november in review

calendar quotes:
"for whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope." -Romans 15:4
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we started november off with a super fun all boy birthday...koy has a great group of boys to hang out with---they were all so well behaved and cheered each other on as they each bowled. boy energy is so fun to watch, everything is "awesome" and "cool" with a whole bunch of sound effects to go with it.
we were supposed to do a ball battle but it was out of order and the boys settled for playing the arcade games. koy is such a cute little 6 year old. we really all can't get enough of him in our family...he sometimes asks why does everyone kiss and hug me? and i just tell him we just can't help ourselves!!!
kelsi made this cute cake for koy...he wanted a bey stadium with some beys battling-i'm sure glad kelsi tackled that one. kelsi really is becoming quite the good artist and enjoys using her skills to help out.
koy was super excited to find a new bat at the end of his treasure hunt and we were all super excited that it was a beautiful sunday afternoon and we could put it to use.all the kids decided to pose for a shot...
can you believe it's november? look at that green grass---we love playing baseball as a family, which is so funny to me because it is probably one of my least favorite sports to watch. it always gets us laughing!
then one week later- this is what november looks like...
gotta love where we live! kelsi took this picture on our sliding glass door, she thought it was so cool that the snow blew on the door and made a heart shape...
i love the month of november because it always reminds me of how grateful i am. we wrote what we we were thankful "4" and hung them on our tree...i was so happy that my kids quickly filled them up, i could've had so many more because they had so many things they were thankful 4.
we were expecially thankful that our daddy was spending thanksgiving with us...we decided to go to a resort in yellowstone for a couple nights-it was fantastic!
the kids loved using the fancy glasses at every meal and toasting each other...
the work-out room was a favorite place to be, someone was laughing that we're the only family that enjoys exercising while on vacation (kaden ran 5 miles in the two days on the treadmill)...
we just enjoyed relaxing, sometimes it's nice when you are away from home so you don't have to look at all the stuff that is undone around the house and just enjoy doing nothing. we played games...
read books...
i even smiled while i was cooking...
finished a puzzle from the lobby(i love doing puzzles)...
and of course the most favorite activity was swimming(a close second was riding the elevator to the pool), they never tire of it! and i never tire of watching them enjoy it!
i'm so thankful for all my blessings :)

CHANGE

ahhhhhh! change-there is one thing for certain and that is that everything changes...i sometimes have a hard time with "rolling with the punches"---i usually am pretty easy going and it takes a lot to shake me up but about a month ago i was shook up with a whole bunch of changes at once (the same week) and i'm just starting to feel like i can handle it!
change #1:
kent decided to switch jobs and is now working in North Dakota in the oil fields, his new shift is 2 weeks on and 2 weeks off...love the 2 weeks off, it's a long 2 weeks on. his first 2 weeks he logged 219 hours-that's averaging over 15 hours a day (i don't know how he does it!) but appreciate that he does :)
change #2:
i got called to be the 2nd counselor in the relief society...i was just getting used to the secretary thing and finally getting all my reports in on time. i am so happy to still be able to serve in the relief society, i have loved getting to know our sisters.
change #3:
my hours at work changed from 3 hours a day to 5.
change #4:
koy turned 6...he's still my baby!
change #5:
my babysitter which koy loved going to decided not to watch him anymore and i had to find a new sitter...i think this was the hardest, koy is so easy going and will do what ever- i think that comes with being the youngest but it's a lot easier when he is totally happy which makes me happy.
...i know in the end i'll be happy with everything these changes bring.

october in review

calendar quote:

when your children see you respond to adversity in faith instead of in despair...
they have a starting point to meet the challenges that face them daily.
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we started the month still in potato harvest, i worked for kent's friend dan again this year for 4 days driving a potato truck---i was a little less nervous this year but not much. i found this potato on the conveyor belt, it looked like it was smiling at me...
we also had a weekend of wonderful conference talks, we have been rewatching and listening to one a night for scriptures. brooke saw that me and kelsi were taking notes in a notebook and she also "took notes"...
i liked that day too! over potato harvest koy had to come up with a monster that he created, he decided to use all his tools from his metal collection---all my kids have gotten to make a monster for kindergarten and i think it's so cute to see what they come up with...
my pumpkins in my garden were miniature this year, so i told my kids we would go buy them-well i have never had to buy a pumpkin before and i didn't realize they were so expensive, so i asked if they would each just share a pumpkin and carve one side each...
we had very different pumpkin designs this year, no faces! each of the kids chose different signs? they were really into beyblade and wizard 101 this year. i do have to say when lit up the signs looked really cool...
one of my kids favorite halloween activities this year was riding in a giant shopping cart from a local grocer. these two boys look a little too happy behind bars, that's a little scary...
my kids are getting so big, i noticed this alot during this halloween...they went to all the carnival events with their friends (i tagged along or got found when they needed money), they each picked their costumes (not me), i sat in the car for trunk or treaters and they walked around without me. it's exciting to see them develop their own sense of self, i'm just glad they still let me tag along :)

my cute little halloween treats...

no more brushing

koy excitedly came and told me "guess what mom, i don't have to brush my teeth anymore- i can just eat one of these (a mint) and my breath is really fresh!"

jealous

sometimes i look at my kids and get a little jealous. kaden can read all day, i would love to read all day...
kelsi can spend a good 2 to 3 hours just getting ready for the day-i'm lucky if i get 20 minutes...
koy can do whatever he wants all day long with not a care in the world. oh, i would like one of those days...
brooke spends her days flipping upside down, doing split leaps, and cheers. i used to do the same things...
i am so glad that i can see my kids enjoy being kids and i love when i get to act like one too!

september in review

calendar quotes:
"when you get to the end of your rope...tie a knot and hang on" -from a great talk, don't know who it was by but they likened the knot to the gospel

"my beloved friends, every day is part of eternity. what happens here and now is forever important." -Richard L Evans
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started the month out with hunting season, i was so excited to go with kent again this year. we were able to go for 3 days and 2 nights...just us! we didn't have much luck, except for this lovely find...

we got rained on for a whole day and camped out in kents pickup listening to his ipod, eating, watching movies and i read a whole book..."the hobbit". it was very relaxing!
the kids competed in the youth triathlon this year again. koy and brooke swam 50 yards...
biked for 1 mile...
and ran for a 1/2 a mile...
they were awesome, koy is such a competitive person...he really tries hard to win (must be his dad in him).
kaden moved up a level and had a pretty hard event, he had to swim 100 yards...
bike 3 miles and run 1 1/2 miles...
i love this picture of kaden finishing, one of his friends cheering him on! so fun :)
we decided to take a trip to the ice caves, i have wanted to do this ever since i heard about them in college. the kids absolutely loved it, we were able to only hike one of the passages and would like to get back and go in the other one- hopefully before the year ends...
the kids were such good little hikers and explorers, we didn't have the best flashlights and at first my brooke wasn't so sure about the dark (and it's very dark) but soon we all were so interested in everything about the caves. i'm not sure why there are these big yellow "yes" signs through it but there are a few of them...
kelsi also hit a big milestone this month, she lost her very last baby tooth...
a neighbor took some pictures of kelsi and kelsi didn't like that you could see her missing tooth and wanted to photo shop in one, not me...you can still look a little "little" :)
i know i say it often but i do love living here. my camera doesn't do a sunrise justice but i love when i'm up early enough to see them...the rays shooting out from behind the clouds this day was so pretty!

famine of 2009

after we took our trip to lake powell we had to cut back a little bit. so the kids would sometimes complain when we ran out of corn dogs or cheese or milk. i was trying to find something to make for snacks one day and the neighbor kids were saying, "you're out of everything!" and kaden said, "man, this is nothing compared to the famine of 2009."
i had to laugh---when kent was out of work for a couple of months in 2009 things got really tight and obviously kaden remembered...run out of hot dogs in my house and life is miserable :)

PTO

i just want to remember today, so i thought i would quickly write it all down:
-i woke up at 6:30 showered and ready for the day
-woke kaden, koy and brooke up at 7, kelsi gets ready on her own now-got the other three ready for school and on the bus by 7:25
-kissed my hot hubby goodbye for a week
-arrived at the school a little before 8 and separated read.a.thon envelopes and treats
-at 9 handed out read.a.thon envelopes to the second grade classes
-at 9:45 went to the bank and made the book fair deposit
-went back to the school for my work shift from 10:30-1:30
-picked koy up from the babysitters at 2
-went visiting teaching at 2:30 and 3:30
- at 4:15 went back to the school and signed up all the teachers for their games for the halloween carnival
-from 5-7 helped with parent/teacher conference dinner
-finished up working at our book fair until 8:30
-made our bank deposit for the day and left the school at 9:15
-almost make it home and get a call from kelsi to pick her up from the football game
-arrive home a little before 10...wheew, what a day!

that was the crazy schedule but that's not really what i wanted to remember. i want to remember all the great people i get to come in contact with daily. i really have loved the PTO, the committees and people i get to work with are amazing. they are so ready to help---kids in tow---and all so dependable! i have just been simply amazed how generous people are with their time and talents. we had our grandparent day for the book fair, a first for our school, and the support we got was unbelievable...we had about 120 grandparents there to eat lunch with their grandchildren. i was just so happy in the wash room today- seeing how happy all the kids were to have their special people there with them. the energy at our elementary school is so awesome! we have an amazing community and i am so so blessed to live here and i just love it. i love working with the teachers and our wonderful principal in our school also, i was dreading going around for our carnival game signup and it wasn't that bad---out of 25 teachers only 2 complaints, i can handle that! i have been amazed how much time all these teachers put in too, anytime i have been at the school late, teachers have been their later. i really am just so grateful to be able to live here...i love it!!!!!!!!!!!!

lake powell

we were able to have the most amazing vacation this summer...earlier in the summer my good friend kris asked if we wanted to go in on a house boat with them on lake powell-not really thinking much about it, i said oh yeah! well i'm glad i didn't think to much about it because if i would have known the price tag right off the bat i probably would have said we couldn't afford it. but with a whole lot of work (thanks kent), we made it happen---and the adventure begins:
we had a rough start to our get up and go day...i woke up to find our well had a huge sink hole that had to be dealt with, $600 later we were on our way: way later than we wanted...i think we left at 4 for our 8 hour trip (so we thought). i think we arrived 12 hours later, after all the stops and a short mishap on some directions; i can't be sure since i slept almost the whole way (i am the worst traveler!) when we woke we were in a new world: beautiful lake powell...the kids were so excited to get on our house boat, we could see the marina from our hotel!
we loaded up all the gear and headed for the house boat, as we put all our stuff on the boat i started to get motion sick but i took a meclizine and one a day of those did the trick...i was so excited to feel fine the whole time. we found a cove to park our house boat in and the kids wasted no time in exploring, of course koy was off to catch a lizard...
kelsi was our mighty fisherman- she fished on the banks, in the rubber raft, off the boat: it was one of her favorite past times...
she was even successful too, so cute...
we ended up loving our little cove so much that we stayed there the entire time except to move across to the other side, we named it DYNAMITE COVE...after a song that we ended up listening to a lot there, named "dynamite", how cool is that...
the kids couldn't have been happier, i can't remember how many times a day i would here phrases like: "lake powell is totally awesome", "this is the best day ever", "i love lake powell", "can we stay here"...it was so fun! the kids could play in the sand and the water all day long and they pretty much did...
it was warm, in the 90's and the water was warm too and i thought it was perfect! warm enough for me to even get in the water (it's where we took our baths too)! we had a top deck on our boat and we put all the mats out and all slept outside under the stars, the first two nights were absolutely breathtaking- it was crystal clear and there were a ton of shooting stars, we all loved it except kelsi informed us of how annoying "did you see that one?" or "whoa, there's another one!" can be. she had to put in her ipod to tune us out- how annoying! and of course our deck served as a wonderful place to lounge and read, here's brooke and jenna catching some rays...
the kids loved to play on the slide too...
kris and i would try to get up each morning and take a little hike before it got too warm, i loved seeing how unique all the rocks were...
we found all kinds of fun areas to play around in, this was a perfect beach spot and we built a totally cool sand waterfall. the sand there was so powdery soft, it didn't scratch at all and you could make really neat tunnels...
we rented a ski boat from a guy kent knew at work and we had so much fun watching all the kids tube, ski, knee board and wake board. kelsi loved to wake board and got to be pretty good at it...
at one of our stops kent decided to get all the kids to cliff jump, i can't believe it- but they all did it and the pictures don't do it justice- it was really high! i had to show brooke jumping because i couldn't believe my cautious little brooke jumped. there she goes...
and kent, show off...
can you believe i went on vacation with that hot guy...woot wooo!
we had really high hopes of exploring all of lake powell but we quickly realized you probably couldn't do that in a life time, so we settled for one day trip to the defiance house ruins. we saw some hieroglyphics...
and toured a few cliff cave dwellings- it was super cool, i was amazed at how they just let you walk through everything. there is no rope offs or guide people, and i was so happy that other tourists had respected it so much that it wasn't trashed or written all over. look at that happy family (except koy, he was mad he couldn't roll big rocks down the cliff)...
we had a big day that day and did a lot of traveling in our ski boat and needed to fill up with gas to get back to the house boat, so we got to the dock gas station and we couldn't get gas because a storm was coming in, so we had to weather the storm in the boat. well, it ended up being a monsoon...literally. we could see a grey wall coming in and it started to get windy and i said, "really- how bad can it be, we're from rexburg" well i must have called down the wrath cause it was bad--- it went from 90 degrees to hailing pea size pellets on us. we were freezing and wet but after about 15 minutes it passed and then it warmed back up: we even got ice-cream treats from the dock, a luxury because the whole time there nothing stayed cold or frozen in our refrigerator/freezer...
and the storm was worth it because all that rain made for some terrific waterfalls off the cliffs, our ride back to the house boat was so pretty looking for all the waterfalls...
we did lose a few things in the wind storm and had very little dry bedding the last night but luckily it's warm there, even at night. we had so much fun---i get all smiley just looking at these pictures...so happy to spend time with good friends, eat good food, enjoy good scenery, go through lots of sunscreen, laugh, dance, play, read, relax. I LOVE LAKE POWELL...
can't wait to do it again!