July Family Month - aka Cousin Month (and 24th of July celebrations)

In our stake, July is "Family Month" which means that calling-related meetings are limited and families are encouraged to spend more time together. This year the Stake President, President Bulpitt asked me to compile a bucket list of activities families could participate in. Here is what I wrote: 

The Lehi Thanksgiving Stake has chosen to implement “July Family Month” as a way to encourage stake members to intentionally focus on their family and relationships. Ward and Stake Leadership are encouraged to limit non-essential meetings. No primary and youth group activities will be held. We appreciate the time and effort that so many in the stake offer to bless others and move forward the work of the Lord. We hope that each member of the stake will take this opportunity to connect with family and neighbors and strengthen their connections and foundations of faith.

To assist stake members in doing so, we provide this list of activity ideas. We encourage individuals and families to select 3-5 items to accomplish together during the month of July.

We then had a list of activities to encourage people to participate in. Our family picked a few of them to complete - but at our house July was not only "family month" it was "COUSIN MONTH!" Jenna and Kevin planned a trip with Kevin's parents to Nauvoo for a week, which perfectly overlapped with Matt and Brooklyn's planned trip to Portugal. I volunteered to watch their girls, Juniper and Sylvie for the 21 days that they would be gone. (There was some discussion of bouncing them around from my house to Jenna's house to Mom's house - but I felt like it would be easier for them if they had a consistent place to stay). It was wonderful, we played with cousins all months long and loved it. Some of the highlights were the 24th of July parades, spending time in Lyman, going to the Thanksgiving Point gardens/museums, and just spending a LOT of time hanging out together. (Even though the Haderlies were only with us for a week, we convinced Jenna to meet up with us for the 24th of July and it really felt like we were together all month long.) I am grateful for this family of ours. I am grateful these cousins love each other, that they get to be together so much, and that our family is dependable enough to allow for world travel because those kidlets will be well taken care of by everyone in the family. 

Here are some pictures from the month: 

-We kicked off Cousin Month with a trip to Splash Summit (aka SevenPeaks) with the Haderlies and had a great time.  

-The kids got really into playing Risk. I do not love playing Risk, but they wanted to play is - so we gave them the rules and they spent hours playing in the basement. 



-Lucy and Juniper are so fun and whenever they are staying with us, I feel like I have twins. It makes me so happy to dress them up alike, and apparently my very favorite thing is taking pictures of them from behind. (The only way to tell them apart is that Lucy's hair is straight and Junipers has curl to it.) 

-Church with 10 kids (+watching the Nauvoo performing missionaries on TV)

-Dinosaur Adventure at Thanksgiving Point Gardens

-Swimming Pool

-Bedtime - David is the hero of bedtime with the cousins. We have enough beds for everyone to sleep at our house, and I love that we have space for them all. David wins all the points though because he does such a good job reading them books, telling them stories he made up, and making sure each one is taken care of. 

-I loved having Sylvie stay for so long, it made me miss having a little baby of my own. I jokingly said that maybe we should have another baby, but David shut me down SO HARD. I was vacuuming and I started crying. I had mostly been joking, but the idea being shut down so immediately and completely made my emotions get the better of me. We are really with our family at 4 kids and it feels like the right thing for us, but that just means that I will soak in any baby time I get from family and friends! 

24th of July Celebrations 

David took Lydia, Austin, Camille, and Jason to the Days of '47 float preview in Salt Lake. It's so fun to see the floats up close! 

-Ogden 24th of July Parade and Celebrations. We missed the Lehi parade (our favorite) and for a minute I thought that we weren't going to make it to any parades this summer. Thankfully we squeezed a few in and filled our parade quota for the year. I planned to take my kids + Juni/Syl to the Ogden parade, (Juniper really latched on to that and was SO looking forward to it) and I convinced Jenna to meet up with us after at the park in Ogden for 24th of July celebrations they had there. 

-Lyman 24th of July Parade 

This is our favorite 24th of July Parade - and now our family are officially residents of Lyman again. I (again) convinced Jenna to come with us to the parade in Lyman and hang out for a couple of days. The kids got SO much candy at this parade. Like SO much candy. They were in heaven. We started making plans to enter the parade next year! (Although the kids might be sad to miss out on all the candy.) After the parade, my dad bought us all lunch at the Bridger Valley celebration. 

-Fort Bridger 24th of July Celebration. 

After lunch we got to explore Fort Bridger. 








This month was filled with a lot of fun, a bunch of slow days hanging out at home, and a LOT of family. It was the perfect July for us this year. 

Cousin Crew & St. Patrick's Day

Jenna was in Mexico with our parents and Grandma Knowles acting as grandma's companion. Remember when Jenna watched my kids for a week when I got to go to Hawaii and be grandma's companion? That was such a special trip for me and I loved it very much - I was so so so happy to be able to return the favor so that Grandma could go and enjoy Mexico, too. They went back to our favorite resort Xcaret and even the thought of it makes me crave tacos, or any food from the Mercado restaurant. (Seriously, that's some of the best food I have EVER eaten.) We had a good week with the Haderlies and then Juniper came and joined us for the weekend for "Cousin Weekend." 

We love our cousins and one of our favorite things to do with them is to celebrate holidays together. Our favorite holidays to celebrate together include RainbowDay (our made up holiday), April Fools Day, and St. Patrick's Day. 

The night before St. Patrick's Day, the kids made their leprechaun traps and left them out. A side note: I do not know how this became a thing. I think that Lydia learned about "Leprechaun Traps" in kindergarten and because our kids are creative kids who like building things, it's something that really appeals to them. We've now been celebrating St. Patricks Day by making traps and eating green things for several years. For someone who is so opposed to "Santa", it's odd that I've allowed this holiday to evolve as it has -but I figure that the kids love it and it's not taking away from anything so it's just fun. 

David and I went all out this year and wrote each child a note from "Lucky" the Lephrechan. I was a little grumbly about it - but they turned out so fun and cute and the kids loved them - so it was definitely worth it. We had some little green candies and gold coins that we set out in the traps and the kids were thrilled. 

We also then had some green treats that we ate throughout the day - and that was the extent of our celebrations. (I had them watch a couple of picture book read-alouds on the computer about St. Patrick related topics, but that was all.) 

We went to the Children's Museum and explored. We loved the "Travel to Africa" exhibit, and the kids especially loved that they got to ride the carousel. (It's been $3 per ride since it opened, but I haven't been willing to spend that, however, this weekend they opened it up to be free for members and there was celebration.) 

We went to the Family Search Building for a Field Trip, which all of the kids loved and then we came back to our house and the kids, plus our friend Quincee, asked to do a "cooking contest". (One of their favorite activities.) They did a great job and had a lot of fun. 

Lucy and Sadie "did their makeup" with the makeup kit that Lucy got for her birthday and were so proud of themselves. Yikes. Cal came over this same night for his weekly Thursday dinner and he played Frozen music on his phone while the girls danced. His other granddaughter Olivia had recently been in a middle-school production of Frozen and he had flown back to Indiana to watch her. He was showing them the video and then playing them the songs. They loved it and he was a good sport to be so kind to them. 

These kids are just so good together. They play so well, they are so kind to each other, they bring out the creativity in each other. Sometimes we look like a production when we are taking 9 kids around with us during cousin weekend, but honestly, it's not that much more work because they are all just such. good. kids. 

Saturday we went to cheer on Matthew at his Triathalon in American Fork. We are so proud of him and how hard he has worked to train and prepare for this. "Go Uncle Matt!" 

And last, but not least - the best part about this week was the care and attention Lucy gave to Molly (pictured here with her head stuck under the gate, because as a two year old she thought it was a good idea and this is the only picture that I have of her, ha). Remember when I went to Hawaii with my mom and grandma and Jenna potty trained Lucy while I was gone? Well, this week when Jenna was gone - Molly started acting like she was VERY interested in potty training. We spent a lot of time on the potty and I asked David if he thought I should try to potty train Molly for Jenna while he was gone. We both agreed, NO. I am a terrible potty trainer and I didn't want to make it worse for Jenna when she got back. However, Lucy took the duty upon herself to help potty train Molly. She took her potty multiple times in the day, helped her get on and off the toilet, and all around took charge of the whole potty training process. When Jenna got home, she was so surprised. She sent me a text the next day, "Molly hasn’t needed a diaper change. She went poop by herself and has gone pee on the potty a couple of times! You guys must have done something! " 

I wish I could take credit for it, but I can't - it was totally Lucy. Now it's a running joke: Jenna potty trained Lucy for me, and Lucy potty trained Molly for Jenna. 

We love these kids and loved spending time together!