake and home-made ice cream.
The 4th Of July weekend was another crazy one. Darby and Chloe had gone up to Provo with Mike & Brenda for Stadium of Fire practices on Thursday. Friday night, Ryan, Sadie and I joined them.
Saturday consisted of a parade in the morning, then the men (boys) went golfing, and the rest of us explored the street fair and chilled at the hotel. We ate an early dinner at The Old Spaghetti Factory, and then got ready for the STADIUM OF FIRE. The show was great! (Much better than last year!) Even though I am not personally familiar with much of the Jonas Brothers music, they put on a very good live show, and I think almost everyone enjoyed it. This was Darby's first year dancing and she thought it was great!
On July 5th, Sadie and Darby went to stay with their Dad for a month. So Chloe is the only one at home with us.
Maybe we'll have a quiet, uneventful month! Not likely!

New Entertainment

Okay, so this isn't something many people would blog about, but here I am.
As a general rule, we wash approximately 2 loads of laundry every day at our house, when all 8 of us are there. There are days it is less, and to compensate, there are days we wash WAY more.
Lately, we have had a series of break-downs.
The shower in the master bathroom was clogged completely.
The washer started leaking, so we brought in Ryan's old washer and the switch went bad. Ryan ordered a new switch online but taped the existing one together to limp by until the replacement part arrived.
Then, the water heater went out. It was under warranty, but the serviceman couldn't come look at it for 6 days, then once he came, he told us it would be another 10 days before he could be back to replace the part. It wouldn't cost us anything, but still no hot water. The replacement part arrived and Ryan actually fixed it 5 days before the repairman was scheduled to come back. YEAH!
During this whole time, we were watching every load of laundry because our washer was draining faster than the pipes in our house could manage, and the washer had to be turned off about 6 times per cycle, to keep the drain from flooding. So, not too long after the water heater was fixed, the new (old) washer gave out due to being turned off and on so many times.
So, to get the kids ready to go for summer visits to other parents homes, and get ready for fishing trips and family reunions we did laundry at the laundry-mat. Other than getting all the wash done in an hour or so, it was pretty much a pain the rear.


SO, last night we bought a brand-new LG Front-Loader. It is beautiful! It uses less water (so it doesn't flood the kitchen when it drains,) it can wash bigger loads, (Hooray! Less loads!) AND we can watch the clothes as they wash, so I have told the kids we will be getting rid of all the TV's and watching the washer!






Isn't it beautiful?

Chloe is 16!!!!!

Wow! I cannot believe Chloe is 16! It was a good day!
She is not a fan of cake, so we had the traditional (?) Rice Crispy Treat Birthday Cake.

We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner

They embarrassed her sufficiently by having her sit on the saddle and have the whole restaurant yell, " Yee...Haw..."

Random pics

Seeing as I keep claiming we have been so busy, I thought I'd better offer a little evidence.










Darby and Sadie playing the wild-flowers with Grandma Nene.










My parents, brother and sisters all together.











Memorial Day at Red Cliffs

And then it was June!

Whew! The last few weeks have been BUSY! The last 2 weeks of school were exhausting! There was some kind of program or concert almost every day.








May 16th was Darby & Sadie's end of year dance review. This year the review also featured a "Special Guest" performance from about 30 of the Mom's of Pizazz dancers (Brenda & myself included.) Sadie won the "Spark-Plug Award" for the dancer in her age group with the most energy and enthusiasm. (Which was pretty awesome, because earlier in the week she had been diagnosed with mono. - Yes, the kissing disease.)









Last weekend all 8 of us went to Arizona and had a fantastic fishing trip with Dave & Amy's family, Rich & Catherine's family and Papa Max. (But, like total lame sauce, I forgot my camera.) So, subsequently the only pictures I have are on my pathetic camera phone. Everyone in the family caught a fish or two (or ten.) We found a fabulous little fishing hole in Tonto creek and pulled out 32 fish on Friday between everyone there. We went back to the same spot on Saturday after getting only a couple of fish at the lake, and managed enough fish for a great fish fry Saturday night. It is so nice to spend time together as family. It is great to get to know each other better and let the kids have a chance to be kids!
Dave & Amy were great hosts and good sports for letting us all invade their home. Thanks guys!

This week begins the mass exodus for the kids visiting other families. Grant, Hayley & Zack leave Friday to go stay with their Mom and Next week Sadie will head to Salt Lake for a couple of weeks with her Dad. During the month of July, all of the kids will be gone at one time and Ryan & I will be empty nesters.

Okay...Okay... I have to catch up sometime!

Life has been and continues to be crazy busy, but I have to give in and at least post some pics. Otherwise you all might think we are holed in our house waiting for 2012. (Ryan's prediction for the end of the world.)
We have had soccer, dance, Salt Lake road-trip, honestly, the list goes on and on... But here is a little of what we've been up to.

Today was "Mom's & Muffins" at the Elementary school. The kids and I went to school at 8:00 and ate muffins and chocolate milk, and just had a generally good time.

2 weeks ago we went up to Salt Lake for my nephew's 'Talk before his Mission.'

Darby & Hayley singing in the school choir.

Soccer Girls







These are some snapshots of Easter morning.
(I HATE Easter grass, so of course the kids pulled it out and rolled around in it.)