Thanks Minnie!

My brother told me the other day that he was listening to a radio station that said the dogs that cause the most damage to their owners property is the Great Dane with an average of $1200. Exhibit A: see picture below! Minnie did this to our carpet about eight months ago. (She has since had a new home in the backyard.) But I can't complain because I got new carpet out of it! We had new carpet laid in the upstairs on Friday.

Minnie sat and enjoyed her chew toy while we were downstairs watching a movie!

BEFORE (I didn't vacuum all week because I knew I was getting new carpet!)

AFTER

It's no wonder

Most of you know that we have an extra large dog named Minnie. She's our Great Dane "puppy", she's only a year old. We like her a lot and she is the most gentle dog with the kids. Dane's are often called the gentle giants. Well gentle has many meanings I supposed as both me and Jess have found out. So every Sunday we go to the park as a family and there are softball diamonds we let Minnie run around in to get all of her energy out. Jess goes to left field and I go to right field and we call her back and forth to wear her down. We've done this so many times without accidents... So here comes Minnie at me full speed (keep in mind she sounds like a horse coming at you and she weighs more than me). I just stand there as I always do and she USUALLY runs around me and back to Jess. The last thing I remember was seeing Minnie about 5 ft away and then I was lying on my back telling myself "I have to breathe, I have to breathe". Then Kaden and Jesse were standing over me and tears were pouring down my face. From Jesse's view he saw Minnie take out my legs, my body went completely horizontal and I landed flat on my back. When I didn't get up it clued him in that I was hurt. I just had the wind knocked out of me and probably passed out for about 10 sec is all so no harm done so me and Jess laugh about it now. Kaden got mad at Minnie and stabbed her in the back with my car keys. So protective. Minnie did the same thing to Jess a couple months ago only she got him from behind and he landed flat on his backside... he had quite the bruise. But there's no pic of that! Jess has instilled in Minnie a total fear of the kids so she is so careful around them. Now I'm wishing he had done the same for me!

Here's our Minnie! We love her despite her clumsy ways!

I Love to see the Temple

Jess had to work in Idaho Falls today so the kids and I tagged along. Kaden and Ellie LOVE to feed the ducks at the river there. Kaden was so excited he talked about it all morning. So we get there and he starts to cry saying it was too windy and he needs to go home (there was a 2mph SE wind). I think he was overwhelmed by the ducks. (If you've never been there before they can get a little violent.) But Ellie is our fearless one and just walked up to all of them and started throwing bread! When all the bread was gone Kaden didn't need to go home anymore because he could throw rocks at the ducks in the water. Right there is the difference between boys and girls!

Ellie Quarantined

Unfortunately Ellie lost her lunch in the car today. (Jesse blamed my driving... he's such a turkey!) If any of you know my husband this picture is not much of a surprise. Ellie got banished to watch movies all night to prevent further messes. Jesse took it upon himself to set up her up on the love sac. He used 4 bath towels and two sheets to protect our furniture. You'd think he was preparing for the flood and not some little two year old girl who has the flu. I just have to laugh. And maybe all of you reading this agree with Jesse and are thinking ???? right now. Like I said the other day... it's never a dull moment with my kids... all three of them!

Lookin' Good

Kaden cracks me up. This outfit is comprised of all of his favorite articles of clothing. This is his football shirt which he found at Target (and about fell out of the cart trying to get it). He begs me to do his wash so he can wear it again. His soccer socks which I finally have to remove myself after two days! And his beloved boots which he still tells everyone he got for his birthday. (I try to convince him they're too hot for summer but he can't resist.) Oh and he loves to steal mommy's reading glasses from the piano. He looked too good to pass up the photo opportunity. And of course little Miss Ellie has to have her picture taken too. It's never a dull moment with these two. I'm so thankful I'm a mommy. I LOVE being able to stay home with them so I never miss a thing!

San Diego

Jess has a convention for work in San Diego every year and I was spoiled enough to get to go with him again. It was tons of fun and a wonderful break. A special thanks to Heidi, Erin and my parents for watching the kids! You guys are the best! It sounds like the kids had tons of fun too! Our rental car had GPS so we were much more adventurous this year. I ventured out to the shopping malls and the temple while Jess was in meetings all day. We definitely miss San Diego but are glad to be home with the kids again!
Here's a pic of the San Diego temple. It is my favorite inside and out. I forgot my recommend but they were able to look up my barcode every time I went. Jess and I did a session together our first night there.
We had to take a lot of pictures ourselves!

The company that sponsored the convention took us to San Diego Zoo one night. They closed down the whole zoo for us and we had private bus tours. It was pretty cool. This elephant was the youngest one there- she was 33 yrs old!

Our last night there Jess and I went to La Jolla for sight seeing. It's a little tourist town. There were some seals on the beach which were cool to see. We ate at a Mexican restaurant that had the best food we had eaten the whole trip! I'll be craving those tortillas til next year!

This is the view from our hotel room. It overlooks Mission Bay.

This is the view of Pacific Beach from the pier. We went and played in the waves one morning in our clothes!

We finally got someone else to take our picture on the pier.

Our hotel is the tower in the center of the pic.