Pioneer Day

The North Las Vegas Stake has a pretty awesome Pioneer Day tradition. They have a HUGE carnival type celebration each year that includes entertainment (well, you could call it that), fantastic food, games, bake sales, crafts, face painting, slip 'n sliding, a myriad of blow up slidey and bouncy things for kids, balloons, fun, and more food... oh, and most importantly: a phenomenal fireworks display at the end. Other than dealing with the sweltering heat, we have had a blast going these last two Summers... and so have a lot of other people. Something like 8,000 people attended this year!

Here we are just arriving and staking out our seats. I thought I deserved special treatment being 8 1/2 months pregnant and all, but looking around I realized that there were hundreds (well, that's how it seemed to me) of other pregnant women too. Oh well. Fortunately, I was feeling pretty good that day. (But seriously, how can you not feel good with carne asada tacos and watermelon coming out your ears?)

Both of our moms came, too, which was a lot of fun... and a huge help with Weston! Here he is with each of his grandmas. Aunt Shae-Leigh also came along with a friend of hersAnd while Weston is always thrilled to see Aunt Shae-Leigh, who is looking very lovely in this photo...his eye was mostly on the object of his affection, Hope OlsenIsn't she a doll? They sure have fun together. Yes, you may even call it a crush. Sometimes when we're having a hard time getting Weston to do something (like brush his teeth, put on his Sunday pants, whatever) Jason will say, "Hope likes boys who wear nice clothes to church." Without fail, once he hears her name, he'll do what we want. Isn't that funny?

Waiting for the fireworks to begin...

All in all, we had a wonderful time. We were glad that we ran into our friends, the Olsens. The kids all had a blast playing with those glow in the dark thingies and dancing to the music (aka "entertainment"). Here I am near the end of the evening, one tired lady! I was remembering how sprightly we all were last year at Pioneer Days, and decided to look up those pictures. Wow, how Weston has grown! He had only been walking for about a month, and once he started, he didn't want to stop - that is why we had to keep him on a monkey leash the whole time. Weston still had a little bit of that baby look last Summer... and from these pictures of Uncle Trevor and Aunt Shae-Leigh, it looks like he isn't the only one who did some growing up in the past year! :)

How I love traditions! It will be fun to see our little family in another year... this time with a 3 year old Weston and a baby girl in tow.

An Invitation...

If you live in Las Vegas and would like an invite to my baby shower... Please leave a comment with your email address - since the lovely friend throwing me this shower is sending out e-vites!
Thanks!

Irresistible

Who can resist this sweet face? Not me!

Pooped

Summertime = Play. That is the formula I lived by as a kid. Weston seems to be following in suit, although I suppose "play 'til you drop" is pretty much his motto any time of the year.
I love it when he just plays until the point that he literally cannot keep his eyes open.
A few examples:

Have you ever been so tired that you fell asleep standing up?

Fortunately the kiddo had something to lean on. He was completely conked out. In fact, shortly after snapping this shot Weston literally fell over onto the floor, slightly hitting himself on the side of the coffee table! Even that didn't wake him up.My personal favorite happened the other day. After a long day of playing outside, Weston came in for dinner per usual. Not so usual, however, was the way he couldn't even stay awake to eat! This pic is pretty great - the unintentional display of "the finger" just kind of puts it over the top!

It was such a humorous display, I just had to catch a moment of it on video:

As you can see, the camera battery died mid-sentence. That's alright though, it still captures the essence of the moment. I love my cute sleepy little munchkin! (Although he was anything but sleepy at 5:30 this morning - something I could definitely do without.)

Independence Day

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the 4th of July, and I always have. I love the celebration and fireworks, I love the get-togethers and the food that goes along with them, and well, when I was a kid I loved the Summer, too, which made the whole thing perfect!
As much as I would love to pontificate upon the meaning of the holiday (which adds an entirely different set of reasons why I so love Independence Day), I will forbear for now. After all, I do need to make dinner in a few minutes!
This year the 4th of July was mostly a hot, miserable, stressful day for me, but we sure did have a good time in the evening! One advantage of having a husband in the fireworks industry is the obscene quantities of fireworks we get for free. Of course, TNT only sells "safe and sane" fireworks, which can be a little lack luster... but when you've got 10 fountains going off at one time, well, things get a little more entertaining! Case in point:
Another perk of being a fireworks "insider" is having access to product that cannot be sold, because it didn't pass testing with the fire department... generally because it's not considered either "safe" or "sane." Nothing too dramatic ever happens though, as we keep a constant water supply nearby. The man loves what he does... but seriously, what man doesn't get a thrill out of setting things on fire and watching them explode?
Jason especially enjoys the fireworks that go haywire, particularly when they go much higher than they're supposed to... although with so many going off at once, I can never tell which ones passed inspection and which ones didn't...

Weston had so much fun! Every time people would "ooooh," or "ahhhh," or say things like "wow," he joined right in - mimicking what the family was doing. It was very cute!

He was definitely impressed by the whole experience. Unfortunately the flash on our camera seems to be disabled, so the only way I could take a decent picture was by the light of the fireworks... here is Weston with his sweet Aunt Shae-Leigh. And, I think this is my favorite firework picture of the night... but who knows, I took WAY too many!Next year we are going to throw a party - it just seems like a waste not to share all the fun with more people!