LOVELY VISIT

One of my dearest friends came to visit from Idaho! Our kids are relatively the same ages so it was tons of fun. Good food, good laughs, water fun, birthday celebrations, and a failed attempt at a sleep over (we tried, right Lissa!)

We got the pool out for some summer fun.

I love this girl!

Owen and Camden really hit it off. Owen cried when Camden had to leave..so did his mom!

Lissa and I were just dying to know what they were talking about.

Jace man is so cute..look at those eyes!

Ella loves to give hugs!

Lissa celebrated my birthday with me. This was my gift from Blake...so exciting!

FRANCE

WARNING: LOTS OF PICTURES IN THIS POST

We had the opportunity to go to the south of France in June with my two sisters and their husbands. It was so nice to spend some time with them...we have never all been on vacation together and it was great!

This is the island of Porquerolles. We rented mountain bikes and biked the entire island. This is one of the cliffs we came to.

AHHHH how I miss the pastries. Ate one almost every day!



This is the view of the ocean from our villa we were staying in.

This is one of the beaches on the island we biked around.

This is another beach we made it to on the island. Isn't it great.

This is in Italy. St Remos to be exact. I absolutely loved all the streets. Although this particular town was a bit dirty.

On the way home from Italy we stopped in Monaco. WOW the money that is there. Very expensive cars line the streets!! And yes, this is how most of my pictures with Blake turn out!



In Italy we HAD to have pizza. This is the pizzeria we stopped at and we loved our server.

I absolutely love this picture because it shows Blake's REAL smile!




This is the oven in which they cooked the pizzas!

Can't see this in America.

This picture was taken in St. Tropez. We had a great dinner there.


This is the entrance to our villa and exactly what I pictured France to be.

We had a boules court at our villa and we all played some games. It was girls against boys and the boys won. We are a competitive bunch of girls and we were not happy about it.

A serious game going on.

Rolling out the court before playing.

This is was at the bottom of our villa. You had to walk down some stairs and then there was some rocks you could jump off and go swimming or you could walk over to an actual sand beach.

This was in Nice the first day we arrived.

This was Nice as well.

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY

We had such a GREAT fourth of July (even though I was still recovering from jet lag..pictures from France to come shortly!) We started the morning off at a neighborhood pancake breakfast, then walked to a parade near our house, then barbecued at our friends house, then ended the day at my sisters house for dinner and fireworks (which unfortunately I don't have pictures from.) So glad and blessed to be living in a free country!!!!

Okay aren't you in LOVE with Ella's red boots..they had white stars on the front!!!

Owen was actually in the parade. It was cute. He was waving to everyone.

Isn't this just so creative??

Tallie and Ella giving some loves!

One of my favorite floats!

Waiting for some candy to be thrown. Ella got pretty quick at grabbing it.

I was lucky enough to have my niece Baylee here from San Diego.

Celebrating with the Taggarts is always a blast.

At the end of the parade there was a little carnival with lots of goodies. YUM!

Have you seen these GINORMOUS marsh mellows???

Oh yeah Smores heaven!

These girls get along so well!

Marsh mellows + bare feet = messy!

Ella wanted Katie to hold it for her the whole time. I was smart and took off all her clothes before she started eating it!

Our fourth of July tradition has been heading to the mountains for some tin foil dinners and smores but with the weather this year we asked the Taggarts if they would let us use there fire pit and luckily they said yes!