How can I summarize what has been going on the past almost year since I last posted???  Pictures...

 Wendi and Rachel came for the general Young Women's meeting this past month... it was SO fun and we ended up sitting 20 rows back and close enough to see the people talking without the big tv's!

 Gracie was in her first Ballet, Alice in Wonderland in March.  It was tu-tu cute...

 Hannah, Joey and David were in The Little Mermaid at school and I was a director!  So fun and so busy.  They LOVE singing and dancing on stage though!

 Derrick and I took the oldest two up to Soldier Hollow the last day it was open for the season for some last minute sledding before it is too late.  We had a blast.

 Abbie continues to be adorable.  EVERYONE still adores her to pieces.  It is a distraction really, she is so cute.

 We have been loving the zoo and of course our favorite social polar bear.

This was when Abby turned 2.  They are all so sweet.  More to come, I am not giving up on my blog.

The Wizard of Oz for kids

Presenting:  Glinda the good Witch (Hannah)
                    The Tin Man (Joey)
                    Munchkin/Oz Man/Flying Monkey (David)

 Really, this play was the cutest thing ever.  My really good friend and running partner put this whole thing together in 8 weeks and called it a Neighborhood Theatre camp!!  They practiced at her house twice a week for a few hours and I was so impressed with how well they all did!

 This is the scene where Glinda changes the poppies into snowflakes to wake up Dorothy.

 This was a perfect role for David... Flying Monkey.   You couldn't have type casted him any better.

 The whole group!

There is David in the middle doing his Munchkin dance and song.

Unfortunately blogger is having a hard time uploading my larger videos which were the ones that showed their singing parts...  if you really want to see let me know and I'll email them to you...  :)

It's been a while, but I'm back!

 Here are a few updates on the fam...  Abby LOVES Hannah.  She lets her take care of her and put her to sleep.  Whiting World is truly a whole new world because for the first time since Hannah was born, Derrick and I can go out together alone without hiring a babysitter!  Woo Hoo!!

 Around Easter we took the kids down to an egg hunt at Lavell Edwards Stadium.  There were lots of eggs!

 I love this picture... Abby is definitely a thrill lover.  And Daddy kindly obliges...

So Cute!

 I love it when you tell them to kiss and the first thing they do is open up as wide as they can and stick out their tongues  :)

Here we are taking our walk to the temple with my mom and sister Becky while they were here for a visit.

 Aunt Brianna came to Utah to let us meet our newest baby cousin, Jacqueline!!  She is SO adorable, the kids fell in love right away!!

 Here is the cute new mom!

 While they were here we got to see the solar eclipse!  We looked up how to make a telescope to see it without injuring your eyes.  It was pretty awesome...

More to come.

She is Walking!! Christmas in Utah/Idaho!

 Is this the cutest baby you've ever seen!  Well, I have to admit it is the cutest baby I've ever seen (since Gracie)  You just have to say these types of things when you are a mom because your kids are the cutest ever!!  I just love this little baby girl...  

 Christmas on Temple Square.  We had the whole Whiting clan there (minus Ayca :()  Very fun and very cold evening.

We were putting the kids to bed this night and Derrick sets Abby down just to see what she would do.  Well, she just started walking as if she already knew what to do!!  Derrick started yelling and all of us ran in there and she just was so proud of herself!  We were all clapping and happy and so she started clapping for herself.  I was so glad we all got to witness her first steps together.  Very very very cute.

We've moved again!!

I know it sounds crazy, but here we are in Utah!!  We made it about 2 weeks ago and so far we are loving it here.  The house we are renting has bright green carpet everywhere!!  We love it.  Hannah had to take pictures.  Hopefully everyone reading will be able to visit us soon here at our new house.  More to come soon...

A trip to the Zoo

Also towards the end of summer was our trip to the Zoo. I don't remember much more than just having a ton of fun together as a family.

I love how in this picture you can tell that Grace was much more interested in the ketchup than the hot dog.The highlight for the kids I would say was the feeding zoo. We have always had a special place in our hearts for goats, so I can see why we loved this part. I think they could have done it all day...

If you look closely in this picture you will see a red water bottle in with the racoons. Yes, it was ours at the beginning of the day, but as soon as it slipped from Davey's grip it became property of the racoons and they were fighting over it! Majorly fighting, like we were worried we started civil war among racoons it got so vicious. Anyway, I don't know why they put racoons in a zoo when you could see one so easily anywhere trash is present... In the end I was glad we gave the poor caged animals something to liven up their day.

Blogging is good for me because as I do it I remember more details that I certainly wouldn't have remembered otherwise. But now that I am thinking about this day I remember loving a display of some sort of tiny monkeys that just had babies and you could see them snugly holding on to their momma's back. It was the cutest thing ever! I remember David, Joey and Grace putting their arms around each other and chanting something odd they came up with as they walked around while Derrick and I were resting on a bench in the shade with Abby.

Playing catch-up

I hate it when I take such a long break from blogging. But here is my attempt to catch up...

The end of summer came and left before I had time to say goodbye! A few highlights from the last month were Joey's birthday party one month late. He had a great time with a few friends and Bay Beach. And then we topped it off with a bonfire and pinata at Gramma's house. It was lots of fun!


The other pictures I had from summer were these from a random Sunday when David got the bee in his bonnet to make cupcakes. We were making them from scratch and right after we got started Abby needed to nurse, so I told the kids to take a break and we would come back to it. Well, David sees no need for me in the kitchen while he is making cupcakes, and as luck would have it he did a great job! I couldn't believe he even made it through the part where we were out of milk so he had to actually make milk from our food storage powdered milk. I said from the other room, "Why don't you just wait for me and I'll make the milk and then you can measure it?" He said, "well, if I just pour a little in and then some water and taste it I can do it myself" And sure enough, he did it, tasted it and said, "this doesn't taste like milk, so I'll pour a little more in" which he did and then he was finally satisfied with the taste of the milk so he poured his cup in. I said, "did you measure it before you poured the milk in?" He said, "no" so I went out there thinking he had just ruined all the batter and so I poured water into the cup he used until he told me how much had been in the cup. I measured the water to see how much milk he had poured in and sure enough, it was almost exactly the amount he needed. I couldn't believe the luck of this kid, but sometimes I think it is just shere determination that drives him... anyway, they were wonderful in the end especially when we decided to use our fresh raspberries from Grampa's garden in the frosting. Nice work Davey!  He actually ate these, unlike the pumpkin pie he was dying for me to make from the pumpkins we got from Grampa's garden.... that is another story...