Family Fun

We took the family to Classic Skating, a local skating ring, this week and we all had so much fun! The girls tried out skating and Kayman cruised around on his scooter like a mad man! I used to go to Classic with a good friend of mine, Lindsey, nearly every week in 8th grade. We had so much fun there! So many good memories! Come to think of it, that is where my Dr. Pepper addiction started...

Here I am making the rounds.

Syd and me taking a break.
Syd picked it up pretty quick and took off on her own for a while...until she fell and hurt her wrist.
Jess didn't dare let go of daddy's hand. She was a little unstable and couldn't quite figure out how to stand on her own two feet.
Kayman quite enjoyed this activity! He had this crazy look on his face most of the time and only took a break to go shoot the guns on the video games when he passed them.
What a great night that was! It was a good warm up for me, I am going back next week for a friends birthday party! Girls only, and it's an 80's theme! Oh yea, baby! Can't wait!

Baby Gabriel!

I became an aunt all over again on March 30. My brother and sister-in-law adopted a sweet little baby boy! They started and finished the adoption process in less than a month, which is much quicker than expected. Both Brad and Lindsay were able to be in the delivery room when Gabe was born, and Brad even got to cut the cord! So amazing!

Gabe was born in Philadelphia, PA where Brad and Lindsay had to stay for nearly 2 weeks after the birth of their baby to get all the legal stuff taken care of. They were SO glad to finally get to bring him home, and I couldn't help but go meet the little guy the same day. Here I am with my sweet nephew!

Syd loved holding him! Jess and Kayman didn't know what to think and wouldn't touch him, but Syd ate it up!
This is the proud new mommy, Lindsay!
My brother Brad playing with Jess and Kayman, trying not to fall asleep! They were both so exhausted after the long stay away from home with a new baby in a hotel.
We are so excited to have a new member of our family, and so happy for Brad and Lindsay during this amazing time in their life.

Christmas Eve

I am so grateful for the Christmas season and all the love felt during this time of year. We had some wonderful opportunities to serve and show love for those around us.

We spent Christmas Eve and morning with Andy's parents, grandpa and grandma, aunt and cousin. We had a delicious dinner at Andy's parents house and spent some time visiting before we let the kids open their Christmas Eve pajamas. I didn't make them this year, and they aren't even Chrismasy, but they all got some nonetheless. They were very excited to open a gift early!

The kids each get to choose where they leave their stocking for Santa to find, and place there it before bed. Kayman chose the fireplace and finally left it there after wearing his stocking for a while. He kept putting his foot into it and thought he was pretty funny! :)

Syd chose the green couch for all her loot.

And Jess chose the big green chair for hers.

Once we got that all settled we got the kids all bundled up and headed downtown to see the lights at Temple Square.

It is tradition with Andy's family to go to Temple Square on Christmas Eve, no matter how cold it is. Luckily it wasn't too bad this year. It was cold and everyone had frozen bums by the time we were done, but I have endured MUCH colder outings to Temple Square! It was so beautiful.

After the Temple we headed back to Andy's parents house to put the kids to bed. It was just about time for Santa to come and the kids were hoping we didn't miss him. They thought maybe we were out too long and he passed our area already. Luckily we got home and they feel asleep just in time.

Syd was very excited about the digital camera santa brought her. She loves taking pictures!
Kayman's got another football! Jess picked this out for him.
Jess getting loves from Nana.

Everyone had a wonderful Christmas. We spent the morning at Andy's parents and then headed to my parents for a while. After a gift exchange at my parents house we headed to my Uncle's house to spend some time with my extended family. It was such a wonderful day! I love spending so much time with family. We are so lucky to have so much family so close. We did miss Andy's siblings and their families though.

Christmas evening was spent putting away all our new treasures and packing for our upcoming vacation. We were headed to Maui in 2 days!

Halloween

This is being written a little later than I wanted. Once Halloween is over, I am so done with it, but I was too busy ripping out the dead flowers in my yard to get this done. That is something I have been procrastinating for weeks, and today's weather was irresistible!

We had a great Halloween! Syd was a fairy, Jess was a princess (again), Kayman was a rooster, I was a devil, and Andy was a hippie/rocker/long-haired-dude. My parents came out to see the kids in the afternoon so they could be home for their trick-or-treaters. They live at the top of a huge hill and lots of the kids make the trek up there for the BIG candy bars, so my parents like to be there for them. We had fun with them for a while at our house!

We had a trunk or treat at our church and got WAY too much candy! The kids loved it and I loved seeing all my primary kids in costume. They looked so cute! We then went home for our traditional "Frito Pie" Halloween dinner with Andy's family. Frito pie is frito's, chili, cheese, corn, tomatoes, and sour cream. So yummy! After dinner we headed out for more candy! It was fun to see the kids so happy and having fun. Kayman finally got the hang of it, but for a while he kept giving the people at the door his candy. What a sweetheart! Enjoy the pictures!

I have SO many pictures from Halloween, so I just made a slideshow for y'all.

I also wanted to post a few of my favorites cause I just LOVE them!

Pumpkin Patch

We went to the Pumpkin Patch for FHE Monday night to get a few pumpkins, one of the favorite things for the kids this time of year. Kayman has been looking at the pictures on our calendar (us at the pumpkin patch last year) and wanting pumpkins! I did attempt to grow some in my garden this summer, but they never even flowered. I hear they are the easiest thing to grow...but not in my garden. I think I put them in a place that doesn't get enough sun and stays too soggy. Anywho, we went to the pumpkin patch to purchase some. After we picked them out we took the kids on a hay ride, which they loved...

...except for Jess. She hurt her foot or something and was a little grumpy.

Kayman loved the hay ride!

Wheelbarrow full of kids and pumpkins!

Jess found her favorite pumpkin, which was not easy because most were rotten and soggy.

Our little farmer.

Blissfully happy Man!

Leaf collecting

We took advantage of the beautiful weather just in time for the snow to come. The night before the big storm blew in last week we drove up to Brighton to get some leaves for the kids. They didn't mind the cold too much and had a blast running around the mountain collecting things. The girls got a lot of leaves, and Kayman got a few sticks and rocks. There were lots of rocks to climb on and they loved that!

On our way back down the mountain we saw this big tractor. The kids couldn't help themselves and started climbing all over it. Kayman found himself a nice seat right in the tire.

Sisters

Last weekend my sister Jaycie did a triathalon and I took the kids to see her finish! She did great! Here we are just a few minutes after she finished. The girls were so excited to see her run through the finish line, it was really cute. (For the record...no, I am not pregnant, and yes I will be starting P90X again Oct. 1st. Don't mind the belly.)

My sister is such an amazing person. I really look up to her and strive to become what she is. She is such a loving and caring person and does so much good for others. She loves the Gospel and lives it in everything she does. She radiates happiness and it's rare to find her in a bad mood. I just love her! She has some amazing physical talents as well. Her musical abilities have helped and inspired so many people, especially those she works with as a music therapist. My family and I love listening to her play the guitar and piano and sing the songs she writes. My favorite Christmas song is one she wrote and recorded called "Mary's King." She is a caring sister, a loving wife, a thoughtful daughter, a FUN aunt, and will be a wonderful mother some day. Love you sis!

Crossing the finish line.

We surprised Jaycie and this is when she first spotted us!

Jaycie, her husband Nick and my kids.

Summer extension

One of the only things I like about summer ending is the excuse to go to St. George to extend it a little. It had been too many months since we had been there, so since Syd was off track we took advantage of the time we had to spend a while in the George. We had a great time together with just our family. It was so great to be together with no responsibilities other than to just HAVE FUN!

As you can see, the kids were very happy to be together. The held hands in the car a lot of the time. When Kayman's hands were not occupied they found themselves full of sisters' hair, so luckily he was willing to keep them occupied this way.

Andy had to go home after a few days...someone has to work, right?! My parents came down the day after Andy left and spent some time with me and the kids. We took their boat out to the lake and had an unexpected experience on the way home. One of the tires on the boat trailer blew out. I did what I could to help my dad fix it. I'm sure glad it happened when my dad was there, and not when we borrowed it last week! We don't have a hydraulic jack that made it so easy to fix. He had to wedge a rock under it to get the trailer high enough to even get the jack underneath it.

We spend a lot of time at the pool at my parents' house. They are so nice to let us use their place, and we loved swimming where we could have the pool to ourselves without having to worry about keeping track of everyone in a crowd. The girls got very comfortable swimming in the deep end, and Syd even learned how to tread water. By the end of the first day their fingers were bleeding from holding on to the edge and climbing in and out of the pool so much.

Here is Jess posing by the hot tub.

Syd loved to jump from the edge of the pool onto this floaty.

Mr. Stud was pretty cool with his glasses on...as long as he was floating on something. He didn't much like being in the water.

Princess Syd soaking up the sun. Check out that view!

We took a trip up to Dixie Rock, a favorite place of ours. Andy and I used to go there with friends when we were dating in college. It's so beautiful! The kids loved hiking around on the rocks. It seems that none of the kids inherited Andy's fear of heights.

We are so fortunate to be able to go to St. George and have such fun times there as often as we do. It is one of our favorite places to be. Of course we always have to drive by our old apartment and show the girls where we used to live. They think it is pretty cool.

It seems like a lifetime ago that we were living there. It's amazing how much has changed and how fast the years go by. While I was there this week I ran into a lady that used to go tanning nearly every day when I worked at a tanning salon down there during college. She thought that maybe it was 3 or 4 years ago. I had to think about it for a minute before I realized it has been 9 years! I have changed a lot since then, and my life has changed a lot. I am so grateful for my loving husband and 3 beautiful children. My family is so wonderful and I am pleased with where I find myself after so much time.

Movie Night

One of our favorite things to do on a Sunday evening is have a movie night. The girls choose a movie, usually a Barbie movie of some kind. I don't recommend you have too many Barbie movies in your home, they are not easy on the ears. Most of them have terrible singing in them and the animation is awful, but for some reason my girls can't get enough of them. Jess chose Barbie's Diamond Castle, so Andy and I didn't spend a whole lot of time watching the movie, but the kids loved it. I think Kayman even enjoyed watching the pretty girls. Either that of he knew where he had to be to get most of the popcorn.

Jess requested pink popcorn, which is strawberry flavored and very delicious, and they each got some sprite. What a treat!

Easter Sunday

We went to church and then headed to the Temple for a few pictures of the family.  Here are the kids in a pretty tree I thought would be cool for a backdrop.  I am hoping my parents got a better picture than we did, Kayman didn't particularly like being wedged into the tree, and Jess doesn't cooperate too long for pictures.  I am pleased with what we got considering the moods of the kids.

On the steps of the St. George Temple.
Syd and Kayman.  She is such a great big sister!
Jess doing a spin jump off the flag pole stand.
Here is our family on Easter '09.