Canada Day

Sweet Revenge

A couple years ago, Jared pulled this same trick on me and the water sprayed so far it hit the freshly painted wall behind me. We had to re-paint the wall. I'd say he had this coming:

(sorry the camera is shaky. I was laughing too hard)

Now all I have to do is scare him so bad he faints, and then we'll be TOTALLY even :)

Jarmys

This weekend we had our good friends the Jarmans come for a visit. They have been living in the Phillipines for the past year and a half and are back in Canada for their yearly vacation. We were so glad to be able to see them and spend time with them. There's really nothing like good friends, especially the ones who you don't see for a long time but can still pick up right where we left off. We went to Fernie, took the kids to the new Cars 2 movie, ate at the Curry Bowl (mmmmmm), played xbox, threw rocks in the river, played at the park, got ice cream, and stayed up way too late playing card games.

At the river

At the park

Sleepover time!

And...a group photo of the funnest 2 families you'll ever meet ;)

Most of the pictures of just of the kids; isn't that how it always goes. They're cuter than us aging adults anyways. We had so much fun together and we were sad to say goodbye. Can't wait till our next visit together!

These kids....

....are so lucky to have a Dad like him :)

Happy Fathers Day to all the amazing Dads out there!

Family fun

Last weekend we did a day trip to Lethbridge - just the four of us - for a spontaneous family fun day. First we went to the driving range. The kids had so much fun practicing their putting.

Then we went for a bike ride around Henderson Lake with the Dutchie-dog. It was such a beautiful day!

On the way home, we stopped at Lundbreck Falls. I love this picture of our goofy kids:

The falls are crazy this time of year with all the spring run-off. We were getting sprayed even from far away. Such pretty waterfalls, I'm glad we live so close to them.

Wordless Wednesday

Circumstances (and a little bit of Pomp)

This past weekend we went up to Sherwood Park to watch my little sister graduate from high school. It was fun to see everyone as almost all my immediate family (sans my bro-in-law Trevor) were there, and so were my grandparents. We did a little shopping:

Went to Chuck E. Cheese, which has been highly anticipated by Carter and Hayley. We live 3 hours away from the closest one, so that gives you an idea of how long it's been.

I love this picture. Pretty sure the play structure is just for KIDS, obviously Jared didn't get that memo....

Here's all four Mendenhall grandkids, together again. I think they all look like they could be siblings.

L-R Taylor, Josh, Carter, and Hayley

And finally, my sister Carly's Graduation. Here they are proudly sporting Bev Facey colors, blue and yellow.....it was planned and not a fluke, I swear ;)

The whole Fam Damily (almost)

I gotta say, it's a little weird to see my baby sister graduating from high school and moving away from home. In my mind, she is still a cute little toddler.

*The toddler that I would take pictures of, frame them, and give them to my school friends as Christmas presents. (I know, I was a weird child, we established that.)*

Go Wildcats

My kids recently watched Disney's "High School Musical" for the first time. To say they love it would be an understatement. Carter is now obsessed with basketball, much to Jared's delight. They brought the basketball hoop up on the deck, set up bleacher seats for an audience, put on basketball jerseys and had a basketball game against each other.



Hayley now wants to be a cheerleader and played the part, cheering as loud as she could. It was so funny. Notice her pom-poms made out of a grocery bag :)
*Side note: Jared (being the former high school basketball player) is not too sure how Carter's obsession came about from high school musical (?) but he'll take it!!! Lol *

Quaddin

Some pictures from our recent day of quadding:

the kiddos, enjoying the view

There's a gravel pit that we like to go play around in. I took a video of my handsome stunt-man in action:

Um...... we have fun together :)

Children's Festival and Camping at Moyie

Okay this post is a little late, but LAST weekend we went to Cranbrook for the Kootenay Children's Festival. We went to it last year and it was awesome. It has a tons of stuff for kids to do and the best part is it's free! And you all know how that appeals to my "thrifty" side :)

face painting

cookie decorating

hat decorating

train ride

Went went to this Schnitzl Haus restaurant with our friends after the Children's Festival. I made Justice and Carter pose for a picture, say "wiener schnitzl"!
We camped at Moyie Lake, first camping trip of the season and it was so much fun. I love camping with our little family.
Pretty lake, hey? It was cold though, Jared went for a swim to test it out, haha :)

Carts

This past year Carter's come out of his shell quite a bit. He's becoming a little social butterfly in fact. Last weekend we went to a rodeo and I took this picture of Carter and his friend Justice. I just thought it was so cute how they're both all decked out in their cowboy/cowgirl gear, standing right by the fence to the arena, because front row seats just aren't close enough to the action :)

At Carter's school, they have school spirit days and last month was "Twin Day". Him and his friend Nolan dressed alike, right down to the matching mohawks.

I also had to take a picture of this note I found in his backpack. He wrote it for a friend at school, and stuck it in there to remember to give it to his friend the next day. On the opposite side he drew a picture of them together.

So. Stinkin. Cute.

Girls Weekend

This past weekend I went to Calgary and met my mom and 2 sisters for a fun weekend away. We played games, looked at old photo albums, shopped till we dropped, saw a movie, ate at restaurants, and stayed up till all hours of the night giggling.

On Friday night we stayed at my Aunt's house, along with 20-something of our female Mendenhall relatives. The next day we attended Time Out for Women together and listened to some great speakers with awesome messages.

Cahoon relatives

Mendenhall relatives

It was a perfect weekend and I had so much fun being around the women I love.

The even better part? Coming home to my 3 favorite people and being spoiled on Mother's Day. Life is pretty dang perfect.

Tis the Season

As if it's not already cute enough watching these little people try to play sports, but then they add the matching uniforms. Aahhh so darling, I can hardly stand it!