race

 A few months ago, Jess asked me and Shannon if we wanted to do a half marathon with her.  I thought, sure, why not.  We ran together almost every Saturday morning, it was fun training together.  Matt even ended up signing up for the fun as well.  Jess found a race for us to do, she said she just went with the cheapest one.  It was Canyon to Canyon, which was just 13.1 miles of hills, we didn't realize that at the time.  Well, we not only survived, but we did pretty darn good

My own little cheering section, which also included Ben's parents:)

 Matt (and a little bit of Ben)

 Shannon decided to kick it into high gear at the end, and sprint off without me.  You can see the determination on my face to keep up, but alas, she ran in ahead of me.

 flowers and hugs from my girls

 Shannon and her boys

what a happy runner

Lots of fun, but for the next one, I'll definitely be going down hill

5th,6th,7th,8th of July

 As promised, here's what we did for the rest of the week.  Lots of parties and good times!

 Don't ask Blake to take your picture

 First BBQ at Eli's house in his finished yard!  It's beautiful!

 proof that Luke does eat

 Aunt Courtney helped the kids find toads

 The whole family

 My Mom and I were unintentionally twinners

Whew!  Our busy crazy week is over, but now I'm missing it... we had a great time!

3rd & 4th

 Of course you already know what we did for the 4th of July this year... because it's always the same, and we love it.  But it was even better this year, because that was the day that Elder Jenkins returned from Tampa, Florida!  We had our usual dinner at the park and dessert at my parents with fireworks on the 3rd.  Then sleepover, parade, breakfast with everyone, 1 hour of downtime, drove in a large caravan to S.L. to pick up Blake, big dinner party back at my parents house with lots of friends and family, then lots of fireworks.  It was an awesome day!

 Abigail is really a fan of pictures of herself lately.  Especially goofy ones

 She always says, "goofy, then smile ones"  Here's the smile one

 she is pretty darn cute

 Little besties (Hailey's clothes were soaked with orange soda, so out comes the big t shirt)

 Oh ya!  An adult got on the tramp.  That's the kids' favorite thing, they're always begging someone to bounce them all

 Getting ready for her first parade appearance.  She was so excited to dance on the float!

 Waiting for the parade to start

 There's Grandpa

 Next comes Uncle Scott

 Very pleased with the delicious candy selection thrown her way

 Hanging with his boys

My little cutie shakin her booty (which she asked me if that was ok, she didn't know if it was allowed)

 Hanging with the newlyweds

 probably already sick of my picture taking, but they smiled anyway

 Just waiting to go pick up Blake!

 We made shirts for all the little kids that said, "welcome home uncle Blake, Tampa, Florida mission

 waiting...

 waiting....

 waiting....

 waiting... it seemed like we were waiting for forever

 He's here!

 It was so good to have the family all in one piece again

 more hugs for Mom, I don't think my Dad could let go

 meeting little Kael for the first time

 talking to Cars

 Handsome guy

 Abigail is always begging to take pictures

 talking about guy stuff I'm sure

 Hailey got herself a bag of chips, her blanket and lounged in a chair for a while

 Beau and Luke have already stripped down to play super heros

Lisa and her sister, Michelle. 

 It's so great to have Blake back.  My kids talk about him non-stop, and ask when we're going to see him next.  This is not the end of our party time together... we partied hard for the rest of the week.  I will post pictures soon.