Celebrating Heroes

The 4th of July . . . We have been participating in the Evergreen parade for the past few years. In years past we have always just decorated wagons, but we have always dreamed having having a float. Our husbands never wanted to build one . . . so this year I found one on ksl.com for $25 - good find, considering it would have cost over $100 to build one + our husbands really didn't want to do it.
This years parade theme was "Celebrating Heroes". We took a spin off of that and did a Little Red Riding Hood float -- The woodsman was our hero!

Good Ole' green truck taking the float up to the start

Old school . . . Riding in the back

Bailey (Little Red's mom) Eva (Little Red Riding Hood) Porter (The Woodsman) Griffin (The Wolf)

Thank you Robert :) You did such a good job holding back the float

Grandfather Stan & the girls

The Boyce Family

We missed having the brothers this year & of course we missed Bart. He was racing in B.C.

Bear Lake

We spent a few days at the lake with Heidi & her boys. The kids had a blast on the beach. We kept saying how lucky we were to be able to take off during the week and sit on the beach with our kids.

Stella bee-lined straight to the water when we got out of the car. And loved every second.

Not posed . . . This is how Eva & Richard ate their lunch .

Stella and her beloved shoes. She refused to take them off.

We have been taking these pix of Eva & Richard since they were 1 yrs old.

Meet Zeke . . .

Here is the newest member of our family.

Eva has been in swimming lessons for the last two weeks. The first day she held on tight to the teacher and wouldn't let go. So we made a deal . . . If she was brave & tried new things for the rest of her lessons we could go to the toy store at the end of the two weeks. Well she was brave & she learned a lot.

So on the way home from swimming today she says "Mom, instead of going to the toy store, I would like to go to the pet shop and get a fish, because I learned how to swim like a fish".

The guy a the pet shop said that Beta fish are really easy to take care of . . . so I am going to say a prayer tonight that little Zeke will still be alive in the morning.

PROUD PAPA

From Balance bike to Pedal bike . . . NO training wheels NO problem!!

We are now firm believers in the balance bikes. Eva rocked her balance bike for about 6 months. In that time she got confident in balancing on the bike. So when we introduced her to the "Butterfly Summer" pedal bike she already knew how to balance on the bike so it only took about 5 minutes of Bart holding onto the back of the seat and then she was on her own - Pedaling like a TRUE Gillespie!
I was excited to see her jump over this learning curve, but Bart was soooo excited!
He had THE BIGGEST SMILE on his face






Thanks to Grandma Janie for finding the perfect bike at good old D.I! It even has a baby seat on the back so that Eva can take her dolls for rides!

Crazy Hair

Stella Jane - All Smiles!

I finally took Stella's 1 year pictures! Only two months late . . . not too bad!


I couldn't do Stella's pictures without including sweet Eva!

My two beautiful Girls!

April Showers

Eva had her big dance recital last night at Judge High School. She did awesome! Her dance was "April Showers" so they did a tap dance to a mix of rainy day songs. She did most of the moves, and she sang the entire time. It was so fun to watch my girl up on stage with all the lights and music!

Eva & Olivia before the recital. They were so excited!
Eva loving her flowers from Mom & Dad

Eva & her adoring fan!
Richard brought her 3 pink flowers, because "she is three and her favorite color is pink"

Don't you just think they have to get married!!??

Proud Papa with his girls!

I love there little belly's hanging out over their tights.

And of course we ended the night with Gelato!

That may have been their favorite part :)