July 4th and more

A couple weeks ago we had the pleasure of having my mom stay with us while she was recovering from surgery. It was fun having her with us and taking care of her for a change. Dalley was so excited to have his Nana around and had to make sure she was paying attention to him most of the time.
At the end of her stay Shawn and Stina came down from Washington and took her out to Nevada with them. Dalley and I followed after attending the retirement party for my secretary, Christa. Christa was the most amazing secretary ever. She was old school and didn't mind taking care of everything that we needed. She even knew shorthand. I could call her in to dictate a letter to her and she would have the whole thing down as fast as I could say it. She is a little German spitfire. She immigrated from Germany when she was 13. She has some pretty neat stories to tell about living in Nazi Germany. I am going to miss her so much and I hope her replacement is at least half as great as she is.
After the party Dalley and I did some shopping with Anne. It is fun to have a friend I can do those things with. Anne is the best!
We finally made it to the ranch along with Luke and Kayce's family and had a lot of fun hanging out, visiting, and helping my dad around the ranch.
One of the days we had to haul cows to the range so we decided to take everyone and spend the day at the cabin. It was nice to relax and let the kids filthy. Dalley loved playing in the creek.
We celebrated the fourth by going to the parade and then sorting more cows. It was a HOT and DRY day. By the time we were done I was so dirty Stina said I looked really tan but if I took a shower it would all wash off.
We had a lot of fun and I am glad that we were able to spend time with Shawn and Luke's families.

Dalley and L.E. playing with the Lego tub. They are so cute together

This kid is in serious need of a haircut

Aunt Celeste helping the kids get candy, she even tried to sneak Ira a sucker

Aunt Stina at the parade

The munchkin buddies

At the cabin we have an old box springs with a rug on it that the kids use for a trampoline. They love it. That and the tire swing was the highlight for the little ones

Jumping on the "trampoline" I can't get Dalley to keep all of his clothes on

Getting ready for a 4-wheeler ride with Papa

The munchkin buddies sure love Papa

Cutest Ira I have ever seen, he is the third munchkin buddy

Dalley trying to get L.E. to swim with him

Kate was good to push Dalley and then Dalley would sometimes try to push her

Shooting clay pigeons, I had a nice bruise on my shoulder the next day

Munchkin Butt

I think this is one of my favorite pictures of Dalley, oh and those aren't freckles

Eating Caramel apples at the cabin

Ira with his morning sippy

Dalley and Ira were playing peek a boo through the drapes

Summer!

It is picture time, I was having a few difficulties with putting pictures on my blog, but I figured it out so we are all good now. I love summer! It just seems like there is so much more going on in the summer. I am looking forward to BBQ's and rodeos. I love the promise of something new that comes with summer. We started out summer by spending Memorial Day at the ranch with Luke's family. It was so much fun. The weather was perfect and the kids had a great time playing at the park in Alamo, going swimming at Crystal, and playing around the ranch. Here are a bunch of random photos from the start of our summer.

Dalley and his best friend L.E.

Lukie/Shrek

Hugs!!

Little cutie patootie

Three handsome boys
Dalley and my grandpa

Lukie told me this was his sour face, they were eating mulberries off the tree in the back yard.

This kid is a cutie too!

Luke and his boys

Dalley all chocolate and pizza faced
Playing Aunt Kayce's piano

The two little Mozart's at work, dirty faces and all

I told them to put their arms around each other and this is what they did
eating lunch outside
Dalley and mommy pulling funny faces
This picture is to show how little he actually looks like me. Pretty much opposites!

family

These pictures are from last weekend when Dustin and I helped put the cows on the forest. This weekend was hard because my grandpa wasn't able to ride with us. He is having heart troubles and is so weak he couldn't get on his horse. I could tell it was hard on him as well to not be able to get on a horse. He also felt bad about not being able to help us mark the calves before we put the cows on the mountain. I hate seeing him go through his illnesses and seeing him so weak. He worries me so much.

I consider my self fairly brave for posting these pictures, because I am very seldom seen without at least a little make-up!

Thankful for Talented Friends

When I had Dalley I was very grateful to all of the wonderful handmade gifts that family and friends gave to me. It meant a lot to me that they would share their talent and give me something that took time to make. I was especially touched by a beautiful blanket and burp cloth set that my wonderful friend Carrie had made for me. She had put a lot of work into sewing and crocheting and it turned out gorgeous. So when I found out she was pregnant I wanted to make something for her in return. When I made this decision I forgot about the part where I am not talented when it comes to making things. I had heard that a self binding blanket was easy to do so I decided to make one. I really did have the best of intentions, but good intentions does not make up for lack of talent. I bought the material and I had it on hand for a good six months, but never had the courage to try. So last night I enlisted my other talented friend, Anne, to "teach" me by example how to make one of these blankets. She did a beautiful job. I think it turned out very cute and she even threw in a burp cloth. The only thing I can really take credit for is picking out the cute material. I might need to leave the crafts to my talented friends from now on.

It is hard to see, but this is the blanket with the burp cloth

All about Dalley

No pictures, I just wanted to write down a few of my favorite things about my Dalley Bugs so I will never forget.

• Everything is "my", my daddy, my mommy, my milk. I love it when he sees me and yells "my mommy!"
• He is OBSESSED with tractors. He has about thirty, we can't leave CAL Ranch without at least one more every time. He has that Jason Aldean song, Big Green Tractor, memorized. He can't say all the words yet but he sings them anyway and it is really cute. I have it taped on the DVR and and we listen to it every night. He sings take you for wide on big gween twactor, we tan doe sew, we tan doe fasser. (i am not sure how to spell his language)
• He love Chitchen (chicken) and he knows which is his favorite. He loves the chicken nuggets from schwan's, one time they were out so I got him chicken bites and cut them in small pieces like I do the nuggets and he wouldn't touch him. It has to be Schwan's nuggets.
• He is OBSESSED with horses and cows, yesterday we went for a Sunday drive by the feedlot and some of the heifers were out in the field. He spotted them first and told his daddy he had to chase them in. Dustin was driving the truck and Dalley and I were herding on foot and he was hollering "hey cow" at the top of his lungs the whole time. Very cute! He still has zero interest in cartoons or other kid shows but he loves the superior livestock auction and horse babies. Sometimes when Dustin goes to pick up a load of calves from the auction Dalley and I will go so Dalley can watch a bit of the auction live while Daddy is loading the calves.
• He loves shaking every one's hand in church, if I am not quick enoughwalking in I will lose him and he will head up the aisles shaking every one's hands as he goes. He is a very social kid so church is a lot of fun for him, if he didn't have to be so quiet all the time it would be perfect.
• He likes to say Mommy repeatedly until I answer then when I say "what" He says I wuv you
• He pulls the funniest faces. And he knows right when to do it. It is hard to get mad when he is pulling a face that is cuter than cute.
• He is pretty smart, if he can't figure out how to do something he will do it over and over until he gets it down. He has more patience than I do. He is also creative. I was doing the dishes the other day and I would splash a little water on him, pretty soon he started splashing water back on me, at first I didn't think anything of it. Then I got to wondering where a kid that tall got water, yeah he was using his tub toy and the toilet. I should have figured that one out a lot quicker.
• Every night when Dustin gets home from work , Dalley will ask, "Wope tow dad, wide horsies?" He wishes he could go to work with his daddy every day.

Weekend in Paradise

This last weekend we headed out to Hiko for the weekend to help my dad. Since Ryan has been on his mission my dad has not had a lot of help getting things done. Running a ranch the size of this and working a full time job is enough work to keep three men busy. On top of the regular ranch work he has also been working on a pipeline project for the last few years trying to get all the old ditches converted to pipeline. Last Saturday the Hiko ward decided to make it a ward activity complete with the relief society providing a delicious lunch. It was really neat how many people showed up to help. I was really impressed by the good people in Hiko. It reminded me how lucky I was to have grown up in an area surrounded by such great examples. There were about 20 guys and they got the work done quickly. They had expected it to take all day but they were done by 11:30.
Dalley had a great time riding around with grandpa all morning. He loves being outside working. After lunch we saddled horses and paired up more cows to haul out to the range. I was nervous to have Dalley outside the corral watching because I couldn't watch him every minute, but he did a good job of staying out of the way. After we got them sorted Ross, Dustin and I hauled another two loads out to the range. We had one flat tire which is pretty amazing due to the rough roads. It is not uncommon to get a couple.
When we got back there were more cows to sort and we had to do a little finish up work on the pipeline. It was a good day. I love working with my family and helping my dad. I just wish we could be out there more often.

Dalley and Grandpa on the cement tractor

Lunch under the old tree in the horse pen


More people lined up for lunch

Dalley was really independent at lunch. He wouldn't let Dustin and me help him eat. He is getting so big!

My little cowboy
Riding Apache

Dad in the sorting pen

Loading the cows

I love him

My dirty faced little boy driving the truck

Fixing a flat tire

Garden Valley

My two favorite boys

Easter

We were able to go out to Hiko for Easter and we loved every minute of it. It was fun seeing Rowdy's kids. We seldom get to see them so it was really nice. They are getting so big. Luke and Kayce were there too. Dalley and their little L. E. were pretty inseparable. Kayce calls them the twin tornados. They had a lot of fun together. On Saturday we spent the day helping my dad build risers for his pipeline. Dalley loved it. He stayed out and helped us except for when I took him to my mom to give him a nap. He fell in the mud and it didn't phase him at all. He loved every minute of working with grandpa and dad. Dalley with Rich and Bart in the wagon
The Twin Tornados

Lukie coloring Easter eggs

Dalley coloring eggs, he really got into it.

Easter Egg hunt on grandma's front lawn

Munchkin Butt

Dalley with his loot