I'm On a Boat

Last Saturday our friends invited us to go out on their boat. July 24th is a holiday in Utah, so we were pleasantly surprised by the lack of other people on the lake on such a great day.

Dan tore it up with the ski.

Then we tried wake skating. Anda thought it was hilarious whenever her mom or dad fell down. I didn't get a great picture of her laughing, though, because she was always intently staring out the back of the boat.

We finished up by surfing (and by "we" I mean everyone on the boat except me and the babies).

Anda was not too pleased when Dan took her in the water with him (which may have had something to do with him shoving her face in it while he was trying to swim her back to the boat), but she had a great time watching and was surprisingly well behaved for it being 2 hours past her nap time.

Garden Update

The garden is coming along. I've killed quite a few plants this summer, but the survivors are thriving.

Melissa felt so bad for me when both of my watermelon seedlings died, that she went out and got me a plant. Lesson learned: nurseries grow things from seed better than I do. And Melissa is a nice person.

These pumpkin plants could not look any sadder in this 90 degree weather, but they seem to be coming along.

My best growers have really outdone themselves. Jordan was right--they are definitely sunflowers. Look at that one on the left!

None of it would have been possible without my green-thumbed assistant, though.

Yeah, that's the garden hose.

Anda Update

Anda has decided we need emergency food storage. I did not know this until I moved the couch the other day.

She also stores her Spin and Say in a convenient location.

She loves being outside. I made her a clover chain today. She did not care for it.

She does like walking although she seems to have inherited my coordination.

They heal quickly.

Fourth of July Weekend

Our Fourth of July weekend started off the best way possible: on a boat. Our friends came down for the day and invited us to the lake with them. The water was too choppy for us to get out behind the boat, but it was fun to just anchor and hang out.

That afternoon I insisted that we go to the carnival (for lack of a better word) downtown because I'd never been. There was a lot going on, but the only thing really picture-worthy was Anda's starting contest with this gentleman at the reptile show.

Dan's birthday was on Sunday. He spent the morning going to meetings for church (I don't think I've mentioned on here that he is the second counselor in a BYU singles ward), but when he got home we partied it up. We barbecued, opened presents, ate cake, and went for a walk in the canyon. Dan scored an Erector Set and a model rocket for his 31st birthday, so beat that.

On Monday we went to the parade. Dan's friend Kirk and his family had staked out a great spot, and they were nice enough to let us squeeze in with them. Kirk's mom and her boyfriend even mysteriously procured some extra chairs for us, which they were very secretive about for some reason.

Anda had a good time being out and about, even though sitting still while the fun comes to her isn't the way she usually likes to do business. The canon fire went over okay, but the fire engines honking their horns did not meet with her approval.

This Beautiful Baby Contest winner, however, met with my approval. How cool is this?

We finished things with a bang and did a little fireworks show that evening. They're a little anticlimactic when the sun doesn't go down until well after bed time, but when your audience is a one year old, you have to be flexible.

The sparklers were fun.

The loud firecrackers were not.

What a great weekend. Let's do it again next year.