Sweet Watermelon Summer

We had a great summer. We moved, of course, so it wasn't exactly stress free, but it was fun, partially because of our new home.

We discovered that this is our watermelon boy. And our strawberry boy, and our grapes boy, and our banana boy. Basically, this kid loves fruit. Takes after his mom...and dad.

We love our new home. We ate outside on our patio every single evening, enjoying the warm summer nights as we rolled in the grass and watched the hummingbirds drink from our flowers.

We planted a few things in our garden including cucumbers, tomatillos, basil, tomatoes, oregano, and watermelon. We were surprised how many things grew so well, including this big watermelon. Our plant only gave us the one, but we were grateful to get it, and so big!

To say the girls were excited about it would be the understatement of the year. They monitored its progress every day and were overjoyed when we finally proclaimed that it was large enough and could be picked. We were especially excited because we'd seen on the tag when we planted it that it was supposed to be yellow inside. We couldn't wait to find out if it was true.

Sure enough, it was in fact a yellow watermelon. It tasted every bit as juicy and delicious as a red one, and probably more so because we grew it ourselves. It was awesome. The other fun discovery for the girls this summer was when I paired the home grown tomatoes with the basil. They thought that was fantastic, and Sophie decided that sometime we needed to make the tomatoes into soup and put basil with it. Imagine her surprise when I showed her some the next time we were at Costco. "Someone thought of my idea!" she said. It was pretty funny. I love eating fresh yummies from our very own backyard!

We did a lot of other fun stuff this summer, including a birthday party at a bounce house place for my friend Tanya's daughter Erica.

(And if you're wondering why William looks so feminine and petite in this picture it's because it's his cousin Nona. I was watching her for the afternoon when we went to the birthday party. She is so cute and has the best smile on the planet.)

Well, except maybe for this one. I'm biased, but his grin when he sees Momma is pretty hard to beat in my opinion. Will was pretty excited to get in on the slide action and was a definite fan, so long as his daddy was going with him. Can you tell he doesn't miss many meals?

We were excited we had our first official house guests in our new home. Our friends the Bowns's game to visit for a couple of days and our girls really hit it off. They still ask when Jules and Lorien are coming back to play.

It took a couple silly pictures to get one serious one where everyone was looking...

...but we finally managed it. We had a blast with you here, so thanks for making the trip to Disneyland so we could see you!

I'm missing the summer already, so it's a good thing they come around every year!

Avery turns 3!

Avery turned 3 on July 4th, 2011.

I decided to make her a rainbow cake and this is the finished product. The outside wasn't my favorite, but the inside was awesome.

This is what the inside looked like before it was baked. You can see it after it was baked at the end of the post.

We started the day with a parade in Avery's honor (or at least that's what she thought! She still doesn't know that all the cool things the community does on the 4th of July aren't just for her birthday, and we're going to keep it that way for as long as possible.) The kids collected a ton of candy.

Then I let the girls do some finger painting...with frosting. I had a bunch of leftover frosting from Avery's cake so I let them dig into that and make some pictures. Avery preferred to paint herself rather than the paper, of course.

In the afternoon we all went to a fun place for kids where there were roller coasters and bumper cars and carousels...and a diner. Avery and I got a hot dog and soda at the counter together. I'm so glad I got to be her date on her birthday!

Grandma Jensen threw a great birthday party complete with delicious food and some of the people Avery loves best from both sides of her family. She couldn't wait to tear into her gifts and loved all of them.

She was very excited about her Rapunzel doll.

And her Princess book kept her entertained the entire drive home from Utah to California. Anything that has music is a hit with Avery.

Then she blew out her candles and we cut open the cake.

And this is what it looked like on the inside! Rainbow inside and out. She loved it.

We hope you had a wonderful day, Avery Jane! Thanks for being our sweet 3-year old girl and for all the laughter and smiles you bring to our family every day. We love you!

(Then we ended the day with firecrackers...still for her of course. Both girls loved them.)

Happy Fourth of July! 2 great ladies were born this day...America and Avery!

Julie and Leo's Wedding

My little (and only) sis married the love of her life in June in the Salt Lake Temple. It was a beautiful day.

Leo is a great guy and we're very happy to have him in the family. We like that he has a little bit of a dramatic flair to him. :)

They were married in the Salt Lake Temple with all their friends and family present, including Leo's family who came all the way from Brazil for the big day.

The Lamb Fam...all 18 (and a half) of us.

When did we all grow up?! 4 down, 2 to go!

Julie and Leo were married by Grandpa Lamb who has now married all of us except Peter and Abby (who were instead married by some guy you might have heard of...President Thomas S. Monson!)

Sophie thought Julie was such a beautiful bride...and she was.

Avery saw everyone snapping pictures and didn't want to be left out, so she begged to take a few of her own. The real photographer of the day snagged a picture of her in action.

Sophie and Avery with their favorite Austin and Gabe. These 4 sure love each other and I hope they always will be close!

This is definitely one of my favorite pictures from the day.

Here's my Grandpa Austin with several of his great-grandchildren.

The night before the wedding we had a wedding dinner. Joseph and I sang the customary song we re-write for the couple to tell their story. This time it was Taylor Swift's "Love Story" ("He knelt to the ground and pulled out a ring and said, 'Marry me, Julie!'" Couldn't be more perfect, could it?).

Afterward we got a picture of all the newest grandbabies on my Mom's side, starting with Will at 8 months down to little Natalie Austin who's only a few days old here.

The reception was held at Carmelle Reception Center and they did a fabulous job. The girls were especially enamored with the floor to ceiling mirrors that they could pose in front of in their purple flower girl dresses and twirl to their heart's content.

The boys were also very handsome this evening, and I especially loved Will's little suit. He looked so dapper in it.

I love this shot of the 6 grandkids with the bride and groom. Sophie's face is priceless, and Will kept looking up at Julie because he couldn't figure out why she looked so much like his mama but clearly not enough.

Here they all are together, and smiling too!

Three...

Two...

One.

FIVE!

The dessert at the reception was a delicious crepe with a million toppings to choose from. How they knew that crepes is one of my girls' absolute most favorite creations on the earth I don't know, but I think Sophie and Avery ate 3 or 4 of them a piece.

The real side of this wedding couple. :) Awesome.

Awwww...

The bride with her attendants, showing some attitude. Without planning it we all popped the same leg--pretty funny.

Joseph and I always have a friendly bet about whether the couple will shove the cake or be nice. This time I said they would shove and he said they would be nice. I almost always win, but before they started cutting Joseph coached them to be nice over and over which I think is totally cheating. Julie was up first and she smeared frosting on Leo's nose first, then fed him the cake nicely, and Joseph maintains that he wins the bet. I think any smearing is definitely in the category of shoving, so I think nobody really won.

Funny story about the bouquet toss: Sophie was looking forward to this moment more than any other during the day because she so wanted to catch the bouquet. You can see she is out in front waiting with open arms. Julie tosses it, it flies up in the air and is on target to land right in Sophie's arms when all the big girls from behind jump over her and snatch the bouquet out of the air before she can reach it. She was devastated. She started to cry and I tried to comfort her, and then the others saw and gave the bouquet back to Julie to toss it again, but even though it went right to her it hit her in the face so she just started crying harder. I explained that I didn't want her to catch it anyway because that would mean she'd have to get married next and I'm not ready to let her go, so she was placated and now loves watching the video we have of the toss. It really is hilarious how her face goes from pure glee at almost catching the flowers, to dismay that they didn't land in her hands, to absolute defeat when she realizes they were stolen from her. It was hilarious.

The dancing portion of the night was my favorite part. Those Brazilians sure know how to cut a rug! They could totally move and they put all the rest of us to shame.

We still had fun anyway, though. Here Joseph and I are dancing to our wedding song, Nora Jones's "Come Away with Me". Will was trying to cut in here, but sorry, this is OUR song, honey.

Sophie and Avery loooove to dance! I think Avery had fun with her aunt Julie the beautiful bride, and we all had a great time at their wedding. Thanks for an awesome day, and congrats Julie and Leo Almeida! We love you!