the 24th

on the 24th, we went to watch fireworks at liberty park near Ashley's house.
we played with glow sticks

The pictures of the fireworks were no good, luckily, Porter drew some that came out great. That's him and dad watching the fireworks.

Later Joe and Porter went skateboarding in the rain (in Porter's imagination anyway)

Prince Philip

We were watching Sleeping Beauty and Porter decided that he is Prince Philip and Dallin is Maleficient (the role of Aurora hasn't been cast yet). When Maleficient turned into a dragon and Philip had to throw his sword, Porter was very worried. He was worried that Philip wouldn't get his sword back. He said, "will Philip be able to have his sword back?" I said no, that it would stay with the dragon, Porter said the fairies could make him another sword. All through the end of the movie, Porter kept asking why the fairies wouldn't just make Philip another sword. He didn't care about anything else that happened in the movie (except when the fairies kept changing the color of Sleeping Beauty's dress) because Philip was without a sword.

the tale of the rose panties

When I was growing up, one of the stories my mom loved to tell us what the story of the rose panties. Apparently my sister Megan and I had one pair of underwear with roses on the back between us and we fought bitterly over them (why no one ever thought to just buy us a second pair, I will never know). One night, Megan woke everyone up in the middle of the night because she kept crying. My parents tried everything they could think of to settle her down and get her to go back to sleep. Nothing worked. Finally, she told them that she wanted to wear the panties with the rose on them and I was wearing them. My parents talked me into taking them off and giving them to Megan (gross, I know, but we were both under five so we didn't know any better). When Megan got the underwear, she shook her little bum at me and said, "ha ha, I have the panties with the rose on them and you don't."
I never thought that with boys, they would fight over underwear too. However, Joe was folding laundry yesterday and Dallin saw Porter's Transformer's underwear. He told Joe and I that those underwear were too small for Porter and Porter didn't need them anymore. They should belong to him. Then he grabbed them up and said he would just put them in his drawer now so that we wouldn't accidentally give them to Porter. Later, when he was wearing them, Dallin went to show his "new" underwear to Porter. There was some bum wiggling. Porter was upset. He did accept it when I told him that the underwear were too small for him now and we would need to buy him some new ones though. Dallin hopes that there will be some Toy Story underwear for him too.

odds and ends

This is a picture from our Saturday hike. Porter wanted to look for caves and crystals. He said the best thing in the world is to look for crystals and trade them for money. Hollywood Connection is the second best place. The trail wasn't as good as we hoped. It didn't have hardly any shade and certainly no caves or crystals. Dallin didn't like it. He got hot and sweaty. Joe had to carry him most of the way down because he was too tired to go on. Porter collected pocketfuls of rocks though so he mostly liked it.

SOCCER

Porter has been playing soccer at the Kearns rec center. Joe got roped into the being the coach. I think he likes it though

the team's biggest fan. He even wears an extra jersey.

DALLIN

Dallin decided to decorate the house with these post-it notes. They are all over the house. He was really proud of himself. He was pleased to show all of his hard work to Joe and I.

Speaking of Dallin, he seems to have inherited a bad habit from me; nail-biting. He has been doing it for several months now. He usually denies it but I have caught him a couple of times and it is clear from his nails that he has been biting them. I can't be mad at him though for obvious reasons.

PORTER AT THE AQUARIUM

On tuesday, the boys and I planned to go our ward play group. We were too late for car-pooling (mostly since Porter slept in until 9:45) and tried to find it on our own. We were looking for the temple stone quarry. After driving around for more than an hour trying to find it, I figured play group would be over and we gave up. We went to the aquarium instead, since it was so close. Porter made special friends with this one stingray. It stayed by him for several minutes, being petting. Other people came by and were impressed that he had charmed this stingray so much.

I don't have a picture for this but it is a funny story. Porter was telling us about earwigs the other day. He told us that they climb in your ears and control you and eat your brain. I think someone at daycare has watched Wrath of Khan. He also told me not to fall asleep in any caves because the scorpions would sting me unless I have a force-field.

dinner

okay, so I am not always the greatest dinner, but tonight was pretty bad. I can attribute it to two basic problems. First, I bought a "boneless turkey breast" which sounded fine but is apparently a bunch of the disgusting parts of the turkey all smooshed together and tied up with twine. Second, the only flavor of Rice-A-Roni we had was chicken and garlic and it was also disgusting. I had forgotten to buy rolls or anything so the rice was the only thing I could think of and I didn't realize that chicken garlic flavor was so unpleasant. I also tried to make sweet potatoes, which I think came out perfectly well but I guess no one else likes sweet potatoes. Porter finally tasted one and he convinced himself that it would be terrible. As soon as he put it in his mouth, he started throwing up (he does this sometimes, he persuades himself that he won't like something and gets so worked up that he starts gagging and then throwing up as soon as he puts it in his mouth. It is annoying. I have a hard time feeling bad for him because I know it is all in his head). After that (and a discussion of the other times they have thrown up - Dallin at the hospital after he hit his head and at home in the toilet and Porter at Chick-fil-a and at home), Dallin refused to try a sweet potato. I told him he couldn't play Wii without trying one bite but he wouldn't do it. Porter wanted Dallin to play Wii with him and tried to convince him to just try one so he could play. Porter promised that Dallin wouldn't throw up if he ate just one. Dallin still wouldn't eat it so no Wii for Dallin all night. That meant that Dallin harassed Porter the whole time he played and so it was fun for no one. So much for trying to get them to eat new things.

the other one

Porter also says funny things. He said he wished that he was cat so that Dad would buy him and then be his best friend like with Poohball.

Tonight, he told me that our brains control us and his brain was making him stay awake. Then he said that his imagination was making him see R.C. (the car on Toy Story, Porter has a lego set of R.C.) with an orange back and a blue back but he knows in real life that R.C. has a green back.

Porter talked me into renting Alice in Wonderland (the new one with Johnny Depp) because he saw it at daycare and thought it was great. Before we got it, he explained the whole plot to Dallin so that he would want to see it too. The plot apparently is that Alice goes to this weird place and it might be a dream. Don't worry though because at the end Alice chops off the dragon's head and the dragon is called a Jabberwakie.

two more

Tonight Dallin and I were watching Porter play soccer (and Joe coach). Dallin told me that he wants to play soccer on a team too. I asked him if he would play the whole game and not cry or get mad and leave (like he is apt to do). He said, "if I play soccer, I will never get upset." He thinks Joe will be his coach too and he will get to wear a blue shirt like Porter. Joe has already sworn that he will not coach three-year-olds, five-year-olds are as young as he can handle. And I have no idea what color shirt they would put him in. That said, he has been much better about doing all of gymnastics lately (he used to cry during most of warm ups and then would usually do the other stuff happily) so maybe he could handle soccer.

Later tonight some guy came to the door to try to sell us something. He was chatting with Joe and asked how many kids we had. Joe said two and asked if the guy wanted to take one. Continuing with the joke, the guy said yes and said that he was really fun and had fourwheelers at home. That was all Dallin had to hear. He went to get his shoes and started heading out the door. We tried to talk him into coming back but he was intent on leaving. Finally, the guy said his four-wheelers were broken. Then Dallin realized that we were teasing him and ran into the house to be held and hide his face. He was pretty embarrassed. I told him I was glad he stayed, we would miss him too much if he was gone. I was surprised how willing he was to leave us behind though, all for a ride on a four-wheeler.

funny sayings

On Saturday, Dallin had cat fur on his bum. I asked him why he was covered in cat fur. He said, "it isn't cat fur, its hair. I just have hairy arms." (holding out his arm for me to see). That's just how Heavenly Father made me.

Today Dallin was going to the bathroom, "and it's poop" (which is what he always says when he says he has to go potty and needs to poop." While he was sitting on the toilet, he looked down and said, "guess what my poop said?" I guessed "bottom's up." "No," he said, "it said 'Cannonball!"

Porter decided to watch tv from inside this container. I just thought it was a funny picture.

4th of July (or 3rd as the case may be)

Because July 4th fell on a Sunday, we celebrated on the 3rd (and a little on the 5th) . We went to West Jordan Parlk to watch fireworks. we got glow swords instead of glow sticks

Before the fireworks, we went to the carnival at the park. We got our faces painted.

and our hair

we rode some rides

and rode some ponies

and played at the park on the monkey bars