4th of July Bike Parade

Here are some cute pictures of our neighborhood's bike parade. It's a fun tradition that we do the week of the 4th. The kids decorate their bikes and then ride through the neighborhood waving to all the onlookers. Afterwards we meet in a cul-de-sac and have ice cream treats. It's a fun tradition that our kids love. We were a little ghetto this year on decorations, but they still had a lot of fun participating. This year we invited the Smiths and the Feveryears (my sisters) to join us. Aren't they cute??




                                                    Rochelle, Jenni, Hollie
                                              Our niece-Abby, our nephew-Parker

Banff

The last week of June we had the opportunity to go to Banff, Canada. Shane has always wanted to go up to Banff. It is about 2 hours northwest of Calgary. It is in the heart of the Canadian Rocky Mountains and is a National Park in Canada. We had to get passports because neither of us have traveled outside the US except for a cruise we did about 4 years ago and we were able to use our birth certificates. Well when we were applying for our passports, I mentioned it to a couple of friends and they would get excited for us and ask where we were going-ummm Canada! Yeah-it didn't sound too exciting to me, I would much rather say Paris, London, Germany, Italy or somewhere in the Caribbean, but sadly this time it was Canada. Well as it turns out, Canada is beautiful! We went up to Banff for a medical conference for Shane which was a bonus because his work paid for his hotel expenses and his flight. We had a great time hiking (I know right?), seeing many of the beautiful lakes and glaciers, staying in a beautiful old hotel that I found out later was rumored to be haunted, seeing wildlife-we saw moose, elk, a coyote which I yelled from the car "wolf, wolf!" I was the designated wildlife spotter on this particular drive. Shane about died. He couldn't believe our luck to find a wolf, ha! ha! Too funny, but the coyote was eating some sort of small animal. We were so close (but safe in our car) to hear the bones crunching! We also saw rocky mountain sheep. They were so amazing and agile. They were able to go straight up steep rocky inclines. It was amazing. The one animal we did not see that would have been cool was a bear. We hear rumors of bear sightings, but we never personally saw one. To be honest I was a little freaked out.  Here are some of the beautiful pictures we took:

Lake Louise (the white that is at the top of the picture is mostly a glacier, but in the picture it looks like clouds-cool huh?)
              Lake Louise
The Fairmont Baniff Springs- our "Haunted" hotel

Shane looking at the Bow Falls which were directly below our hotel
  Us at the Bow Falls

Us at Emerald Lake-we did a hike around this lake that was about 3 miles, it was so pretty
Us at Moraine Lake-this was my favorite lake because of the color of the lake and the backdrop-so unbelievable. It was so pretty that there was a bride there that day in strapless wedding dress getting her bridals done. Talk about cold!
Rochelle at Moraine Lake
Shane at Moraine Lake-check out the view!
Lake Louise-this was at the opposite end of the lake looking back at the "Chauteau"

Ok-enough for now, but I have a lot of other pictures to post about this trip.

HOT HOT Lava Springs-2009

or should I say Lava HOT Springs? Nah-I like it the 1st way. At least Connor does. We went to Lava Hot Springs at the end of June for a Kjar family reunion and that is the way Connor kept saying the name of the town. It was so cute and funny! Well if you haven't been to Lava, you are missing out! The town is tiny, but we had a great time. A friend of our family has a cabin/house up there that she let is rent from her. It was awesome! It slept 18 adults! We got to Lava Thurs night and went swimming on Friday. The pool there was so much fun. The boys loved the water slides, and Peyton especially loved swimming in the pool and playing on a giant play snake that is in the pool. Even Shane and I had a blast on the water slides. On Saturday some of us went and sat in the hot springs, which were, shockingly HOT! Once you got in, it did feel really good. That afternoon we met at a local park and had the big reunion. It was so fun to see cousins that we only see every few years. We can't wait to go back to HOT, HOT Lava Springs!

                 Braydon and Sadie
  Peyton is the one in the middle with the orange water wings
Wow-I look HOT!! Anyway-it was a fun day and Shane and Sadie look cute!
        Connor loved the slide!
           Look at that excitement!
            Sadie and Aunt Kim 

a little of everything

Just some thing we've been up to:

Peyton got the Rise Award at school. Congrats Buddy! He had to do 8 out of 12 requirement to get the award, and most had to be done at home. It's something that takes most of the school year to complete.  June 8, 2009

Connor and Mom spend a day at the zoo.
Sadie got her 1st haircut on May 31, 2009. Here is the after picture-what a cutie!
Before haircut-she had a little bit of a mullet going on.

Sadie can sit up on her own!!!! June 9, 2009

Just some fun things we've had going on at our house!

For Time and All Eternity

On May 30th 2009 we had our daughter, Sadie Lynne Kjar sealed to us. It was a beautiful day! Sadie looked beautiful in her white dress when she came into the sealing room. She was just a delight. So happy! We had a few moments after the sealer had spoken to everyone in the sealing room and we were waiting for the kids to be brought into the room. The sealer asked us if we had anything we wanted to say to everyone. Shane said thank-you to everyone for coming and sharing this day with us, when it was my turn all I could say was that I was happy. I was so overcome with emotion and gratitude. It is a feeling I will never forget. I loved seeing our boys when they came into the sealing room. They looked so handsome! The temple workers even had tie tacks for them to wear. They just looked so grown up and happy. The actual ceremony was very short, but so wonderful. I am so grateful for eternal families. 

lately

So here are a few things that we have been up to lately......


Bats in the backyard.....I opened up our umbrella to get some shade with a neighbor and this is what I saw. To say that I freaked out is an understatement. We ran inside and I promptly called animal control. It took them a couple of hours to get to our house, meanwhile I had to keep the kids inside because we didn't know if they bat was rabid. The animal control worker took our umbrella out and put it on the ground. She was able to get the bat into a coffee can and take it away. It made for an eventful evening.......one that I might add, Shane was at work!
Signs of a good nap......this is what your hair looks like after a great nap. What a little cutie!
Gardening....we've been doing a lot of work in our yard, and Connor was a big help while Peyton was at school. We planted two new trees this year: a Pansy Locust Redbud and a Haruko Nakishi Willow. We also planted two new shrubs: Wagilla (not sure if I spelled that right). We got all our annuals planted: graniums, petunias, and impatience. I planted our 10 pots (I know I go a little overboard here, but I LOVE the pots in my front yard and love the color they bring to our backyard.) I also got the "garden" planted. Since our yard in wider that it is deep, we have gotten creative with our garden. We don't have a square plot dedicated to this, but we plant our garden in our flower beds in our backyard. This year we did, 2 cantaloupe, 1 watermelon, 2 trellis' of pole beans, 2 cucumbers, 1 celebrity tomato, 1 cherry tomato, 2 habenero chilis, 1 red pepper, 1 zuchinni, and 1 crookneck squash.

Ducks in the yard. Since we live pretty close to a river, our neighborhood has a lot of ducks every spring. This little bunch waddled through our backyard with 9 or 10 baby ducks. Connor and his friends loved to see them. It's fun to see new life and new little families each spring.

BASEBALL!!!!! This spring has been full of baseball! Peyton and Connor both played baseball this year and it's been busy!!! Here is a picture of Sadie at a game. The weather was weird-games were either HOT or COLD. 

Peyton up to bat. He played for the Yankees this year. It was his 1st year doing player pitch games. It made for some seriously long games. He did great this year! He had great coaches that really built up their team and taught them that teamwork was #1.
What a good lookin' dude!

Connor-after his "slide". He is So funny! Connor is way into baseball. I mean this kid loves baseball! He has been patiently waiting for 2 years to be old enough to play tee-ball. He was on the Pirates this year and has loved every minute of it.
What a cutie! Look at him, so proud at 1st base.
Connor hits the ball so hard-I'm not just saying that because I'm his mom. All of his coaches are amazed when he throws and hits the ball. Everyone asks "How old is he?" Everyone thinks he is older because of his size and his athletic ability. We love ya Connor!

So in a nutshell....that's the randomness we have been up to lately.

Finalization

Today we took Sadie to court and finalized her adoption! Yeah!!! We are so thrilled that her adoption is final. She is offically SADIE LYNNE KJAR! She was darling during our meeting with the judge and cooed and was really sweet. The judge asked the boys what they thought of Sadie and they were both  SO quiet! I think the judge in her black robe was a little intimidating. I have to admit-I was sweating it just a bit. I wasn't too worried that things wouldn't work out, but come on-this judge had the future of our family in her little pen! I always get emotional during finalization when the attorney asks if I have bonded and love the child. This time was no exception, but the tears started a little sooner when he started to present the case to the judge and I was feeding Sadie and he pointed to her and said we were here for this sweet baby girl. I totally started to tear up and was thinking how blessed I was. I still can't believe she is ours! The circumstances of her adoption is a total miracle that we got her. The proceedings went really smooth and before we knew it, the judge was signing the adoption decree to make everything final. We actually held the hearing in the judges chambers, which was a first for us. After the proceedings, we went to a late lunch/early dinner to the Cheesecake Factory. It was fun way to celebrate the newest "official" member of our family. We couldn't be more thrilled!!

                                       Grandpa Kjar and Grandma Gay with the kids
Grandpa Vick and Grandma Janet with the kids
                                                          Our family with the judge