Broken window

We had an extremely eventful trip to a splash pad this week. And by extremely eventful I mean terrible. It was a blast for the first 2 hours, we met up with family and had fun with cousins and then some friends came too. It started to DOWNPOUR and my friend and I were the last ones there, trying to get out of there in the least traumatic way possible. I ran ahead to my car through the pouring rain (which was not very far away, the parking lot is right next to the splash pad) and stopped in my tracks when I saw my passenger window broken out. I knew the second I looked that my purse had been stolen. I ran back to my friend and explained the situation. She was a saint as she helped me sort through everything and figure out what to do. It was a mess and there was glass everywhere. I had stashed my purse mostly underneath the console between my front seats and tossed a blanket over the other side and my purse wasn't 100% covered up but with the tint on the windows it would not have been easy to see. Thankfully I had my phone on me and very little cash in my wallet. We cancelled the credit cards and called the police to report it and waited for them to come. This is what Emery did while we waited:

She had played hard and was so tired. I was really thankful she slept because we were there for an hour waiting for the police to arrive.

It was really unfortunate weather for this because it kept raining really hard which is bad when you have a busted window. Wendy had a car full of supplies so she borrowed me a huge umbrella to put in the window that kept the water out. This is what we did with the other umbrella so we could talk while we waited:

She's a clever woman! She has two boys who were being so patient, but an hour is a long time to wait in a car and I told her she could go but she stayed right there with me through the whole thing. I was so grateful for that. I also really admired the way she taught her boys about it. They would ask, "Mom, can we go now?" And her reply was, "No son, we can't, we never leave a damsel in distress or a friend that needs our help. We take care of people." It was really inspiring to me to see that, and gets me a little teary eyed just typing it. I wish all moms of boys taught those principles, and moms of girls too, of course.

We immediately cancelled our cards but they did end up getting $100 of gas off my credit card. I found that out yesterday when I was checking my accounts. The bank should take care of that since we reported it stolen but I'm mostly just mad they got something from robbing me. Pretty vengeful of me, right? Another frustrating part of this ordeal was that the driver side back door doesn't even lock unless I do it manually which I usually forget. So my car was unlocked and they broke a window. Seriously guys? Couldn't you at least TRY THE DOORS first?! As the officer who came to take the report said, "If they were smart enough to think of that, they wouldn't be robbing cars in the first place."

Pool time

The sun was just too bright for these two:

Backstreets back, ALRIGHT!!!

My friend found some tickets to Backstreet Boys on Groupon a few weeks ago and we both couldn't resist the nostalgia so we went! Avril Lavigne opened for them and it was a crazy, wild, and hilarious trip down memory lane. Nick, this guy:

Who now looks like this:

Told us to "act like [we were] 15 years old and party like it was 1999". And so we did. We screamed, squealed, danced our hearts out and sang along at the top of our lungs. It was an absolute BLAST!!! Here's some 15 year old girl selfies from the concert:

We were as excited as we looked. We brought some really good Thai food with us and the red curry was PERFECT so I was even more happy. I'm picky about red curry and this one NAILED it. Yum.

It was so fun but I couldn't help but think about what the singers REALLY thought about this concert. Avril Lavigne was up there in this weird black tutu with a skeleton on the shirt, jumping around like she's a 16 year old girl while we are having a blast belting out Sk8er Boi. But I'm just watching her thinking, "This is weird. She's almost 30 years old. Is she enjoying this? Or rolling her eyes wishing we would all just get over the past and listen to her new stuff?" It got even worse when the Backstreet Boys came out and a few of them spoke like they were 14 year old surfer boys. I wondered if this was how they are all the time or was this just part of the act? But isn't that 14 year old boy act what the audience wanted? It just seemed weird. I guess I'm growing up? 

Not too grown up though...

It was really fun to realize how many memories I have attached to some of those songs. I reminisced  making up dances to "Larger Than Life" with cousins growing up, slow dancing with boys at stake dances, and singing harmonies to the songs in my car as my friends and I drove around. It was a night to remember!

Sunday slippers

Emery really wanted to wear slippers to church on Sunday. Gavin was explaining to her why we shouldn't wear them and it was such a cute moment I had to capture it.

She decided he was right and wore her sparkly shoes instead. :)

Garden Haul

Our garden is doing MUCH better this year. This is due to a lot of different factors, but it's mostly because I'm trying harder. :) I did plant better things this year too; last year half the things I planted never produced! This time around has been great! My peppers are still not producing anything...same as last year, but our green beans have done very well. We've already eaten tons of them and they are still going strong. Our cherry tomatoes are starting to ripen now that our temperatures are staying hot and those have been Emery's favorite. We try to pick the green beans every other day, sometimes every two days if I forget on the weekends. This was our haul yesterday:

But unfortunately all that deliciousness came with a price, and it was at Emery's expense. :( She was helping me pick the tomatoes and they were too far for her to reach so I told her to step in an empty space in the garden. When she did her foot sunk a lot, which I thought was strange, and then 5 seconds later she's crying, "Mommy the ants! The ants!" I look down and her foot is COVERED in fire ants. I felt so awful as I frantically tried to brush them off. They got their revenge for their hill getting smashed, she had probably 20 bites on her little foot and leg. It was bad. She was upset and as we ran inside she just sobbed, "I need to call my daddy!" So we Facetimed Gavin to show him and she felt better once her story was told.

That poor little foot! We put some lavender and Benadryl gel on the bites to help the sting. Once the stinging stopped she was very proud of her pickins' as you can tell in the next picture:

Family Night Fun

Monday nights are a fun night at our house--busy, but fun. Mondays are Family Night, or Family Home Evening as LDS people call it. We are lucky enough to have a few extra kids around for our family night. It makes it crazy, loud, chaotic, and absolutely wonderful. This picture about sums it up:

I love these kids. The bottom two were baptized a little over a year ago. Some family friends and neighbors brought them to church and taught them the gospel and they chose to get baptized. Their mom is an incredible woman who was very supportive of their decision and encourages them to be committed and faithful. The family that introduced them has since moved away and I don't know how we got so lucky but we got to become their "mormon family". The older two come to church with us, all 3 have family night with us, and come along to ward activities with us. They are such great kids--well mannered, respectful, polite--and it's so fun to see them learn and grow in the gospel. It's not easy joining the LDS church, there are a lot of things that we do differently (3 hours of church, no dating until you're 16, keep the Sabbath day holy) and I know sometimes they struggle. But they are faithful and they are trying so hard to do what is right. We love having them as part of our church family!