Summer fun, St George!!

I love the summer, have I ever expressed my love for the sun? I love everything about it-the heat, the way my skin loves the sun, and how happy my husband and kids are in the sun. We are a happy family in the summer time! (Ok Matt and the kids love the snow too, but not me, i despise it actually!)

Our normal summer usually consists of ONE summer trip and some small boat rides out on Utah Lake. That's it! Work takes over both of Matt and my time and the summer goes by far too quickly.

This summer we have made an effort to take some small trips to St. George (3 times actually). And i am now this is the way to celebrate the summer. I LOVE IT! Adam and Natalie have been so generous to invite us along TWICE with them down to Coral Canyon and do nothing .

The first trip was with NO kids. I finally experienced an actual relaxing few days, one that i will appreciate forever. Sorry NO pictures, I read 2 books, sat by the pool and slept. It was joyous.

Thank you to both of our families for helping out with the kids, I know they both had a great time with everyone, and we enjoyed them being with you!!

Second time we decided our children could be included and headed back down for a few more days in the sun. Our children are fish. Love the water, love the sun, love the lizards, and love being outside.

It was very low key and lots of fun, spent most the day at the pool while the boys golfed, then had some really good food (Matt and Adam did two great bbq dinners!!!) We played a lot of card games, learned to master my michigan rummy (which I beat Adam EVERYTIME!!), and just had a fun few days together! Saige developed a huge crush on Chad and I am pretty sure drove him insane, but it was a lot of fun spending time with Adam's family!

Our best friend Staci

Staci had been watching our kids for quite a while, and when I say that my kids love her, that is understatement. The both adore her, and wish that they could hang out with her over Matt and I any day. (I don't blame them, she is pretty cool!) But she decided that she needed to do some growing up and "soul searching" and move away to Virginia for the summer.

At first I was a little torn about her leaving, (I hope I am not sharing too much Staci, if so I can always delete this!), she has been doing so well with her sobriety and had such the "fan base" of people who were needing her in their lives for their sobriety. She honestly became an inspiration to everyone who met her. (My favorite was when we went to her year sobriety meeting and everyone came up to our Mom telling her how much they loved her, and I think I heard about 10 people say "Staci has this light about her, she is amazing!")

ANYWAYS.... I was afraid that she would move away from her comfortable life here and get in a rut there and it would trigger something to make her go back to drugs and alcohol. After a couple of talks she helped me to see that this is what she needed to grow-up. She promised me that she would be good, afterall her best of best friend Cameron and his wife were headed down and they are there to keep track of her. So we said lots of prayers and I knew I had to put my faith in her and send her on her way (gosh why is this sounding like a mom sending her daughter....).

Fast forward to now, SHE IS DOING AMAZING. Staci has grown in more ways than anyone could ever ask. She has been so successful selling, she has found so many things inside herself, thing she would not have found living here, and has learned to turn to our Heavenly Father.

Stac-- we miss you more than you ever know, but we are more proud of you than we have ever been. I know you are going through some wonderful changes, and I am so glad that you are doing this things to make yourself better. You have our love and support behind you 100% and just know now matter what time it is in Virginia we are here for you. Continue to do your amazing work, and we can't wait to see you the end of August. WE LOVE YOU!!

Love-the 4 Smiths in Lehi!

Mom's One Year Celebration

A year ago in April, it was when my Mom was having brain surgery. My sister Bonnie decided that we needed to have a celebration to honor her and the last year our whole family has been through.

We met at Sweet Tomatoes, somewhere that could accomodate our large and often times loud group. And some how we kept it all a surprise and when she showed up she was so excited that everyone came to celebrate her!

Don't we have a great family, everyone was so great to come and spend the night with our beautiful Mom!

Thanks Bonnie for all your hard work, planning and even decorating. We all had a great time, and I know it meant a lot to Mom.

Here is to many many many more years with our great Mom.

Scott's Sushi Night

I am finally catching up on some much needed posts, sorry they will probably go WAY back but I wanted to document these things and share some fun pictures so here goes, enjoy!

For Scott's birthday we decided to give him a surprise sushi night. We have a great sushi instructor at Gygi's who Scott loves so we thought why not have Jonas meet us at home and show us all how we can all make sushi.

Jonas brought everything we might need for a wonderful evening of sushi and fun. He started out with some really great appetizers and filled me right up before we even began rolling any sushi. Josh enjoying the wonderful creations of Jonas.

Jenni and Lisa were a bit nervous at first, neither "love" sushi so they didn't know what to expect for the evening, but both were great sports to try things, and of course Matt loving every bit of the night.

We got the whole crew around the island and began, everyone was having such a great time, learning new things and joking around.

Jake and Lindsey getting the hang of things. She was brave to come spend the evening with the whole crew.

Matt working the fryer, nothing better than a fried roll. We both have taken many classes with Jonas, so we became his assistants for the night. I sometimes wonder if Matt and Jonas' joking was a little flirtacious but they made us laugh....

Jenni and Lisa trying a piece of Sashimi ( i think) they were so brave to try things, i think they both said it tasted really good. I was so proud of both of you!!

After an evening of some AMAZING Sushi and even better company we all wished Scott a happy birthday! THANKS JONAS, and Thanks Scott for giving us a reason to celebrate!

THE 5th.

Well, I know you are all waiting anxiously for the news on the anniversary. I FORGOT my camera so I don't have any pictures to document the evening. But i will give you the fun... Matt took me up to Park City and we went to dinner at Ruth Chris, it was wonderful. I dont know if I enjoyed the food or the quite atmosphere better. I loved not having anyone around and the beautiful setting to look out on. (Not having to worry about chicken nuggets is a nice plus as well). We then traveled up to Daniels Summit Lodge, and spent the night out in the mountains. Sat out on the little porch and just enjoyed being able to talk to each other, NO computers or cell phones, i didn't realize it until we don't have them how much we both are on them.

Thanks Matt for a wonderful night, you are thoughtful in more ways than you may want to admit, but i love the way you treat me! Thanks for being you, and loving me for being me. Happy 5th year, you better look forward to the many many many more.
LOVE YOU!!!!!!