The Girls

Pictures of the girls! Riley (12) Mariah (11) Emily (8)

First Day of School

Every year goes by faster than the last. Look at how old the girls are. Riley and Mariah are both going to the Intermediate school this year. Old enough to have lockers, choir, P.E. Riley is in 7th grade this year. Mariah is starting 6th grade. And Emily is in Mrs. Nielsen's 3rd grade class. We are so excited to have her as Emily's teacher. And Devin? He is just happy to go whereever the girls go. He just adores them!

Messy Faces

Devin's first time this year roasting marshmallows. All he wanted to do was watch the marshmallow burn. Cupcake store in Logan. Nutella on toast for breakfast.

Emily's Baptism

Emily turned 8 in January. I have pictures of her birthday that I have not posted yet. I really need to get around to doing it. In February she got baptized. Justin and I both made the comment that it was the smoothiest baptism of all the kids so far. She was the only one from our ward getting baptized that day and it was nice to have just our family and friends there. It was personalized toward her. Justin's mom and sister Natalie gave the talks. It was the perfect time to teach her about the Holy Spirit because we definetly felt it there. I can hardly believe that my little Emmy is 8 years old. It was a really good day.

Cheerleading Camps

Emily is easily the most adventurous of our children. She is always open to trying new things. She is also the the most girly of the 3 girls. She has been wanting to do the cheerleading camps where they get to perform at half-time during a football game. So I signed her up for the one at Box Elder High School and the one at Weber State this year. She had a good time and made new friends quickly. But both of the games were rainy. The Box Elder one was even the weekend before school started. The Weber State one was Saturday and it rained the whole game. Here are some pictures of her experience. (Not so much the acutal performance. It is hard to get a good picture with lots of little girls dancing in the rain and on a football field to boot.) Notice the cheerleaders are all in plastic ponchos, but none for the little girls. With Waldo At Box Elder High School

Thoughts on General Conference

We enjoyed General Conference last weekend. I love staying home, cooking a good breakfast, and staying in my pajamas. Entertaining the children has always been a challenge, but since we live in Utah we are fortunate to be in our own home and not disturbing anyone else. We have tried several things over the years to entertain the kids. We started out with coloring books and puzzles when the girls were small. That lasted about 20 minutes of the 4 hours. Then we tried Conference Squares aka Bingo. It worked really well and the girls had a great time earning prizes when they got bingo. But it progressively get more rowdy and not a reverent activity. There was fighting and complaining if one person got bingo and the others missed. Now that Devin has joined our family we have had to put Bingo away. He is now 18 months and into everything. We could not have bingo cards with markers on them on the floor or he would destroy everything. The girls are getting older. Riley is 11, almost 12, Mariah is 10, Emily 7. I think they are old enough to actually listen to Conference and learn something and feel the spirit. So this year we tried something new. No coloring (Devin would be an all too willing participant). They were given a notebook and an activity book (mostly for Emily so she could do mazes and puzzles). I still had a bowl full of prizes that they could earn. They earned the prizes by listening. During each talk they wrote down the speaker's name (that turned out to be a hardship sometimes) and what they spoke about. They could write down the theme of the talk, something they liked about it, or in Emily's case she could draw a picture. We really enjoyed Pres. Monson's talk. It is just what our family needed. Justin and I have talked about the issue of gratitude many times. We want to give our children all we can and make life good for them, but at the same time we want to teach them not to take things for granted. Children are often ungrateful for their blessings, because as parents you never want your children to lack anything or have hardships. It was a great thing for us to focus on as a family and try to be more grateful for all that we have. We have talked to the kids about being grateful for what we have and not complaining or whining about things we do not have. That was the highlight of Conference for me. As is so common with children we learned something unexpected as well. One of the General Authorities told a story about a cow who kept breaking through a fence to eat food on the other side (you may remember this story). It was eating food that was harmful to it and the fence was there for the cow's protection. In the story the cow got through the fence and ate the food and ended up dying. This man was so emtional about this cow and upset at the choice it made and he quite enthusicatly said "You stupid cow!" In all my days listening to Conference I have never heard this phrase, nor will I ever hear it again. Of course the kids thought it was hilarious! Emily later showed us what she had learned from this man's talk. Here it is: That was an unexpected lesson from General Conference and now one of my kids' favorite quotes. Isn't life so much more exciting and fun with children?

Hello Again!

Hello! I know, I know! I am not even sure if anyone out there still follows my blog since I never update. Justin solved my problems uploading my pictures yesterday and I hope to start posting more regularly again. So far summer is good! The kids seem to rotate between being extremely busy and very bored. Here are some picutes from the 4th of July.

Dance Party

For Emily's birthday she got a game for the Wii called Just Dance. The girls love it. All week we have had their friends over and they have played the game. It is really funny to watch them and it is a good workout for them. The pictures do not do it justice but here are some pictures of the kids showing their moves. Sorry, Layla, I know I said I would delete the pictures they took of us, but I had to laugh at this one. Good times, good times!

My Heart Took a Picture

Birthdays are a good time for reflection. I was looking at some of Emily's pictures. She is so darn photogenic and I had such a good time looking at all the cute thing she has done through the years. Here are some of my favorites.