The Big Truck

On Father's Day we stopped by the Scherbel's project house to check out the progress. Very impressive. While there has been lots of work done inside, I think everyone's favorite thing to do is level the dirt in the backyard with the trackhoe. Rick got it out and let us take a stab at operating the machine, and I must say I wasn't very coordinated. Caden, though, was great at his job of pushing the lever to dump the bucket of dirt. Ever since he keeps saying, "I wanna go to grandma's house, ride the truck, and dump out the dirt!"

Purple Power!

Last weekend was the American Cancer Society Relay for Life. The relay goes all night long, because 'Cancer never sleeps.' My sister, Kellie, has been involved with organizing the local relay the last two years. She is the entertainment chair, and does a great job getting local talent to donate a few hours of their time. I particularly liked whoever she got for the opening band this year. In addition to her enetertainment duties, Kellie also decided to captain a walking team. Since our grandpa, an aunt, and an uncle on my Dad's side of the family are all cancer survivors she pulled in team members from the family. Our team was pretty colorful, with survivors wearing purple shirts, organizers wearing green, and walkers in white.

Caden made countless laps in the stroller with whoever would push him, and even Eric made a lap. Caden also helped fill a paper bag with sand (as weight) for the luminaries ceremony.

Way up High, In the Sky

Its Caden's rocket! Last night was the annual ward summer party. Caden had a blast (literally) making and launching his rocket. Daddy helped him chase it down and repeatedly relaunch it for almost an hour. As you can see, Ryan ate most of his hot dog dinner on the fly because Caden just couldn't wait. And Ryan now has one more thing on his 'I've gotta build this' this.

Downtown Salt Lake City

What would a trip to Salt Lake be like without a visit to Temple Square and other downtown sites? We took today to be tourists in our own city. We drove downtown and parked in the UTA free fare zone, then boarded the Trax train. The kids waited anxiously on the bench at the train station. We rode the train a few short blocks, then got off at Temple Square. We saw both the North and South visitor centers, including the new miniature model of the inside of the Salt Lake Temple. Caden loves temples and is really fascinated by the Angel Moroni statues. Its pretty hard to get 5 kids to all look at the camera. We didn't even really attempt here. Then Grandpa joined us for lunch on the Main Street Plaza, followed by a trip up to the observation deck of the Church Office Building. We finished up the day with another train ride (Caden thought it was pretty cool we got to go twice).

A Day for Play

We decided to scale back for a day and just let the kids run free outside. The cousins came down to our house, jumped on the tramp, played on the swingset, and got the grand tour from Caden. Then we went to a local park where the kids discovered a slide they could all three fit side by side on. It was so cute to watch them line up, hold hands, and tumble down. Eric and Brooklynn thought it was pretty funny, too.

That night Grandma and Grandpa watched all 5 kids while Em, Kell, and I went to see The Wedding Singer at Hale Center Theater. I love getting out to see live theater!

Family Dinners

After the adventures in California, Emilee and her girls came back with us to Utah. Em wanted to see as many of the cousins as she could, so she organized two cousin dinners. On Monday, we met the Loveridges at a park. We had a bring your own dinner potluck and played some Minute to Win it games. I'm trying to locate safety pins in a bucket of rice - harder than it sounds. On Tuesday McKenzie got home from her mission so a good chunk of the Dodds cousins converged on Murray. We again met at a park, this time for Pizza and some t-ball. Caden fell in love with hitting the ball and Caden and Grandpa formed a new bond.

Day at the Museum

We dropped by the Church History Museum today to play for a while in the children's area. Grandma helped the three older kids color stained glass windows. Caden managed to get the marker all over his hands and shirt, but he sure was proud of his pictures. Madisen's picture was solid color, and Caitlyn's was all purple. Meanwhile Em and Kell entertained the younger two with the animal puppets.

For me, the highlight was watching Eric play with the plastic chair. It was worthy of a video

Sun (sorta), Sea and Sand

We had high hopes for our beach day in California. Eric's shirt says it all - Sun, Sea, and Sand. We stayed at a beach house, so we had the convenience of being at the beach all day long. SUN: First thing in the morning the kids wanted to take a walk down the beach. As you can tell from our attire, the sun wasn't really out. We had a good time, anyway, and Caden and the girls loved running from the waves then chasing them back down the beach.

SEA: We couldn't seem to stay dry, so even though it was chilly we changed into our swimsuits and played in the water. Caden loved wave jumping, but since the waves would have swamped him he needed a little help. I think the boost from daddy is a big part of why he liked wave jumping.

SAND: We finally coaxed the kids away from the water, but not back into the house. Aunt Kellie spent a lot of time supervising the sand digging. Eric kept picking it up and squishing it in his hands while squealing. He couldn't seem to figure out the new texture.

Ryan, Kellie, and Grandpa flew home Tuesday afternoon. They had to return to work. Emilee, Grandma and I would be taking two days to drive home with the 5 kids. Before Ryan left, though, he tried body surfing with Bill and Grandpa and helped Caden make a sand castle, complete with moat so the waves wouldn't wash it away.

Disneyland!

Saturday afternoon my mom and Kellie came to help me load all our stuff and the boys up. We drove to Panguitch that night where we met up with my dad and Ryan who had been fishing with the guy cousins. We stayed the night at grandma and grandpa's house, then Sunday finished the long drive into LA. You can see how the men traveled. Poor Eric. His head kept flopping over, so we were trying to prop it up with pillows and the life jacket. You can't tell here, but he really can breathe.

Monday morning bright and early we piled 12 people (including 5 car seats) into one van and drove on into Disneyland. Back in February we'd made quilts to donate for the Give a Day Get a Disney Day program. Mom did a majority of the work, and we're all glad she did. We all wore yellow hoping it would make it easier to keep track of each other, and it worked. Here we are entering the park, ready for a day of fun.

We stood in lots of line, but we got to ride lots of rides. Caden didn't care what ride was next, as long as he was getting on it. Every time we got off a ride he'd say "I wanna do it again!" We piled the majority of us into the "Wild Animals" car on Casey Junior. We took a break from the heat on Its a Small World (my dad's favorite ride), and Caden rode the carousel twice.

We watched the parade, which was a high energy dance party. Caden's favorite Disney character is Donald Duck and he was jumping off his seat when Donald came to dance right in front of us. We rode the teacups and spun them as fast as they would go. Then Kellie, Ryan and I left the kids with the other adults and went to ride some non kid friendly rides. You can see they had their hands full.

We played so hard we wore the boys out. Caden fell asleep in the stroller going between rides, and stayed that way for over an hour. Eric and Brooklyn both fell asleep in their daddy's arms and rode a few rides that way. It was a good thing our little troopers took naps, though, because that meant we were able to stay for the fireworks show. We went back to the beach house and all slept soundly.