In Loving Memory of My Father

My father was a man who had the ability to touch the lives of others. Anyone that he came into contact with he reached out to. In every career that he served in he reached out to others. He was a paramedic, on the Salt Lake City Fire Department, Air Med, Life Flight, and ski patrol. He also loved to teach paramedic classes and training classes for the fire department. There were many people he encouraged and influenced to join these fields of work, including my sister and my cousin Chad. My dad was a wonderful father and I feel fortunate and blessed to have had him in my life! No matter how busy or tired he was from work, he always had time for my sister and I. My dad had a great passion for the outdoors. Not only did he influence my sister and I with this passion, he influenced many of our cousins and friends. He loved to take us hiking, camping, snow skiing, water skiing, and biking. When we were little we were always attached to his back doing one of these activities. Another thing we always did together was go for walks after Sunday dinners. These walks will always be dear to my heart! On these walks my dad would ask and talk to us about what was going on in our lives. My dad also had a humorous side to him and a wonderful imagination. When I was little the letter L sound came out as the letter W sound instead, so when I would tell him that I wanted to go to sleep ("sweep") he would respond back saying, "Then go get your broom." He loved to tease me. My dad also had nicknames for Brooke and I. Mine were Bosco Bear and Buggly and Brooke's was Brookley. These are just a few of the things my dad did that made me smile and laugh, but there are many more memories that I will always hold near to my heart. My father was a very special person to many people and I truly hope that I can carry on his kindness and love and be able to touch the lives of others as he did. I love you dad and cannot wait for the day to see you and feel your embrace again! If any of you have memories you would like to share I would love to hear them.

4th of July Celebration

Ever since we have moved up to Oakley the 4th of July has become one of our favorite holidays! We get to see professional fireworks from our backyard for 4 nights in a row because of the rodeo and the day of the 4th is filled with activities. The fun starts at 5:00AM when the sound of cannonballs are shot throughout the town. Surprisingly this tradition has never woken my girls up, but without fail it wakes Dallas and I up every time. Although I have to admit this year I was awake before the 5:00AM wake-up call because I was way too excited for the day to begin. Later on in the morning we go to the parade and then in the afternoon we go to the kid's rodeo. Then that night we go to the Oakley Rodeo. It is a day filled of fun and our family absolutely loves it!

The night before the 4th we had our friends Scott and Jenny and their kids come stay with us. It was a lot of fun! We had a BBQ, lit some fireworks, and then watched the Rodeo's firework show from our backyard.

Aaliyah started out not liking them so much!

After a little coaxing she decided they weren't so bad.

Adeline started jamming to the music they were playing at the Rodeo grounds. It was pretty cute!


The 4th of July Parade

Dallas was an announcer for the parade that day. He did really well especially for all the craziness that happened in the rodeo this year! There were a few people who got injured during the parade because a horse fell on them, but luckily no one seriously got injured.

Aaliyah and Grandpa Doug

Candy!

The Kid's Rodeo




They both raced for a coin.

Here's Aaliyah trying to catch a chicken.

Here she is pouting because she didn't catch a chicken.

Here's Aaliyah getting ready to ride a sheep. She had been telling us for days that she wanted to go to the rodeo and ride a sheep.

You probably can't see her that well in this picture, but Aaliyah's on the sheep and not too happy about it. When it came right down to it she did not want to ride the sheep anymore.

When Dallas got her off the sheep she threw quite the fit and it made most of the audience laugh! I'm glad I got it on video!


The Oakley Rodeo

This year was my most enjoyable experience with the rodeo because both of my girls cooperated really well! Don't you love my humongous sunglasses? Someday I'm going to get made fun of for those!

Life has been busy, but fun!

So I haven't made a blog entry for almost two months! Where does the time go!? Can I just say that summertime is a busy time, but we have had a lot of fun along the way! In May, Aaliyah had her first dance recital and we went to Yellowstone with our friends the Lee's. So far this month Dallas has found a new job, which has a been a little nerve racking, but hopefully a good move and I just ran the Wasatch Back Relay Race. Dallas left his job at Comp Health where he had worked for 8 years and he is now working for a software company and will be in charge of launching and selling the software that they have created. He has to commute to Springville until he is trained, but will be working from home from here on out. I just ran the Wasatch Back last weekend and can I tell you it was one of the most fun experiences I have had! In fact, I plan to do it again next year and now my sister has talked me into doing the Logan Marathon with her in September. Here are some pics of what we have been up to lately:

Aaliyah's Dance Recital

I wish this picture wasn't blurry! Aaliyah was so excited to introduce herself!

When she introduced herself she said, "My name is Aaliyah Aste and my daddy and mommy are Dallas and Brittany and Brody and Clowee." So she remembered the dogs, but not here sister.

She was really getting into it her, but of course the darn picture has to be blurry.

Yellowstone with the Lee's

Our friends invited us to come up with them to their cabin during Memorial Day weekend. We hadn't seen them for at least a year because they live in Arizona now so it was a great time to catch up. There cabin is right off of Henry's Lake so it has an amazing view!

This is part of their view of the lake.

Here's Adeline, Aaliyah, and Broderick hanging out in the back of the car while we drove through Yellowstone. They actually did really well considering that we forgot to bring snacks for them. I was way bummed to realize that this is the only picture we got of Broderick and we didn't get any pictures of Chris and Marchelle!

If you can't tell that little black spot in the middle of the picture is a black bear. We also saw a grizzly bear, but as you can guess we forgot to take a picture of it. The grizzly was laying on top of an elk it had just caught. The ranger didn't let us stay long to see it because it was too close to the road.

Aaliyah wasn't particularly fond of the smell of Yellowstone.


Wasatch Back Relay Race

So I don't have a whole lot of pictures of the race yet, but when I get them all I'll explain the race a little better. This picture only has half our team in it. If you like running I would recommend looking into doing this race, it was so much fun!

American Idol

So I have to say this season of American Idol has had the best performers yet! I have never been so mixed with who I want win! On previous seasons that I have watched there has always been one that stands out to me and for the most part I'm ready to see everyone else get eliminated, but not this season. I've had a hard time seeing people go ever since it came down to the final 5 contestants. I hope to see Chris and Adam in the top 2 tonight. I like Danny and in the very beginning he was one of my favorites, but slowly I've kind of lost interest in him. He's never sang a song that I loved so much that I wanted to purchase it on itunes. Whereas I have to admit I have purchased Adam's song, Tracks of My Tears and Chris's song, Falling Slowly. I go back and forth on who I want to win between Adam and Chris. Adam has an amazing voice, in fact I think he has the strongest voice of them all, but when he sings a song I either absolutely love it or I don't like it at all. With Chris I've always liked the way he's sang his songs, but his vocals aren't as strong. I could see myself buying Chris's album and either loving or liking every song on that album and with Adam there would be songs that I would absolutey love and then some that I don't like at all. No matter who wins I think all three of these guys will make something of themselves and I think Alisson definitely has a chance too!

Easter

This Easter was a lot of fun with the excitement of our two little girls. Aaliyah was very excited to decorate Easter eggs and have the Easter Bunny come, but when I asked her what was the real reason we celebrated Easter she replied by saying, "Jesus died so we can have bodies." It's nice to see that she realizes that the holiday isn't just all about the Easter Bunny!

For family night we colored and decorated Easter eggs. Adeline was amazed by all of the colored water and kept saying, "Ohhh....".

When I walked into Aaliyah's room on Easter morning I found this cute little arrangement on her floor. She had found her Easter clothes along with a few accessories and laid them out all nicely. The sun lying right next to her outfit says, "I am a child of God" on it.

Here's Uncle Nick and Aaliyah decorating a bunny cake. I think Uncle Nick had just as much fun decorating the cake as Aaliyah did! :)

Here's the finished product. They decided to turn it into a robot bunny.

Here's Grandma with Aaliyah, Adeline, and Eloise. Eloise is the newest addition to our family. She's my sister Brooke's little girl.

Luckily it didn't snow on Easter like it was suppose to so we were able to have an Easter egg hunt outside.

Adeline caught on really quick to finding the eggs and absolutely loved it!