Sullivan Family Blog

More Mud!

My kids love to play in the mud (is this normal I hope) anyway on this day, it was a little cool so I sent the kids out to play while I fed Brooklyn and did some quick clean up, as I was cleaning I heard the kids come in and go out and then come back in. When I went to see what was going on the girls were taking cups of water outside with them. When I looked outside too see what was going on, I found the neighbor kids and my kids had brought over a large pile of dirt and had then turned it into mud. As much of a mess I knew it would make, the kids were having so much fun that I told them no more water, and ran for the camera.

What you don't see in these picutres is me cleaning up their feet and legs and hands with the hose, and then cleaning off my porch. We did have a discussion about the fact that we don't make mud puddles on the porch, or in the dirt pile.

sprinklers (%$#%@)

Ahh sprinklers...for homeowners I could leave it at that and they would empathize completely with what Ryan is doing, however for the rest of you at the beginning of the summer each year is the fun job of seeing which sprinklers have made it through the year, and which have broken. In our case there are usually more broken ones than ones that are fixed. Here is Ryan working on one of the many that he had to fix. The fun part was the girls followed him around the whole time even Brooklyn trying to do what they could to help.

Here Brooklyn is giving Ryan a part that she thinks he should use to fix they pipe. (too bad it was wrong.)

So she tried again, and this time got it right. I am so greatful for the patience that Ryan shows with the girls when they are following him around like this.

****Just as a side note this was the easy fix we later found out that we had to fix one by digging a whole new line to bypass an area that was bad. This took roughly two weeks to dig the trench fix the pipe and put everything back together. (thanks to Tiff and Nate who came over to help us dig the trench and put in the new line.) I can only hope that the sprinklers will get better over the next few years as we slowly replace all of the bad ones with better new ones, but only time will tell.

Mud...mmmmm

Brooklyn loves to be outside with the other girls, and she loves to play in the dirt, which if mixed with liquid will turn to mud. On this day I had given the kids popcicles to eat while they were outside. Brooklyn took hers away from me to "do it herself" and this is the aftermath of that decision.

To be honest she finished the popcicle and enjoyed ever bit of it mud and all.

Summer Fun with Dirt

Summer time brings out the dirt in my kids. Ryan and I were planning to build a sandbox this spring, but our backyard neighbors tore down a shed at the end of the summer last year, and this made a perfect pile of dirt. The kids have enjoyed it so much that we haven't had to build the sandbox yet, maybe next year.

Here you can see the kids are makeing and pretending to eat dinner on my little table that I keep outside. Even Brooklyn was getting into it.

Aby is making a dish of some kind for the others to eat.

Here are Josh and Kenzie playing with more dirt.

Brooklyn jumping

Soon after we put up the trampoline at teh beginning of summer Brooklyn decided that it was a spot to play and have fun. She learned how to get up the ladder and onto the trampoline without any help at all. (this is a little scary for mom) She loves to have the girls jump softly and bounce her, but gets upset when they bounce too hard. The girls are pretty good, and they will let her have a turn. Really Brooklyn doesn't jump, she runs around and falls down and then grins like she has accomplished a major feat. It is so funny. (you can see in the video at the bottom.)

This is how I can tell when she wants to get off, she will lay down by the ladder, and either cry or scream for me to come and get her.

Enjoy the video!

My little Tiger

Aby has finished her Dance class, and this was her final costume. She was a tiger in the zoo, I have a really great video of her part of the performance, but it is too long for the blog, sorry. I thought that the performance was really great, but Ryan didn't like it at all, he thought Aby was cute, but hates dance in general. Luckily Aby didn't want to do dance anymore.

She really wanted to take some pictures at home, she was trying to be scary, but I don't think that it worked.
This is the only picture that I have to the performace, and it shows all of her class, they really did a great job, and I am glad that Aby stuck with it until the end of the year.

Childrens museum

Lately my kids and I have been spending a lot of time at the new children's museum at the gateway mall in Salt Lake city. These are some pictures of the first time that we went. When I go Mckenzie always askes that we take Brynn. I love that they are such good friends, and they play so good together. The other fun part is that we usually will take the new frontrunner train into the museum. (the girls call it the fastest train.) they love to watch out the windows, and see how fast we are moving.

This is my little Brooklyn being a fireman. The girls like to play in the usptairs theater where there are costumes that they can put on and pretend play.

On the main floor there is a "kids world" everything in the back 3/4 of the main floor is kid sized and the kids can play in a small house, a construction site, on a farm, grocery store, or a water area. Kenzie fell in love with the little house and spent a lot of time in the kitchen.

If only she was this happy to clean the dishes at my house.

In the front part of the main floor is a ball zone, this is really cool becuase there are a million things to do with ball that are different and fun.