Water Table

Thanks so much Grandma & Papa for the water table. The girls are having so much fun playing in the water. Alison loves to try and sneak drinks. Emmy has added all kinds of toys to play with in the water. It was a great summer surprise. Thanks again!

Emilie's 19th Birthday

Today, my baby sister is 19 years old. We celebrated her birthday last night with a family dinner, cake, and confetti poppers. We had a great time. Since my mom is in Iowa helping my other sister with her new baby, I was in charge of the family party. Here are some pictures for you mom. We sure do miss you!

Tator Tot Triathlon

Guest Writer: Aaron, from the perspective of Emmy (4 yrs)

On Saturday night after my dad was home for less than one whole day, we went to a party. This was a silly party because it started with what my daddy calls a triathalong. That is where people go swimming, ride their bikes, and then run real fast. It's kind of like a race around the world. These are some pictures my mommy took.

My daddy is that white triangle close to the front. He and the other people are chasing the guy in front. I think he took something and they are trying to get it back.

I found these pretty ducks. One girl and two boys.

This is me watching my daddy put on his socks before riding his bike. I'm asking him where he is going to go next. He told the neighbor guy behind him to tackle the next person out of the water.

Go, Daddy!

Even though he was the number 3 person after the swim, my daddy is weak sauce on his bike, so a lot of people passed him.

Go, Daddy. Run! My daddy ran a lot last weekend, and he came home all sweaty. He's holding his back because it hurts. Kinda like grandpa's.

Daddy ran fast at the end and passed some people who had smoked him on the bike. You can see two of them chewing shoe rubber in this picture. Then he drank a lot of Gatorade and walked up and down the street. By then I was ready for the party to start.

We had fun after the people all finished the race. I cheered for all of them, but only my daddy got a big hug and kiss. Then we had a party. The winner, who was the guy everyone was chasing in the water, cooked hamburgers and got a trophy with tater tots or something. I jumped on the trampoline and lost my flip flops. Then I remembered where they were.

I got to stay up late, so this was a good party.

Editor's note: The Tater Tot Triathlon is a friendly neighborhood race in Stansbury Park, Utah. This was the 4th year the race was held. The winner traditionally cooks the burgers for the afterparty. There are no t-shirts or prizes other than the travelling trophy, and everyone has a great time.

Visit to Tulsa

Guest Writer: Aaron

I spent last week in Missouri at a conference for work and was close enough to Tulsa that after the conference ended on Thursday, I drove to the old place. My Tulsa mom, Chris Garber, picked me up after I dropped off the rental car, and I stayed with the Garber family Thursday and Friday nights. These are a few photos from my 36-hour stay in Oklahoma.

Knotty Pine is a great BBQ place in Sand Springs. Best baked beans on the planet and awesome sauce.

Mmmm. Let's see, we've got some baked beans, toast, pork ribs, brisket, bologna, hot links, and ham. God bless America.

My old pal DB at his place in Sand Springs. He manages several small newspapers in NE Oklahoma. Note the awkward dude-hug photo pose.

This is the chapel where I attended church for about 20 years, with time off for good behavior (college, mission, etc.). I have a lot of great memories of being a youth here.

This is my old house. Still felt like home as I approached the driveway. Really wierd to have a stranger answer the door.

This is the engraving in the driveway from when we moved in many years ago. My sisters will get a kick out of this. It says "Ken, Sue, Aaron, Karen, Darin 1990." Dad did the engraving, surely under the impression that if he had let me do it, we would have had to re-pave. Smart.

Good trip.

Many thanks to the Garbers for letting me borrow a car on Friday so I could tool around town and for letting me stay with them those two nights.

The best part was being able to see old friends and just visit for a while. I still keep in touch fairly regularly, but it's different when you are on home turf. I miss it/them already.

P.S. And I miss $.49 pops at QT. It'll take a while to get over that one.

We are so glad...

That daddy is coming home tomorrow morning. Aaron has been away all week on business in Missouri. He was so close to Oklahoma that he decided to head back to his hometown Tulsa for a quick visit. The girls have been wonderful for me, but they sure do miss their daddy. I'm glad that he doesn't leave town very often.

Slide

Alison has learned how to go down the slide all by herself. She is very proud of her accomplishment. She loves the slide, as you can tell by her "Wheee!" as she goes down. Emmy's comments in the background are really funny. I'm not really sure what she's talking about.

Sleeping Beauties

I love to peek in on my girls when they are sleeping. They are so peaceful and beautiful. I don't peek on Alison very often because she is a really light sleeper. However, Emmy can sleep through just about anything. We usually peek on her every night. We find her sleeping in the strangest ways usually with books or toys all around her. She is a funny kid.

Check out the awesome bed hair on Alison. Her hair loves to stick straight out in the back in the mornings. It always makes me laugh.

New TriHive

This is the cover of the June/July TriHive magazine. We are expecting them to arrive in the mail any day now. We are excited to see Aaron's design work, especially since it will be 8 pages longer and have a few other fun surprises. If you haven't signed up for a free subscription, it's never too late. Just head to http://www.trihive.com and click on FREE subscription!

First Harvest

My first harvest of the season; yummy spinach that I actually grew from seed. Yipee! I spent 20 cents on the package of seeds, and I have 12 very happy and well producing plants. I made spinach omelets and spinach lasagna, and there is still some left over.

Aaron put together the sprinkling system for the new boxes the last two nights. We finished putting the dirt in this morning. Emmy stayed up last night until 10 pm helping us haul dirt into the garden boxes. She was a big helper. I planted our plants this afternoon while Alison napped, and Aaron and Emmy went to see Up for a Daddy/Daughter date.

This is a view of all the garden boxes. The big busy things in the first box are potatoes. About a month ago, I was making a roast and some of the potatoes had eyes sprouting. So, I cut off the sprouting eyes and planted them. They are doing great!

We planted this 3-in-1 apple tree last June. It is really doing very well. We actually have fruit this year. There are 8 tiny apples growing on one variety of the tree. I'm very excited that we are getting some fruit so quickly.

A couple of baby apples!

Visiting Great Grandparents

Last week, the girls and I stopped in to visit Great Grandma & Grandpa Sydenham. We had a nice visit, and the girls loved all of the fun toys and stuffed animals grandpa pulled out for them to play with. After this visit, we headed down to Spanish Fork, Utah and spent a couple of days with Great Grandma & Grandpa Davies.