Playing dress-up

Sophia and Savannah have been having a ball playing dress-up this week with their sweet friend Maddie. Sophia is in her glory, but Savannah is not as happy to be dolled up and photographed. Savannah runs when she sees a dress or a hairbrush, she would rather run around in a diaper and be left alone. Sophia is a little princess, and the only time she's not in a dress, she's in her swimsuit. It's so funny to see their little personalities bloom. I love the photo of both of them together in front of the dresser, because it really captures who they are. Maddie was trying to get them both in cute green dresses, but Savannah was not going to give in. I took Savannah to her closet and told her she could pick whatever she wanted to wear. She immediately grabbed her sweater and said that's what she wanted to wear. When Bethany was here visiting last week, she said "Sophia is more elegant than Savannah." I told her she was right on! Savannah is my Tomboy for sure!! I'm glad that they're so different, and have their own cute little ways.

Rodeo

Savannah has a passion for horses, so during Cheyenne Frontier Days I thought it would be fun to let her experience a rodeo. Nick got free tickets from the hospital, so I took Sophia, Savannah and my friend Ruth. We had great seats in the sponsor box, where we were given star treatment. We had all of the food and cold drinks we wanted, souvenirs, and a chance to meet some great people. First, the Indian dancers came in the box, their costumes were beautiful and the girls thought it was nice to meet them. Then they brought in Wesley Silox and asked if we wanted to pose with him and get his autograph. We said sure, but I was thinking who is this guy, and why do we want his autograph. I came home and googled him, it turns out he is a champion bull rider, and he's from Payson, Utah. We didn't know the first thing about rodeo rules, but it was still an entertaining afternoon. My girls liked the barrel racing event the best, but were great the whole time and we enjoyed our first rodeo together.

Pedicures for the girls

Make a Smilebox slideshow

An evening at the Lake

One of the evenings that Shella and Bethany were here, Nick had the idea to go camping, we were kind of dragging our feet, so Nick decided to spend a few hours at a Lake in Curt Gowdy State Park, just a few minutes from our house. It was fun to be outside, and the weather was beautiful. Nick and Savannah caught a rainbow trout, Savannah was so excited, she said, "I caught a rainbow trap!" Nick made delicious dutch oven potatoes, we popped popcorn on the fire, and ended with a nice dutch oven blueberry cobbler. It was so good, we ate the entire thing! Nick took the kids out on his pontoon, the kids had fun wading in the water, and Isaac blew us away with his spelling and memory skills by writing in the sand with a stick. He wrote food dishes from around the country. He spelled them right, and we all impressed that he knew what Mango Kulfi, guacamole, wrapped grape leaves, hummus, sweet potato pie, and bubble tea are. He learned about them from a computer program, and he really retains what he reads and learns. We had a fun time playing at the lake together.

Shella and Bethany's visit

After our fun visit in Hurricane, we were ready for our 12 hour drive home, luckily I didn't have to do it alone! shella and Bethany drove home with us to spend the week in Cheyenne. It was a long drive, but we broke it up by stopping in Heber to have lunch with Marilyn and Adalee. We went to Isaac's favorite place, "Dairy Keen". Isaac is still talking about the orange sherbet. We were happy to see Nick when we got home. I had so much fun with Shella and Bethany, they were both very helpful with the kids, and it was great to have the company. Bethany came up with an idea of having a Fiesta, so we played Life, ate popcorn, chips, salsa, and guacamole. Later in the week, we played a six hour game of monopoly in the garage, while we watched Sophia and Savannah play in the hose and with bubbles outside. They were here for the beginning of Cheyenne Frontier Days, so we watched a wonderful parade. We did just a little shopping, got pedicures, and had a good time just hanging out. Come again soon girls!!

Happy 61st Birthday Dad!

We celebrated my Dad's birthday at his favorite locatation, Lund, Utah. I was a little worried about taking 3 kids and a dog to the barren desert for an all day event, but I was pleasantly surprised at the beauty that Lund holds. There were mountains in the background, a few trees, some bushes, and a lot of sand. My Dad had a goal for the day to clean up and get his hangar doors hung. We had a nice lunch, then most everyone drove their 4-wheelers to the sand dunes for a longest drive competition. Some of us that aren't golfers and had kids to watch stayed behind. While they were gone, Isaac, Bethany and Bryn were playing so great together in the hangar. I was so delighted to see Isaac interacting with his cousins and they were having so much fun together. They were making a bowling alley using empty pop and water bottles, they had softballs to use as makeshift bowling balls. We thought this looked like good clean fun and left them to play and have fun. About 20 minutes later Isaac came back to the trailer with white paint covering his hand. I knew we were in trouble and went to survey the damage in the hangar. The kids had gotten very creative on the cement floor of the hangar and had spray painted lanes for their bowling alley. They also had made a great sign to hang outside the hangar which read "Bolwing Isle", this was a large piece of tin with the words written in red spray paint. Wow, aren't they creative and imaginative! I feared that Grandpa would not be happy, so Chani, Shella and I scrambled to find sponges, sandpaper, and anything else we could scrounge up to try to wipe the spray paint up. The kids also dug in and started helping. We managed to lighten up the marks, but they will remain on the hangar floor as a reminder to Grandpa as to how much fun he had on his 61st birthday! We love you Dad!!

Grandma and Grandpa Reeve's house

After spending several days in Midway with Nick's family, I took the 3 kids and the dog to Hurricane to spend a week with my family. Nick had to get back to work, so he came back home to Cheyenne. I think he had some nice, quiet down time being home by himself, but he says he missed us. We had so much fun spending time with all of my family. We went swimming almost every afternoon, went to Red Cliffs for a picnic, celebrated Leslie's, Dad's, and Uncle Kenneth's birthdays, had an apron making party with aunts, sisters, sisters-in-law, and my mom, and just wore ourselves out having so much fun. I feel bad that my kids don't get to live close to their cousins, so it makes me happy when they do get to spend time together. Isaac had so much fun that he informed me that next July we're spending 7 days at Grandma and Grandpa Larsen's house, and 21 days at Grandma and Grandpa Reeve's house.

1st annual Larsen Family Reunion Highlights

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

4th of July

We spent the 4th of July in beautiful Midway, Utah. We enjoyed spending 3 lovely nights at the Zermatt Resort. It was our 1st annual Larsen reunion, we had fun spending time with family and just relaxing. Adalee was baptized, congratulations to her! We were glad to be there for that special event. The kids had fun playing in the sandbox, blowing bubbles, and creating their own sun visors. Aunt Lisa was the party planner, thanks to her the kids were entertained. We had a nice BBQ, then celebrated Tasha and America's birthdays with a delicious cake. Uncle C.J. and Ty treated us to a kid friendly firework show-thanks guys! When it got dark, we took the lawn chairs to the front yard where we had a spectacular view of the city fireworks on memorial hill. The boys planned a backpacking trip to the Uintah mountains, while the girls had a blissful afternoon of shopping and dinner. I'm glad I'm not a boy!! It's always fun just being around family, it was so nice to see everyone. We all voted Lisa to be in charge of the 2nd annual Larsen Reunion, so we'll look forward to that next year!

Isaac's input

This is what Isaac wrote in his journal one night during the dog training:
My dog ate chocolate. Chocolate is not good for dogs. My dog ate a tissue. It drank toilet water. And we got the Doggy Bowls. I tried some Loud dog toys. I buyed some dog balls. My dog chewed on my socks.

This all really happened the first night we brought the dog back to the hotel room with us. We've improved every day since, and Isaac's dog now only eats dog food and dog treats. We are learning!

Shopping excursion to PetCo

This is out of order, but these are pictures of our first outing with the dog after getting back home to Cheyenne.

CARES Graduation

These pictures are of Sarah Holbert (CEO of Cares) Megan Lewellyn (Canine Assistance Director of Cares) A board member awarding Isaac his certificate, and Nikki and Trenton Heiman, and their dog Ronday

Isaac's Professional Therapy/Service Dog

Isaac's new dog is named Crosley, her litter was born on opening day of baseball season and were all named after baseball stadiums. My Mom, Isaac and I just returned from a 5 day course in assistance dog training. The company is called CARES, it stands for Canine Assistance Rehabilitation Educations Services, Inc. It is a great program, and we were so impressed with all 19 of the dogs they trained in our graduating class. Our testing and training took place in Concordia, Kansas(an eight hour drive from Cheyenne). The dog has had 9 months of intense training. Most of the dogs spend 3 months in a State Prison where they live with an inmate 24-7. Then the dogs are trained by students from girl and boy academies(troubled teens, or teens with behavioral issues). Then the dogs are trained with Megan and Sarah, who are the amazing women who run Cares. We participated in many activities with the class, attending Pizza Hut, Super Wal-Mart, Applebees, the mall, and the park(where Isaac pointed out a sign reading "NO DOGS ALLOWED") Part of the public access testing was visiting a skilled care facility(old folks home) and the prison. Going to the prison was an experience I'll never forget. There were 5 inmates that talked to us, they said they couldn't change what they'd done in the past, but they wanted to give back and help people. It was really neat to see how the dogs had changed their lives, and how the dogs will benefit the people that take the dogs home. Crosley is trained with hand and voice commands, she is trained to sit, stay, lay down, shake, stand, stop, up, give 5, dance, brace(for handicapped purposes), come, wait, retrieve, heel, about turn, etc. The very best part of all is that a few times a day, we take her outside and say "take a break" and she'll go to the bathroom on the spot. Getting a dog that's already potty trained is wonderful! We are hoping that Crosley will help Isaac with his autism. She will help him with social opportunities and also provide safety for Isaac, as he tends to run out into traffic. Isaac hasn't taken full responsibility for Crosley yet, but he does play with her and feed her doggie treats. She sleeps on the floor at the foot of his bed. Hopefully Isaac will be able to take the dog to school with him. By law the dog is allowed anywhere Isaac goes, and has already been to many restaurants, stores and even 2 hotels. For our test, we had to put the dog in a down, stay position and leave for 3 minutes. She did great and didn't move. Crosley also had to line up with all of the other dogs in the class and couldn't move until I told her to come. The hardest test for her was not moving when they tempted her by putting food 2 inches from her mouth. (We failed this test during practice when she ate a chocolate chip cookie off the ground) They're not allowed to eat people food or pick up anything up off the ground. All of the dogs had to lay down and stay while they were tempted by children, balls, strollers, etc. All of the dogs did really well and passed. She's a big responsibility and it is an adjustment, but I think we are making a smooth transition in dog ownership. Thanks Mom for joining us for the adventure.