1st birthday

Most of you who will read this were probably at the party, so I will spare you the details and let the pictures do the talking. We had all the birthday essentials: a cake, homemade ice cream, b-bque, presents, family, and a giant slip 'n' slide. Thanks everyone for the presents. She loves them all!


Enjoy.










She didn't much enjoy eating her cake. She is apparently much to dainty.



This is our rockin slip'n'slide with the added help of two man power.








It was a great day.

Squatters

Turns out having baby birds living in your back yard can be hazardous. These three adorable baby robins live in one of our trees out back. Under that same tree was also a broken sprinkler head. Throw in a fiesty mommy robin and you have got the perfect storm. After multiple attempts at venturing near the tree to fix the sprinkler and equally as many dashes back inside the house, Lance sheepishly asked if I would come with him outside and protect him from a bird. (you can giggle if you like - I know I did - that is until I got outside)

Armed with a broom we made our way toward the base of the tree amidst the terrible screeching of this hysterical mommy bird. We hadn't even made it to the tree when I realized why Lance had been dashing into the house and was now requesting protection. The mommy robin was dive bombing us, and she was a side-winder. With moves like a linebacker, she would zig and zag through the air as she zoomed toward my head. It was terifying. No really, I thought that the Alfred Hitchcock movie "Birds" was a bit hokie, but after this experience I think he was really onto something.

This mommy robin drove us back indoors at least 3 more times, each time we collected more protective equipment and made more advanced battle plans complete with hand signals and defense strategies. I will boast that I successfully defended my husband's safety for a solid five minute stretch with at least 15 dive bomb attempts from the enemy and endured endless torrents of what I assume to be the foulest bird profanity.

At long last, the sprinkler was functioning and we were safely back indoors content to let the mommy robin reclaim her nest that had never really been in harms way. I do have to respect her efforts for single handedly taking on two grown adults in full battle attire with such relentlessness. Although it was my head she was aiming at, I do respect her motivation. Go mommy bird!

I guess having birds in the yard is not all it's "cracked" up to be.

Tree House Museum

The Tree House Museum, whose name is misleading at best, features almost everything but trees. With the one exception of a giant tree house that doubles as a staircase set in the middle of the building there is almost no other reference to plant life at all. I felt very foolish (much like I did when I saw Fiddler On The Roof expecting a comedy and sat wondering at intermission when it was going to get funny) as I was expecting to become educated on the many different kinds of trees and which ones were best for building tree houses in. However, this was a more welcome turn of events than the previous mentioned mis-understanding as this meant that it would be MORE fun.

There were many different rooms, each with a different theme and complete with dress ups for young and old alike. Here are some pictures of said rooms.

What's this? The Oval Office complete with life size cardboard cut out of President Obama? Why not.

And here is the Presidential wall, recently updated with our new President's picture and the potential for one more. Who will it be? You decide. That's why they leave the question mark, so that you can decide.

The giant chess room

Turns out that Alex is only 4 inches tall, which I believe makes her a fairy rather than above averaged height human being.

Creepiest room after dark.

The royal court

The court jester (the man behind the curtain -lance - not Alex - although she seemed pretty tickled about it too)

And what would be stored in a little house with giant chicken feet sticking out the bottom? Russian dolls. Of course.

No caption, the picture really is enough.

Dress ups intended for children with Rob's best wolf face.

But everyone's favorite room was the music room. It really was fantastic and you couldn't help but want to make reckless irrational noise as seen here.

Well, that is the tree house museum, once again, not about trees. Go and have fun.

Oh and we found a turtle in the middle of the road on the way home. We rescued it from certain death and it shared a brief stay with us during which time it peed on Lance (ungrateful), scratched him to pieces, and rejected the veggies and temporary home it was provided while we searched the surrounding neighborhood for owners of a missing pet turtle, found on the internet that this turtle could be native to Utah (What? Who ever heard of flocks of wild turtles running around Utah?), and returning it again to the precise location in which we found it (off the road of course) where she was more than likely headed to lay her eggs. We also learned that turtles can also carry many types of disease. Hooray for good deeds and hand sanitizer.

4th of July Fun

My sister, who lives in Missouri, came out for the 4th of July. Since this is a rare occurrence we had to pack every second with fun. First up, a kids parade. We had the sweetest ride in town. This is the Cadillac of little red wagons complete with bucket seats, seat belts (so wiggly babies can't jump out), and an added umbrella for shade (courtesy of Emma my niece - how thoughtful). We then pimped our ride with streamers, sparklers, and a giant poster so there would be no mistaking who we were. The kids were stoked.

There was of course the Legion Hall breakfast, the renowned parade, and regular park festivities which are all Beckstrand 4th of July traditions and are not to be missed. Unfortunately, I was having far to much fun to waste time taking pictures. Sorry. Use your imaginations. I am sure what you will come up with will be sufficient.

Then of course there are fireworks, which is where Fillmore spends 98% of the annual budget. We have a firework show that rivals Times Square and is enjoyed by about 1,500 people. Our pre-firework show had an even smaller audience, but was enjoyed just as much.

On to the main event. We had staked our claim with multiple blankets, consumed our donuts, and settled in for the show. Everything was going swimmingly when we began to feel that the illusion of each fireworks flaming remnants falling down on top of our heads was no longer an illusion. We were under fire. We dodged canisters and miscellaneous bits of smoldering ash as we took shelter under the safety of our blankets, and with eyes peering out continued to watch the show. What goes great with fire? Why rain of course, which is what began to fall from the sky next. (I didn't know James Taylor had been to one of Fillmore's firework spectaculars. Make that 1,501 people) Luckily we were already under our blankets so no harm done. However, after all this it was the finale that was the real kicker. There was a problem with the last firework of the night. The problem being that it exploded on the ground rather than in the sky, shooting a terrifying but quite brilliant ring of fire out in all directions. The closest of which landed about 15 feet from our battle torn blanket. Thankfully, we didn't hear of anyone being hurt from the debacle, and all we can say is we look forward to next year!

During the rest of the week, we also managed to fit in a trip to Cherry Hill, where Alex promptly fell asleep upon arrival and remained that way for and hour and half, (thank goodness for mom's who like to sit and watch over sleeping babies) a trip to see my cousin Brianne's darling new baby, where I realized that mine no longer could be classified in that category, and the Ute Stampede.

I know, we sure know how to have a good time.

(I put this one in because my brother is so cute - he was very proud of himself for beating Emma in tetherball)

there is a big house in centerville

Yeah, it's probably not the biggest house you've ever seen, but something about where it is located and how deep it goes back just blew my mind for some reason. Also I wanted to try out the video feature on my new iphone 3gs.

"Did you just say 3gs?"

I did indeed. Suck it world.

Lance's post. No words just pictures.

figure it out yourself.