Joy School

Austin and I did a joy school this last year.  It was fun, it was tricky, but all in all, good memories.  I only had to take the class 5 weeks, twice a week for the whole year.  A pretty good deal I think.  We broke the weeks into two week increments, and that worked awesome.  Of course, by the time you were done with your two weeks, you were so ready for a break! Or least I was... maybe it was easier for the others since I was the only one with other kids at home for most the year (one had a baby partway through the year).  Since Lauren wouldn't sit for the group activities, the other kids didn't want to so much.  It made it a little crazy, but we all had fun.  I loved teaching the kids the alligator chant that we do with our kids.  We had lots of fun doing puzzles, songs, games, coloring, stacking blocks, playing musical instruments, making necklaces, watermelons, and mouses, and so much more! I'm glad we did it, although its not something I'm considering doing again until its for my last child at home.

Good Times at Our House

Here are a few "moments" in our house:

Reading books together

Playing the Wii

Little helpers as I cook (sometimes this is the only way I don't have to hold her while I cook)

Hanging out and doing selfies:

Lauren helping herself to leftover pancakes:

BYU Men's basketball games:

Silly:

Fingernail painting:

Celebrating birthdays with the Gibson's:

The favorite hideout:

More Lego creations:

A girl growing up in a house full of boys:

Me scrapbooking with Amy:

Having fun:

Sweet kids:

Oregon!

For Spring Break our family took the long drive up to Oregon to visit Rachel and David and their family.  It was the best!  The kids took the 12-13 hour drive like champs!  Of course modern technology does help - we let them watch movies a lot of the way, but we also did a lot of the alphabet game and looking out the window at different things.  Dylan was so excited to see several bald eagles along the river as we came in near Portland.  He felt like his life's dream had been fulfilled!

Our week was filled with so much fun and playing!  One day we hiked Multnomah Falls - or at least part of the way.  We went as far as we thought the kids could handle and turned back, but it was so much fun to see the falls.  At the bridge behind this picture and a few other places along the trail you get a lot of mist falling on you.  Pretty awesome.

I love how the ground here is just covered in moss.  Gotta love Oregon!

We went to the beach at Seaside.  Of course I think everyone within a few hours of us had the same idea.  The drive to the beach was supposed to take a little over an hour, I think, but it took us more than double that.  The weather was beautiful!  It was beautiful the entire week.  Apparently we picked the most amazing April week practically ever known to be in Oregon.  Or maybe we brought the awesome weather with us from Utah.  =)  Traditionally it is cold and rainy at this time of the year.

I had gotten the impression from Rachel that swimsuits weren't going to be needed when we went to the beach - but apparently I should have brought them.  Dylan and Jayden got 100 percent soaked!

After the beach we walked around the town a little bit, and the kids had fun riding this carosel.

Not long after getting to the beach and eating lunch, we realized that Jayden was missing a tooth.  Pretty funny - he had no clue he had lost it!  This is the note he wrote (and I can't get this to load the right way for some strange reason):

Dear toothfary, I lost a tooth but swaloed it at the beach when I was eating a sandwitch.  Jayden

We taught David a new way to roast - dipping fruit in brown sugar and roasting it over the fire.  Of course we had fun doing marshmallows and peeps too.

The kids had a blast playing at this bounce house one day.  We did end up needing a few bandaids because of how hard they played.  Also, Devon, David, Rachel, and I had fun racing through the obstacle course to see who could get the best time.

And we played at park after park, after park, after park.  Eight kids all together have so much energy!  It was a great way to let them use it.

It was awesome trying to get a cute picture of all the kids together.  There were a bunch of other parents watching us try to get everyone to look at us and smile, all at the same time.  Totally didn't work.  I'm sure those other parents thought we were crazy.

We made a stop at the Portland Temple.  They have a new Visitor's Center, so the kids enjoyed looking at all the displays.

Yet again... trying to get a cute picture.  Didn't quite get it all together at the same time.

After a week of awesome fun - it was time to go home.  Bittersweet feelings when we saw this.  Yay to be home (almost) and sad to be leaving Oregon.  Thanks Rachel and David for letting us come visit and make your house burst at the seams with energy.  It was a blast!