Family Fun in June

At the beginning of June, we went to Utah for the blessing of our newest nephew, Cooper Jack Cutler. Looking through the pictures, I'm sad to say we didn't even get any pictures of him! :( It was a really quick, but enjoyable trip. We hadn't been to Utah since November!! Ken had so much fun with his siblings and our kids really enjoy their Utah cousins, too!

Uncle Nick and Uncle Mark with Ken and Bailey looking at Grandpa Ned's fountain Taysum discovered Grandpa Ned and Grammy Penny's sandbox and he LOVED it!
Here is Bailey getting a horsey ride with Uncle Mark in the background and Ryan peeking out

Ken and his brothers like to have competitions. After the push-up contest, they had a balancing contest.

Bailey climbed right up and had a seat with all the girls watching the silly boys

Taysum and Sami

Uncle Nick showing Bailey the horses (she had NO fear around them which was a little scary for all of us!)

Michael, Eli, Taysum and Kymball

Bailey watering Grandpa Ned's fountain

Mark, Nick, Ken, Holly and Kade

Mom, Ken, Paul, Mark, Nick and Shane

Taysum came up with this one on his own on the way home

We stopped in Farson, WY to let the kids get out and stretch; it was really pretty

We had such a great time even though it was so short! Cooper is so sweet and we are SO happy for Paul and Jess's new house! She has made it so beautiful and we're glad that things are going so well for them! We love you guys!!

Our Baby Girl is 2!!

Our darling little girl turned 2 years old on the 2nd!! Time is going so fast and I can hardly believe how grown up she is already becoming! We love her so much and she has brought such love and joy to our home! Her birthday was on Sunday this year, so we got together with our family to swim in the wading pool at the park on Saturday. Bailey LOVES water and every one had a lot of fun!

Carissa and Bailey

CJ and Taysum
CJ and noodles

Aunt Lindsay and baby Celeste (in Bailey's baby swim suit :) )

Sunday morning was kind of a short celebration because we have 8:00 church. Here is Bailey in her new Minnie Mouse nightgown and her new "sly." Bailey LOVES to slide, so we were excited to see what she thought of it! We have also found out that Bailey LOVES horses, so we did a "My Little Pony" party. She was pretty tricky going down the slide with a pony in each hand!

Bailey is always pulling the step stool out of the bathroom and using it to sit on and watch movies. So, we found this little step on the internet. The top opens and that is where we keep some of her horses. Ken painted the top for her.

This picture didn't turn out very well (it's pretty blurry) but I thought it was kind of fun with the paper flying through the air. Taysum was just as excited (if not more) for Bailey.

This is a stuffed My Little Pony baby and Bailey is being a good Mommy and feeding her. Her name is Cheerlee.

Ken was really enjoying just sitting with Bailey while they watched her new "Madeline" movies. He loves it that she'll just come and sit with you; Taysum is usually pretty wiggly ;).

That night we had a little party with all the family. We had Great Grandpa and Grandma Anderson, Grandpa and Grandma Anderson, Aunt Lindsay (Uncle Chad had just gotten back from Colorado and was worn out), CJ, Quinn, Carissa, Celeste, Uncle Matt and Uncle Tyler. We had a really nice time together! Ken played some home movies of the time just before and just after Bailey was born; it was really fun to have that going in the background and to see how little the kids were then! They were really fascinated at seeing themselves so little!

Bailey received a lot of fun presents! Thanks so much everyone!

...And A LOT of horses! :)

Then the cake and ice cream! We had pink juice and a darling cake that our friend Jodi Strom made for her. Bailey absolutely loved the cake!

Bailey had a great day! She was shown so much love on her special day! She even received birthday calls from Uncle Nick, Aunt Holly and Grammy Penny & Grandpa Ned!

We love our Bailey Grace with all our hearts. She has brought so much to our home and we feel so blessed to have her in our family! I thought that I'd also write down some fun things about her.

Nick names: (Mom) Bay G, B, (Dad) Princess, (Taysum) Bailey Griurl, Little Bailey, (Grandmas) Bailey Beautiful

Favorite foods: Chicken, bread, pickles, cheese, bananas, popcorn, grapes

Favorite drink: Juice

Favorite colors: Green and Pink

Favorite animal: Horse (although she calls most things a chicken)

Favorite things: Binky, Blankey, toy horse (one for each hand), sippy cup

Favorite sayings: "OK!" "Woo-hoo!" "It's Mommy!" "Where going?" "Come on!" "Oh, no! What gonna do?"

Favorite things to do: Play with her brother, read stories, play outside, slide, watch "foo-fies" (movies), cuddle, somersaults, sing and dance

Favorite movies: "Mary Poppins," "Dora," "Bambi"

Favorite songs: "If You're Happy and You Know it," "Popcorn Popping," "I'm Bringing Home a Baby Bumble Bee"

Things we love about Bailey: Her smile, her eyes, her laugh, her voice, her dancing and twirling, her love, her sleeping patterns :), her funny face, her patience with and admiration of her brother and how she wants to do everything he does

We love you so much, Bailey and we know the years to come will be just as wonderful!! Happy Birthday, baby girl!

Many Memories

Here are some other pictures from May and June. There's no rhyme, reason or theme; just some other fun pictures from the summer.

Taysum and Bailey playing the Wii together.

Slip and Slide

Bailey went through 3 swimsuits this summer. The first one was too small by the second time she wore it, the second one we lost at the Legacy Center in Lehi after one use. The third one is really low in the front, but it was the only one we could find! This is a picture of her in the first one.

Sliding with Daddy

Our little flower girl "watering" the flowers

Popcicles at Grandpa and Grandma Anderson's

Super Taysum!!

Taysum and his Thomas the Train Seek and Find book

Playing baseball with hiking sticks Ken made for them

Bailey's "squishy face" this is an after-bath game she and her dad play.

Camp Cutler

We had a really fun weekend together as a family! We went camping!! This is only the second time Bailey has been camping. We left Friday evening and went to the upper campgrounds at 5 Springs. We got there kind of late, so we hurried and set up before it got too dark. Ken was so excited to use all the camping equipment he's been collecting. He got to use his Dutch Oven and he baked a PERFECT cherry cobbler...it was SO good!! He said it was even worth his burnt finger. We also got to try out our new camp stove and lantern. It was SO warm even at night! The kids just had a blast and they did great! We were trying to keep them quiet because we had neighbors, but they had SO much fun!!

(This picture got out of order, so the explanation is at the bottom!)

The mighty mountain men cooking breakfast

Good morning!

Ready for anything!!

Taysum was so proud of the sand/pine needle castle he built

A closer look at the "Dragon Castle"

After we broke camp, we decided to hike to the Medicine Wheel. Ken had never been there and I hadn't been there since middle school or since they restored it. It was really fun to see again. It is a Native American marker bevieved to be used during religious ceremonies. A lot of people have left blankets, beads and other offerings tied to the fence. The parking lot was full when we got there and we were really surprised at how many people were there from all over: South Dakota, Maryland, Colorado, etc.

We saw a HUGE rainbow (sundog) around the sun!

Taysum and Bailey were both exhausted and fell asleep on the way down!

We had a couple scares on the way home...we nearly burnt out our breaks! We stopped (thankfully we were able to!!) and they were just smoking like crazy! So, we pulled over and had lunch and let them cool! That was our "grins and giggles" moment for the trip. (When I was young, we'd go to the mountains a lot and Dad would always want to do something just for "grins and giggles": try to drive through a snow drift, try to drive through a creek, try to go up that REALLY steep road, hike up that mountaing "really quick," etc. Needless to say, no one was grinning or giggling!!) We were very blessed and able to get home just fine! We made one more "diaper" stop on the way home. We pulled over at a construction site. The kids are into "Bob the Builder" right now and they were really excited to see the machines. We let them go see them and Bailey ran right up to one. She was so excited about it. I happened to look down and right next to her foot was a (at least) 1 in. thick SNAKE she was almost stepping on! I haven't been that scared in a long time! I screamed and my first thought was to stay very still and somehow grab her away. Then I noticed that the head had been cut off and it wasn't even alive. Oh man, I was so thankful, but I still snatched her up, held her very very close and told Ken we were leaving NOW!! When we got home we went to the wading pool at the park. We were all really worn out, but we had such a fun time just hanging out as a family!!

The kids were so great the whole time, but Bailey got pretty beat up! She tripped over and over at the campsite and one time she really crashed and burned and scraped up her elbow pretty badly. She also got some splinters in her hands we had to get out with a needle! We distracted her with a movie at home and she said "ow" once and then didn't make a peep the whole time! She also was bit by a mosquito right under her eye and the next morning it was swollen shut! It's looking better today, but she looks pretty beat up! Smiles, joy of living, grins and giggles!!