Hiking, D-Backs, and Halli

This is Halli. She really isn't as chubby as she looks in this picture! Halli is growing up WAY too fast! I can't believe she is already 7 weeks old! She is getting a lot stronger, holding her own head up a lot of the time, rolling from side to side (I said side to side, not front to back to front!), and yes, those lungs are getting stronger too! She is having problems with going # 2, so right now I am on a lactose-free diet (not fun in the summer time, I'm missing my ice cream WAY too much!) and we are hoping that works. She is just so constipated. (something a breast fed baby should not be!) I took her to the dr last Thursday, and other than being constipated, she is very healthy! (a good 10 lbs. 11 oz healthy! Halli is by far my best sleeping baby ever! She usually goes to bed at 7 pm, sleeps until 2:30 am, then sleeps until 7am, then wants to sleep until around 9. I LOVE it! She also sleeps a lot during the day and I'm starting to wonder if she'll ever wake up! Halli is definitely adored by all under our roof, and she really loves her brothers and sister! She is my least smiley baby by a long shot, but she does smile (sometimes it takes a lot of coaxing though!). She especially loves her daddy, and will quiet for him every time he picks her up, then cries again when he puts her down. I love it! Like all my others, Halli is a binki baby (sometimes she won't take it though). She prefers her belly over her back. She is already losing her hair, but more is already growing back in, replacing what she's losing! Halli definitely has the lightest colored hair out of all my kids! Her eyelashes have finally grown in, and are even dark brown, unlike when she was born (with only a few very white ones!). Even though she's growing steadily, she doesn't eat well still. She especially doesn't eat well when covered up!


One Friday night we headed into Phoenix (a good hour + drive!) for the Diamondbacks/Rockies game. It was so much fun taking the kids! Even though we live in AZ, we don't go to many sporting events. (Ok, not true, we got to TONS! We just go to High school ones, not professional ones!) We met up with Brad and Steph and their boys, most all of the Greer family, Jeff (Cauley's little bro!), and Cauley's parents. We had a group of 35 of us! Tyli wasn't too interested, and Halli was too hot (they had the roof of the stadium open so no AC, plus, I carried her in the baby bjorn since we had to park away from the stadium and I didn't want to deal with her car seat at my feet all night.) I guess Tyli did really like the "clapping songs." The boys had a good time though! I think it had something to do with the fact that Steph had some nephews there about their age! It was fun, listening to Cauley teach Dallin about what was going on on the field! All in all it was a good game! The D-Backs were down 4-6 going into the bottom of the 9th. We ended up tying it up, then hitting a double to knock in the game winning run! My boys were yelling "Hit a home run so we can watch the fireworks!" at the end. That's when we won. We stayed after the game for the fireworks show. My kids all really enjoyed that as well. Funny how it didn't take long after we got back to the car for all of the kids to crash! (and they slept in the next morning too!)

Don't let this picture fool you, we sat on the other side of the stadium! (Upper left field side.)

Cheering on the D-Backs!

This is just a random picture I threw in- Cauley took it one morning. These flowers are in our front yard. Cauley planted them for me last summer. I love them! They open really big in the morning and usually stay that way most of the day, and yet every day the sun bleaches the flowers to a pale orange. The next morning more buds open, and so on. (they're pretty big flowers too, bigger than my hand span!) Every time I pull into my driveway and see them, it makes me smile.



A-hiking-we-will-go!

(Pictures are backward- again!)

Last Friday Cauley woke up and decided it was hike day. Not me! It was too hot for me, plus that'd mean Halli'd have to hike with me, AND my toe still isn't allowing me to do too much yet. Tyli didn't want to go either, so us girls stayed here while the boys went and hiked the San Tan Mountains again. It is definitely the perfect family hiking spot, and it's nice that it's fairly close!

(looking down from the top- you can see our house wwwaaaaaaayyyyyyy out there!)

Cauley made it to the top too!

Oh look, some shade!

Cauley called me from the top of the mountain and asked me to get every one's swim suits ready. We then met him at his sister Jennifer's house and swam for a while. We love swimming (sorry no pics of that!) and have been about 1-2 times a week. (I know, we should live in the pool in AZ, but we don't always have access to them!) My kids are swimming so good (but still need to learn more!) Dallin loves to play, swimming from end to end, diving for toys, jumping in, and I am happy that I don't have to watch his every move in the water now. McKade is getting a lot better. He can now jump in, float on his back, and swim the long way across the pool without help, and he likes to just kick around the pool on noodles, and Tyli, well, she needs to learn to kick her feet or she's going to drown! Unless she's being held onto, she spends most of her time where she can touch! She LOVES to put her face in the water though, and will put her face in and walk on her hands from side to side of Jenn's pool on the sun shelf. Halli has yet to go swimming. (although she has the most adorable swim suit ever!)

Oops! Another picture out of place!

Yeah, I'm a "little" behind!

Halli D Clark on her blessing day (6 weeks old)


Some of our favorite people who came to support us on Halli's blessing day. Missing from this picture is Uncle Ray and Aunt Jeni who had to leave right away, Jeremy and Cori Contreras with their beautiful kids, and Correy and Heather Johnson and their kids. (they were taking the pictures for us.)

I have to apologize to everyone who keeps checking in on me to see if there's anything new. We have been so busy having fun the past month or so that I haven't taken time to get on here and write about it. I know that I will definitely be missing things as I definitely have post pardum brain, but oh well.
The beginning of May brought a fun get together with good food and even better friends. Every year my friend Marie and her husband throw a Cinco De Mayo party (and yet the actual party has not fallen on the 5th of May yet) at a local park. We always have the yummiest carne asada tacos, chips and salsa, and fruit. The location is perfect as we plant our lawn chairs right next to a splash pad that the kids spend most of their time in. This was Cauley's first year attending and I don't think he'll miss it from now on! (there is a picture below of my kids together playing in the splash pad.)

(1 month old. Taken by Aunt Steph May 23rd!)

My parents got to come down for a very brief but wonderful visit the end of May. They haven't been here since Tyli was a month old (3 1/2 years ago) so we were SO excited to show them all the changes that have taken place since then. (I can't describe it for those who don't live here, except that we used to live literally in the middle of nowhere, and now we don't have to travel more than 5 minutes to do most things like shop, Dr. appointments, and so on!) They even got to see our new house (that we've been in for 1 year now!). While they were here, they got to attend Dallin's awards assembly that Dallin got his Honor Roll certificate at. We shopped till we dropped, barbecued and swam with some good friends, and had a wonderful time in the 2 days that they were visiting. They ended up staying a little later on Saturday as Dallin and McKade ran in a track meet that Cauley's track team put on and then Tyli performed in her dance recital. At the Higley school district elementary school track meet, Dallin got first place in the long jump (for K-2nd graders), 3rd place in softball throw, 3rd place in 50 meter dash, and 4th place in 100 meters! McKade, who wasn't supposed to participate because he's only 4 and hasn't completed Kindergarten yet (but since his daddy put on the whole track meet, he let him) got 3rd in long jump out of ALL kindergartners! (They DEFINITELY got their jumping ability from their dad- thank goodness!)

Tyli was part of a little dance group this past 6 months. A young lady in my ward who is 13 decided to teach dance starting in January and she did a GREAT job! (Way to go, Keagan!) Tyli LOVED going to dance and most of her little friends ended up in her dance class with her. Their dance was to a clown song, hence the clown costumes. It was so fun having my parents there, as well as being supported by the whole Clark family. Thank you to all who came! My parents and I at Tyli's recital.


(Ty's right behing the cute little girl with the walker.)

I am going to end right here for now as I just thought of lots of other things we have done, but didn't upload the pictures from my camera yet. Most of the pictures I have on this post is from my wonderful sister-in-law, Stephanie. Thanks, Steph! (Check back soon for more posts!)