Our 4th of July in Pictures

(Bear with me, I am really behind in posting! Hopefully, I will be completely caught up today!)


 We had a FANTASTIC 4th of July this year!

Kayleen and Rex came up with their little family to spend the week with all of us,
as did Grandma, and it was great to see them again!

We started our 4th of July celebration with the Rexburg parade. Stan and Rex saved us an amazing location up near the beginning of the parade. We brought breakfast to snack on and enjoyed all the floats and patriotism.

Waving her little flag while waiting for the parade to start.

Rex and baby Seth

Joe, Stan, and Sammy

My festive toes! I got really bored one night at home! :)

LOVE my sisters!

Little Miss Claire!

Sammy boy!

The Grandmas and baby boys

The parade finally started!

Sammy kept saying, "WOW!"

Enjoying the parade with my two favorite girls! 

The kids LOVED the parade!

Kay and Seth!

The kids all loved seeing Uncle Adam in the parade with the marching band.
 Ally kept saying, " Uncle Dadum! Uncle Dadum!"

Claire got a necklace and had so much fun playing with it!

Ally waving her flag at the parade.

The kids LOVED the parade! I think that is what made it so enjoyable this year. Claire loved waving her little flag and would clap and squeal her little heart out. She loved the otter pops that they threw into the crowd and loved being with her cousins. She just loved it!

After the parade we drove to Idaho Falls to have lunch at Savannah's house.
The food was delicious and hanging out with the family was wonderful!

Seth, sucking on a pickle.

He just loved that pickle so much!! Haha!

Savannah and Sammy
So unfair how tan they are!

We dressed the kids up in matching outfits for the holiday.
They all looked so adorable!

Claire, Ally, and Sammy (Seth was sleeping)

Uncle Adam is always a favorite with the grandkids. 

They just LOVE their "Uncle Dadum"!

Claire kept pulling his hair and she thought it was hilarious! 

Good thing Uncle Adam is a good sport!

All the girls and Seth 

The Steel Family

The Jagielski Family

The Reed Family

As always, we enjoyed the time with family. I have always loved celebrating the 4th of July. It's such a relaxing holiday and I love feeling patriotic and celebrating the beautiful country we live in! 


We hung out at Savannah's until it got close to Claire's bed time and then we headed home. To our surprise we could actually see the Rexburg fireworks from our backyard. It was the perfect way to end the day, cuddled up to my husband watching the last few fireworks go off.

Father's Day

We celebrated Father's Day a day early since Joe had to work on Sunday.
I wanted to make Father's Day extra special for Joe this year since last year we had just arrived home from the hospital with Claire. I hadn't planned ahead for it at all.  All my poor husband got for his first Father's Day was a sleep deprived, weepy wife and a lactose intolerant, screaming infant. But I guess I gave him the best gift he could ever have asked for...our little baby girl.

This year I put a little more thought into the event. I had planned on making him a Shutterfly book but I missed the expiration date on my free book coupon. I was so bummed! (I'm hoping to finish it for his birthday! :) ) But thankfully I had a few more presents up my sleeve. I saved up the money to get him the smoker he has been begging me for for months. If anyone knows my husband, they know that he LOVES to cook...but he especially loves to grill and smoke meat. I bought a rack of baby back ribs for him to smoke for father's day and they turned out SO good! He really is an amazing cook! It was the perfect gift and he loved it! 

Claire LOVED "helping" Daddy put it together. :)

Such a serious face.

Silly girl!

She loved playing in the box too.

I also bought a funny little gift for him. Back in January I was out shopping with my mom and sisters at the Mini Bazaar in Idaho Falls. We were checking out when I saw this back scratcher by the register. I picked one up and started laughing thinking about how funny it would be to get Joe a back scratcher because every night (without fail!) he asks me to scratch his back. I thought it would be such a clever gift since it's pretty much a running joke with us. So I bought it and hid it from him for months. Well I completely forgot to give it to him on Father's Day but remembered a few days later. We were laying in bed and he turned to me and asked if I would scratch his back. I started laughing when I remembered that stupid little back scratcher. I ran around our bed and dug into our blanket chest at the end of the bed where I found the little metal pole. I handed it to him and he just busted up laughing. I knew that he would laugh at it but I did not expect him to LOVE it. Haha it turns out that he uses his back scratcher more than he asks me! So I think it's a win win!

I really think I lucked out with my amazing, handsome husband. He is everything I hoped for in a husband and he is an amazing daddy! He loves his little Claire Bear to death and will drop anything he's doing to get down on the floor and play with her. I love that I get to spend every day with that fantastic man of mine! Claire and I are the luckiest girls alive.

Little Miracles

We received the news a few weeks ago that Joe's great-grandma, Granny Fain, passed away. She was 94 years old and an amazing woman!

At around the same time Joe's Grandpa (who is also Granny Fain's son) was admitted into the hospital for his third surgery in a month. He had cancer in his bladder and they had to remove the entire organ. But ever since then things just weren't working right. He was not doing well and we were told that if this surgery didn't help then there was nothing else they could do. 

I knew Joe wanted to be down in Reno with the rest of his family, especially since his mom was flying in to be with her dad and be there for the funeral. I didn't think we could afford it, so I told Joe I was sorry but we have to sit this one out. The trip to New Jersey cost us a fortune and we just couldn't afford another trip.

But despite the issue of money we both kept getting the strong impression that we needed to be there. I couldn't get the idea out of my head. I thought about it, talked about it with Joe, and dreamt about it. So we decided we would go....we just had no idea HOW we would get down there. We felt good about our decision to go but at the same time it felt like everything that could go wrong for this trip did. All the sudden the brakes wore out on our car and the tire had a nail imbedded in it. My mom had just had carpal tunnel surgery and Claire was coming down with a cold (which went away the day before we left!) Thankfully my brother-in-law is an awesome mechanic and was able to help us out with the brakes. He recommended that we replace the tire but we couldn't afford it so we just prayed really hard that it would last until our next paycheck (which thankfully it did just fine!). And despite everything, we somehow ended up with enough money to make the trip. I still to this day have NO idea how we did it but we did. 

On Thursday, June 21st we packed up the car and drove the six hours to Elko, Nevada. Since Joe gets amazing rates on Marriott Hotel rooms we decided to call it good for the day and stay in the Residence Inn there. It felt good to just relax without having to worry about work or chores and nice to have a break from the car! We played in the hotel room and went swimming. We thoroughly enjoyed our mini vacation.

Princess Claire in her "throne". :)

This picture cracks me up every time! After we went swimming
 I was trying to get her dressed in dry clothes and she thought
 it was so fun to roll around on the bed naked.  

Pulling the diaper bag apart. 

Bath time!

 The next day we drove the last six hours to Reno. We met his Mom and Grandma at the hospital in Reno and checked on his Grandpa and then we checked into the hotel.  We had a little down time before the viewing that night so we rested at the hotel. We were all exhausted.

Later that night we attended the viewing for Granny Fain and there was a small get together for her at a relatives home afterwards. On Saturday we got ready for the funeral, packed up the car, and we were ready to travel down to Fallon for the burial.

She wanted to make sure we didn't forget to pack her too. :) 

All ready to go! Still looking pretty tired because she refused to sleep in the hotel.

She LOVED helping Joe push the cart! So cute!
She would try to push it on her own too.

 On our way out to Fallon we stopped at the hospital to say good-bye to his Grandpa. He still wasn't doing very well. Joe's mom asked if Joe would give him a blessing and of course he quickly agreed. We were sitting in the hospital room with all of his family (none of them are LDS) when Joe asked his Grandpa if he would like a blessing. He said yes and to our surprise everyone wanted to stay for it. Joe gave him a beautiful blessing. The spirit was so strong and the feeling in the room quickly changed from sorrow to pure happiness. By the end of it there was not a dry eye in the room. It was a wonderful experience.

After we said good-bye to his Grandpa we drove an hour to Fallon, Nevada where Granny was being buried. Her burial was sweet and simple and the reception afterwards was a full on celebration for her. We were staying in a motel that night that was connected to a casino and bar. His family had a blast entertaining themselves with the slot machines and just drinking away. We got a couple of really good laughs from watching a few drunk relatives (Although it's definitely not something I enjoy being around). Joe showed me around the Casino, explained how some of the games work. Since he is originally from Las Vegas he knows all about them. It was fun to be kid free for a few hours (Claire was in the room asleep being watched by Joe's 14 year old cousin) but I did not enjoy walking out of the Casino smelling like an ash tray since in casinos it's still legal to smoke indoors. 

The next day was bittersweet, we were ready to be home but sad to leave family.
It was really hard saying good bye to Joe's mom!

Claire and Grandma (She was so exhausted by that point!)

After saying good-bye to everyone we drove half way to Elko again and stayed with a cousin.

Playing at Kenny and JJ's house.

Watching a movie with Leila and Loreali.

My super tired baby! She hardly slept at all the entire trip!
Thankfully she slept ALL night that night! 

On Monday morning we made the trip back home. It had been a rough couple of days. Claire had a hard time sleeping at night since we were never staying in the same place twice. She had to catch naps in the car or in our arms which didn't work out too great and she doesn't sleep well unless it's in her own bed. She is definitely a home baby! When we got home I had her in my arms and opened the front door, she squealed so loud and had the biggest smile on her face! She squirmed her way out of my arms  and started crawling around the apartment as fast as she could go and finally rested on the pink rug in her room. You could tell that she was happy to be home! It made me happy to see that she was that comfortable in her own home. I hope that our home will always be a comfortable place for her!

And a few days after we returned home, we received the news that his Grandpa was eating solids again! Huge progress! And he has finally been released to go home! Just another amazing example of the power of the priesthood. We are so thankful that we were able to be there to support his family and that Joe was able to give his Grandpa a blessing.

 We are also so thankful that we had the funds to be there and that we made it home safely and without over drawing our bank account. (We made it home with .61 cents left in our account!) The trip was an amazing testimony builder for our family. We are so thankful to a loving Heavenly Father who hears and answers prayers.