Meatball?

The Saturday after Thanksgiving, we were rushing around trying to get ready for Ambree's birthday party. Chrissy was busy getting Ava ready and I was pulling my socks on when Chrissy hollered to see where Lily was. She announced she was going potty. After she'd been camped out on the porcelain throne for quite some time, I told her to hurry up. In exasperation, Lily leaped off the toilet and said, "Fine! I'll just throw a meatball in the toilet!"

I can't explain where she came up with such a thing, but Chrissy and I both nearly died laughing.

Alpine Loop

We took a beautiful Sunday drive around the Alpine loop to see the fall leaves. When we were driving we saw Jon's dad and Wendy up there doing the same thing. They stopped and took our picture for us, because silly me, I forgot my camera.

Labor Day weekend

We love to spend Labor Day weekend down at my parents house. We sleepover on Sunday night and then go to Onion Days in Payson on Monday. We have fun at the parade, car show and the play.

2009 and 2010 blog books

Biking

We spent most of our family time this summer riding our bikes together. We went on all sorts of trails and we had a really good time. Calvin can go about six miles with us on his little bike before he starts to get tired.

I have always liked riding my bike but I have never been extreme with it. I am happy peddling around town on my mountain bike, pulling the kids, and getting a little exercise. Jon has always loved biking. He has had almost every kind of bike. He can do tricks and he can go anywhere on his bike. My dad says he is a mountain goat on his bike. He can go up and down stuff most people wouldn't even attempt. In the spring Jon decided to buy a road bike. This is a new thing for him and he has really enjoyed riding to work. After riding so much this summer I decided to get a road bike as well. I love my mountain bike but I never go mountain biking, so it just makes more since to have a road bike. I had closed on a house and I had a little money to spend on myself so I went all out, I got the bike, clothes, clip pedals and shoes, and the speedometer. It is a good thing Parrish (Jon's step brother) works at the bike shop and can hook us up with good deals or I would have gone broke. I take that back, I did brake the bank even with the good discount.

Funny story about the clip shoes. I said I would never want to be clipped in to my bike. But Jon has always loved it and all the guys at the bike shop love it and my friend who just did a 100 mile race loves hers, so I let all of these people talk me into trying it. They all told me I would fall several times before it became second nature to unclip your shoes when you stop. I thought I would practice clipping in and out in the house before I went outside. When I felt comfortable I gave it a whirl. Yes, I crashed a few times. And yes, it hurt like crazy. I was all black and blue up and down my left side. I even had to go to the chiropractor to get put back together. One of the falls was pretty funny. I remembered to unclip one of my shoes and put my foot down. I was standing there for a minute and I forgot my other foot was clipped in and I shifted my weight to the other side and just fell flat on the hard asphalt. Oh my, I will never do that again. It is funny, you just know you are going down and there is nothing you can do about it. I decided I should have gotten used to the bike first and then added the pedals. You would be surprised how completely different road bikes and mountain bikes are. The angle you are sitting at, the brakes, the steering, the skinny tires, everything is so different. The bike goes so much faster too. I am still not comfortable going downhill on it. I only have like fifty miles on the bike because it got sooo cold before I could do much more. I look forward to getting better at this new hobby next spring. And lets cross our fingers I don't have any more falls.

Isn't this the cutest road bike you have ever seen!

Last day of Summer vacation

The kids and I had a date for their last day of summer vacation before school started. We went to Thanksgiving Point and became paleontologists for a few hours. We dug up trilobytes and we had a good time. It was very hot that day so we had to get some icecream afterwards. And then we went to the movie theater to see Cars 2. It was a very fun day with Calvin and Lily. Ava had fun with Grandma Nancy.

Fairview

The Nielson family camping trip is in Fairview every August.It has been that way since I was very small. It is fun to see all of the cousins with their kids up there now. We had a good time shooting guns, riding bikes, hiking, and chatting around the camp fire. Lily loved trying to catch grasshoppers with my dad. And Ava loved running through the flowers. Calvin rode his bike all over the place. Jon rode Travis's motorcycle and thought it was so much fun. Now he wants one too, does that surprise anyone?

9 year anniversary

On August 6th Jon and I celebrated 9 years of marriage. We went out to dinner, and then we hiked Battlecreek, here in Pleasant Grove, up to the waterfall. It was really pretty. The next day we went up to Deer Valley and went biking. Jon is great at riding on the mountains. I am not so great, so I went hiking for half of the time. There are such beautiful views up there.