Kyle's 7th Birthday

Kyle is all about football these days. For his birthday he got to attend a 3-day football camp and he is signed up for the Lehi Youth Football League starting tomorrow night! He also got a pair of cleats and some workout clothes. He even wanted a football themed cake!

Kyle is such a good boy - he sincerely wants to do what is right, and he goes out of his way to do nice things for people. He is caring and loving and wants others to be happy. We are so blessed to have Kyle in our family! Happy Birthday Kyle! (and sorry that Sunday birthdays aren't very exciting).

Notice Josh "helping" blow out the candles? We had to relight them to give Kyle a chance to blow them out on his own!

Goodbye, Trigger

We have had Trigger since he was a puppy in the spring of 1996 - longer than we have had kids! So when our neighbor called us on our vacation Sunday night and told us that Trigger had died, we were all pretty upset. We decided to drive home immediately and bring him back up to the property the next morning and bury him on our land. We found a nice spot on the northwest corner of the property with a great view of the mountains and cliffs and had a little funeral for him. We took a walk up to the gravesite a couple of nights later when the stars were out and the moon was almost full. It is a quiet, peaceful place for him to be. Trigger was a good dog and a big part of our lives for a lot of years. We are going to miss seeing him everyday!

Strawberry Mountain Vacation

For our family vacation this summer we decided to go camping! We wanted to enjoy our land and try out our new camper, so Joe took a week off and we spent 7 days in the mountains in Eastern Utah. Here is a list of some of the highlights (and lowlights) of our trip:

• Joe, McKayla and Kyle biked down the face of the mountain to the Strawberry River, twice! Kyle crashed pretty bad the first time and had battle wounds the entire week. McKayla crashed the next time, but didn't draw as much blood!


• I'm learning how to cook in a Dutch Oven - I make a good Chicken and Rice, but my desserts need a LOT of work still.


• While Joe fished, the kids played in the mud and water of the Strawberry River and had a ball!


• Grandma and Grandpa Bell came up to visit and eat with us on Saturday. Thanks Grandma for the yummy chicken!


• To keep ourselved entertained during the hot hours of the day we played dominoes, Mancala, read some books and watched a few movies.


• We went to church on Sunday at the Fruitland Branch. They weren't a very friendly group, but the speakers were great!


• We all got covered in mosquito bites down by the river.


• Joe's unit got called out on a response and Joe left camp as fast as he could, but it was cancelled before he got past Currant Creek, so he came back to camp.


• We spent Tuesday in Roosevelt, taking showers, doing some laundry, visiting, and having dinner with G&G Bell.


• The camper was wonderful! Joe make sure everything worked properly and kept it all running smooth. The air conditioning was the best! The fridge, stove, and flushing toilet were pretty great, too!


• On one of our walks, Joshua ran past a snake, then ran past it again to tell us about it. When Joe got to the snake, it was in attack mode and Joe shot at it with his AR-15. Luckily, no one got hurt


• Our dog, Trigger, died - but that deserves a blog of it's own.


• McKayla spent one afternoon with her new friend, Destiny, who lives at the Camelot Resort. They floated down the river on tubes for hours!


• Darren Budge brought his boys and some friends up and camped on our land one night. It was good to have them sit around our campfire.


• The kids rode their bikes up and down our "driveway" a hundred times. Josh pedals his tricycle until his legs can't keep up, then he just sticks them out and flies down the hill like a wild man!

Stadium of Fire

We continued our Parker Family tradition to attend the Stadium of Fire! This year tickets were really hard to get because Miley Cyrus was the main attraction talent. Thanks Lisa for getting some tickets for us!Joshua didn't like the noise of the fighter jets that flew over, or the sound of the fireworks, but he ended up enjoying them by the end.Kyle loved watching the Blue Man Group and watching the fireworks. McKayla's favorite part was, of course, Miley Cyrus. She had the binoculars the whole time and she sang and danced to all of the songs she knew.

Timpanogos Cave

Only 15 minutes away from our house, up American Fork Canyon, is Timpanogos National Monument. Joe hiked it last year with his YM group, but I haven't been there since I was a teenager, and our kids had never been there, so we decided to make a day of it and go! The mile and a half hike up is pretty steep, but we started at 7:30 am to beat the heat. The kids did great marching up the mountain side and the cave was absolutely worth it!McKayla loved when they turned off all of the lights and we were in TOTAL darkness. I liked seeing the "heart of Timpanogos" and I was happy to see the "salt and pepper shaker" formation that I remember seeing as a kid. Kyle loved all of it - especially the "carmel sundae" room. Josh held my hand and led me through the cave with helpful hints like "Step up now, Mommy" and "Watch your head!". Joe's favorite part was the hike back down the mountain. After the hike we crossed the street and had a little picnic.

Lehi Round-Up Days

Each year wards get to make a float for the Lehi Miniature-Float Parade. You get $600, a small set of rules, and a theme (this year's was "Tall Tales and Traditions") and you come up with whatever you can to make it look good. Our ward's pirate float was a last minute project, put together in 5 hours, but it turned out okay.

The older kids painted skull and crossbones on some t-shirts and we made sashes and scarves for them from some old sheets. Making the costumes was half of the fun! All three of them were in the parade on Friday evening, and Saturday morning.

On Saturday Joe's team, the 85th CST, was also in the parade with their vehicles.

Gotta be "in" with the in-crowd!

So honestly, I'm tired of looking at everyone else's cool blogs and wondering why I don't do fun, exciting things like you guys do. Then I realized that our family really does have a lot of fun, and I scrapbook a lot of great pages, but nobody ever gets to see them, because you all live so far away! So I decided to finally get techno-savvy : ) and make a blog for our family, and even if we are lazy and boring and don't have any fun at all, at least you will be able to see our lazy lives and see what we are up to! I'm going to add a few posts right away to catch you up on our summer so far - please respond and let me know if you can read them.