Our Not-So-Fun 4th of July

If there is anything I look forward to every year it is the 4th of July! I love it! And I loved that my sister Lauren and her boyfriend decided to come up share in the fun festivities with us this year. Made me look forward to it even more!

Well, the night before the 4th we all went to bed, everyone feeling just fine...(can you guess where I'm going with this?) and all of the sudden Riley wakes up throwing up. Great. Well, it's probably just something she ate and she'll probably feel better by morning.  Well, I was wrong. WAY wrong. That was the first of 10 TIMES for just her. Then began the domino effect.  Then Landon, then Mason, then my sister Lauren and even her boyfriend. What is going on?? We all felt fine before we went to bed. It must be some sort of food poisoning from dinner we all thought.

But the parade was first thing in the morning! You just don't miss the parade! Not in our house. But thank heavens Katelyn wasn't sick because she was in the parade.  She made the Sandcreek Middle School cheer team (Woo Hoo!) and was cheering on the float. So Josh and I and the kids, minus Riley and Lauren, the sickest ones, went to the parade to cheer on Katelyn.  Even though Landon was still very sick. Not our finest parenting moment. Maybe if we just carry on as planned this will just all go away? After the parade we went to the park with the Bradshaw clan for lunch.  About that time me and Josh felt something coming on.  We left early, came home and went to bed, in a short time the rest of the house was throwing up.  By now, the entire house has been hit by some sort of plague.  It was horrible.  Of all the days for us to be sick.  And my sister and her boyfriend came all this way from Utah for this?? We spent the rest of the day in bed and the bathroom moaning and groaning.  My dad says some day we'll look back at this and laugh. I'm not there yet.

(Here's a couple pictures of Katelyn on her float. She's in the row facing the camera on the far left.)

Katelyn's 12!

I am officially a mother of a Young Woman. How did that happen? I'm not old enough for this. Turning 12 in our house brings new adventures....make-up, Young Women's at church, Girl's Camp, MIDDLE SCHOOL, and many other things she thinks she needs because all of her friends do.  For example, a cell phone.  Not happening. We'll hold off on that one for as long as I can. Not ready to go down that road of no return.

Katelyn did have a big swim party with all of her friends up at Green Canyon. This is the only picture I got before my camera went dead. Ugh!

One of the main things that Katelyn has been most excited about now that she is 12 is doing baptisms for the dead. Our Stake doesn't haven't any scheduled for awhile and she didn't want to wait. So she and her cousin Savannah went and got their recommends and Josh and I took them the week she turned 12. Josh's mom got them little baptism bags to take with them to the temple. They are so cute. The girls got to do some family names so it made the experience that much more special.

(Katelyn & Savannah with their recommends.)

The other fun thing she got to be a part of now that she is 12 is she got to participate in our Stake Pioneer Handcart Trek. A lot Stakes require you to be 14 so we felt pretty lucky that she could go. There were over 600 youth from our Stake on the Trek so it was a very large crowd. We bought the material for her skirt, apron and bonnet and helped make it. They were all asked to walk in honor of a pioneer, preferably a ancestor if you had one. She walked in honor of a pioneer ancestor on my side named Sarah Goode Marshall. She is known as "The First Lady of all the Handcarts" because she was the first person from the very first handcart company to cross over into the Salt Lake Valley. And she did it as a single mother with 6 children. She has an amazing story and it was neat for Katelyn to get to know her and have that opportunity.

So I guess this is my last year before I officially have a TEENAGER! Wow, where has time gone??