The Hoyt Family: 2014

So here are the before or start of our back yard landscaping. It started out as just a huge steep hill of dirt. We have now made terraces of useable space and areas of grass for the kids to play on.. The grass still needs to grow in, in some areas but its almost done. I am loving it.. It will be awesome in a couple of years when the tree's and plants mature and all the ground cover spreads and blooms.. Hope we are here to see it..

Cutting the dirt.

starting the rock walls

Let the terraces begin..

Here is the place the pergola will go..

woo hoo let there be useable yard when the grass gets fully in..

Here below is where the pergola will go with a big wood swing bench that will hang from it..

Lots of walkways and stairs running all throughout the yard.

Having tree's is so awesome.

The fire pit (minus the log bench to be built yet) where we will spend many nights I'm sure..

The built in tramp area.

Our some day terraced garden.. It got finished a little to late to plant much. We however did put in a few tomato and pepper plants on the top level to see how they would do.. Still need to add rock to the steps that were just completed today by my trusty handy husband..

some of our pretty flowers and ground cover.

Love sitting in the hammock or these hanging swings..

Wow so it's been a while since I got on here.. Life gets so busy.. I was trying to update pictures on this blog of family and kids and don't ask me what happened to the top family picture.. I cant figure out where to go to try and shrink it down to fit in the blog layout. It wont allow me to adjust widths.. Iv tried cropping the pict down through my iphoto program but that didn't work either. I have a lot of catching up to do.. I will start where I left off with the school year for 2013-2014. As I chose Pict's to upload it put them in a crazy order and not how I chose them so this may be a crazy post if I cant move them into the right order..

Ok so here was the first day of school.. Logan in 4th grade, Jessie's first year in middle school 6th grade, Austin's first year of High school 9th grade and Allie is a junior.

Football was a lot of fun this year.. Once Austin got his cast off and was all healed up from his broken arm he had a pretty good year with making a few touchdowns for the team. Go #23

So Allie was asked to Homecoming and she had a great time.

We started the demolition on our huge steep hill of dirt and weeds. Here was the first phase of the landscaping. Placing the rocks and creating the different levels of what will be usable space.. So excited.

We got our family Pict's done here in Star at a park which runs along side a river. I think they turned out pretty good.

It is always so hard to get Austin to cooperate and just smile normal without cracking up or pulling silly faces.

Then came Halloween.. I usually try to do a fun dinner for Halloween. I made a meatloaf in a hand mold with bloody mashed potatoes around it with body parts spread throughout. We drank blood from our skeleton wine glasses, and had grave yard pudding with a few extra body parts laying on top of the dirt.. Oh ya and not shown we had a jello shaped into a brain as well.

Next was Austin's 15th B-day. He really wanted a phone so we told him he had to wait until he was in High school so he finally got one.

Somehow we missed getting any documentation for Steve's BIG 40!! Don't ask how that happened.. I think he was... Well i know because he always is every week out of town for his b-day, but I still don't remember what we did for it. What a terrible wife.. Next came my birthday and of course Steve was traveling again for my b-day but I was surprised by my awesome friends showing up at my door with balloons and gifts and kidnapping me for the night to take me to dinner and a show.. It was so fun..

Christmas 2013.. I didn't think we would get any snow, but we finally got a little bit.. Still Idaho didn't get very much of it this year..

The door to keep the kids upstairs so they couldn't sneak downstairs before it was time.. Grandpa was pretty sneaky this year..

Of course we had to get in a little Ice fishing for the holiday. Specially since I hadn't been for like 3 years when we lived in Michigan and before that it had been another 3-4 years when we still lived in Utah so I was pretty rusty.

Ah the joys of modern day conveniences while sitting in an ice shed in the middle of a lake.

Well 2 days after Christmas I was scheduled to have my partial knee replacement surgery. There was only 2 doctors I was given to do this type of surgery because it was only a partial replacement and not a full there were no doctors in Idaho who could do it so I was given a doctor in Iowa or one in Utah. So given I have family in Utah I could stay with and we had time off for the Christmas break we decided to get it done.. It was a tough surgery. I had a hard time staying on top of the pain for the first few days. It was pretty miserable.. Steve had to basically hold my leg up every time I had to go to the bathroom so it wouldn't bend and it seemed those first few days I was going alot.. Poor guy.. It's a good thing I have such a great husband who takes such good care of me.. Before surgery! Pretty swollen..

I had both knees done but just had a scope done to the left knee for now..

I got a little frost bite from an ice pack I had on my knee..

Then came our February birthday month for Jessie and Allie.. Jessie finally turned 12 and was so excited to be getting out of primary and going into young woman's. She wanted a Katniss Everdeen braid in her hair for her special day.

It started out with getting a very nutritious donut breakfast served to her in bed.

Followed by a skating party at the roller rink with her friend.

Followed by cake and ice cream for dessert.

Like 2 peas in a pod.. Such great friends.

Sometime during this time Steve spent some time in Switzerland for work. He brought back the yummiest chocolate..

Austin's and I normal routine around here.. Trying to prove who's the toughest.. I hate to admit that I think he is finally stronger then me since he has started football and lifts weights everyday.. Of course I can usually still take him..Well some times..

Finally talked him into wearing a suit coat..

I never got any good shots of Allie at any of her concerts. This year she made it into Madrigals and she claims it was her sole purpose in life her reason for existence.. She absolutely had the time of her life being in Mads and made some great friends. She was given a few solos throughout the year which she did great in..

They got chosen out of all the choirs in the treasure valley to sing with The college of Western Idaho .. It was quite an honor to be chosen.. And they received superiors at their Festival competition.

Logan decided she wanted to go back to curly hair so we got her a perm and it turned out really good.

Allie was asked to the Tip Off dance by a kid in our ward that she liked at the time. It was a really fun group of kids.. We hosted the dinner and picts at our house.

Then to end the month we had Allies 17th B-Day.

Also at this time Austin completed driver's ed training and received his permit.. Talk about scary!! He has 6 months of driving with his parents till it's official. Heaven help us.. He's already almost killed us 4 or 5 times running a stop sign and falling asleep at the wheel and driving into the other lane almost hitting cars.. He is like his dad.. Doesn't drive well while tired.

Jessie got her braces on.. She was so excited to get them and then quickly changed her mind once the pain of new braces kicked in.

In April we went to the owahe mountains with some good friends from the ward to spend the day 4 wheeling and cooking in dutch ovens. It was a great time.. We even got to see a herd of wild horses while on a ride. The 2 oldest had some shooting target contests and shooting clay pigeons contest.. Austin kicked Allies butt at the shooting..

Another trip to the hospital for Austin. Shocker I know!! This time for a broken rib from dropping a weight bar on his chest during weight lifting.. I swear this kid is accident prone..

I love it when my kids get along and play nice..

Allie was asked to prom this year by a kid in our Stake. He filled her room with pink balloons which one of them had the question in it. And on the door there was a sign that said Someone might ask you to prom when pigs fly. Then amongst the pink balloons on the floor in her room was a huge helium pig balloon floating.. It was pretty cute however I didn't get a picture of it. It was a masquerade and although I'm a little bias I think Allie was the most beautiful girl there.. I did her hair and makeup for her.. I know I am awesome!!

Turning out to be such a beautiful young woman..

Wasn't really prepared for a picture.. I had been working in yard most of the day.. Sheesh!!

Gorgeous corsage!

Another trip to the hospital for Austin again.. This time we thought he might have broken his leg during baseball.. He jumped to catch a pop fly and came down on another kid and his leg bent out sideways.. However thankfully it was just a bad muscle pull or something like that..

To finish up the school year Logan had her drama play she had worked on all spring. She was the cutest little old granny who lived in a shoe.

We had a schools out party for my Wolf scouts to pass of one of their requirements. It was fun we roasted hod dogs and smores over the fire pit and played games.

This year we decided to take the kids to Cayman Island for Memorial week. We had to take a red eye out of SLC that left at 11:30 pk and then had a 4 hour layover in Atlanta then arrived in cayman at like 11 in the morning there.. It was such a long night.. Everyone but me was able to get a little sleep on the plane. I cant sleep on planes. I was so exhausted.. This is our 4 hour layover in Atlanta.. Steve was falling asleep while he was trying to type emails for work.. I know he doesn't know the meaning of vacation.. Austin was passed out on the couch and Allie passed out against me and yet again I could not fall asleep.. No way would I fall asleep in an airport while there is all these people walking past us..

There at last.. I think the kids had more fun chasing the lizards around the condo..

I think this was the longest I've ever seen Steve be able to sit still while not having his laptop or phone going..

The after math of traveling all night.. The next morning no one wanted to wake up..

Because a cereal bowel just isn't big enough..

Gorgeous sunsets on the beach.. it was so hot there though.. It was hard to get used to the humidity.

Heading to our Sting ray adventure.

The kids all got a chance to drive the boat..

The captain found a star fish on the bottom of the ocean so he jumped off the top platform of the boat and dived in to get the star fish so the kids could see it and get a picture with it.

At the turtle farm.. All the kids wanted to get a pet turtle after this..

Can you tell Logan was less then thrilled to get her picture taken.

Kids would spend all day in the water if we let them.. I cant say that I blame them..

Who wouldn't want to spend all day in this?

Aww sisters... I love this picture of them being so good with each other and getting along and playing together.. Someday they will be the best of friends..

This was one of our snorkeling sites we went to.. we didn't see a whole lot here like Steve and I did when we came here before but it was still a fun spot.. We all went to the tiki bar to get pina coladas and fries..

This was our swim with the dolphin adventure.. We all had so much fun here.. I always wanted to work with the dolphins when I grew up.. I still kick myself for not pursuing it but I prob wouldn't be where I am today if I had.

showing her graceful skills..

Logan was a bit nervous.

Allie Laughed the whole time.. She had a blast..

It couldn't quite get my fat butt out of the water..

LOVE!!!!

It almost pulled her out off the platform we were on because she is so little..

Practically all the way out of the water..

The kids couldn't believe how big the sting rays were. They had so much fun.

The stingrays were bigger then her..

Some of the many sea life we saw while snorkeling throughout the island.

Good ole R&R!!

So after i healed from my surgery I got back into working out and decided to sign up for this training program my friends sister started online.. She is a personal trainer and has created workouts she puts online for us to follow along with recipes for healthy clean eating. It has been awesome but hard.. some of the workouts are killer.

Staleen and I's makeshift reverse push up bar!! LOL

We were saying what the heck to the workout we just finished.. I think her sister was trying to kill us.. I am not about to show my pre training Pict's but here is after 3 months of training.. Not as big as improvement as I was hoping to see but I definitely feel a big difference and can actually see some definition starting. Now if I could just stick to the clean eating I would look alot better.

Logan had her 10th b-day in June and has been begging us for over a year to get a cat. So we finally gave in and got one..

Not only one but 2... She was so cute I couldn't resist..

We also got a RV this summer and have been camping in it twice now.. It is so awesome.. It is the best way to travel.. So excited to be back out here in the west to do more camping with family and friends..

A little to much fun in the sun on our last camping trip over the 4th of July to Warm Lake for the Hoyt boys!! Didn't get any picts. I'm so bad at remembering to take them. Ha ha just found a couple more..Austin and his cousin Dallin went squirrel hunting and decided to cook their catch.. I almost barfed.. So nasty.. They loved it..