2 Week Summer Vacation

*Warning! There are a TON of pictures in this post. Sorry, but they must be remembered.

The main thing that brought us over to Idaho was my little sister's graduation. I am so proud of her. She has worked so hard and is the first daughter to receive her 4 year degree. She so dang cute! Then Dylan had to fly out to Philadelphia for two weeks. We missed him so much but that didn't stop us from having some fun.







That weekend I took the girls to the zoo. It was really fun because it was Dr. Doolittle Day at the Idaho Falls zoo and they learned all about the life cycle of a frog. There were tables set up all over along the way where they had to stop and learn something new and get pieces of their tadpole as it "grew" legs and a tale. They made a bag to put all their treasures in and also had to fill out a worksheet with the right answers to the questions to get their stuffed animal at the end. It kept them busy and Kylee especially loved it and had to hurry as fast as she could to find the next table.











I stayed with Dylan's parents for 5 nights. It was so nice to let Emily and Katelyn roam around their property and hang out with grandma and grandpa. Emily was extremely excited to see our horse and road Little Chex just about everyday that we were there. We got to hang out with cousin Kylee and Aunt Julie a lot too. We never get to see them! :( Aunt Kortney and Uncle Nate came up to see us from Utah and brought Grandma Marsden along with them. It went by way too fast!!!













We spent some time with Andrea, Eric, Whitney and Bailee while we were there. I wish that there were more hours in the day. I always felt bad leaving grandma home while we spent time with my brother and sister. I hadn't seen Eric and his family since Thanksgiving and now Bailee is walking!!! These babies grow up too darn fast! We ate pizza, played outside, ate snow cones, and chatted the afternoon away. Oh, and Eric took me for a ride on his new bike. It was way more fun than I thought it would be and I wasn't even scared.










Then it was off to Meridian to stay with my parents. We were able to go to the fair and the kids LOVED the animals which was no surprise. We went to Sportsman's Warehouse in Nampa for kids day. Emily was so great with the activities. She would cast over and over until she FINALLY hit the target all by herself. She then shot a mountain lion with an arrow and got some fun prizes. We went on a scavenger hunt, made trail mix, and camouflaged our faces. We got to see cousins and go to the water park. I went and saw Mama Mia and loved it. Emily loved to be able to go out in the yard and just play and explore. She had so much more freedom on this vacation than she has ever had before and was feeling very grown up. The kids love my mom's dog and keep asking for a Misha dog (bichon). They had fun playing in the kiddy pool and Emily is already asking to go back. Yesterday Katelyn started to cry for grandma. Excuse me? So I let her talk to her on the phone. She was so pleased!!!
The picture of Katelyn bawling at the fair is when Smokey the bear tried to say hello. She was terrified! And the last picture of Dylan and Emily by the cat sign is all for Emily. She loves that sign and every time we drove out of the driveway she would ask if we were going to see the cat sign.