cool kids

Every morning we wake up at 6:15 and wave bye bye to daddy off the balcony. We eat breakfast and take baths then we go to the gym. This morning I grabbed my camera and took these of the girls before we loaded in the truck. They are so fun to be around right now. I love our little set up. I know things will change before long. Gretta will go to school, more kids might come and then London will be gone too! So hopefully I'm making the most of my life right now. It's not always easy to love the toddler stage and all that comes with it. But I know that I'll look back someday and miss it.

i am not a germ-o-phobe.

Ok i said it. I got it out in the open. I am not afraid of getting dirty. I actually like it when my kids get dirty. I feel a little sense of pride when they smother their clothes in dirt or roll down the muddy slide at the playground. We go hiking a lot, and I always feel like we accomplished something when Gretta comes home covered in dust and with scraped knees.

I am the type of mom who thinks its important to be exposed to some germs in the world in order to learn how to fight them off. I feel lucky that my kids don't get sick the minute they breathe the same air as a sick kid around them. But its because they are strong kids! These little girlys of mine know how to fight off the bad.

This is becoming a really far fetched metaphor but I don't care. I want my parenting approach to echo this attitude I have towards germs. These girls have got to make some mistakes while they are under my care. And this needs to happen so that they will learn the right way to correct their mistakes and get back up again and keep on going. Being an intentional parent, in my opinion, doesn't mean protecting my kids from all the scary, hurtful or dangerous things this world has to offer. It means showing them how to be strong and not let anything keep them from trying their best at life.

I love my girls. Right now, this stage they are at is so incredible. I really love the people they are becoming. I love the moments throughout the day when I look at them and know they are happy. To be truthful, I've never been this exhausted or stressed but those feelings pale in comparison to the pride I have for Gretta Elise and London Keira. I see parts of Spencer in them and I see parts of me in them. And best of all, I see they have their own strong personality, and way of seeing the world. How fun for me to get to observe that and learn from it.

^^^digital scrapbook pages by my mom @shelleysdigitals

our little family

yesterday we had a really fun little birthday party for London. It was in Prescott at my parent's house and we took some shots of us four, thanks to my bro Jordan. This is the best one out of the lot. It is definitely not perfect. You can't even see Gretta's adorable dress. BUT! I love it. A lot. We really need to take pictures of us all together more often. 

More pictures of the party to come. Thank you to my mom for helping me with food and decorations. She really is amazing. 

a camping we will go

alternate title: how to camp with babies...

don't. just don't do it. if you have a baby who doesn't sleep through the night, don't go camping with her. she will wake up more than she already does and then she will attract all the bears in the forest with her "dying rabbit' cry/scream. it is not fun and you will spend the entire next day trying to recover from your sleepless night.

other than that... camping was AMAZING! gretta absolutely loved it, especially her new camp chair with owls on it. and payson arizona is gorgeous, it looks more like sundance, utah than arizona. i'm so happy i finally got to go to that side of the state.

so here is what we did on our camping trip.
we left at about noon and drove to our campsite. it only took 2 hours from the dry desert of phoenix to end up in the most lush green campsite surrounded by pine trees. we even picked some blackberries it was that green!

we set up our tent just in time to cover it with the rain fly and keep our belongings dry from the wonderful sprinkle of rain we got. we didn't even mind that it was raining. it was just perfect. we hiked around a little bit and threw rocks in the adorable creek right by our site. gretta was in heaven and london seemed to like being in nature and not cooped up in the house too.

you see, summer in phoenix is (almost) as bad as winter in north dakota. most people add a few pounds in the winter because you aren't as active and outside as much with the cold and snow. here in phoenix, people add their "summer coat" for the few hot hot months during the summer when it is always above 100 degrees and you really can't go be active other than the pool, but who wants to get skin cancer anyway?

so that is why payson was such a nice getaway and it is also why i end up heading up to prescott once a week in the summer. i can't help it!

we cooked some yummy tacos on the fire and ate dinner and we were all a little sleepy so while it rained some more we got things cleaned up and the girls in their jammies. i think we all ended up falling asleep as the sun went down.

and that is when the horrible part started. i was terrified about bears. all over the camp grounds and even on our picnic table were signs about the bears and how you can't have any food or water out at night because it attracts bears. its even against the law! i couldn't stop thinking about what i would do if a bear came. it was not fun. add to that feeling a baby who would wake up every 30 minutes and screech and cry. i was convinced the bears would come and get us. spencer finally told me to say a prayer and try to relax. DUH why didn't i think of that? i did and immediately i fell asleep, thank you heavenly father. but then a while later i felt a tap on my back and spencer saying "do you hear that"!? omg, there was something walking through the woods nearby. we were staring out our tent forever trying to see it. it had to be big. we shone the flashlight out and we heard it climb a tree really fast. so that's when we knew it was a bear.

we each grabbed a sleeping baby and ran to the truck. holy crap! we slept each holding a girl and it was the most uncomfortable thing in life but at least i wasn't scared anymore. when the sun FINALLY came up we were so happy. it was a beautiful morning. goodness! i'm such a wimp! but anyways, it was funny and scary and an adventure. and i'm glad we now know to wait until london is a little older to go again. or get a cabin! haha

that was long sorry. camping is fun:)

the ocean

while on our california trip, we went to the oceanside pier to walk around and kill some time. it was spencer's only day there and he had to get a little bit of ocean breeze in his system before he drove us right back to the desert. to be honest, i'm not so sure about busy piers like this. it was super fun to look down right into the water and show the girls the surfers. gretta really wanted to see a shark! but at the same time, spencer and i both agreed that those places are too busy for us and it makes it hard to enjoy the ocean when there are so many people... (i.e. shady characters, scary guys and freaks) all around.

but still, who can really dispute the beauty of that water? i love the color so much i want an entire room painted to match! also, can we talk about how brave surfers are? i can't deal with a whole ocean floating beneath me AT ALL.

 ^^^gretta likes to hitch her arm up when i take her picture now? maybe she knows something we don't about looking cute for the camera? haha

^^^one legged seagull and my dramatic 3 year old

king julien turns 1

every once in a while in arizona, you get a summer night like this one. it's the kind that's warm and spent outside. a little bit of drizzle comes down. you get cooled off and stay outside longer. the light is so pretty you could take a million photos. it was one of those kind of nights on monday at julien's birthday. we had the yummiest cake and played soccer and opened presents. i'm so glad my brother has such a sweet little boy! happy birthday king julien!

'Round Here

Simple Floral Jars: Party Decor DIY

This weekend was a busy one. I photographed a wedding and helped my mom get ready for Hayley's homecoming party. We decided we had to have flowers and so we made these floral jars to put on her mantle in the living room.

1. The 99 cent store has these cute colored glass jars. We chose 10 of the green and blue for Hayley.

2. Go to the grocery store and pick a few bunches of your favorite flowers. We went to Trader Joes and they still had a few peonies, plus roses, stalk and dahlias! 

3. Fill the jars half way with water and start cutting down the flowers. Don't cut them too short because you can always go shorter but you can't get any length back ;)

4. We added one peony, one dahlia, a couple stalks of white, one rose and a few of those green accent flowers to fill in spaces. 

5. Greenery really helps to make a backdrop for the pops of color. We only had a couple of these huge leafs but the jars that we put them in turned out to be our favorites.

6. Arrange on the mantle or anywhere else and enjoy as the flowers open!