July "Part One"

I'm trying to get this blog caught up. Here is what we did in the beginning of July. The rest will come soon....

Seriously, why do I still live in Arizona????

I ask myself that every July and yet, I'm still here every July. I guess it's because it's one of the few places you can go from 116 degrees to this below in only a few hours.

Honestly, these were taken in my car on the same day. Granted it was 116 in Glendale at 3:00pm and then that evening we drove to Heber and it was 59 at 11:00pm. Needless to say.....it's HOT!!!!

For the past 14 years we have been in Heber for the 4th of July and we look forward to it every year. It's not even a matter of whether we're going to Heber or not, the only question is "when are we leaving?"

This year we added a new event to the holiday schedule. Most of the Crandell family participated in the 1st Annual Carissa's Run. Carissa was a sweet little girl that tragically passed away last year and her family organized this run in her honor. There was a 2 mile fun run as well as a 10K. LJ & I decided to do the 2 mile. We just started running regularly for some exercise so the 10K was a little out of our league. I was also worried about the altitude difference. We both ended up doing much better than expected, LJ even won 4th! Too bad there were only medals for the first 3! He was 3rd for most of the race until a "little girl" (as LJ calls her) kicked it into high gear and pulled ahead of him. By that point he was beat and let her have 3rd place. Turns out she was Carissa's big sister and had wanted to place more than anything so he was happy how it turned out.

Here's a picture of all the Crandell runners (except Chester who had gotten away before we got the picture).

LJ's brother, Leon won the 10K!! Here's a picture of him with his kids after getting his medal.

Lyla is dressed & ready to celebrate! Her adorable bow was made by my friend Jenny with Bowtique Chic http://www.bowtiquechic.com/. I thought it was perfect for the occasion!

Luke & Lyla were the only ones I could get to pose for me this year. Ally & Emily were too busy off playing with their cousins. How can you not smile around these two?

They had a good time entertaining each other.

The bigger kids had fun playing on Grandpa Brown's home-made jungle gym, equipped with slide, swings, tire swing and a zip line!

Luke LOVES the zip line!!!! This kid has no fear. Which scares me but looking at his face, it's easy to see he's having a good time.

We ate the traditional jello dessert, Independence Day style.

After lunch we made a few rockets to shoot off. It was a lot of fun! Also a great way to kill a few hours in the afternoon and keep kids entertained while they wait for the awesome fireworks show. Honestly, Heber has the best show in Arizona, no question!

I love this picture! My brother Drew handled the launching of the rockets and everyone had a turn to help. The looks on the kids faces is priceless!

Trying to catch the rockets as they land is another story. Some got away but were later recovered. Everyone had fun trying to be the one to catch it.

My niece Katelynn & nephew Ian were the cutest running around trying to catch a rocket. I think I'm going to hang on to this picture for a future bribery opportunity.

Here is the peanut-gallery for watching the rocket launching.




Well, it seems like I'm always playing "catch-up" with my blog but this will have to do for now. I'll finish up July in another day or so (hopefully).