July

This summer was probably the best summer of my life. We had stuff going on EVERY day during July and we had so much fun! For the Fourth of July we drove out to West Lafayette, Indiana to visit my brother Jacob and my sister in law Megan. They were in Indiana for a few months for an internship. We had so much fun spending a weekend with them! A few days after we got back from Indiana our friends, the Lotts, came to visit from Memphis.  We toured Kirtland, went to Melt, and the beach.  The day after the Lotts left Casey's two sisters and their kids drove to Cleveland to stay with us for a night before we all left to drive to Canada. We drove to Palmyra and met up with Casey's two other sisters and Casey's parents (who got to leave their mission for a day to see the pageant). We saw all the church history sites and the pageant. The next day we saw Niagara and then headed into Toronto. We had tons of fun with Casey's family in Toronto. It was so fun to see all the cousins playing with each other. Here's the photo diary! 

July started off awesome with Holland getting potty trained! She was awesome. She decided she wanted to do it and then didn't have any accidents. I attribute her success to Hershey kisses and this Build A Bear chart. 

The potty prize! (Her name is Rainbow Dash)

Holland also got to go out for frozen yogurt with me because she's such a big girl now. 

On the Fourth of July we went to the Indianapolis Children's Museum which is the largest (I think) in the US! It was awesome and we only saw a little bit of all there was to see. I wish Jacob and Megan could come with us everywhere... they were so sweet to help out and entertain the girls. 

This glass ceiling was amazing.

Largest water clock in the world. Can you tell what time it was? (12:30ish)

Giant indoor slide was a hit!

There were tons of fun water exhibits for the kids to play in.

The kids got to dress up like animals and climb through an awesome jungle gym

The indoor carousal was awesome! 

Jacob and Megan live right by Purdue so we went and walked around campus and of course stopped by their stadium.

Purdue has some cool fountains on campus that students supposedly run through and play in a lot, so we let the kids go to town.

Cool drinking fountain

We then went to a sweet zoo that had a lot of wallabies and wallaby babies that kept getting in and out of their mom's pouches. It was so adorable to see. 

Jacob and Megan gave us a personal tour of Endocyte, the company where they interned this summer. Megan is a chemist so she got to work in a lab and do cool stuff that I don't understand. 

Same with Jacob except he's not a chemist but he's really smart and got to inject mice with cancer.

This little girl has the cutest plumber's crack ever.

Waiting to see fireworks in Lafayette.

We were right under the fireworks. It was so fun.

After our fun weekend with Jacob and Megan we came home and dressed up like cows to get free Chick Fil A. 

Then our friends from Memphis/Arkansas came to see us and tour Kirtland. We started at the John Johnson farm. 

Joseph Smith preached from this very door step. It's so cool to live so close to all these awesome sites.

Carly loves Caleb and has missed him so much since we moved back to Cleveland. They were preschool and primary buddies. 

We then went to the "beach"

Then we went back to Kirtland a few days later with cousins! 

There were so many butterflies!

Cute cousins!

This was probably the only time that Daxton was still and not running around!

We made it to Palmyra, and saw the Smith home. In this home upstairs Angel Moroni appeared to Joseph Smith. 

The Sacred Grove. We got an in-depth tour from Casey's dad cousin Kent Servoss.  

Waiting for the Hill Cumorah Pageant to start! 

Niagara Falls, (US side)

The Falls

The Maid of the Mist boat ride. The girls loved it! I loved Holland's little poncho :)

The elevator we got to go down to get on the boat. 

American Falls

The only pictures I could get were of the American Falls because once you get closer to the Horseshoe falls it's too wet to take pictures!

The whole group!

We made it to Toronto and saw where the Blue Jay's play.

Went on Carly's favorite train

Ate at an awesome Asian restaurant, The Mandarin, in Toronto with the whole group (some are missing in the pic).

Saw the temple.

Went to a Blue Jays game! 

We had so much fun in Canada with Casey's family staying up late every night laughing, eating snacks, having fun standing around in the rain, and getting stuck in elevators (our nephew got stuck in our hotel elevator and the firemen had to come rescue him!) I laughed more than I have in a long long time. Why can't summer last forever??? Next up is our happenings so far in August!