Halloween 2010

This year for Halloween Preston was Napoleon Dynamite and Ava was a Woodland Fairy. We went to their schools Fall Festival first. Ava loved the petting zoo. Then we had a church party on Saturday where we blanket trick or treated around the gym. It actually worked out really well. We also had a chili cookoff--where I happened to win 2nd place for best chili. How funny.... Then we all enjoyed being home on Halloween and handing out candy to trick or treaters that came to our house.

Ava turns 6!

Ava turned 6 and we decided to have a big party! She choose Chuckee Cheese. She invited some of her most favorite people, and we had a blast. Happy Birthday Ava!

Mackenzie's Choir Concert

Mackenzie had a choir concert where they paid tribute to some Motown artist, It was awesome and here are a few pics to show. It was dark....

Lots of FIRSTS for the CARTERS!

First time to California for some of us, first time at an Ocean for some of us, first time to Disneyland as a family.... for all of us! SO many first and we had a BLAST! It only took us 16 years to get to Disneyland....but we did it :)

Just like any time I get a really good deal on something, I have to share! We got the whole family into to Disneyland & California Adventure for $330.00! I found someone on Craigslist selling their Hopper passes for $55/ea. Plus, Rob's work paid for the hotel rooms that we stayed in right across the street from Disney's main gates.

We had so much fun going to Hollywood and walking down the Blvd. Then Huntington and Venice beach we so beautiful. It was so fun to see Preston and Ava's reaction to the beach. They loved it and didn't want to leave. And then of course Disneyland! It really is an amazing place. Ava and I spent most of the day in Disneyland after the older kids and Rob headed to California Adventure. We had such a sweet time going to see Tinkerbell, ride the teacups, going through Mickeys house and seeing Minnie and doing all the fun little girly things. LOVED IT! Then we meet up with the others and rode some of the more daring rides with the older kids. That night we got to see the new water show (because Rob is awesome and went and got them for me :) "World of Color". It's in the park, but after the park is closed. It was really awesome too.

We also got to go see my dear friend Amy and her family. She cooked us a great dinner and we had a great time. Her little girls and Ava played make up and Ava still talks about them. Amy has always been a great friend to me and I am so glad that we are still able to get together with our families. She even meet up with us on Monday for a few hours at Disneyland. They live a few blocks away and have season passes.

Taking this trip made me realize that we need to go on family vacations more often. These were some amazing fun times we will remember forever! Where should we go next??

Arizona's newest Temple --Gila Valley

One of my favorite things about my calling, is being able to go on Temple trips with the Youth. I was able to go with them to the Mesa Temple for Baptisms and also to the Christmas lights. Because of Robert's work schedule, Preston and Ava are lucky enough that they pretty much have to go with us wherever we go. We are super excited to have had 3 new Temple's announced for Arizona. The Gila Valley Temple-- which is in Safford/Pima area, the Gilbert and the Phoenix Temple. We have made it our goal to go to all of the open houses. The first completed Temple is a smaller sized Temple 3.5 hours east of us. We love the Safford/Pima area, because Rob spent a lot of time there with his work and we would come up and spend the weekend with him in his hotel room. We hiked the mountains, played in the streams, checked out the historical sites and went to the mine site that Rob worked on. It's also where President Spencer W. Kimball grew up. He prophesied that there would be a Temple there some day. It was neat that they included that information in the video that they play before visitors went inside the Temple. It had a lot of really unique and beautiful art work inside.

Mother's Day 2010

I have not been on here for 7 months! That it so sad. There have been SO many fun things going on, but with work and kids I have slacked! I thought a good place to pick up would be a Mothers Day brag fest......I mean post, about what my perfect angels did for me for Mothers Day.
The super cool thing about this is that Mackenzie put this whole photo shoot together without me or Rob knowing about it. It was SO cool. The pictures turned out great and I really love them......<3 onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy1E7l8ngaIzI1GoCKvQ0qt66VAJMBVIGlBGS_ZMz5e7AQsXKzVk45dZrH_RZ7ZyvUorY_qaLDodig5V3z_ydWDADhcJs_j4rVpmrNeiGE3VAMuf5kSJLY2IHvDpfiWURCD5SeUXMaWh8/s1600/familypics+378.jpg">Rob pinning on my Mother's Day corsage. This corsage was part of a fundraiser we did in Young Women's for the girls camp fund. You can see it better in the picture above.





This was such a sweet Mother's Day gift. I will have these forever and will always remember how happy it made me feel that my kids would think of something so amazing.......see I told you it was going to be a brag fest!

So this year I asked Preston what he wanted to be for Halloween. His response " Well, since I am probably the most popular boy in my class and, well , really popular at school, I think it would be funny to show up as a nerd." I am finding out after having two teenage girls that are very modest and struggle like the some of us women/girls with insecurities , that boys don't suffer from low self esteems! They don't worry if they sound conceited. It's just a strong ego--and a male trait.

He's just wearing clothes from his closet and we got the tie & glasses at the dollar store! Everyone kept calling him Alfalfa--which he didn't like because he was NOT Alfalfa. I guess I got carried away with the hair.

Ava was really easy this year as well. She wanted to be a cheerleader. We already have pom, poms. I found this costume at Goodwill for $4.00! She loved it!

The Cheerleader and the Nerd!

End of the night! Preston had a long night of geeking it up!

Here's the closing shot-he is such a NERD!