Catching Up the Blog

Oh my goodness, I'm so behind in blogging it makes me sad. And the only way I know how to catch back up is to do snippets of all the events that I would normally do as full posts because I don't have time to write full posts for each of them. I haven't logged onto blogger for at least a month and when I logged on today to do Shelby's 5 month post (a month late) and 6 month post, I saw I have 8 drafts started. EIGHT! Gah. So I'm just going to combine some of those thoughts into one post with pictures to capture the moments! Some of them deserve their own post so not all eight will be included.

Labor Day at Cherry Hill:
Every year Nick's dad's side of the family meets under the pavilion at Cherry Hill for lunch. This year none of his siblings/spouses/kids were missing so we took advantage of snapping some family pictures.

Here are all the grandkids; 8 girls and 1 boy. But don't worry, another boy is on the way!

Grandma and Grandpa with all their grandkids.

Nick's parents with all of their children and grandchildren.

Shasta was done having her picture taken... as was I because, well, nobody needs to remember my 4th trimester body!

An amazing daddy with his two amazing daughters.

Then afterwards we went back to Emily's house and celebrated Raylene's birthday. Nick made her cake. It's supposed to look like a quilt, but he ran out of time to finish it.

Cache Valley Parade of Homes:
I entered a contest on Facebook to try to win tickets to the Parade of Homes this year. The contest allowed its contestants to enter a new photo everyday and vote once a day for as many photos as you wanted. I entered 4 photos total and technically I was in 1st-4th place! Ha! I crushed that contest! And I wouldn't have been able to do it without all the help of my friends and family that faithfully voted everyday.

Our prize was two tickets to Parade of Homes and a $50 gift card to Texas Roadhouse.

We were a little disappointed with the parade this year. There were 12 homes instead of 10 which normally I would love because I LOVE walking through new homes, but there wasn't a single home in the heart of Logan. They were spread all over Cache Valley, but none in Logan. Although technically there was one home in North Logan, we still drove from Wellsville to Newton. The homes were spread so far apart that we couldn't do them all in one day. We had to use up two Saturdays to hit all the homes which I found a little frustrating and because there were two extra homes it added to the amount of time it took to see all of them. Part of the parade is to pay attention to all your favorite features and once you've seen the last house, vote for what you liked the best. But since there were 12 houses and we did it in two weekends, it was hard to remember what we liked the best and which houses those features were in, so I pretty much just filled it in without giving it much thought. I probably voted for best curb appeal for a house that didn't even have a yard put in yet! Ha!

But still, it was fun to see the homes and add more features to our dream home! Nick's uncle had his home in the parade so that was fun to chat with him and his wife for a while. We don't get much one on one time with them so I really enjoyed our conversation. We ran into some different friends along the way and we got to spend 2 full Saturdays together, just the four of us, with no television or distractions. So although I was annoyed that it filled up two Saturdays, overall it was enjoyable and good bonding time for us!

Homecoming Parade:
Nick took Shasta and Wedge to the Homecoming Parade. I was a little bummed that I didn't get to go because I had another obligation that I felt was important to attend. It's a tradition for us to go to the parade every year, but I'm glad Nick was still able to go with Shasta. I took Shelby with me so Nick wouldn't have to juggle all three 'kids' by himself in a crowd of people. Plus it's good for him to have bonding time with Shasta.

Daddy did her hair!!!

Aggie Pride! Wish I could remember what it took to convince Shasta to wear her Aggie shirt....

Wedge has his school pride too!

Enjoying waaay too much candy and parade treats. Otter pops... really?!

And Nick didn't want me to miss my favorite part of the parade so he took a picture for me. This is the Sign Language Club float. I don't think Relay For Life had a float this year which is my other favorite to watch for.