Peek-A-Boo

We traveled to Utah for Mike and Kaila's sealing. All of my siblings were there and we had such an enjoyable weekend. We had so much fun with Elle. This is one of her new tricks. She is very talented and we love her so much. Her cheeks must have been raw by the end of the weekend from all of the stolen kisses. I made a slideshow on photobucket of all of the pictures from Utah and I can't figure out how to put it on my blog. It was a hard blow to my self-esteem. Anyone know how?

The Party

We had all the right ingredients for a wonderful birthday party!

Great Friends . . .

A Handsome Birthday Boy . . .

and A Huge Feast.

Mark sadly came without his spouse. We tried

really hard to not make him feel like a fifth wheel.

The BIG 3 - 0

Happy Birthday to the best husband around. Last night I had to convince Jeremy to leave early so that his coworkers could decorate his office. They did an awesome job. He is holding a cookie bouqet in the shape of balloons. I had it delivered to him at work so he would feel extra special. You only turn 30 once so I have had to pull out all the stops. I woke up early this morning and made waffles with strawberries and whip cream. I also decorated the walls at home with 30 hearts that each had a reason why I love him. We are having a pary tonight with some friends so there is more for him to look forward to.

Fun Weekend

On Friday Jeremy and I went to Golden Gardens Park, which is on the beach, and had a BBQ with Jeremy's project team . It was a ton of fun. We got to leave work early at 12:30pm and we ate some really good food. The highlight was playing Volleyball for 2 hours straight with no little kids.

Saturday I awoke early because I could not stop thinking about Breaking Dawn and wondering if pre-ordering meant I would receive my book on Saturday. I was tempted to just buy two so I could start reading on Saturday, but to my surprise my book was on the front porch Saturday morning. I tried to have some restraint and I spent time with my friend Jeanne and her kids while Jeremy took a load to the dump with her husband. I finished the book on Sunday and it was so not what I expected. I did love it, but it is definitely for adults only.

Sunday we had a great day at church and then went over to Jeanne's house for dinner. I love her house because it is always crazy there and Jeremy and I both get to play with the kids and practice parenting skills. I do get teased mercilessly by her husband for my addiction to the Twilight series, but I can deal with it.

Weeds

I am sure that Lara has told many, if not all of you, about all these lame flowers that were planted in our yard and how she wants to rip them up. Well we have had some of them bloom recently and I wanted to show you what they looked like.






















The white ones are Cala Lily's and yellow are Tiger Lily's













These are called Peonies. We're glad we didn't rip them out.

July 4th Weekend

This was a busy and fun Independence Day weekend. The 4th of July is huge for the pyro's in the McMullin household. Attached are some photos and videos of the days events and a typical 4th of July BLAST (pun intented). Now remember, don't try any of the following activities at home. These were done by trained professionals and should not be attempted except in a safe and controlled environment.

That is the joy of dry ice. No wonder it is not recommended to put in mailboxes.

This is a very simple yet effective way to have fun. Please do not try this in mailboxes or at school. Yes we know someone that did and this individual is no longer allowed on school grounds.

The picture below is an example of what it does to the container it is put in.One of our favorite fireworks are called mortar shells. They are like the ones you see in real shows but at a smaller level. Here is a video of one of them going off.

Here are a few great photos that Lara took during the show.

Notice the smiley face on this one

We had a good time on Saturday. We had planned to have a party with some friends in the evening so we came home early and finished getting the house prepared for the festivities. It was a cloudy day, as others have been recently, but it had not really rained and we maintained hope that it would not. Well the party was supposed to start at 5:00 and it started to rain at exactly 4:30. It wasn't a heavy rain but we had planned to have everything out side because our house is too small to have so many people (kids) inside. We kept praying and our faith never waivered and sure enough, right at 5:00 the rain stopped and it was nice the rest of the evening and had even cleared up by the time it was over. It was a great blessing. We had decided to have Shish-ka-bobs for the main course since we figured everyone had hamburgers the night before. They turned out great but take a long time to cook. We also played volleyball and kickball with a beach ball.

Raccoons

Well I made it back safe from Girl's Camp. One night I thought I might be eaten by raccoons, but apparently they only like chocolate marshmellows. Wow, camp was really hard and a ton of fun this year. This is my 4th year going as a leader in two seperate states and I must say that I love the way they do camp in Federal Way. The leaders actually get free time each morning while YCL's take the girls to their different certification classes. One of the highlights was teaching the girls the proper way to play Big Booty. They didn't know about the cool dance moves that can be added for everyone's viewing pleasure. Camp was a lot harder this year mainly because there was only one other leader for our ward and because the girls were all 12 and 13 years old and a few of them were used to someone else doing everything for them. The weather was perfect for camp. It was even warm enough on Friday to swim in the lake and go canoing. I prayed very hard that there would be no rain, since June can be a very rainy month in the Seattle area.