Summer Funnin' we had a Blast!

The Nutt House had a wonderful summer full of enjoyment, togetherness, new adventures and love.  As I work to once again, catch us up, here is a recap of the 2012 Nutt House Family Summer Activities (not all activities are in chronological order, as some activities may be grouped together by like pictures).  As the Nutt House stayed busy it has also been a summer of newness – newness as our family adjusted to a Nutt House of three to a Nutt House of four, newness to summer in a new town that greeted us with triple digit weather most days of the summer, and newness as we’ve embarked on the toddler years.  Through all the newness, yes, even the triple digit temperatures we wouldn’t change in the summer we had for anything.

Over the course of the summer we attempted to have as much family time as we could. 

As we did that we found ourselves visiting and revisiting the grounds for the Gilbert Temple that is currently under construction.  Brent and I have found ourselves beaming with joy as Kara will excitedly tell us she sees the temple or wants to see the temple.  On one trip to the visitor’s trailer we were given slabs of a broken panel that was to be part of the temple.  Our temple rocks are now valued treasures that we hope to hold on to for many years to come.

We’ve also discovered the Phoenix area together as a family with parts serving as a trip down memory lane for Brent and the discovery of our new home for the rest of us.  One such discovery was up to the top of South Mountain.  What a beautiful place to go if you want to get a view of the Phoenix valley!  It helped to put into perspective just how big Phoenix is, how much it has grown, and the beauty of this desert area.

Game playing has always been an enjoyable activity for us and as we’ve spent many a Family Home Evening focused on the concept of sharing we have realized that game playing helps a young toddler to learn the concept better than mom or dad constantly reminding her to share.  (As I’m sure we were sounding a lot like the teacher in Peanuts after a while just a jumbled “waa wa wa wa waa wa…”)

Reading!  The Nutt House is a family of readers, Brent enjoys his science fiction or fantasy books, Kara enjoys her anything that sounds fun books, and while I enjoy mystery or classic novels, my reading as of late has been limited to such classical titles such as “A is for Apple” or “Do Princesses Wear Hiking Boots” or whatever library books happened to come home with us for the week from the toddler section.  While our tastes may vary, our love of reading is a pleasure for the entire Nutt House family even Kaden and Pixie enjoy cuddling up for story time. 

One of the perks to moving to Phoenix has been the close proximity we now have to some of our family.  This is particularly true for the Northern Nuttall’s (Brent’s dad and Julianne).  Family is key and means the world to us, so, having family so close is a blessing in so many ways.  The enjoyment that can be seen on the face of a child and a grandparent when they are together is magical. 

At the beginning of summer we snuck off to our favorite park (Desert Breeze) a time or two before the weather drove us away from the stifling err, I mean fresh outdoors.  Fortunately for us, the temperature is cooling back off a bit, the train portion of the park has reopened as we’ve been back a couple times already.  Now, we just need for the ducks to return and we’ll have a weekly park date set into our weekly schedules.

During the summer we had important days to celebrate at the Nutt House.  One of which was Father’s Day.  This year, Kara created her own masterpiece for her dad which he is now proudly hanging on the wall in the office. 

I love how creative this little girl can be!

Final Product                         

During the summer, we also celebrated the 4^th of July.  As we contemplated what patriotic activities we wanted to participate in for the day we elected to go the less obvious route and enjoyed some time at the top of the airport parking garage watching planes take off and land.  (What can I say; we are a family of Nutts)  While this may seem a little unusual for Kara there was no better activity we could have engaged in for the day.  In her eyes, the only downside to the day was that we left the garage and that we have not been going back on a daily basis for additional plane watching.

Summer also brought us family time.  The first of which we saw when we had Kaden’s baby blessing; what a touching time this was for us!  As we’ve looked back on Kaden’s special day we realized we may not have another event with all of Kaden and Kara’s grandparents together again for 6 more years when Kara is baptized.  The day itself could not have been better.  We had family pictures before we headed off to church where Brent along with so very many family members blessed Kaden.  Afterwards we had a get together at our home with our family and friends.  I mean in the course of the day we were spiritually fed and uplifted, I got to watch Brent exercise the Priesthood on behalf of one of our children and we were surrounded by family and friends.  There is no better way to spend a day!!

Yep, this about sums us up - as Nutty as can be

I was lucky enough to have my parents and sister down here for a couple extra days.  As I grow older I understand more and more the importance of time with our loved ones and hold the time they were here close to my heart.  Especially the times I watched them interacting with my children.

The petrified wood came from my Grandpa Lang's.  Seeing Kara on it brings back so many good memories of my childhood

The other big family time event is a very bittersweet memory for me.  I was to visit my favorite place on this earth for what will be the last time.  While that pains me to think about, from the aspect that it is the last time, I am so grateful to have been able to have that last time there with my family and not just my Lang family but the Northern Nuttall’s as well.  Julianne drove up to St. George with Kara, Kaden and myself.  While we live just 5 miles apart we don’t often have/find/make the time to spend together so the drive up was a special time to me.  While we sat in the front seat talking we got a little too into the driving and talking aspect of the trip as a glance back to check on Kara and Kaden greeted us with Kara who was bored of coloring in her coloring book and chose to use a different canvas for her art work.

After one final adventure we entered good ole’ Washington where we enjoyed family time for a couple days before heading off to the ranch.

Aunt Allison meeting Kaden for the 1st time

Kara's first sleep over, man I feel old!

Once at the ranch we were  involved in some of my favorite activities from camp fires, visiting, walks, games, and in a nutshell – just time with family in a beautiful, peaceful, tranquil part of the earth.

Between the family events the Nutt House has taken the time to relax and relish in the simple pleasures of life.  Whether they may be a good cookie recipe that I’ve discovered, time out with the guys on a Saturday night for Brent, making new friends and uncovering layers of myself to become a person I’m very happy with in, or even simpler items for the kids such as swimming, coloring or dancing.

The next Michael Phelps, he LOVES the water!

She loves arts & crafts and Free Art Friday's in Tempe are  amazing!

Who knew that a box of crayons and a box could occupy someone for hours?  But, it works!!!

Just layin' around

*The video is of Kara dancing to her favorite episode of her favorite show "Care Bears".  That and Strawberry Shortcake rule our house and our DVR*

 Of course, this is just the cliff notes version of our summer and recapping the events this far after, the finer points, the details that made each of these memories so special may be lost in this post.  Hopefully though, this will give insight to the summer of 2012 for the Nutt House.  It was a fun and busy time, thankfully, we did find time to sleep, once or twice!

We enjoyed our summer and hope you did the same!  **I am hoping by next Sunday to have more posted and be closer to being caught up