24th of July Fun

I'm going to keep this short and sweet.

We had a great time on the 24th, spending it with DEl's family in Hurricane! We spent the morning at the park, where it was cloudy and shady and felt sooo nice. After lunch, the sun came out and we decided to pass a few hours at Sand Hollow Reservoir before Jefferson and I needed to head home to get ready for the play.

Here are a few pics I took that day; Bronson's missing because he had to work :(

At the park:


At the lake:

Just So Darn Much Fun!

Yesterday was very hot, so Mathison was unable to go outside to play until quite late. I decided to drive him to a nearby park, and as I did so, I told him, "This is going to be so fun!"

"Yep," Mathison agreed, "Just so DARN much fun!"

On a side note: Opening night for "Annie Get Your Gun" was great....we nearly had a full house and got a standing ovation during the bows! I hope to post some pictures of Jefferson and I in costume soon :)

Time to Break a Leg

Figuratively, that is.

Tonight is the opening night for "Annie Get Your Gun".

It's been a long, exhausting road to get here, and I honestly didn't know if I'd survive the last 2 weeks with 4-5 hours of rehearsal six days a week. Hats off to all of you working moms out there; I honestly don't know how you do it!

But now it's time for Jefferson and I to sit back and reap the rewards of our efforts....just keep that applause coming :)

This and That

I remember complaining about the heat a month ago.

If only we could go back to the high 90's, low 100's range of last month! It was 106 yesterday and the day before, and the temperature is supposed to climb to 110 by the weekend.

That's HOT by anyone's standard, but is especially toasty for our family, who have been accustomed to much cooler temperatures for several years.

Besides the heat, here is also what's been going on with the Beatty Bunch:

DEl recently spent a week in Reno, produced the Miss Nevada pageant. This was his fourth year doing this; he does such a great job!

Kim and Jefferson are spending every evening in lengthy rehearsals for SGMT's upcoming production of "Annie Get Your Gun". It opens this coming Monday, and runs through Aug. 15th. Kim will be playing the part of "Dolly" for three matinee shows on Aug 1st, 8th, and 15th. It's going to be a great production, and we'd love to have friends family join us!

Bronson just earned his Eagle Scout award......YEAH!! His court of honor will likely be coming up in early fall. He is still working at Iceberg and is trying to enjoy his free time until starting college in the fall.

Krissia is swimming, swimming, swimming. She has been doing extremely well in her swim meets, and is currently teaching private swimming lessons in our neighborhood, as well as in LaVerkin.

Mathison does what toddlers do best, making big messes and exerting independence while being just as cute as a button. He is definitely "the boss" around our house!

I just realized that school will be starting four weeks from tomorrow....where did the summer go?????

The Enforcer

Sounds like the name of a really cool TV show.

Maybe it is one already?

Anyway, it's also the newest nickname that this little guy has acquired:

Being the youngest means Mathison gets a lot of correction from other members of the family, and recently he's decided to turn the tables and correct whomever he sees doing any of the "bad" behaviors he's been reprimanded for.

The funniest incident by far happened a few days ago when I was driving to Wal-Mart with 3 of the kids in tow. Krissia was in the passenger seat, with Mathison and Jefferson seated right behind us. I noticed things in the back had suddenly gotten quiet - TOO quiet. Just as I was about to ask what was going on, I suddenly heard a little voice pipe up:

"Jepperson, we DON'T pick our nose!"

A quick look at Jefferson's bright red face in the rear view mirror confirmed that he had indeed been caught in the act by his younger brother.

I nearly wrecked the van, I was laughing so hard :)

A Most Unwelcome Guest

Yesterday, we had a most unwelcome guest enter our home.

Luckily, Jefferson was on hand to apprehend him just after he snuck through the back door.

And just who was the trespasser?


Yep - a huge, mean, scary-looking......grasshopper.

You thought I was going to say spider, didn't you? This grasshopper does look rather like a tarantula when its legs are extended like that. In fact, that's what I thought it was when I first saw it because of its enormous size; we measured the grasshopper, and from antennae to tail it was six inches long with a leg span of five inches.

Pretty impressive!

But not impressive enough to allow our "guest" to stay :)

Wouldn't You Know

Wouldn't you know that on the weekend where we had a stunning swim meet, fantastic 4th celebration, and rocking reunion.... I'd forget to bring my camera.

*@#!!

Anyway, I'll offer a brief - albeit pictureless - synopsis of our weekend. Krissia had a USA swim meet (pre-Olympic) in American Fork on the 2nd and 3rd of July. She was great! Krissia moved up 11 slots to the 14th rank in the 100 Meter Freestyle, and broke into the top 5 in the 100 Meter Backstroke! This is especially impressive because this meet is open to ALL swimmers in the state, including kids from 4 and 5A schools. There were even some swimmers from BYU in attendance.

The fourth of July was really fun for our family. We drove over to LaVerkin (my hometown) for the festivities and spent the morning doing games, races, and listening to the local entertainment. Around lunchtime, the 2nd half of the Kerry Gubler family reunion began (our family missed most of the first half due to work and the swim meet). We ate a pizza picnic at a local church, then had some family "Olympics". It was so much fun - even if our family is just a LITTLE competitive :) Afterwards, we headed over to my brother Micah's house and played in the pool for a while. Several of the adults made plans for dinner, and DEl and I ended up with Micah and Martha at Ted and Allen's restaurant. The food was excellent!

Later that evening, we visited with DEl's parents then loaded our tired family into the van and drove back to St. George. Our initial plans were to finish the day with a quiet movie at home, but Krissia and Jefferson were strongly in favor of seeing the city's fireworks display. Since this is our first year in St. George, we had to call around to see where they were setting them off. We ended up at Worthen Park....along with half of the city. In fact, it was so crowded that we ended up parking 3 blocks away! But it was worth it; the city had fireworks going in two locations so that there wasn't a lag between batches, and the length of the display was probably at least 15 minutes.

Needless to say, we've spent most of today recovering from our busy weekend :)