summertime '15.

The Strawberry Days Rodeo is one of my favorite rodeo's and every year it feels like the perfect kick start to summer-rodeo, fireworks, strawberry's and cream, and a summer night with my man. This year it didn't disappoint and was a great night!

no braces selfie

Gardening quickly became part of our summer festivities trying to keep our plants alive. We weren't a 100% effective at keeping them all alive but it's been fun to find vegetables popping up. Part of our problem we've now learned is that our dogs love vegetables more than we do-so keeping them out of the tomatoes is a daily battle! Luckily we've still been able to enjoy some.

One Saturday morning we grabbed breakfast with some friends and snuck off to Wallsburg for one of our favorite 4 wheeler rides-riding from Wallsburg to Daniel's Summit Lodge to eat lunch then 4 wheel back. It was a beautiful day and ended up being super hot!

Russ's 2014 Archery hunt story and pictures got published in another Hunting magazine: Hunting Illustrated Summer 2015 issue. I'm super proud of him for all he's accomplished and continues to accomplish. It's fun to see him fulfilling childhood dreams.

There was a CNA I first met when I was in high school at my first CNA job-back then she went by Melissa but when I reunited with her at Timp 3 years ago I came to know her as Missy. She was just as fabulous as an aide then as she was when I first met her and loved working with her. Unfortunately, this summer she got a new job and no longer works with us. We had a small goodbye party for her on her last night which meant we were lucky enough to get some pictures with some of my favorite people! I love my work family so much and am so grateful for their friendships!

4th of July! I was lucky enough to have the holiday off this year so we decided to host a BBQ and then party with the neighbors doing fireworks. It was a great way to spend the 4th even if our husbands could have bankrupted us buying fireworks :) It was worth it was we had the best show in the neighborhood!

Summer Thunderstorms! Russ was sick one night and I was home from work so we snuck outside for a few minutes to watch a crazy thunderstorm roll through and were able to capture this shot.

 There's a new reservoir in Springville and I've been wanting to check it out since Russ and I saw it getting built a long time ago. Well it opened this summer so Channy and I took the kiddos to check it out one afternoon. It was a blast! we played in the water and built sand castles etc... I'd say it was a successful day! 

Seeing as how weddings are a huge summer thing we had one last summer wedding to attend: my cousin Mailey and her now husband Austin. They got married in Moroni so we enjoyed an evening drive to Sanpete then finished the night with a visit at my grandparents before driving home.

photobomb by Taylor

Anytime Russ holds Calvin I have to document :)

 Fiesta Days Rodeo in Spanish Fork is another one of my must have summer traditions. This year we went on July 22 and it was slightly stressful as we were going to be leaving to go on our annual Ferron camping trip the next morning, but I couldn't resist! So we got a crew together and had a great time! 

more summer adventures coming soon....

baby calvin.

On June 22,2015 I got to witness yet another miracle as my nephew Calvin Joseph Brandt was born.

He made it in time before I had to go to work so I made sure to come back the next day and snuggle the crap out of him before going home and having his 3 cute siblings over for a sleepover.

Times like these I understand the expression "be still my heart!"

Russ hadn't met Calvin yet due to work and so we went over later that week (plus Ash had "banned" him based off his baby guesses -11 lbs, 9:45pm, saying she'd need at least a week before she could see him haha. Russ doesn't hold babies but I love it when he does so Ash and I had worked out a plan before hand to get him to hold Calvin. Luckily it worked! I couldn't stop laughing about how nervous Russ was. We would tell him to rock him and pat his butt to help sooth him and Russ would respond with " that sounds like child abuse". Calvin would barely grimace and Russ would say "ahhh he's mad, he's really mad now". Then he blamed it all on what we were trying to have him do "he's mad at me for spanking his butt". It was seriously adorable!

Welcome to the world Calvin! We can't wait to experience life with you and watch you grow up. Just try to not make it go as fast as your siblings have :)

Levi.

Meet my new ride- Levi.

After we decided to sell the BMW we decided to go back to my Toyota roots and began looking for a 4Runner. We finally came across Levi towards the middle of May and fell in love! We bought him and listed the BMW on KSL the next day.

Clearly we had to test out the off roading abilities as well as get the doggies approval so that following weekend we loaded up the crew and took off to the mountains. It was the perfect evening and the dogs loved riding crate free-but we learned out lesson the next morning after vacuuming dog hair for 2 hours! Next time we'll take the crates :)

My World : )

 Our only regret of the evening was not bringing hot dogs to have a weenie roast while on the mountain!

Russ is always saying the I spoil Remi and that she's the most spoiled dog because of me. Well.... on the way home Remi snuck her way up by dad and rode like this (while sitting on the console)the whole way home. I had to document because I thought it was adorable and for proof I'm not the only one that spoils them :)

The one time we owned a BMW...

It's true, us rednecks actually owned and drove a BMW for a short time. Back in November 2014 we decided to sell my truck and get a more gas efficient vehicle for my "commuting". However, me being the spoiled brat that I am made it clear I did not want a "car car" I wanted something more SUV type without being large and in charge. So we shopped around and ended up finding a BMW X5 for sale at a car dealership near Russ's work. Long story short we bought it. In fact we bought it on November 24 because it was the night before Russ's surgery (and man can I just say that it was so nice to load him in that thing after ankle surgery instead of having him have to jump up in my truck for the next few weeks while he was non-weight bearing on the leg).

We named him Stetson because with his BA attitude, camo floor mats, and driver: he was the most redneck/tough BMW.

But then.... Russ knew before buying Stetson that the cost of parts on BMW's were more expensive than "normal". However, having a customer come in for a broken headlight and leaving nearly 1,000 dollars later Russ came home that night and decided it was going to be best to get rid of the BMW. He saw it as an impending doom vehicle-if it cost that much for headlights then if we encountered a serious problem with it we'd be in trouble. Then there was the fact that it only took premium gas (which was adding up over time-therefore defeating the idea of saving money on gas), the $100.00 oil changes even with Russ doing the labor, the fact that we couldn't go off road/no 4 wheel drive (we tried don't worry)etc... It just made sense to find something more our speed. 

Thanks for the memories Stetson! Our time together was short-but definitely sweet!