The kid and their friends have been very interested in the US World Cup games. They decorated their face and had a party to watch a game this week. They all chant "USA USA"

Emily and her friend, Kate did the best Art Camp this week. They painted, did sewing, clay, drawing, and made this adorable Fox puppet out of paper mache. She had a blast working on these projects every day. I am happy she had fun and came home with cool art.

More pictures from swimming last weekend, and the USA games.

On hot days when we don't go to the pool, we get out the slip n' slide! It's a favorite for all the kids and keeps everyone wet and cooled off. 

Lizzie and Isaac did their second session of swimming lessons this week. They both made lots of improvement  and are learning important swimming skills. They both learned to dive off of the diving board by the end of the week.

Lizzie especially is crazy in the water! She loves to go underwater and look around with her goggles one. She loves to jump or dive in as well.  She has lots of confidence in the water!

Selfies at swimming. Love Isaac's freckles.

Natalie is busy getting ready for her mission. She went through the Draper Temple Thursday night.  It was a great night and fun to spend time with everyone in the temple. She is leaving on Sept. 3rd.

Taylor had his first 11 year old scout camp out on Friday night. He packed a tent, mattress pad, sleeping bag, pillow, clothes etc.. all in this backpack and slept over Fri. night. He had a lot of fun- but came home tired and worn out. I can not believe he will be 12 in February! He is really growing up too fast. He's a funny, smart, hard working, helpful, musical boy. I am so happy to spend time with him when he's around (which is rare these days).

While Taylor was at scout camp I took the younger kids and their 3 friends to the Gateway Museum. It was a fun day and the kids all had a blast!

The kids had fun playing Doctor in the fake hospital. They also loved going in the hurricane simulator. it's their favorite thing at the museum. The wind gets up to 78 MPH. It's hilarious to watch them inside.

Isaac and Lizzie had a fun "Around the World" camp this week at our church. It was some girls in our ward and their moms who helped organize it. Each day they learned about a different country, they talked about the culture, made crafts, played games and had snacks. Lizzie made this mask and she wears it all the time now. Here she is drinking chocolate milk in her feather mask. She cracks me up!
 Summer is the best!

We had such a fun week of summer! The theme of this week was dressing up for the girls. They spent hours playing dress ups and making up plays, songs etc... More pics to come.

Another theme of this week was getting our new trampoline! The kids have wanted another one since ours broke in the fall. We finally got around to ordering a new tramp. It's a rectangle and everyone loves it! We put it together Monday night and it's been busy full of kids ever since.

Lizzie loves having her turn to jump.

Lizzie continued with her swimming lessons. She is taking from a new teacher and gave her a hard time the first few classes.
The first day she told her teacher.
"I already know how to swim"
"My mom said I don't have to go under water or blow bubbles if I don't want to."
She's full of it!
She ended up having a great week swimming every afternoon. We're doing another session this week, with Isaac.
She was exhausted every day because she didn't take a nap. (her  lesson was right during her nap time)
She LOVED the diving board, went off it several times every day and wasn't scared at all.

Emily and her friends being silly!

Our friends and neighbors The Reeds came home from Ireland. The kids were so excited! They went to the airport to welcome them home. It's so nice to have these great friends back on the street and in the neighborhood.
We celebrated Thursday morning with a Dunkin donut party. Eveyone loved it!

Here's the girls dressing up and having fun. Emily's outfit was hysterical! She really was in character with a weird smile and gang signs!

Lizzie was thrilled to be included as a kitty cat. She meowed all afternoon and is the cutest kitty around.

Evening jump with the sprinkler on our tramp. Lizzie likes taking selfies.

Marcus, Natalie, Turner and Darla were in town for a couple of days. We all went swimming at Bretts pool on Saturday. The kids had so much fun swimming, going on the waterslide and sitting in the warm hot tubs. It was a great day!
Here's some more pictures.

We had a BBQ and home made ice cream that evening at mom and dad's. It was another wild, fun weekend. We miss Marc and Nat- glad to see them for a few days!

Shields Family Reunion



We started the Shields Family Reunion with a day at the Provo Seven Peaks, Teresa and the kids joined us.
Everyone had a fun day and loved swimming and doing water slides.  Baby Henry had a great day too, he's so cute.




After the water park we went to visit Natalie at her work at the Shaved Ice shack. The icees were delicious. We all enjoyed them and also bought some food at the Greek Food truck next door. Yummy!



Next we headed up to Timp Lodge for the Shields Family Reunion. It was three days in the mountains in a big lodge with 75 or more family members.
It was gorgeous there and so nice to spend time outdoors in the warm sunshine with the kids. Danny was out of town in Denver so he couldn't come - we missed him but had tons of fun with out him too.

The kids loved playing with their cousins and second cousins.
Here's the lodge where we slept. There were tons of bed in the upstairs of the lodge so we had a little corner where we stayed for the reunion.

One afternoon we made marshmallow guns and had a giant marshmallow war. The kids had a blast. It rained after that and got nice and cool.

Another afternoon we did a car mountain rally. There was a scavenger hunt we did in teams in the car. It was tons of fun and very well organized. We had to sing songs, do a human pyramid, read billboards etc.. and answer all the questions while taking pictures and videos on the phones.

After the scavenger hunt we did a HUGE Slip n slide down the back of the hill. Everyone was so excited about this! Lizzie thought it was fabulous! She loved it all! She kept cutting in line to take more turns.

We spend a lot of time hanging out in the lodge, playing games, doing crafts, and visiting with everyone.

We had a skit night one night and did a song to "Let it go" where we changed the words to go with the Shields Family.
The kids liked the song and really sang loud. There were tons of funny skits, and songs and we all laughed so hard!

The reunion was Super Fun- we all came home happy, tired and grateful to be a member of the crazy Shields Family.
Thanks to everyone who helped plan and organize everything!

Happy Father's Day to Danny. He has always loved being a dad and is a fabulous father, leader and example in our family. We snapped a few photos before church.

All four of our kids adore their dad, he is defianately the favored parent. When Danny comes home from work, there are cheers of joy from the kids and me! Lizzie especially is a big "daddy's girl". She loves to spend time with her daddy and doesn't like to share him.

We visited a pet store this week and held this 14 foot albino Python snake. Danny and the kids LOVED this activity and all thought it was so cool.  Lizzie and I were a little grossed out and scared.  This snake wasa HUGE!

We also fed the tortises lettuce leaves. Another hightlight from the pet store.

We had a delicious dinner at Goofy Grandma & Grandpa's house for Father's Day. I didn't take many pictures. But the kids loved riding in John's new mustang that he just finished building. They thought it was super cool!
Happy Father's Day to all the dad's in our life. We have been blessed with wonderful examples of loving, selfless, smart, dads in our families. We love you all!

Summer so far is going great!