Monsoon Season

The first weekend in July we got rain for the first time this year.  Just in time for the outdoor parades, BBQs and fireworks.  It doesn't usually rain a ton here in the dessert, but for the last few weeks it has been raining almost everynight.  The lightning/thunder storms have been exciting too.  The girls like sitting outside under our porch watching the lightning and hearing the thunder.  So that the girls weren't scared I told them the thunder was a roaring lion in the sky.  One morning after a huge storm, we were on our way to school when Whitney must have noticed that the sky was clear and said, "Mom, there's no clouds anymore, the lions went back to the zoo."  I though that was so cute.  Along with the rain we've seen lots of rainbows too. 

My Happy Birthday

My birthday was June 7th.  I have been so behind on blogging, so I am going to try and catch up in the next few weeks. 

My Birthday was a great day even though I wasn't very happy about getting older.  I went to lunch with my mom and sister-in-law Cody and then went and got a manicure.  Then we went shopping for a little bit and I got a new purse that I absolutely love!  Later that evening we went out to dinner with my parents, and my brother and his wife and kids.  Cody made me the most delicious, beautiful birthday cake I could have ever imagined.  Brigham got me some really nice gifts this year...I got an embroidery machine, and a cricut cake cutter.  I am so excited to use both of them in the future for my etsy shoppe and special occasion cakes!   I don't mind birthdays when I get gifts like that!!  :)  Thanks to all of you who remembered my birthday by calling, texting or facebooking me!!

Our Pet Cricket

For the last few weeks we had a pet cricket.  He lived in the wall behind our refrigerator.   There is an opening in the wall for the water hose that goes to the ice maker.  He chirped and chirped and chirped and chirped every night at around 7 and stopped sometime after we'd gone to bed.  It's amazing how we could hear him throughout the entire house.  I don't know if he chirped for us, or if he's looking for a girlfriend, but either way it's really annoying.  It didn't really bother me too much because I can tune him out, but the chirping literally drove Brigham crazy. When Chirpy started singing, Brigham disappeared to our room and shut the door to watch TV.  I didn't think it would last so long, but....it did.  It had been weeks and the little guy had to go.  We read on the internet on how to get ride of our little friend.  So I tried the molasses and water trick to drown the poor guy.  Once I put the bowl of molasses water by the hole we haven't heard him.  Either he knew the molasses trick, he went outside and got eaten by a bird, or he died on his own, we don't care.  As long as the chirping doesn't start again, we're happy!!  

The other night I did smash a big cricket in our kitchen headed toward the refrigerator.  Maybe it was Chirpy coming back from vacay.  I did feel bad about smashing whoever it was, but I don't think Brig would have been able to ever be normal again if the chirping started up again!

Easter Time

        

This post is really late, but here it is anyway.  For the month of April all Whitney talked about was Easter Time.  The Easter bunny and springtime had been a big part of Whitney's life at daycare.  It had been part of Brooke's life too, but I don't know if she's noticed or not.  Both girls still love me to sing the hop hop song(where I just say 'hop' over and over to a tune and they hop).  To actually celebrate Easter the girls had 4 different egg hunts, lots of candy, and now we have lots of plastic eggs.  At daycare they had a party that lasted all day that included an egg hunt, crafts, songs and tons of junk food.  On Saturday we went to the city Springfest where there was a huge egg hunt and carnival rides. 

On Sunday morning the Easter bunny had come to our house and the girls knew just what to do when they saw the eggs.  Brooke started stuffing chocolate in her mouth, drooling everywhere, but it was too cute to stop her.  The front of her pjs were turned brown with chocolate drool. 

                    

While Brooke took her morning nap, Whitney made glitter eggs that turned pretty good.  I let Whitney do as much of it as possible, so she really enjoyed it. 

 

At church we, of course, learned about the true meaning of Easter :).  After church we went to my parents house for dinner and another egg hunt. 

I had my fill of egg hunts but I bet Whitney would have liked to do it again and again. Happy(late)Easter!

Houston Visit

At the end of March we drove to Houston to visit Brigham's family.  The drive seemed like it took forever, not surprising when traveling with two little kids!!  We hadn't been back for years, so it was great to see family that we hadn't seen in while and hangout in Penny's kitchen like we used to when we lived there.

We went to the Houston Rodeo where Whitney saw all sorts of farm animals and ate carnival food and Brooke slept(almost the whole time).  It was warm, but not hot so I was happy about that.  It was a little humid the days we were there, but not as bad as it is in the summer.

We went with some cousins to the Houston Children's Museum.  When we drove up there were tons of buses parked outside.  I thought that it was going to be super crowded but the building was so big that I hardly noticed any other kids.  We didn't even see everything, but we had lots of fun with what we did get to see.  The girls were so tired by the time we left, they both fell asleep in the car.

Whitney had never been to pick fresh strawberries, so when we went it was a fun experience for her. We found one strawberry that was actually 4 berries that had grown together.  We picked a whole bucket.  I was going to make some kind of dessert out of them for everyone, but I guess I didn't get around to it.

We got to spend some time at a couple of our favorite hangouts from when we used to live there.  We went to T-Bone Tom's with most of the family.  This restaurant was featured on the food network and the food is delish!  We also went to the Kemah Boardwalk where we road a few carnival rides and fed a huge group of discusting fish.

The drive home was just a little awful.  The girls cried alot and we were all tired.  We left Wednesday night and drove til 2am and then got a hotel room.  The next day we drove the rest of the way and got home with enough daylight left for the girls to play outside and get some energy out before bedtime.  We had a great time and look forward to the next time we can get away for a little vacay!