July

July came and went for us here in Dallas. It was a little more low-key than June was, but we still did a lot of things that made it a great month.

Danny had the 4th off and we spent the day hanging around the house. Nothing too significant happened, but it was nice having Danny home with us. We saw some fireworks on TV and that was the extent of our celebrating.

We came across something online that we'd never seen before, something they don't have in Mesa (that we know of). We discovered something called a "sprayground" and we went to check it out one day. It turned out to be a really neat outdoor water area with lots of unique playground-like equipment that spray watter. There were even water spouts in the ground. Emily enjoyed herself, but was hesitant when it came to running through the spraying water. She preferred sitting on the ground, filling up a cup with water, and dumping it out over and over.

A week later we went to the Dallas World Aquarium, a place to which we'd planned to go all summer. It was a very cool experience. At the aquarium, they have three levels, with three different indoor exhibits. Each exhibit was filled with exotic plants and animals from around the world. We saw just about any animal you can think of - from a jaguar to manatees to a toucan to a three-toed sloth. The neatest part of the exhibit we experienced was walking through a glass tunnel surrounded by water. In the water were fish, sting rays, and a huge bull shark that we could see perfectly and very close-up. We had a great time seeing all the exhibits and eating lunch there as well.

The next Saturday we took the kids to Chuck E Cheese's to play and to eat lunch. We expected Emily to be in heaven with all the rides and things, but upon arriving she just kind of wandered in and stared at everything. I think she was in awe of all the lights, the noise, and kids running everywhere. With some coaxing, she got on the rides and seemed to have a good time. Her favorite thing by far was a big, blue balloon we got for her, which she carried around the whole time. She was all "rided-out" before all our tokens were gone, so us grown-ups helped ourselves to playing some ski-ball. We definitely will go back to Chuck E Cheese's, but it'll probably be when the kids are a little older.

The highlight of the month for me (Amy) was attending the temple. I was able to go twice (and Danny once) before it closed for cleaning, including a Spanish session. That was the greatest. It is a beautiful temple and we've been blessed to live so close to a temple yet again.

This last weekend we went out on a date - with no kids!! We did a babysitting trade-off with our friends and it was wonderful to go out all by ourselves (our first time all summer). We'd read online about an antique trolley ride that takes passengers to various locations downtown. Best of all it's free! It turned out to be up-town Dallas and we had a great time riding the trolley. We got off in a shopping district and enjoyed strolling up and down the streets looking at the shops. We stopped at a little Italian ice cream shop and enjoyed that tasty treat. We loved being out on the town, especially since the evenings cool down quite nicely here.

June's Pictures

Shopping at the outlets.

Going swiming at the apartment pool. Our time in the pool lasted all of five minutes, which in the end was a good thing since my (Amy's) arms were getting really tired from holding both kids.

Emily's second birthday.

Emily's "funfetti" birthday cake.

Emily got a dress-up set complete with a wand, a cape, earrings, a ring, a tiarra, and high heels (which were her favorite). She learned two new words that night: princess and tiarra.

Our smiley little Dallin.

Our two cute kids.

Emily riding a pony she named "Holly".

At the Mesquite Rodeo.

Wagon races at the rodeo.

Emily loves it when she and Dallin are "naked" at the same time.

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Outside our apartment. We're on the first floor. There's our black Jetta.

The lush view from our back patio.

Our fancy "dining room".

Our two pieces of furniture.

A June Full of Memories

Our first month here in Dallas proved to be a fun-filled one, especially on the weekends. Danny has every other Friday off and we took advantage of those days by visiting places we thought would be interesting or fun.



The first place we went to was the Ft. Worth Zoo, which in one of Danny's co-worker's opinion, is one of the best in the entire country. We found the zoo to be everything he claimed it to be. Considering the fact that the Phoenix Zoo is the one we're used to, this zoo was absolutely amazing and beautiful. It was like walking through a tropical rain forest and we couldn't get over how lush and green the foliage was. Even better was the fact that the animals were visible in almost every exhibit, which is also unlike the Phoenix Zoo. We ended up staying for almost six hours and the kids did wonderfully. Dallin slept on and off in his stroller and Emily enjoyed seeing the animals. Her favorite part of the zoo was riding on the train they had that went all over the grounds. Much to our frustration, however, our camera battery was dead and we didn't get a single shot of our excursion.



The following evening was our next exciting outing. We went to our very first rodeo! We went with the Hansen Family, who we've met since arriving. We took our kids and they took their three kids to the Mesquite Championship Rodeo at the Resistol Arena in Mesquite, TX, a town located about 15 miles east of Dallas. They had several activities to participate in before the rodeo started, and Emily chose to ride a pony, which she named "Holly" from a "Spot" book she loves to read. During the actual rodeo, though, she didn't pay much attention to the events as she was busy playing with the other kids and gorging herself on a big bucket of popcorn. The adults liked seeing all the action, though. The events included bull riding, barrel racing, mutton bustin', bronco riding, calf roping, bare back riding, rodeo poker, and wagon racing. Our favorite was the mutton bustin', which consists of little kids hanging on for dear life to a sheep while it's running all over the place. Sometimes it was hard to watch the cowboys ride because their bodies really take a beating. Somehow, they get right up and walk away after being bucked off a huge bull. Seeing a rodeo is definitely something we won't forget!

Father's Day came all too soon this year for us. We almost missed it since we thought it was going to be on the 24th, as opposed to the real date, the 17th. Amy did some last minute shopping to try to make it a special day, but made sure to tell Danny he'd get some good stuff at the outlets when we went. His request for dinner was Brazilian black beans and rice, a delicious recipe from Amy's Aunt Liz. It turned out very well, in spite of the fact that we didn't have a blender! Emily helped wrap gifts and colored on Danny's Father's Day card. All in all it was a good Father's Day.

The next weekend we headed north to a town called Allen to do some shopping at the outlets. Again, the kids did really well in the stroller and we got a good couple of hours of shopping in. There were so many great stores we didn't get to that we think we'll head up there again to finish them off.

On the 26th we celebrated Emily's second birthday. We had been talking about it with her for a couple of weeks in advance and she'd look in the cupboard every day to see the box of cake mix that would eventually turn into her birthday cake. She looked forward to eating that the most, along with her #2 candle she'd get to blow out (she was especially mindful of the applause that would follow), opening presents, and balloons. Since we knew it would be a small gathering with us being away from family this summer, we tried to make it a big deal by decorating the house with lots of balloons, signs, and streamers. She loved every bit of it and she had a great birthday.

Just yesterday we returned from taking an over-nighter to Austin to visit Matt and Megan Mullins. Megan is Amy's former roommate from her BYU days. It had been at least three years since they'd seen each other and it was great to see each other again, especially at this fun phase of our lives. The three hour drive turned out to be four hours on the way down there; traffic, a feeding, and a huge diaper blow-out were some of the factors that slowed it down. We finally got to Megan and Matt's house in time for dinner and we ate take-out from Rudy's, a BBQ place that they said is the best in Texas. It was just that and we really loved it. Emily liked their little baby, Blake, and said several times as she cupped her little hands together that she wanted to hold him. For some reason she kept saying that she wanted to hold Matt too. Go figure! Thanks to the graciousness and hopsitality of the Mullinses, we got to stay the night at their place. In the morning we went out for a late breakfast at Magnolia Cafe, a quaint local place that is very Austin. Again, the food was delicious and very filling. The pancakes were bigger than the plates themselves and, uncharacteristically, Danny couldn't finish the two he ordered. After that, we went to Megan's parents beautiful home for visiting, swimming, and lunch. Paul and Jan McKinnon were very accomodating in letting us crash their place with ourselves and our two kids. While Dallin slept and Emily hung out in a floater, we played a mean game of water volleyball. It was really fun to be in the pool, to get some sun, and to be in such good company. We had a very enjoyable time in Austin and give a big thanks to Matt, Megan, Paul, and Jan for making it so fun!!

A quick blurb about Dallin is in order. He had his two month check-up on the 14th and the doc said he's a healthy little guy. He weighed in at a whopping 14 lbs., 11 0z. and measured 24 inches long. He falls into the 95th percentile for weight, and in the 85th for height. What a big boy we have! He had to get FIVE shots, but was a trooper and didn't cry for long.

Six Flags Pics

Here we are ready to enter Six Flags to ride some crazy coasters!!

Behind us is Titan which has a 255 ft drop!!! It reaches 80mph and Amy and Danny could were seeing black on some of the turns!!! We rode Titan three times.

Superman is an elevator ride with sudden drops of from 325 ft in the air!!!

Our Move to Dallas

Our family has finally united in Dallas! Danny came a week early to start his internship with Raytheon. Amy, Emily, and Dallin flew with Grandma Dixon a week later and arrived safely. Everyday since we have been here it has rained. This morning, in fact, we had quite the rain/lightning/thunderstorm. Despite our best efforts, we all got quite wet, especially Danny, and were all cold through church. Danny used our one umbrella to individually shuttle everyone from the apartment to the car. He proved to not be very talented at buckling the kids in their cars seats while simultaneously holding an umbrella to shield himself from the rain. Let's just say his suit coat left a puddle on the floor underneath where it was hanging during sacrament meeting. As you can imagine, with all the rain Dallas is much greener than Mesa. We are constantly amazed at the abundance of giant, green trees everywhere.

We are having some fun experiences in Dallas. On Memorial Day we were lucky enough to have Grandma Dixon spend her holiday babysitting the kids while Danny and Amy went to Six Flags Over Texas (the original Six Flags). We had a great time riding coasters with 255 ft drops, 0-70mph bursts in 3.6 seconds, and corkskrews and loops backwards! Our favorite was "The Titan", the one in the background of the photo.

We also had a great dinner out at Razoo's, a Cajun Cafe. Amy ordered a cajun-spiced chicken dish with deep fried potatos and Danny ordered fried shrimp and fried catfish. Emily played it safe by going traditional and sticking with a corn dog. We all enjoyed our meals!!