Baby Rae

These are the photos I took of my new neice. She's so perfect!

Congratulations Laura and Nick!!!

Summah time, summah time, sum, sum, summah time

So it would appear to someone that only knew me through my blog that we didn't have a summer at all. As though perhaps we'd entered some sort of worm hole or time continuum that caused us to skip time and go from one school year right into another. Quite the contrary actually. So here are some of our summer goings-on.

Bear bear in coach-pitch baseball. Awwww. It was so cute. He got a hit every time he was at bat (except the one time they had to break out the tee for him...).

Nearly every Tuesday has been "Park Day" with the cousins from my family and Jeff's. It's always a different crowd, but its been really fun to have the little cousins from both sides of the family all play together.

We've been having "Friday Night Swim Party" with Jeff's family nearly every friday since May. It's been great to have a regularly scheduled time to get together.

Our Fourth of July was pretty fun. We went to the Sandy city celebration with a bunch of people (Mortensens, Hortins, Gadds, etc...) to see the festivities and fireworks show.

My brother, Rick, was here visiting for a MONTH! It was so nice to see him on a regular basis. We went hiking a couple of times and the boys loved it. Uncle Nate came with us once too, and boy, I was so glad because I could not have carried the little ones the way the uncles did.

One of my fondest childhood memories is all the time my Dad spent with us at the University of Utah Natural History Museum. We took the kiddos a few weeks ago. They had a really cool frogs display with amphibians from all over the world. And of course the standard dinosaur bones are always the favorite. The museum still has the dark and musty smelling diamond mine and the money eating dinosaur sticking out of the wall... "Hi, my name is Al. Feeeeed me money. Mmmmm. That tastes gooooood." I love that place!

A few weeks ago we visited "This Is The Place Heritage Park". I thought it was a little pricey, but it was well worth it. The boys absolutely loved doing pioneer chores (why do they think hand-washing laundry and beating rugs is easier than putting away toys?), and learning how to card wool, and play that hoop 'n' stick game. We rode a train, and saw a old west quick draw gun fight, pet lambs and goats and oxen calves, saw Brigham Young's house, and had a pony ride. It not just for kids either, Jeff and I enjoyed learning the history and seeing the old structures that began our valley home.

Okay, I have about a bamillion more photos of stuff, but you get the idea. So clearly no worm hole entrance here, although that would have been a cool adventure too.

IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!

(Michelle Rose Grove...circa 1994)

It's my big day, so tell me how much you LOOOOOOVE me and all my awesomeness!!

I want a record amount of comments today!
For REALZZZZZ.

Love, Michelle.
(This is totally me typing.)

For My Jeff

Jeff is out of town this week. I hate it. I miss him everyday. This post is for him so he doesn't miss out on laughing at our funny little boys.


This is my Bear and me at his school.


Our cute four boys lookin' at water. Why aren't they as excited to stare at water in other forms?


This is the day that Jojy decided it was much more fun to paint his little brother rather than the paper he was given.Then he disappeared and let Gabey take the heat for it. I can't leave them alone for a second...


This was the Saturday before Mother's Day. Poor little Jojy fell on his knees at Home Depot when we were choosing flowers for grandmas.

The rest of the boys enjoyed choosing flowers. Jojy still couldn't muster a smile after his injury.

If it looks as though Nanos is in a garbage can- it's because he is. Actually, it's the recycling bin, so it's not as gross. Doesn't he look happy? Hahahaha.


How was that Honey?

Saturday Memorial Day

We went to visit my Grandma's, and Jeff's Grandparent's and sister's graves on Saturday. The weather was perfect. We talked about family history, eternal families, and did rubbings of the headstones. It's an important tradition in my family and we've had to miss it for a couple years so it was nice to participate.

This photo would be so sad if this headstone was for someone we actually knew.

They looked so cute taking break on this gravemarker that I snapped a photo.

Then we all got in there- is that disrespectful? I figured no, because it was family time, but maybe other people looked at us and thought we were horrible.

If you think I'm terrible, don't tell me, what's done is done.

Playing In The Yard

We have a great yard for little boys. So much adventure to be had- diggin' holes, climbin' trees, the creek, bridge, rope swing, space for a baseball game. We honestly spent probably 8 or 9 hours straight in the yard on Memorial Day. It was great.

Is it me, or are these boys so handsome????

Nanos Gets a Guitar

This was such a great moment and I couldn't wait to share these pictures. I love this kid. He's been saving, and saving his money to buy a guitar and he thought he wasn't even close to affording one, so when I surprised him with it, it was priceless. He did have to pay for half (an exercise in responsibility) which he gladly handed over to me today. It's something that's really his, that he bought. I hope he continues to love it as much as he has the past 24 hours.

I always look at my oldest son and think how big he's getting. Until I look at this photo- that guitar drowns him! Hahaha! He seems to handle it pretty well though, and play the few things he knows. He'll just keep on growing at an alarming rate, and I'm fairly certain at some point we'll have to commission the creation of some larger guitar just so he can keep playing. :-)

Thank you again to Neil who sold this to us for a great deal. We'll always be grateful to you for Nano's first guitar.