Lake Powell...

Sophie has been looking forward to Lake Powell since her Birthday. Everyday she would say several times, "when we go Lake Powell"? or "Mommy, I want to go Lake Powell". A week before we left, I finally started doing a count down. She didn't fully grasp the concept. The rest of the week she would walk around saying, " I go to Lake Powell in 7 days". The preparation, as always is a lot of work. It takes a week just to get ready to go. We were all up late Monday night getting the last minute things done. We drove away around 7:45 Tuesday morning. Sophie fell asleep not too far into the drive. We went ahead of the caravan, Corey thought he would have to stop at Jeff's to get some work done. He didn't end up needing to, so we waited at a gas station in Spanish Fork to meet up with the rest of the group. We arrived around 3:00 in the afternoon. It was raining lightly and a little bit windy. We found our campsite just as the rain stopped. We set up our camp and made dinner. The rest of the night was calm and nice. Sophie tossed and turned the whole night and cried that she wanted to go home. The next day she woke up with puffy eyes, a runny nose and a cough. She was in good spirits though, and we enjoyed another cool/mildly stormy day. We had another wind storm pick up that afternoon with thunder, lightening and a little rain. We stood under the canopy and held on for dear life as we watched our tents bend over, and blow away in the crazy wind. Thank Heavens for the motor home. It was a life saver for Sophie. The next day was sunny and HOT. We spent most of the day water skiing, and tube riding as usual. Sophie got to ride the tube with Daddy, and I enjoyed just being on the boat. We spent some time at the Marina eating ice cream, we also spent some time trying to find Sophie some cold medicine. She got a little bit worse on Thursday. We painted our toenails, a Lake Powell tradition, and swam around the shore. Sophie loved splashing around in the shallow water, and swimming with Daddy. Thursday night we took a drive in the car to Bull Frog so Sophie could get some rest in the air conditioned car. She fell asleep quickly and took a nice long nap. Because Sophie wasn't feeling weel we were going to get a room for 1 night at the Hotel, but they were sold out. When we got back to our campsite we saw a disaster area. All of the tents we down. Things had been blown every which way, and some metal poles had been broken in half. We found out while we were gone they had had a massive wind storm, worse than then ones before. Our tent was the only one semi left standing, but one of the poles had snapped. The canopy had also stayed upright, but some of its poles had also been snapped. Our floating swim toys had ended up over the hill, and Matt and Krista's tent ended up almost taking a swim in the Lake. We spent the rest of the evening cleaning an inch of sand out of our tents and making/eating dinner and playing games. As we were heading to our tent for the night Sophie looked at it, and in a sad, depressed voice said, "There my new home". We started to laugh and told her we were going to go to our old home soon. She woke up Friday with a low grade fever so we decided we were going to leave that afternoon instead of Sunday. We spent the morning loading our car and tie dying our shirts. Look closely at Corey's tie-dye shirt in the picture. He didn't care to make one this year, he said "I never even wear the one I made last year". We told him to wear one of Sam's and get into the picture. So instead he grabbed one of Jessica's tank tops for the photo op, he's a nerd! All of the shirts turned out so awesome! We ate a quick lunch and hopped in the boat. We drove up the main channel and found one of our favorite caves. We swam in the cool, clear water. As we were leaving, Corey went to climb into the boat. As he went to stand on the platform, the boat caught a little wave from another boat causing him to slip off back into the water. As a result he sliced his big toe open. It was bleeding everywhere. My dad put a band aide on it and we drove around the channel for a few more minutes. We headed back to our camp, and my Dad cleaned up Corey's wound and told him not to get it wet anymore. He was bummed because he still wanted to ski and tube. We decided that it was time for us to go, so we packed up the last of our things and drove away. Sophie was excited to be back in the air conditioned car. She fell asleep 20 minutes into the drive. We stopped at Blondies and got dinner to go. Sophie slept clear through until the middle of Price canyon, when we forced her to wake up and eat something. We got home around 9:00 at night. When she got in our house, she exclaimed "We're HOME"! Then proceeded to run back and forth with a delirious excitement. When she realized we really were home she ran to her toys and started saying "Oh my gosh, there my castle, Oh my gosh, there my bed!, Oh my gosh there my princesses, Oh my gosh, there my closet. I was laughing so hard. We all took a long shower to wash of the Lake Powell grime, then fell into our nice soft beds and went to sleep. It was a really, really fun trip. Despite all of the problems we had with the wind and Sophie being sick. We laughed hard, ate good food and spent time with people we care about! Once again, Thank you Mom and Dad for all the hard work you put into this fun trip... Until next year!

Magic Feet and other Random Silliness...

Little Miss Sophie is full of Beans! She is constantly saying things that have us rolling on the floor with Laughter. I felt like I needed to document some of her best...
She got some Princess Shoes for her birthday from Grammy and Papa. She is convinced that when she puts them on her feet they become magic. The other night, as she put her belle shoes on she said "Mommy my feets are magic." I excitedly told her that was amazing and told her that I wished my feet were magic too. She happily clunked over to me, picked my foot up off of the floor and kissed the middle of my foot. She put it down and proudly exclaimed "there" "now they are magic".

She thinks it is a funny game to push the input button on the side of the TV. When she pushes the button it makes the TV change from TV to Movie mode. Her favorite, is to push it when we are in the middle of a movie, or if she doesn't want to watch something anymore. She has been put in time out for it before, and knows it is something we don't like her to do. The other night, she started pushing the button. We told her to please stop and asked her if she wanted to play a different game. She didn't and continued to push the button. After several minutes, we told her that if she did it one more time she was going to be put in time out. To our surprise she stopped, which mind you is a miracle considering her determined, stubborn, two year old self. She proceeded to walk away. That's when I noticed a little gleam in her eyes, like a light bulb had just turned on. She walked over to her stuffed Ariel doll, picked her up and nonchalantly strolled back over toward the TV. She then grabbed Ariel by the arm, lifted her up to the button and exclaimed "Come on Ariel do this, It's fun!" It took me a second to register what she had just said. After that I couldn't contain my laughter.

Some of her other daily sayings are, "Oh My Gosh", "Holy Smokes", "Oh My Goodness", "Oh Man", "Let's go daddy O", "Sheesh", "Let's go funny face", and her latest which I am not proud of because it was my fault... "What the freak" she was immediately told that we do not say that.
Now she walks around saying " what the freak, No No No Sophie, we don't say that". She loves toenail polish. If she sees that you have your toes painted she will say, "oh, I love your paints". She always tells us "I love you so so much". She calls herself a Silly Goose. Sam taught her to say "whoa, see ya later Sophie" whenever she falls.
She is a joy and brings sunshine into our lives every day.

Pioneer Day...

This morning we drove down town to try and make it to the Days of 47 parade. We saw floats go by us on their way home, we saw a couple at Liberty Park, and by the time we made to the actual parade route, it was over. When we got home we started getting things ready for Lake Powell. That night we rode tracks to Spring Mobile Ball Park for our yearly trip to the Bees game. Due to a sad event, the opposing team wasn't able to catch their flight. As a consequence the game was canceled. We were able to watch/endure a home run derby. Balls we flying at us every minute or so. One scared a lady behind me so bad, she threw her drinks in the air and they fell on the ground and splashed us. Corey knocked over a lady sitting by us as he was trying to save Sophie and I from being hit in the head. Sophie and I finally took refuge under the picnic table until it was over. We ate yummy Baseball park food, my favorite part of any game! There is something wonderful about a Chicago Dog and a Diet Coke! We also sat through 7 innings of a High school all star vs. College all star game. The game itself was a bit of a let down. But, what I really go for is the fireworks. They were awesome as usual. Sophie enjoys them almost as much as I do. She ooos and ahhhs as each one goes off. It's a fun holiday and I feel humbled to celebrate. I am so grateful for my ancestors. I am so grateful I didn't have to cross the plains and settle this beautiful state. God Bless America and our Utah Pioneers.

Birthday Party at Grammy & Papas...

My Parents threw Sophie another birthday party tonight. We ate kabobs, fresh vegetables, chocolate cake and homemade ice cream. My parents gave her princess shoes and dress ups, an outfit and some other little things. Grandma Webb gave her a Ariel bath doll, and The Blancks gave her a princess necklace. She had the best time. I told Corey she is going to wake up tomorrow morning and wonder why she isn't having another party. Thanks for the fun time!

Sophie's Ariel Birthday Party...

Sophie had her Ariel Party today. Whenever we would ask her what she wanted to do for her birthday, she would always say she wanted an Ariel Birthday. We invited our family and friends over for a BBQ and swimming. We had lots of good food. Everyone got into a "pushing each other in the pool contest", probably instigated by Corey. I think almost everyone ended up in for a swim. Sophie had a blast sitting on the side of the pool watching every one. She also got in and swam with Papa. She got a lot of really fun presents that she just adores. She was so excited when we brought out her Princess Castle that she tripped and scraped her knee. She had an Ariel Birthday cake with strawberry ice cream. I loved watching her face as we sang Happy Birthday, she blew her candles out all by herself, Just like she said she would. She was so tired after her fun party that she fell sound asleep right after her bath. I love you sweet girl! I hope you had a really fun party.