Our July

I've found that when I have a blogging lull, it's not because nothing is going on, it's because everything is going on! Then, I don't even know where to begin to blog about it all. This weekend we had a great visit from my Dad and Debbie and also Dave's niece Becca has been here too. It's fun having an excuse (like we need one) to go out and be busy.

Becca has been a huge help with the kids!

Aubrie asked me why it's called 'Stillwater' because the water looked like it was moving.



Papa took the girls fishing for their first time, and they caught about 10 fish a piece! Even Dave caught one! Go Dave. This was one of my favorite memories of the month.

Minnehaha Falls is gorgeous!

We all enjoyed rides at Mall of America, until my cell phone fell out of my pocket on the roller coaster that loops upside down! I filed a report, the maintenence worker went looking. He found it, without a battery and pieces hanging out. Needless to say I'm in need of a new phone. The part that was a bit tricky was that David and the girls were not in the same store when we went to find them. He had kept my purse for me, so I didn't have any money. His phone is long distance, so my call wouldn't go through in the mall office phone to reach him. Remember this is the biggest mall in America, so finding him wasn't really feasible. Finally, I got the idea to ask someone if I could use their cell phone and fortunately he answered and we met up. That was quite the adventure!

Aubrie has turned into an impressive soccer player! Go Aubrie!

Our family visited Nauvoo, Ill, for the first time. What a treasure of a town! Isn't the temple beautiful?

We ventured with two other families and our kids loved it.

Notice the hole in the door from Carthage Jail.




With all the family-oriented activities, our kids still chose the hotel pool as their favorite. Oh well, what do you do!?



What a delight to be able to catch up with some old Tokyo friends in Nauvoo! Who would have thought?! We spent a great evening with the Stouts and Gloria Rodenberg catching up.


Here's our cutie enjoying our neighborhood parade during the Fourth celebrations.

I apologize for the LONG post, but truly this is a brief summary of our past few weeks!

The Man Project

I (David) will take a brief detour from the normal theme of our blog, and post one of MY grand accomplishments that I am pretty darn proud of. Keep in mind that I am about the lamest handyman out there, and prior to this, my grand lifetime achievement in building was the little footstool I built in High School wood shop. Enjoy my before/after pics of the new and improved garden.

Adventures in Modeling

Check out this coupon from Mall of America's Amusement Park and notice the girl in maroon! Look familiar?

Since my little girl is as famous as SpongeBob now, I'll tell you how she ended up on these coupons that are all over town.

Since the MOA is basically our second home, when I found out the kids could ride the (expensive) rides for free by participating in the photo shoot, I thought it would be fun to sign up Aubrie.

Then, after arriving at the casting call, I found myself second guessing this great idea. There were overly-excited moms primping their well-polished model kids, and we were far from fitting in. I realized I would have a hard time if Aubrie wanted to pursue modeling. The process of having my daughter feel like she has to be judged by her looks is not something I feel comfortable with. Fortunately, this casting call was selected on only a first come basis, so I tried to downplay her observations of the others' fancy dresses and well-done hair.

Aubrie was selected for the kid bumper cars, and she ended up riding them for about 45 minutes! She loved it and had no problem flashing her smile for the camera.

At one point, they lined up the cars with just one in front. They specifically picked Aubrie for the front car and took a handful of just her pics for that. The photo assistant said to me: "It must be rough to have your daughter be a star!" That was a total compliment to her and fun, but I have to say I still don't feel like my self esteem has to come from her succeeding in a photo shoot and (hopefully) neither does hers. This probably says a lot about me, but we were there for the free rides, free prizes they gave her for doing it, and a new experience.

I figured we may or may not ever see her in promotional materials, so I was surprised when (less than a month after the shoot) our neighbors told us she was on a coupon! Then we found the same coupon on the website. The thing I'm surprised about is they probably took thousands of pictures of all the rides over a course of three days and hers was the one selected for the coupon!