Parker's First Day of Preschool!

Parker started preschool on Tuesday. I was a little nervous because ever since we moved he hasn't been very excited to go (I think all the changes were hard on him), but he woke up Tuesday morning SO excited! He couldn't get out the door fast enough. He had so much fun and his teacher is great. He's doing so well. He can recognize almost all of his ABCs and write many of them. We're so proud of Parker!

Hiking to Calf Creek Falls

We went down to visit Mom and Dad (and Tim) this past Labor Day Weekend. Cammie and Jesse were down there too camping. On Monday we all went down to Calf Creek Falls and went on a 6 mile hike. It was a beautiful day and we all had a lot of fun! The kids had fun playing in the water, and Josh braved the cold water to go swim under the waterfall. Brrr! Here's a slideshow of some of our pictures. You can click on the pictures to make them bigger.

Isaac's 1st Day of Kindergarten!

Every mother probably says it, but I cannot believe Isaac is already in Kindergarten! He had his first day today, and was so excited to go. He had SO much fun! He was excited to wear his new Power Rangers shirt and Power Rangers backpack (can you tell he has a new obsession?) We went to his assessment on Monday, and I was so proud of him and how well he's doing! His teacher told me that Isaac and one other little girl are the only ones in the class who can read so far, so they will get to go to the library once a week and get a special reading kit to take home and read. He's going to love that! We did his first homework assignment tonight. Our pre-school days are now behind us!

Our Summer

Yes, I'm actually posting on my blog! It has been a whole summer and I have not posted once! I guess I will just give a brief update of our summer. We've had a lot going on! We'll start back in June.

In June Josh and I took the boys hiking one day in S.F. Canyon. It was such a pretty place and we had a nice hike. Here are a couple of pictures from that:







Also in June, we had a mini Bell Family Reunion (my parents, siblings, and us) on Monroe Mt. Marcie, Dason, and Dryston weren't able to make it, but we had a lot of fun fishing, camping and hiking. I have a whole slew of pictures, but I'll just post a few here. I do have a slideshow in the works that I'll hopefully get uploaded eventually.








Isaac & Parker Fishing




Isaac, Grandpa, & Uncle Tim



Josh & Bryce



Parker & Grandma



Cammie, Tim & Jesse


Moving on to July... We had a fun 4th of July this year. I painted Isaac & Parker's faces with 4th of July pictures and we went to a benefit breakfast in Provo that morning and then went to the big parade. On the way we watched the hot air balloons. Isaac & Parker were so excited to see the Smoky the Bear hot air balloon! They couldn't wait to tell Grandma and Grandpa Bell all about it! That night we made a big yummy dinner and did fireworks. Here are a few pictures from our day.




Bryce eating watermelon (I think he actually swallowed some of that!)



Isaac & Parker by the hot air baloons



Bryce and me



Josh and his feast!
Also in July, my parents along with my brother Tim came up to visit and we all (including Cammie & Jesse) went to Salt Lake to the zoo and then to the "This is the Place" park. Later we went home and celebrated my mom's 5oth birthday! It was a fun day. :)


The whole crew.



Isaac, Bryce, & Parker on the tiger sculpture.



Dad & Jesse with their BIG popcorns. hehe



Bryce eating a frog.... well, a toy frog ;)



My little animals


Josh and I did a bunch of canning this summer! We got some apricots from a friend and we had the apricots from our own tree as well so we put of several batches of apricots and several of jam. We did almost all of it without sugar too! Here's a pic of some of what we did. We actually ended up doing a few more batches after that.




The first week in August we had a little Chappell Family Reunion with Josh's parents and siblings and their families. We went to the Mirror Lake area and did some camping and hiking. I even got a little fishing in! :) Again, I have a whole slew of pictures, but here are just a few.


Where we camped


Bryce having fun running around


Me and Parker



Part of our hike



Hiking




Josh & the boys on a little bridge on our hike



Melissa standing in the lake we hiked to

Fishlake

After Tim's graduation (well, the next day) we all went up to Fishlake for the weekend. Dad was able to get us one of the Forest Service cabins to stay in (it's become our Memorial Day Weekend tradition). It was a cold weekend, but we were able to go out on the boat a few times and caught a few fish. Parker caught a HUGE brook trout. Isaac "helped" Uncle Tim catch one too. Bryce had fun "hiking" with Grandma. It was a fun weekend.

Isaac fishing



Uncle Tim & Parker




While we were at the lake, I set Bryce's chair
in Tim's truck so he could have his tube-feed
out of the cold.




The boys in their new Fishlake hoodies



Parker with his fish




Isaac with the fish he helped Uncle Tim catch

Tim's Graduation

Congratulations Tim!!

My little brother Tim graduated from high school last week. Josh had to work, but my sister Cammie and I went down with the boys to see the graduation. It was really nice!

Heather, Cammie, Tim, Marcie & Dason (M's husband)


Uncle Tim with all of his 4 nephews



Tim with Mom and Dad




Tim with Grandma & Keith



Tim with his diploma

Happy Birthday Josh!

Josh turned 27 on May 18th. We started his birthday celebration the day before by taking a date to Comedy Sportz. It was a lot of fun. His actual birthday was on a Sunday. After church we had his birthday dinner which was teriyaki salmon and coconut taro with peas. For his birthday cake I made him a dark chocolate orange almond cheesecake! It turned out really yummy.

Instead of a big gift this year, we gave Josh a whole day of surprises with a family outing. We started out in the morning and with Josh blindfolded we drove to his first surprise - a walk and picnic at a really pretty park in Provo. It was a lot of fun and such a beautiful place! His next surprise was black-light miniature golf and Dippin' Dots at Trafalga! Everyone had a blast golfing, and the black lights were really neat. For the next surprise we drove to Barnes and Nobel where we gave Josh a gift card to buy a book. After that we took him to his favorite restaurant - Bombay House. We had Josh blindfolded between each surprise so he never knew where we were going next and we also gave him some little gifts to open between each thing. It was so much fun for the whole family. :)