Happy Anniversary to us!

Yesterday marked eight LONG years for Scott and I (Scott made me say that.) They really haven't been long. They have been great. We celebrated with golf in the morning and with dinner and a production of "The King and I" in the evening. I just want Scott to know how much I love him and how glad I am to have him as a husband and father to our children. This last week I had a good friend of mine unexpectedly go into a coma. It has made me realize how quickly things can change and grateful for every moment I have with my husband and children. I LOVE YOU!

On Sunday we were at the Stake Center getting our recommends renewed. I was in the foyer with Indie and Annicka and of course Indie was running around like a crazy kid and screaming some. An older couple comes in and the lady starts talking to Indie saying, "We don't scream in the church. This is Jesus' church. We can scream outside, but not inside." Annicka looks up at her and says, "He's just a baby!"

The other day coming home from the doctor's office I hear Park singing this song:

Ring around the rosies
Popsicle of posies
Ashtons, Ashtons
We all fall down!

Summer fun!

We've had a crazy busy summer as many of you already know. So here are lots and lots of pictures of just some of our many fun activities!

This is the Place Heritage Park

Park LOVED the goats and sheep that he could pet.

All the cousins

Park's melt down on the train. "Mommy I want off!"

Annie riding the horse before it got skiddish. It scared her a bit, but she recovered.

Thanksgiving Point's Farm Country

Indie on the horse ride

What cute kids!

Indie feeding the goat.

The Wagon Ride

Annicka getting back on the horse after her scare at This is the Place.

Splash Park

My cautious Park actually got into it!

Almost there buddy! A little to the left!

Basement

And of course the basement is an every Saturday project right now. We are up to mud and tape.

Lunch with Daddy at McDs

THE cutest picture of Indie in a while.

General Exhaustion...especially for Indie!

Yes, he is really asleep!

Project City

So the last several weekends have been full of projects. Oh the joy of home ownership!

We've had lots of problems with flooding in the basement of both our house and for our next door neighbors the Michaelson's. It finally got to the point where we needed to put in a French drain. We spent several days digging a four to five foot hole and trenches that were all later filled with gravel so that the water would have a place to drain.

Our neighbor Adam and two of his boys in our enormous hole.

Scott hauling dirt to the field down the street.

Me taking a well deserved rest.

Now our next project was not an anticipated one. You see, we live where there is an HOA (Home Owners Association). Basically they are there to help keep the neighborhoods looking nice and to keep people from painting their fences some crazy orange color. Who would paint their fence a crazy orange color anyway? Oh wait, we did. Any part of the fence that is visible from the street needs to be a particular color, we'll call it HOA gray. That we did, but I wanted the inside to be more of a natural cedar color when we first put it up about three years ago. I went to Home Depot and picked a color I thought would be a burnt cedar kind of orange. Scott went out one Saturday morning to paint and when I came out to start helping this is the color I found. NOT what I had wanted. But, money was really tight then and since Home Depot won't return anything that's been tinted already we just had to suck it up and paint the entire fence so that it at least would have some kind of protection from the weather and the sprinklers.

After Scott's brother Doug said "at least it makes to grass look really green," it began to grow on me and over the last three years it's toned down a little (see the difference between pictures?) and I've grown quite used to our orange fence. A little while ago a different company took over the HOA and they have been much stricter. A month or so ago we got a letter saying that our fence needed to be re-stained the approved HOA gray.

I was a bit disappointed that we'd have to get rid of our beautiful orange, but such is life in an HOA community, so this last Saturday we spent the day painting our fence.

Although it doesn't make the grass look quite as green I must say that it does look better.

Now for the ongoing big project around here, the basement. A couple weeks ago we began drywalling.

Before.

And halfway through. My brother BJ will be coming this weekend to help finish it off. All of the ceilings are done and most of the top part of the walls in all the rooms. We love how it's coming together.

2010's Chamberlain Family Reunion

Things haven't slowed down in the last couple of weeks like I'd hoped they would after girls camp, but we are having fun and loving it! Yesterday was the annual Chamberlain Family Reunion. The theme this year was a Super-hero theme. We all went as: Scott- Dr. Doofenshmirtz, Karin-Perry the Platypus (Agent P), Annicka-Candace, Park-Phineas and Indie Ferb. It's from a Disney cartoon that the kids love to watch called "Phineas and Ferb". For some reason, we didn't get a picture of all of us in our costumes before the kids got into their swimsuits. Anyway, the Reunion was a blast, all thanks to Lori who plans it every year.

All throughout the house and yard there were signs. This one is our favorite (obviously because it pertains to Scott) Others read things like, "No tights, No cape, No service" "Spandex required beyond this point" "Superheroes never cry (ever)" and "For everyone's comfort no x-ray vision beyond this point"

Annie was wearing a red shirt and white skirt, but then she REALLY wanted to get into the kiddy pool with the other kids.

How superhero does that look?

Park's Phineas outfit was an orange and white striped shirt and blue shorts.

Too late to get Indie's green hair. We had to wash it out so that he could take a nap without turning grandma's crib sheets all green. Then he didn't even fall asleep after that!

Lori had a "superhero" obstacle course. While wearing a cape you had to fling a flying monkey into a small pool, walk across a zig zag balance beam while looking through the wrong end of binoculars, crawl through a childsize tunnel, run around a tree while wearing boxes on your feet while kids were throwing dodge balls at you and then through the cardboard box wall all while carring a "baby". Each dodge ball you got hit with was +5 seconds to your time and if you crossed the finish line without the baby that was +30 seconds.

The person with the fastest time got this T-shirt.

Scott's cousin Jarren won, I tied with Jeff for second place. If you can't read it the t-shirt says "I was a 'Super Fantastic Super Hero' at the Chamberlain Family Super Hero Reunion (Basically I kicked everyone elses super hero butt!)"

The kid's red hair turned their bathwater bright red! It was a tiring but extremely fun day. Thanks again, Lori!

It's over!

Girls Camp is DONE! Since I got back almost a week ago I've been playing catch up around the house and unwinding. It went fabulously well, by the way. Scott said that Annicka was a great help and a good big sister, she usually is. Here are some funny tidbits that happened while I was gone and from church that Park's primary teachers told us.

Scott took the kids to Carl's Jr. for breakfast a couple of times while I was gone. When they pulled up the first time and saw the playground Park shouted, "Yea! McDonald's!" Scott said, "No, Park, this is Carl's Jr." Park responded with, "Yea! Carl's McDonald's!"

Park is one of those kids that is a bit shy and reserved, but once he's comfortable with you he'll open up and says the funniest things. His Primary teachers were telling us a couple weeks ago about how he started opening up in March. Once he went to sit down during sharing time and he missed his chair completely and ended up on the floor. When his teacher asked if he was okay he responded, "I thought the floor looked comfy." Another time in class they were talking about being grateful for their eyes when he got up and said, "If I were blind I would be like this!" He then proceeded to stumble around the room with his eyes closed. When he didn't run into anything he peeked open his eyes, found the wall and then threw himself into it. This kid is always making us laugh!

Scott showed me something with Indie when I got home. Scott stands up and says, "Indie, go crazy!" Scott will then start flinging his arms around and shouting while he walks around the house. Indie copies his every move, the same arm flinging and shouting! I about died laughing. I absolutely love this age!