Rob, Amy, Brooklyn, Alyssa, Ashley & Hunter

Valentine's Day, Del Sol Ragnar, the Kids and School and Happy Birthday Rob!

2010-03-11T20:00:00.000-08:00

This year only Brooklyn & Alyssa had to make Valentine boxes for their classes. Thank goodness for the Cricut!!! Since Rob wants the kids to decorate their own boxes, I do all the cutting and put the double-sided tape on the back of the decorations and then show the girls where to stick everything:)...Does that count as letting them decorate their own boxes???Ashley didn't have to take her box to class, but I still had her make one just for fun. This is the product of a no-help-from-Mom box:)...Isn't it adorable?!!! She did use a few left over hearts that I cut out for the other girls though:)
Rob, Hunter and I all got to go to each of the girls classes for the Valentine's party. Ashley made this cute bag for her valentines. She has one of the best teachers in the world!
Hunter enjoyed eating all of the candy that Ash didn't want.

Brooklyn

Hunter made himself at home in Alyssa's class. He plopped down on the rocking chair and read a book to himself:)...Well, he at least looked at the pictures.

Alyssa let Hunter eat most of her candy too:)

Valentine's Day was also Black and White Day at school. Hunter and his Valentine's gift from Rob and me

Brooklyn

Lulu

Ash

A few weeks ago, I ran in my 3rd Ragnar Relay. It was terrible, yet sooo much fun! By the third leg, we were all seriously wondering why we keep signing up for these things. Fortunately, or unfortunately:) some of us are running the one in Los Angeles in April. I think now that all of our muscles have healed, we should be able to make it:) My total this round was 13 1/2 miles. Who in the world came up with the idea to run this far in 36 hours with little to no sleep???

Our team name was Wii Not Fit

Thanks to my photographer friend, Ruth, I have pictures of myself.

Jeff giving me some water...Thanks Jeff!...I was really thirsty:)

Last year we had a problem growing lemons, but this year we got a bunch! The kids were so excited when they actually got to pick some:)

Rob and Hunter made lemonade

My girls have had very few big projects that had to be done for school. For some strange reason, this time Alyssa's and Brooklyn's were both due on the same day. Being the procrastinator that I have been since I was in school, we of course waited to do the projects until the last couple of days before they were due. Rob was out of town, and once again, I was saved by the Cricut. Alyssa's project was on the skeletal system.

Brooklyn had to choose one of the Winter Olympic sports to do a report on. Since she is taking ice skating lessons, she of course chose figure skating.

Last Saturday was the annual Spring Carnival at the girl's school. Keeping with tradition, Rob had to win a basket at the silent auction. This year Rob bought Brooklyn's class basket which was "Pamper Yourself".

I don't know who was more excited for this basket, me or the girls. Yes, Rob does like to pamper himself, but this basket was full of stuff for girls:) All Hunter got was a blue loofah that I later took back, and of course he has no idea that it's gone:) Hunter was really disappointed that we bought this basket instead of the Hot Wheels basket:(

On Rob's birthday, Alyssa had her 3rd grade musical. I went to the morning showing at the school so that we could go see Alice in Wonderland 3-D after school...Loved Alice in Wonderland by the way. Anyway, Alyssa was a crow and she looked so adorable singing all the songs and flying around like a crow:)

The lighting is always terrible on the stage, so this is the only decent picture that I was able to get.

Our friends came over Monday night for cake and ice cream. I think Rob offered to hold Max while we sang to him so he could hide behind him:)...I still got a picture Rob:)

Rob's bosses sent him a YUMMY fruit basket for his birthday. The kids have never eaten so much fruit in one setting.

I guess Ashley and the Richey girls thought that we were having a fiesta...Ashley is so dramatic:)...In a good way!

Happy 37th Birthday Rob! We love you! I will say that one of the best presents he got for his birthday was the card from Benson:)...That was awesome!!!

Annie, Supercross, Desert, Ice Skating & Peter Piper Pizza

2010-02-17T20:25:00.000-08:00

During Christmas break, we took the kids to see Annie on Broadway with some of our friends. Rob and Hunter were the only boys that came:) The kids had so much fun, and have renewed their love of the movie Annie. I think they've seen it 10 times in a month and a half.Even Hunter liked the play, until he got stuck in the seat while he flirted with the Richey girls:) After that, he had to sit by Mom and Dad.
In January, we went to our first Supercross race. We went with our friends the Richeys and the Urrys. Instead of trying to park downtown, we decided to take the light rail. Once we boarded the train, the kids quickly got a culture shock! Everyone on board was a die hard motorcross fan! I'm also pretty sure that we were the only ones that were sober and wearing bright colored clothing:). We were definitely the only group of adults that was outnumbered by kids. Everyone aboard wanted to teach us about supercross. It was a blast!
Ashley, Hannah and Alyssa on the light rail.
The kids watching the mouse trap outside of Chase Field. The moms were all busy people watching, while the dads tried to get us tickets.

Hunter loved seeing all the motorcycles, but I think he may have liked the cotton candy more.

It didn't take the guys long before they started making bets on which motorcycle would win. Shane and Rob cleaned out Derek's wallet:)...and then Rob cleaned out Shane's:)...nice going Rob!

Rob and Ashley

Alyssa

We went out to the desert again with our friends, only this time it was a lot more adventurous than the last. I'll get to that a little later:) The kids are always so good to entertain us by posing for pictures:) I love this one!

The kids had a half day of school this day, and we were so excited to get to the coveted shooting spot before anybody else. We were thrilled when we pulled up and nobody was there. Luckily we had already used up most of the bullets before a cop showed up to inform us that we were shooting on government land and it was illegal:( We have never seen any signs posted...I guess that's why it was open this time. Maybe everyone knows now. Rob wanted to make sure I got a picture of the smoke coming out of his muzzle loader while her was shooting. I got it Rob!

Hunter wanted to hike up the hill to help Rob and Derek set up more targets.

Rob and Hunter

Rob and Derek shooting clay pigeons.

What is it with boys and guns???

Now to the adventurous part of our day. While Rob, Sarah and I were shooting with four of the kids, Derek took the other four on a rhino ride. It is so dry here, 360 days out of the year you wouldn't have to worry about driving in mud in the desert. We had a lot of rain in January, and I guess Derek couldn't resist driving the rhino into a swamp:) He says it was Brooklyn idea...you be the judge:) Where we were, none of us had very good cell phone reception. While we were talking to the cop about our illegal shooting, I received a text from Derek that they were stuck somewhere. It was getting dark, so it didn't take long for us to get worried. Rob immediately jumped in his truck and headed out to find them. We had brought walkie talkies with us, but of course they were both inside the rhino because the kids had been playing with them. Rob drove around for about 20 minutes before coming back to tell us he couldn't find them. We were finally able to get enough bars on our phones to call him, and he tried to direct us to him. Rob then headed out again to find them. As he was driving he found Derek walking alone without any of the kids. Rob thought that was weird, but as soon as Derek led him to the rhino, he quickly realized why the kids weren't with him. Rob drove the truck (which has 4-wheel drive) as far as he could, but couldn't reach the rhino because it was 150 yards into the muddy swamp. Rob and Derek had to walk that distance in the mud and then carry each kid back to the truck. Poor Brooklyn got dropped by Rob and got so muddy! Lucky for us, Brooklyn had taken her camera so we have a few pictures. I guess these are pretty good for a 10 year old:) I'm so proud of her for thinking to take a picture before it was dark. Anyway, Rob and Derek tried to get the rhino to budge, but soon realized they couldn't do it without a winch. They all piled in the truck and drove back to where Sarah and I were and told us they were going to have to leave the rhino over night and come back in the morning with a winch and some shovels. This was pretty inconvenient for Sarah and I because we were supposed to run a 10k the next morning at 8:10 a.m. Once we got home the men decided that they would just go to Bass Pro Shop and buy a winch and then head back out there to see if they could get it out. After driving all over the valley trying to get everything they needed, they headed back to the desert. Derek brought along his big utility light and his generator so that they would have some light. Since the truck could only get with 150 yards of the rhino, they had to connect 3 extension cords to the generator and then they put the big light on a piece of wood to keep it from falling in the mud or from falling into the pond next to where they were. The light was still a good 50 yards from the rhino, but it helped some. Armed with shovels, Rob and Derek suited up in their new rubber boots, and started to dig out the wheels. As soon as they freed the wheels, Derek told Rob to jump in and drive. Rob didn't dare turn around for fear of getting stuck again, so he popped it into reverse and stepped on the gas. At one point the whole passenger seat was submerged in the water from the adjoining pond...but nothing was going to make Rob take his foot off the pedal:) Rob's account of his driving backwards was like this..."Amy, you should have seen me...I was like Mario Kart driving that thing! You wouldn't believe what that rhino can do backwards!!!" As he was racing to the "finish line", he drove over the extension cords that were powering the light. The wood that the light was sitting on slid through the mud and into the pond. Rob (he has been electrocuted more times than I can count) grabbed the extension cord with his bare hand and electrocuted himself. Luckily Derek didn't have to give him CPR:) Rob survived and they quickly loaded up the rhino and headed home, with plenty of time for Sarah and I to run our race in the morning. Sadly, I don't have any pictures of our race. I forgot my camera:( We ran London's Run in Queen Creek to benefit children's charities. It was so much fun!

Brooklyn all muddy after being dropped by Rob.

This mud smelled so bad you wouldn't believe it! It took hours to get it all off! But, the rhino now has the most powerful winch we could find!

The girls started ice skating lessons in January. We all went together one of the days before the lesson. Hunter hated it when we were skating, but cried when we wanted to stop.

One of the little girls on the rink couldn't figure out why Hunter wasn't skating on his own:) Nothing is more exhausting that holding up a three year old while trying to ice skate!

Ashley fell about every 60 seconds on her first day of lessons. This girl never gives up and never cries...no matter how hard she falls.

Alyssa was pretty wobbly at first too, but she his such a determined kid, she would never stop trying to be better.

Brooklyn may fall a lot when she is walking, but she actually has only fallen a few times while skating...This was one of those times.

The girls can't stop smiling during their lessons:) Except Brooklyn...She always seems to get paired up with the only boy in her class:)

Hunter and Rob

Brooklyn skating with a boy:)

The girls during their lesson.

Brooklyn asked Rob to chaperon her school field trip this year to see a Charlie Brown play. Rob was given the biggest group of kids with the naughtiest boys. All the kids loved Rob (of course), and Brooklyn was thrilled to have her daddy go on her field trip.

Hunter...Or should I say "Sleeping Beauty"?

The girls helped Hunter load up his backpack one morning before school, complete with a water bottle. He was so proud to be going to school...or so he thought:)

My friend and I took the little kids to the Mesa Art Museum...aka AMY. Hunter and Grace had so much fun together.

The kids drawing a picture...

painting...

sitting in the weird chair...

driving the car...

and playing kitchen.

One morning a bunch of moms took our kids to Peter Piper Pizza before it opened to make pizzas. With all the toppings to choose from, the kids all chose cheese and pepperoni.

Alyssa was so nice to lift Hunter up so he could see better.

Brooklyn had fun even though she was the oldest one there:) She may not ever admit it though.

It was so nice for the kids to be able to roam around and play the games without any other people in Peter Piper. The kids quickly realized that they were with the wrong parent when I informed them that they didn't have an endless amount of tokens. Rob's the man for that!

Ashley and Hannah didn't realize they needed more than one token for this game:( I didn't stick around to see if they gave up the rest of what they had to make this one work:)

December, Christmas, New Year's, Utah

2010-01-12T18:08:00.000-08:00

Our December started off fairly normal. Rob and the kids worked tirelessly on their first Christmas puzzle. Alyssa and Ashley can spend hours doing these puzzles! Sadly, I think this was around my last normal day for the next few weeks:( I have never had such a bummer of a December. I started out by getting H1N1 the first week, followed by pneumonia the second week...that wiped me out for the next three weeks. Even once the coughing got better, I picked up one sickness after another. My advice-Get the H1N1 vaccine! My kids were all vaccinated (plus, I think they already had it), and none of them got sick. For that I was thankful!Since Brooklyn & Alyssa both get to go to Activity Days, this year they had to share Rob for the daddy-daughter gingerbread house activity.
At least they could each take pictures for the other:)
Final product...These girls love doing things with their Dad!
All three of the girls take piano lessons from their teacher, Jessie. They love her! The girls all did a terrific job at their Christmas recital! We have had a game group with five couples for the past three years. This year I was in charge of December, and since everyone was busy on the weekends, we decided to do a family night the Monday before Christmas. We had a special visitor come to our party. Luckily, the men were able to pull themselves away from their ping-pong tournament to watch their children sit on Santa's lap:) Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of the tournament.
Ashley & Santa...Ashley was my only kid that told Santa she didn't know what she wanted. Ash changed her mind daily. By Christmas Eve she wanted a real dog...She didn't get one.
Hunter may be shy around most adults, but he was not shy around Santa. When Santa asked him what he wanted for Christmas, he said, "Candy". Wow! Santa could have gotten off really easy this year:)

Alyssa & Santa...She wanted a spy kit.

Brooklyn & Santa...She asked for a Ripstick. She is pretending to be embarrassed because there were boys her age at the party. She was actually VERY excited to see Santa!

A group of the little kids watching Santa leave out of the window...The older kids ran up to the bonus room to watch him leave:)

All 18 kids

These kids actually were all very good. Too bad that all of the boys wanted to play ping-pong, but the "big boys" wouldn't let them.

The night before Christmas Eve, Rob's parents met us at the Mesa Temple and then we went to dinner. I think it was the coldest night we have had all winter...I guess this is winter:)

It was nice to have a complete family picture taken...Thanks, Bob! In case your wondering, my kids did all have coats, but Ashley wouldn't wear hers because she said it made her look fat:( She isn't used to seeing people wear big fluffy coats.

While I was in another room wrapping presents, Ashley, Alyssa and Hunter decided to make a tower with some of the presents from under the tree. Then, Alyssa grabbed my camera and did her own little photo shoot.

She's a pretty good photographer.

How cute is this picture that she took of Hunter?

Where did she come up with these ideas?:)

On Christmas Eve, I was so sick to my stomach, I couldn't do anything. The only contribution I made to Christmas Eve dinner was making Rob's mom's yummy slush. Rob and Brooklyn did everything else! They did a wonderful job!!! I only wish I could have eaten more!I was the first one out of the pass-around, so here is everyone else unwrapping their presents.

Hunter's game

Brooklyn's game

Alyssa's game

And Ashley's game. We played every body's except Rob's and mine.

The girls are so nice to always play with Hunter!

Since I was completely worthless on Christmas Eve, the kids had to find their own costumes for the Nativity. They looked adorable! I love Hunter's face in this picture. He seems to really be adoring a new baby:)

They don't ever last very long before they get silly.The kids in their Christmas PJsRob even made the sugar cookies for Santa with the kids. Sadly, I didn't even get to see what they made:(
Brooklyn's favorite present that she has not yet learned how to ride.
Alyssa's spy kit that she had been begging for.

Once again the girls are playing with Hunter and his toys:) He drove his cars on his new parking garage, and the girls had their zhu zhu's ride down the ramps.
Hunter's favorite present that he hasn't figured out how to steer yet. But he sure looks cute driving it, even if he can't stay on the sidewalk.

On Jan. 30, I took Alyssa to her orthodontist appt. at 7:30 a.m. We then came home and played Wii with everyone. At about 10:00 a.m. we decided that we should go to either San Diego or Utah. Or course the kids all chose Utah. We frantically packed the car and dug out all of our snow clothes, and we were on the road by 12:30. Unfortunately, in all the excitement, neither of us did a weather check for Utah. From Flagstaff to Lehi, we hit one snow storm after another. Even with 4-wheel drive, we had to turn around 30 miles north of Kanab and drive a different route through Hurricane. 12 1/2 hours later, we finally arrived. Since my kids are too smart to surprise anymore, we once again decided to surprise my parents. The next morning my brother invited them over for an early morning breakfast, and we all surprised my parents as they walked in the door. For some reason it never gets old seeing the excitement of surprising everyone:) The kids were all excited to see snow, and Rob was excited to be able to do fireworks on New Year's Eve. It was really cold!!!

Since I have two brand new nephews, some of the adults were lucky enough to watch the fireworks from the window. I can't believe it, but I didn't even get pictures of my two new nephews. Since August, my family has had 4 babies born. The newest addition are Kya, Parker and Case. They are all absolutely adorable! I can't wait to finally meet Kya one day:)

On New Year's we spent the day in the snow. The men and the kids all built snow bunkers for a snow ball fight.

Ryan's looked strong...

But, I think Rob had more helpers.

Ashley finally realized that everyone wears big fluffy coats in the winter.

Even Rufus played in the snow.

I love this picture...Cooper and Hunter just couldn't resist eating the snow:)...Even with the dog running around...YUCK!

Everyone was taking shelter behind a bunker except for Ashley...It wasn't long before Ryan nailed her in the face with a snowball. She definitely looked like the most wounded warrior when she came walking into the house.

In the end, Rob and Adam won...Ryan and my Dad lost. Their bunker got destroyed!

Ryan has a big ice fishing sled that he let the kids take down the sledding hill in front of my parent's house. For some reason he and Rob decided to let the kids pull it up the hill and it took FOREVER!

The kids had so much fun once they went down:)

Grandpa and Cooper

Rob took the kids down and Hunter did not like it...but everyone else did.

The saucer sled was a better fit for Hunter.

Ryan wanted to take Cooper and Hunter down one last time before we went in for the night. Hunter cried the whole way up the hill, and the whole way down.

The boys went rabbit hunting. Apparently, they shot a lot of bullets, but nobody hit anything.

Whitney and Rex

Stephanie and Ryan have some friends that let us come over to their house and ride their horses. Alyssa was the only one brave enough to brush the horse.

These three were all scared to get on the horse, so they had to watch Gracie and Alyssa to make sure it was okay.

They started with the mini horses...

But, eventually they all graduated to the big horses.

Except Hunter:)

Alyssa

I'm not sure Kinzie ever graduated to the big horses, but she sure looked cute riding the mini:)

Gracie

Even Baby Colton rode the horse.

Cooper finally woke up from his nap and joined us. Such a grumpy little face for the little boy that all morning couldn't stop talking about riding the big horse. He quickly cheered up once he went for a ride.

Ashley didn't want to get off...

So she rode the donkey. This stallion got 2 horses pregnant and they both delivered babies on the same day...Wow!
I got the horse with the kids saddle and the itty bitty stirrups. Seriously, I should have just ridden bare back:) I had nothing to put my foot in when it came time to dismount:/ Or course nobody wanted to help me because they were all busy laughing and taking pictures...Thanks guys!

I've known my dad for 32 years and I never knew that he didn't drink hot chocolate...neither did any of my siblings. He told us that he didn't drink it because he got burned as a kid. Once we all teased him and Rob wouldn't let it go, he finally agreed to try it again after decades of not drinking it...His response-"This is actually pretty good." :)

We were in an earthquake the morning that we left to drive home. Unfortunately, everyone in the family except for Kristi slept through it. BUMMER! It was a 2.9...I guess we are all very deep sleepers!

For Hunter's birthday/Christmas present, my parents gave him this water/sand table. He loves it! Finally something dirty to play with:) Rob bought him some army guys and Hunter goes from one person in the family to the next asking them to play war with him. Today he came up to me and told me it was my turn because his dad played with him two times and I had only played with him one time.

Decorating for Christmas, Family BBQ at School, Turkey Trot, Thanksgiving, Day in the Desert, Hunter's Early 3rd Birthday

2009-12-03T10:00:00.000-08:00

Christmas decorating starts early at our house. Only I think we were a little late this year, because it was the first year we had all of our neighbors asking us why our lights weren't up yet. 1 1/2 weeks before Thanksgiving, one of our neighbors starting putting up their lights. Rob had already been strategically planning his display for weeks, but he didn't want to seem too eager. As soon as he saw the neighbors had started, he paced the garage and front yard for about 30 minutes, until he couldn't wait any longer. He quickly grabbed his first set of lights and went to work on his masterpiece:) Rob has two daughters that share all of his hobbies...Alyssa and Ashley. They love to hunt, fish, golf and even hang Christmas lights. Ashley was so helpful to check which strands worked, and which ones didn't.Hunter is my only child that has OCD. He spent his time putting all of the boxes into a neat row.
Hunter was fascinated by the village pieces that I put on our mantle. I love his cute reflection in the mirror!
Brooklyn height really came in handy this year. The other 3 kids only decorated the bottom part of the tree, but Brooklyn stood on a bar stool and was able to decorate almost as high as I can:) She was much more diligent that the other kids. She decorated most of this tree for me. Alyssa helped with the other tree, but she only lasted about 15 minutes.
Don't mind the top part that doesn't have lights or all of the branches. I promise we completed it the next day:) We ran out of lights, so this was as good as we could do this night.
Every year the kids have a family BBQ at school. This was the first time that Rob was in town for it. About a week before the BBQ, the school sent home a letter asking us to RSVP and let them know if we were going to buy food at the school, or bring it ourselves. I asked Rob what he wanted to do, and I told him that every year I just grab something at Subway or somewhere else and I bring it to the kids. He insisted on eating at the school telling me we would be missing out on the experience of the school BBQ if we didn't eat the school food. I hesitantly said okay and checked the boxes for the amount of hot dogs/hamburgers that we needed. As soon as Rob saw the lunch, and saw that all the other parents brought their own food, he immediately denied ever telling me he wanted to eat school lunch...After his first bite, I don't think we will ever be eating school lunch again:) My kids sure like it though:)
Apparently Rob missed the memo on the financial problems our schools are having. He raided the ketchup and mustard packets, the plastic utensils, and even the napkins. I had to remind him we weren't eating at McDonalds...Luckily we were able to share some of it with our friends:)
Rob spent at least 30 hours putting up our lights this year (by my calculations). The kids helped with some of it. After days of this madness, Ashley asked me on the way home from school if Dad was going to be putting lights up that day. I told her yes and asked if she liked the lights. She said, "Yeah...but we don't get to see Dad that much":( Luckily at this point he was almost done.

Every year I think there is no way he can add more, but he did it again. Dad, do you have another poem you could write?

Since Ashley helped Rob with the lights across the grass, I guess she thought it was okay to dance and jump between strands. Luckily she didn't break any lights. I can't say the same for myself. A few days ago when I was pulling into the driveway in my car, I heard a crunch...crunch...crunch...crunch. After I realized I was driving over lights, I decided I was already far enough into it, I had better just step on the gas and finish the job. I took out two strands of net lights. I thought that it still looked pretty good, and nobody would really notice, but where do you think we had to go that night?...Michaels...to get new lights:)

Rob and Hunter putting up the train around the tree

Our Thanksgiving morning started with me running the 10k Turkey Trot. It was so much fun and I plan on making this my new tradition. Next year all of the kids want to run the Fun Run as well.

A few of our friends ran the race too. Brooke and Jeremy were a lot faster than me. Look at Jeremy jump that rope:) When I left for my race, Rob told me that he and the kids were just going to stay home and play Wii. I was really sad that they weren't going to come and meet me at the finish line, but I didn't say anything. When I came around the last corner before the finish line, I seriously got tears in my eyes because there on the sideline was Rob and all of the kids. I was so happy to see them! Brooklyn had wanted her own t-shirt so bad, she was luck enough to find one laying around that someone had dropped.

I didn't even come close to beating the turkey, but at least the kids got their picture with him:)

My friend, Kaye, ran this race with me, despite the fact that she is much faster. Sadly this is the best picture I got with her. Our other friends, the Bonds, ran as well.

Since I knew I would be tired after running, I made most of our Thanksgiving dinner sides and pies the night before. I put the turkey in the oven before I left, thinking we would eat about 2:00. The turkey was done so early that we ended up eating at noon. I think that is the earliest Thanksgiving meal I have ever had! Thanks to some help from the girls and Rob. My girls are at the perfect age where they love to help in the kitchen. They all wanted to set the table, and Brooklyn washed all of the potatoes.

The day before Thanksgiving, I made lemon cheese pie. My favorite pie that my grandma always made. When I was making the crust, Hunter asked me what I was making. I told him I was making lemon cheese pie. He said, "No, pumpkin pie!" I said, "No, lemon cheese pie!" We bantered back forth for a while until he went into the pantry and again told me pumpkin pie and proceeded to count all of the cans of pumpkin in my pantry. He then pulled out a can and put it on the counter. That night when we were eating pie, I gave him a small slice of all 3 different pies so that he could taste each one. The only piece he ate was the lemon cheese pie. After he was done, I asked him what his favorite pie was, and he told me pumpkin pie. I told him the one he ate was lemon cheese pie, but he could not admit it was his favorite:)Pumpkin, however, was everybody else in the family's favorite. Alyssa could have eaten pie all night long. I had to cut her off once the sugar high kicked in:)I was a nice wife this year, and I didn't set my dining room table with my Christmas dishes so that Rob could do his annual Christmas puzzle with the kids. This happens to be one more hobby that Ashley and Alyssa share with Rob. Brooklyn read a book while they did the puzzle, and Hunter just knocked the pieces off the table.Once Rob thought he was finally done with his lights, we noticed that a section of our icicle lights wasn't turning on. It couldn't have been a section on the bottom level, it had to be on the top...and at the highest pitch in our roof. To avoid getting on the roof again, Rob climbed the ladder to the opening above our front porch, and stood on the edge to fix the broken bulb. Once again, height came in handy this Christmas:)

The finished product looks so much better in person, but these are the pictures I took.Rob's amazing!

The Saturday after Thanksgiving, we went out to the desert with our friends. We took the rhino and guns to do some target practice. Grace and her friend "Choncho" have a lot of fun together.

Sarah and I looked much cuter as we were leaving on the rhino...

After nearly being shot to death, we arrived safely back to base camp wearing goggles:) Yes, that's right...goggles. Thank goodness Derek and Sam had theirs to let us borrow. I had to take a contact out because of all the sand in my eyes. I kept hearing the theme song for Indiana Jones the whole time we were driving. It seemed like every corner we turned, there was another group of people shooting randomly at targets. We would just have to step on the gas and duck:)

Hunter and Max

Who would grab a cactus??? Oh yeah, Brooklyn would:) She grabbed this cactus and it was really stuck in her hand. Once I was able to get a picture, we started first aid:) Sorry Brooklyn! I have a really good first aid kit that I thought had anything we could possibly need to help us. Unfortunately, I didn't have tweezers in there. Luckily, Sam had a set. This cactus was very stubborn, but eventually we got it all out...I think.

Alyssa won't even admit she is friends with Sam, but they sure seem to get along well together:)

Hunter didn't bother to tell me that he had to go potty. He never has accidents, so of course I was unprepared. He had to go without pants the rest of the afternoon.

These guys sure look like friends to me:)

Brooklyn adores Baby Max! A couple of weeks ago our friends got a new dog. As soon as Brooklyn heard, she said, "Now Richey's have everything on my list...A baby and a dog". I just can't keep up with Joneses.

Ashley and Hannah

Another hobby Ash shares with Rob.

The one safe place we find to shoot has a sign that says "No Shooting". Go figure!

Alyssa is now asking for a pink .22 for Christmas. I'm vetoing the request...I think she is too young.

Once we moved on to the higher powered guns, the kids had to find ways to entertain themselves.

Rob and Derek were great with the shotgun.

I hit my target with the muzzle loader and Derek's handgun, but I don't think I ever even got close with the shotgun...This thing is too HEAVY!

Sarah was about as lucky as I was:)

Kids can make a jungle gym out of anything.

Since Hunter's birthday is only 6 days before Christmas, we have vowed to always celebrate it early. We had planned on doing it a month before, but we kept putting it off. On Monday, Hunter saw Rob and I buy him a Lightning Mcqueen toy (I guess we weren't as sneaky as we thought) and he wouldn't stop asking me for it once we got home. When the girls got home from school Rob said, "Why don't we just celebrate it tonight?" So, he took Ash and Alyssa to Target to finish the shopping, while Brooklyn and I made cupcakes. It was a no stress party, I didn't even have to plan for it:) Can you guess what Hunter's favorite movie is?

I LOVE this picture. It totally captures how much my girls all adore their little brother. Look how happy they are for him:)

Each girl picked out a present to give him. This is what Alyssa gave him.

I love that he was even excited to get clothes:)

This is what Ashley gave him.

This is what Brooklyn gave him.He loves to play in his new Mac tent, but he doesn't have any interest in sleeping in it:)

The girls are so nice to play cars with Hunter. I guess they owe it to him for making him play Ken when they play Barbies:(

Brooklyn helped me frost the cupcakes. She was so offended when everyone ate one of the cupcakes that I had frosted and nobody chose one of her's. But after all of her complaining, I looked at which cupcake she chose...it was one that I had frosted. I guess next time I'm going to have to let her frost all of them.

I cannot believe my baby is 3! Hunter is a dream child! He never had one moment of terrible 2's! I love you Choncho!!!

And, so does everyone else!

Dana Point, Las Vegas, Ragnar, Utah, 2 Deer Hunts, Halloween and the Rest of Oct.

2009-11-10T13:15:00.000-08:00

President's Club '09

Every year Rob's company does an award trip for the employees who make their goal. This year it was at the Ritz Carlton in Dana Point. The hotel was gorgeous and we had so much fun being on a trip with just the two of us. Unfortunately, we forgot to take our camera...I guess that's what happens when we don't bring our kids along:) We had to use my phone for the few pictures that we ended up taking. This is the picture of the view from our balcony. This was the other view from our balconyOne of my favorite parts of the hotel, were the fresh flowers in vases throught the hotel. The day we arrived, the flowers were purple...a few days later they changed them to orange.
More flowers

We spent a day doing a tour of Newport Beach Harbor. Rob was chosen to be the captain of our boat.

This was the view from the treadmill in the gym at the hotel. This made running a little more enjoyable:)

Isn't this gorgeous?!!!

Brooklyn's 4th Grade Musical

The day after we got home from our trip to California, Brooklyn had her 4th grade musical. I may be a little bias, but I think Brooklyn is the most beautiful 4th grader:) About 25% of the 4th graders missed this musical, due to an outbreak of swine flu.

Alyssa Got Braces

In September Alyssa went to the dentist for a cleaning, and we were told that she might need braces because her permanent teeth didn't have enough room to grow in. 2 weeks later, she had 5 teeth pulled and new braces. This is her before picture.

I cannot tell you how excited this little girl was to get her braces. Her two sisters are insanely jealous:) Alyssa got to choose her color pattern for her elastics...she chose purple, black and orange...for Halloween.

After

Las Vegas

Rob babysat overnight with all 4 kids for the first time ever. I left for Vegas the day before he did to run the Las Vegas Ragnar Relay. He had them for 2 1/2 days and even drove alone with them for 5 1/2 hours to get to Vegas. He did a great job! Unfortunatley for him, now he might have to do it more often since I know that he is fully capable. We stayed and Rob's brother's house in Vegas, and the kids had so much fun playing with their cousins!

Kids are easily entertained:)

I drove up to the race with my two friends Kaye and Rebecca. We had two teams this time, and they ended up on a different team:( I did however, get to run on the same team as my brother Adam. We had so much fun with the kids in our van. I use the term kids, because I was the oldest person in our van of 6 people. Is 32 really that old??? Natalie and the kids met us all at the finish line. Hunter and Rex had a little too much fun playing in the dirt waiting for us to run into the finish line.

My team running in...For some reason I am always at the back of the line...Maybe it's because I was wearing flip flops:(

All of us with our medals

My girls all plan on running these races when they are old enough.

After the race, I had about 1 1/2 hours to take a nap before going to the BYU/UNLV football game. I had only slept for 20 minutes in the past 36 hours during the race. I'm so glad we went though!

Rob was so excited to finally be able to go to a BYU game again! I'm not sure why we were all wearing our BYU shirts, but Rob wore light blue. At first I thought maybe he forgot to pack his BYU shirt, but a few days later I saw it in his suitcase. That's a little weird Rob:)

We had GREAT seats in the north endzone of the stadium. You would never have believed that BYU was the away team. The stadium was at least half full of fans wearing blue. UNLV's color is red:) We are so sad that they have dropped to 25 in the rankings:(

Rob left during half time to go and get more snacks. He was like a paparazzi with the BYU team. They went back onto the field right next to Rob.

Max Hall

Rob gave "five" to the players as they walked back onto the field. He thinks they thought they were supposed to know who he was:)

The kids had so much fun at the game! Ash especially loved the cotton candy:)

Some nice lady offered to take a picture of our family after the game. Thanks nice lady:)

We were able to meet our beautiful niece Paisley for the first time. This is Rob's sister, Brittany's new baby girl. Her dad, Ryan, did a great job on her blessing.

Rob's parent's cabin looked so cute decorated for Halloween. Is there any question as to where Rob gets his outdoor illumination skills from?

Utah

My brother, Ryan, changed my parent's go-cart track from dirt to concrete. It looks awesome!!! Rob is the current day-time record holder of the go-cart track, and Ryan is the night-time record holder.

Ash looks a little scared riding with Grandpa:) This is about the spot where Alyssa and Hunter crash...pictures will follow:)

My brother, Dave, got home from serving in Iraq for 4 months. He lives just outside of D.C., so he had been home for 2 weeks before he flew to Utah to see all of us. We all met at the airport to welcome him home.

Dave, Maren and Liberty (and Baby Kya in Maren's tummy). We are all so proud of Dave and all the other men and women who risk our lives to defend our liberties! Dave got home just in time for a new baby. Maren had Baby Kya on Sunday. She is gorgeous!

I love this picture of Hunter! This one is definitely better than when the little kids were all playing swords with their flags.

My mom and brother

My mom spent a month before we all came to Utah to visit making quilts for all of the grandkids and men. They all turned out sooooo cute! Jessica, are you still bummed that they all have to stay at Mom's house?:)
Since my sister, Jessica, married into a Hawaiian family, she has finally decided to learn how to do all of the different Hawaiian dances. They perform as a family in Missouri. I never knew your hips could move like that Jess:) She taught all of the granddaughters how to do a dance.

Happy 10th Birthday to my baby Brooklyn! I cannot believe she is that old! We had a costume Halloween party, like always, only we forgot to bring our kids costumes this year. Luckily Natalies's mom has all kinds of costumes at her house. Natalie took the girls over and dressed them up. Brooklyn was Miss Utah. Brooklyn was so excited for her birthday, she wore her birthday crown all day on her birthday...and she even tried wearing it the next day:) We love you Brooklyn!!!

The bakery near my mom's house has never let me down! Until this year:( I called the baker and told her that I wanted a witch cake. Instead, I got this. Thanks to my sister-in-law Stephanie, she helped me spice it up by adding all of these plastic spiders. It turned out cute after that:)

I tried to add new games this year, since we always do the same things for Brooklyn's party. We did pumpkin bowling on the basketball court. It was great for the older kids, but the little boys just wanted to knock down the bottles that the girls were trying to roll the pumpkins into.

The next game we did was wrapping the kids like mummies. This turned out to be lots of fun. Rob was determined to wrap Alyssa faster than anyone else.

Taylor wrapped Ashley

Kinzie wrapped Hunter

Taylor did a great job with Ash

Ryan wrapped Gracie

Dave wrapped Libby

Our last game was a hat and broom race. The kids & adults loved this one:)

The birthday girl

Doesn't Rob look cute wearing a witch hat?:)

Brooklyn opening her presents

Rob wanted to mix things up this year and have the kids go down to the "Haunted Forest" and scare the adults. The kids all thought it was a great idea, until they got too scared walking down into the forest:) Cooper had a blast scaring the other little kids with his mask:)

Brooklyn blowing out her candles

Hunter was so exhausted after the party that he fell asleep eating his cereal. He was even still holding his spoon:)

Remember the go-cart hill??? Well, we told the kids that they could only go counter-clockwise around the track because we figured the other way would be too dangerous because of a big hill. Apparently, counter-clockwise was just as dangerous because Alyssa crashed riding her razor, and Hunter did a flip and landed on his face when he was simply running around the track. Alyssa put her brakes on as she was going down one of the hills, and the scooter stopped, but she kept on going. Her face got banged up pretty badly.

And, she broke a bone in her hand. The night it happened, we didn't even know she had broken it. By the next day, when it was still hurting, my grandpa got her an oppointment with an orthopaedist that he knew to get it xrayed. It was Brooklyn's birthday that day, so we didn't want to spend the day in the emergency room. Once we got to the orthopaedist's office, we were in and out in 20 minutes. Xrayed and casted. Plus, I only had to pay a $40 copay. We are so lucky to have a doctor for a grandpa!!! The advantage to having 21 people staying at one house, is that Alyssa's cast was immediately filled with signatures. There were a lot of disadvantages to having that many people in one house. On Saturday, my 10 month old niece started throwing up with the stomach flu. Hunter came down with it the next day, and then it dominoed throughout the family. By Thursday, the 19th and last person out of the 21 got sick. Ashley and I are the only ones that didn't get it. That is especially amazing, because Brooklyn and Alyssa threw up the entire way home from Utah. About 30 minutes after leaving Alpine, Alyssa threw up all over the dashboard of the truck. An hour later, Brooklyn was throwing up. Alyssa even threw up in my mouth, and I still didn't get it. Rob was supposed to go on a fishing trip in upstate New York with his boss on Thursday. His flight left at 6:00 am, and at 3:00 am he woke me up and informed me that he was finally sick. What are the odds? At least he got sick before he boarded his 5 hour flight to New York:)

Rob loves having a son that will spend hours looking through binoculars for deer. My parents always have so many deer in the field behind their house.

The is apparently the largest non-typical elk to ever be shot in the world. It was shot in Utah so it is on display at Cabelas. Of course Rob had to take Hunter to get a picture with "Spidey".

Dave wanted one too:)

This picture is so sweet, because all the little grandkids are looking at the pictures Dave has from Iraq. They think he is so cool!

Now that the go-cart track is paved, the grandkids all spend so much more time at the bottom of my parent's yard. Just about everything in my parent's yard is named after the grandkids. This is Marshal Cooper's office...named after my nephew Cooper. My dad better get busy, the 18th grandchild is going to be born in December:)

Hunter (I don't really know what he is doing)

We took the rhino up American Fork Canyon with the kids that were not under quarantine for being sick...Even though in the end we almost all got it anyway:) Libby and Hunter had so much fun on the rhino.

Hunter, Jaxon and Libby had fun throwing rocks into the river. Jaxon almost fell in as well when he tried to throw a rock in that weighed more than he does:)

Hey Dave...What are you doing walking out of the trees with a package of wet wipes?:)

My sister Jessica, my sister-in-law Maren, and myself...Rob almost ran into me with the rhino as we were posing for a picture. Nice Rob!

Hunter's wound from running on the go-cart track

Jessica, is that you driving the rhino??? Do you see that Mom?

I love the mountains in Utah!!!

Adam took all of the little kids into the front yard to play golf. It was a great idea until he left and the kids started hitting each other with the clubs:)

Hunter and Jax

Rob drew out for a deer tag in Utah this year. He hunted around Strawberry Reservoir this year instead of going to Vernal. Ashley went up with

Rob the day before opening day to scout the area with him.

On opening day, my brother Dave and Alyssa went hunting with Rob. Too bad I don't think they even saw anything more than a spike.

Rob had his gun out, but never got to shoot it at anything other than a target:( The next hunting day, all of the kids and I went hunting with Rob. We drove all over and saw nothing but doe.

Ashley's 1st Grade Field Trip

Ashley's field trip this year was to the Phoenix Botanical Garden. The only highlight was the butterfly exhibit. This kids loved seeing hundreds of butterflies.

A butterfly even landed on my friend Sarah's head.

Ashley and her friends

Ashley was chosen to hold the mouse. Hunter got it next, and lost it. Luckily I found it because the guide was a little upset when she noticed Hunter didn't have it in his hand:)

Pumpkin Patch

Why is it that kids pick the first big pumpkin they see, and then they change their minds as soon as you've put it in the wagon??? Ashley is my most indecisive child!

The pumpkin patch we go to every year always has cute photo ops.

Halloween

This year Brooklyn was a gothic witch, Alyssa was a candy corn witch, Ashley was a pumpin princess, and Hunter was a fire fighter one day, and Lightening Mcqueen the next.

Rob was nice enough to be the only dad helping with games at Ashley's class Halloween party. The kids in the girls classes always think Rob is so cool!

Hunter wasn't thrilled to be a firefighter...hence the sad face:( Alyssa was sure excited to have him come to her party though:)

Alyssa and her BFF Courtney

Brooklyn's classmates were all so excited to meet Choncho...I swear nobody knows his real name:)

Rob carving the pumpkins with the kids

Hunter was proud of his little spoon that he used to carve out the tiny pumpkin that he picked at the pumpkin patch.

The kids STILL carving

Voila! They turned out so cute!

We had a party again on Halloween night before the kids went trick-or-treating. I seriously spent 8 hours in the kitchen getting ready.

The spider cupcakes that I made took me forever!

The spider web dip

The Spider Deviled Eggs

The cousins eating dinner

If you saw this crazy witch trick-or-treating with Brooklyn, just know it was NOT me! This is Rob's mom:) She is a great witch every year...the kids love it!

The kids decorating their Halloween cookies

I love decorating for Halloween even more than Christmas. It's a lot less work! I was so sad to take my decorations down:(

Rob is the master outdoor illuminator. The picture doesn't quite do it justice. He put about 30 sets of eyes in our ficus trees over the porch. So cute!Kaibab Hunt

This year both Rob and I drew out for the deer hunt in Kaibab. Rob went up 2 days before me to hunt with his brother Kris. I thought for sure he would have something by the time I got up there, but he didn't:( He even passed up a 4 x 3. Once I got there, the biggest thing we had a good shot at was a 2 pt. Ashley found a 4 pt., but as Rob was getting out of the truck to shoot it, Hunter started yelling, "I want a deer!"...over and over. That buck ran away really quickly!!!

The lodge that we stayed at in Jacob Lake had a fun little playground for the kids. Is it any wonder why Alyssa is always breaking bones or getting stitches???

Ashley hanging upside down

My girls always flash a peace sign in pictures for some reason:)

Rob and Hunter on the swing

Rob wanted to take my car out the first morning we were there because there was more room for the kids to lounge around while we hunted at 5:00 am. I was so proud of my car and all the places it could go. There was seriously an inch of dirt on the back of my car. After the morning hunt, we ditched my car so that we could take Rob's truck and the rhino out. When we got home that night, my tire was COMPLETELY flat. I mean completely!!! Rob successfully put on my spare tire, I only had to help him jack up the car:) He was constantly looking around to make sure that no other hunters were watching his wife jack up the car:)

We actually really had a lot of fun on this hunt. I was kind of dragging my feet about going, but we had a blast! Rob may be sad that we didn't come home with a trophy, but I like the hunting... minus the killing and the gutting:)

Hunter was determined to find a buck for us:)

Brooklyn is my only child that doesn't like hunting. The other two girls LOVE it! She and I were the "rhino hogs"!

This is the only picture that Rob took while hunting with his brother Kris. Thanks for going Kris!

Labor Day in Utah, Star Student & Poor Lonely Choncho

2009-09-22T10:11:00.000-07:00

Ever since I can remember my parents have hosted the Neider Family Reunion at their house almost every year. It is usually around the 4th of July, but this year it was the Saturday of Labor Day weekend. When my mom told me the date, I knew we wouldn't be able to sacrifice any school absences to attend. On Friday morning of Labor Day weekend, Rob woke up and said, "Why don't we just make a quick trip to Utah for the weekend?". My first response was, "You're nuts! A 10 1/2 hour drive each way for a weekend trip???" After first questioning the sanity of his suggestion, I quickly agreed that it would be fun and I was on board. We hadn't surprised our kids with a trip to Utah for a while since they have gotten smarter. I knew it would take me a couple hours to get ready, so I sent the kids off to school with them not knowing we were going anywhere. (I was also hoping if I checked them out at noon, we would only get a half day absence instead of a full day:) The girls knew our friends were going to Lake Powell for the weekend, and since our girls have never been there, we told them we were going to Lake Powell and that it was on the way to Utah. It worked beautifully until about Fillmore (about 2 hours away from my parents) when Alyssa asked me if she could play with my iphone. As she was playing, my sister sent me a text message asking when we were going to be arriving. All you iphone users know that when you get a message from someone, above the new message is all of the past messages that you have exchanged with the sender. Alyssa read off all of the messages to Brooklyn...including the one that I wrote to my sister saying, "My kids have no idea we are coming to Utah...they think we are going to Lake Powell." Luckily Ashley was asleep so we could still have one surprise. We also hadn't told my parents or grandparents that we would be in town for the reunion. We stayed at my sisters house that night when we got in town and Ashley was so funny because after we had been there about 15 minutes, we started talking about surprising my parents at their house in the morning. Ashley piped into the conversation and said, "We're going to Utah tomorrow???" My sister only lives about 15 minutes from my parent's house, so apparently Ash isn't as quick as I though she was:) I guess that makes for great surprises:) When we got up to my parent's house Saturday morning, my parents were both gone. We all hid down in the backyard and surprised my mom when she went into the backyard frantically looking for my niece that she thought was lost (thanks for the trick Natalie:) I will say that my mom screamed like a little girl when she saw all of us! My dad's cousin, Cory, has an awesome band that played for us Saturday night.

My niece, Amber, is quite the dancer! She had to ditch the Princess Belle dress so that she could show us all of her SEXY moves:)
The lead singer of the band decided she needed to teach us all how to dance...Some of us Clarks are extreme introverts!!! I always think my dad is, until we do something like this. He was just like the other Neiders out there on the dance floor:)
Ashley is another grandchild that knows how to dance:)
The kids doing their own routine

Brooklyn decided she would look better sitting on the chair most of the time:)

Kinzie teaching Hunter how to dance

Rob and my brother Ryan took Cooper and Hunter out on Ryan's rhino one morning. Hunter had so much fun just being a boy...That isn't always easy in our house:(

These boys thought they were so cool with their helmets on:)

Buddies

Cooper is all boy throwing the stick in the lake.

Rob and Hunter...Both are dreaming of owning their own rhino:)

I'm glad Hunter can raise his arms in a rhino, because he would NEVER do this on a roller coaster:)

A couple of weeks before we arrived, my sister-in-law Stephanie had their 3rd baby. His name is Colton and he is so beautiful and so sweet! Yes Ryan, I called your son beautiful:)

Ashley was star student this month.

Hunter's new favorite toy is my iphone. He loves to play games on it...I'm not quite sure why he likes to play it sitting under the bar stool, but here he is:)

Hunter staring over the fence into the park behind us. I don't know if he was watching all of the cool boys playing football, or maybe he was checking out the girls??? He is getting better at entertaining himself since all three girls are in school all day.

Happy Birthday to Me!

2009-08-31T13:39:00.000-07:00

For my birthday this year we decided to go to a local resort for the weekend before my birthday. We went to the Squaw Peak Hilton where they have a great water park complete with a lazy river and water slide. Hunter wasn't quite tall enough for the water slides, however, the girls had a blast...Rob and I only lasted a few times. Alyssa and Ashley could have spent all day on the slide:)
The girls playing under the waterfall

The hotel was having a Hawaiian themed weekend with a luau and fun games for the kids. They each got to take a turn at pineapple bowling using coconuts to knock over the pineapples. Ashley threw hers so hard the coconut broke in half.

Alyssa tried really hard to knock them all down:)

Hunter ditched his water wings on the first day of our trip. Rob and I were amazed to see that he can actually swim without them. He has turned in to quite the fish now...He jumps off of the waterfall in our pool and can swim to the side without any help. It is such a relief each time one of my kids has learned to swim on their own!!!

Brooklyn managed to avoid the camera most of the weekend...We finally got a picture of her laying out:)

Alyssa and Hunter spent about an hour breaking part of a coconut into tiny pieces to use as "moisturizer". They even brought some back to the hotel and added it to all of the shampoo and lotion bottles...I'm glad I brought my own!!!

This picture has absolutely nothing to do with my birthday, but I'm posting it anyway:) My girls love to play school and it actually comes in handy sometimes. This is Alyssa going over Ashley's sight words with her. Hopefully Choncho will learn them too:)

On the day of my birthday, I went to lunch with some of my friends. When I came home, Rob had decorated the house with streamers and balloons...Isn't that so sweet?!!!

He also ordered this cute cake for me. Thanks for the great birthday Rob!!!

Best Anniversary Ever!!!

2009-08-19T20:34:00.000-07:00

Rob and I have now been married 13 amazing years! This year Rob had to leave the country on a late night flight the day of our anniversary. Because of this, Rob and I celebrated our anniversary the day before. The kids wanted to surprise us with a "romantic" evening before Rob left town. They started planning early in the morning and kept all the details mum, except that we were going to have a romantic dinner on the patio...complete with dessert. They set up on the patio in the backyard and closed all the blinds so we couldn't see what they were doing.

This is the sign that they made...complete with a stand and balloons. I love the way Alyssa spelled anniversary:)

The girls got our card table out of our garage and set up this "romantic" table for us to eat dinner on. They even brought out my ipod with speakers and had the song "Everything I do, I do it for You" playing for us. I especially liked the shoe box lids they used to put the silverware in:)
This was the card they made for us

Here is Rob and I eating our dinner. Brooklyn kept peeking through the blinds trying to get a picture of us kissing...Sorry Brooklyn, we did it while you weren't looking:)

The girls were terrific servers for us. Rob and I were almost in tears it was so adorable!

Alyssa made this for Rob as a present. She also bought us a box of Nerds to share along with a card she bought at Trader Joes. We had gone to Target earlier in the day to get a few things. Alyssa stood in line after us with her money and told me she was going to buy herself some candy. This is quite common because Alyssa has a sweet tooth...Candy is one of the few things she will actually spend her money on:) She is so sneaky, we had no idea those Nerds were actually for us...Thanks Lulu!!!

Alyssa ended our evening by doing a "show". She danced and did some tumbling for all of us:) The only thing as good as being married to Rob for the past 13 years, is having 4 wonderful kids to go along with it:)

Okay...Okay...Here is the Picture of Rob

2009-08-14T14:23:00.001-07:00

There was a little confusion on which way he was supposed to point his toes...up, or down...:) Down was what he chose:)

First Day of School & FHE at the Lake

2009-08-11T14:06:00.000-07:00

All three of my girls started school yesterday and since Ashley is now in 1st grade, they are all in school ALL day:( I'm one of those moms that dread sending my kids to school! I love having them home all the time and Hunter misses having three playmates...Even when they do make him play Barbies:( The only bright side to Hunter being alone, is now hopefully I can reverse the damage that was done over the summer with him being dressed up like a girl and having his toe nails painted...YIKES! He was so sad to have the girls leave yesterday. As we were loading up their backpacks with snacks and their lunch boxes, Hunter kept saying, "Me...unch. Me....nack. Me...school." (Yes, he does speak on occasion:) He ran around the house carrying a bag of chips and a bag of cookies. Ashley said our family prayer before leaving for school and she said, "Bless Choncho not to miss us today and not to cry...and bless that I won't miss Choncho..." It was very cute! Luckily, all went well, and aside from a lot of tears (from me), the girls all had a great day first day!
Hunter with his "nacks"
Ashley and her BFF Hannah

After school we headed to the lake with our friends. Normally the front of the boat would be a pretty safe place for all of these kids (and Sarah) to be sitting. Not the case last night...These kids had to dodge flying objects twice. The first time was a flying sandwich...That's right, a sandwich. Sam pushed Derek into the lake while he was eating his sandwich, but no worries...Derek managed to throw his sandwich to keep it from suffering from the same fate that he did by falling into the lake:) I don't know if he just wanted so badly to finish the last inch of it, or if he was afraid the fish might choke on the turkey and lettuce...Who knows:)??? The second flying object was the tow rope that Rob was using to wake board. He let go of it during an unsuccessful wake boarding attempt and it flung all the way the the front of the boat and hit Alyssa's leg:(

Besides driving for a little while, this is what Hunter spent most of his time doing. Just hanging out.

Last night everyone took their turn wake boarding (except Brooklyn and Hunter). Brooklyn had regrets the whole drive home for not giving it a shot. Sam went first and showed us all how it was done.

Alyssa went next and she tried...and tried...and tried. She finally got up for a minute...

but, quickly crashed:(

Derek went next and made it looks so easy...

Since I was able to get up on water skis last time, I decided to give it a try. On the 3rd attempt, I did it. I was up for quite a while and even crossed the wake...I didn't realize I was as scared as I look in this picture:)

Rob actually followed me, but I have been warned not to post the awesome picture I have of him wake boarding:)...So, Hannah gets the next picture. She was up for a second, but didn't like crashing:(

Ashley was the biggest surprise of all. Derek got in the water with her to help her get situated and keep her in the right position. He stayed in the water with her because we all assumed she would crash and burn like the other girls. She got up on her 2nd try and kept going...and going...and going. She even managed to stay on while Rob turned around to go back to Derek. It was so funny because she sat in this position the entire time...She never stood up:) In Sam's words, "That was AWESOME!"

Disneyland & Newport Beach

2009-07-30T16:18:00.000-07:00

For our last big vacation before school starts, we spent last week in California at Disneyland and Newport Beach. This is the kids and I on the parking lot shuttle on our first day at Disneyland. Every night when we would take this shuttle back to our car, Rob and I had to laugh. On the way into Disneyland EVERYONE is smiling...at night on the way out, NOBODY is smiling. Most the kids are half asleep and the parents all looked exhausted. Our kids did really well this time and we stayed each night until about 11:30 pm. It was so much fun!!!It doesn't matter how many times our kids go on the Haunted Mansion ride, they are still scared. Brooklyn and Hunter most of all:) Brooklyn is always on the verge of tears before the ride even starts:) The second time we went on this ride, Hunter pretended like he was asleep as soon as we got in line. He was so convincing, I really thought he was asleep. He had his eyes softly closed and his head on Rob's shoulder throughout the entire ride. As soon as we were done, Hunter perked up smiling and said, "Done!" That's one way to not get scared in the Haunted Mansion:)

Ashley, Brooklyn, and Alyssa waiting for their mozzarella sticks...YUM!
I don't even know how Rob managed to take pictures of the fireworks because we never actually stop to watch them. This is the best time to ride all of the rides in Adventureland...Really short lines!

Hunter all ready to go to Disneyland with his Mickey Mouse ears and his Lightning McQueen shirt. "Ca-chow"!

Rob held up our Small World boat so that he could get a picture of us:) I love this ride!

We had a yummy dinner at ESPN Zone in Downtown Disney. It was soooo nice to be in an well air-conditioned restaurant!

The kids all really thought they had a driver's license for the day! Alyssa still has her driver's license in her wallet:)
Autopia was one of Hunter's favorite rides. He drove the first half of the track until it got too crazy...then I took over. I don't even think he could see over the steering wheel, but he had a blast!

Brooklyn was nice enough to let Ashley steer while Brooklyn controlled the gas...She is such a nice big sister!!!

Rob was the lucky one to be the passenger in Alyssa's car this time (I was in it last time...WHIP-LASH!!!) Apparently she did better this time...no complaints from Rob:)

While Rob and the girls went on Splash Mountain, Hunter and I rode Winnie the Pooh over and over and over again. There was no line, so we just stayed on and went around and around. After 4 times, we got off and grabbed a treat at the candy store and did a little people-watching...well, I did...Hunter just stared at Winnie the Pooh as if he hadn't had enough:)

On Friday we ate at Joe's Crab Shack before we headed to Disneyland. The kids were fascinated by the employees dancing around the restaurant.

It is rare to have Rob and I both in a picture...It is nice to have kids old enough to take pictures:)

We spent all day Friday at California Adventures. Hunter was so excited to get his picture taken with Sully!

Another photo-op...Brooklyn is even covering her mouth pretending to be scared:)

This was the highlight of our trip from Hunter...LIGHTNING MCQUEEN:)

While the girls and I went on the Jellyfish Drop, Hunter polished off a bag of cotton candy.

The kids with their bug glasses on ready for the Bug's Life 3-D. This was the first time Hunter actually kept his glasses on the whole time...He loved it!

I love the little caterpillar ride!

Hunter carrying on his tradition of burying his cars in the sand. He wanted this yellow bus from the surf shop because it had a peace sign on it. Are anyone's kids obsessed with peace signs right now, or is it just mine? I took the kids shopping at Fashion Island Mall in Newport, and every time we passed a shirt with a peace sign, Hunter and Ash would point and yell, "Peace!"

The waves were so big at Newport Beach, the kids spent a lot of their time digging in the sand. I've never seen the lifeguards have to run into the water so many times to save someone from drowning.

Alyssa throwing a football to Rob

Since we were about the only ones at our hotel with children, we had the pool all to ourselves:)

The Hyatt that we stayed at had a glass elevator on the outside of the building. My kids were scared by this almost as much as the Tower of Terror:) Yet, every time we took the elevator, this is the one they wanted to go on.

I am sooooooo sad that school is starting in a week and a half:( Now I'm going to have to start keeping track of absences again:(

Alyssa's Baptism and Boating with Friends

2009-07-21T09:55:00.000-07:00

Last weekend Alyssa made the decision to be baptized a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We are so proud of her for being such a good example to her little sister and brother. She looked so beautiful in her baptism dress!Alyssa was the first baptism this day and when it came time to go to the font for the baptism, a lot of the water had drained out. The drain was broken and it was emptying quickly. There wasn't enough water for Rob to stand as he baptized her, so he had to kneel:)
Afterwards, all of our family members in attendance came over to our house for lunch. It was a very special day for our sweet little Lulu!
Yesterday some friends of ours took us boating at Saguaro Lake. We had a blast! They have this tube that all of the kids could ride on (and Rob), and it never once tipped over...Very cool! Doesn't Rob look like a giant surrounded by all of those tiny kids?!!! I think he is having the most fun of all:) Hunter didn't like it very much...He only lasted a few minutes. He didn't leave my lap for most of the day.

The kids had a lot more fun after Rob and Hunter got off the raft. Derek couldn't drive fast enough for them:)...especially Sam!

Grace didn't want anything to do with the raft, but she sure loved driving the boat!

This is the closest anyone came to being dumped off the tube. Unfortunately the boat hit a bump at the same time, so this is the best picture we got of Alyssa's feet flying up in the air. Sam fell off right as the boat stopped...He says it was intentional:)

Studly Sam showed us all how to water ski

Alyssa was the only one of my kids that volunteered to learn. After her lesson from Derek, she gave it a shot. She was struggling with getting her skis facing the boat with the tips out of the water. A few minutes later she yelled, "Apparently this isn't working!!!" She finally got her skis straight and got up for a second or two:)

Right before she crashed:)...Look at that smile!

Rob was great at water skiing! He is still a little bent out of shape that he never got his water skiing merit badge because he couldn't slalom. I wonder if he could still get it???

I have NEVER been able to get up on water skis. I tried and tried as a kid and was never successful. Derek promised me he would be able to get me up and he did. I didn't stay up for very long, but I was definitely up:) Lucky for me, all of the pictures Rob took were blurry. He must not have been able to keep the camera steady out of excitement seeing me water ski:)

Our Trip to Utah

2009-07-14T17:25:00.000-07:00

The first day of our Utah vacation was spent swimming and eating at one of our favorite restaurants, JCW's. For you Training Table lovers, it has the same cheese fries and ultimate dipping sauce. Doesn't my parents house have the best view of the mountains? Notice, there was still snow on the top. My kids loved having a slide and diving board to play on.The next day we all went to the Strawberry Days Rodeo in Pleasant Grove. I don't know what the kids enjoyed the most...the food or the entertainment. Nice nacho cheese on your face Kinzie:)
Hunter is drinking one of our few drinks that I didn't accidentally knock underneath the bleachers that we were sitting on. That is where all the baby cows were being held...it was a little stinky!

Alyssa and her cousins watching the rodeo close up. This lasted until a bucking horse came running right up to the fence:)

Notice the rider coming out of the chute...It is a boy no older than 5 that is riding a very irate sheep. Rob and my brother Ryan have vowed to enter our kids into this contest next year.

My brother and his friends entered this rodeo a few years ago to milk an angry cow...Maybe next year he will try this:) Happy 8th Birthday to Alyssa! Alyssa had some great helpers to open her presents...My cute nieces:)

Alyssa wanted a new camera for her birthday this year. This is her taking a picture of her birthday cake:)

Alyssa blowing out her candles

For Alyssa's birthday party this year, we went to Lagoon. These lines were typical throughout the day...It was fabulous!!!

Lagoon has the cutest kiddie-land. Hunter and Whitney had so much fun riding on all of the baby rides...So did my girls:)

After all of us yelling to Hunter to ring the bell, he finally did it after the ride assistant told him to pull the rope...Why didn't we think of that???

At 2 and a 1/2 Hunter is tall enough to ride the Tidal Wave. He was happy before the ride started, but horrified once we got going:)

As if the Wild Mouse ride isn't scary enough...Ashley and I got stuck on it in the hot sun for about 20 minutes. They sent a worker up the staircase next to us to comfort us...As if a 16 year old can comfort a 31 year old:) Once we finally got going, towards the end it suddenly stopped on us once again. Everyone in line behind us had to leave for repairs:(

Hunter and Whitney on the train

Rob and all of the girls took turns playing this guessing game. Rob won a prize because the lady incorrectly guessed his weight and most of the girls won because she couldn't guess what month they were born.

I was the only adult brave enough to go on this ride. Turns out I should have opted out of this one, because I took the kids on the new Wicked ride afterwards and I was sick to my stomach the rest of the day:( Is that a sign of aging??? I love roller coasters!

We bought this kids this cup to drink from while we were there...Free refills! It holds 100 ounces of soda, so I was relieved when we left the park without ever needing a refill.

The girls and my niece Mckinzie on the log ride

Grandma and Whitney

All of us that dared went on the Rattlesnake Rapids. Here we are headed for the big waterfall.

Here we are going under the waterfall...I got the wettest:( It was nice to cool off, but my shorts were very transparent.

I like the rides at amusement parks and Rob likes the food and the games. He won this Hunter this giant Elmo and many other stuffed animals.

Rob and my dad played this game for quite a while trying to break plates to win prizes. My mom was screaming for my dad to win and I was screaming for Rob...even the security guard came over to watch these grown men play for stuffed animals:) Rob did awesome, but my dad ended up winning the biggest stuffed tiger.

Brooklyn doesn't really like the big roller casters, so my mom went on the one in kiddie land with her:)

This pictures is so funny...Hunter is scared, Ashley is having a blast with her arms up, Alyssa is at least smiling, but Brooklyn and Kinzie are pretending to be too cool to enjoy the baby rides:) I didn't hear either of them asking to ride the big rides:)

Rob ended up winning enough stuffed animals to fill a while wagon. Good thing I didn't just rent a one-seat stroller:)

I keep telling my girls that they are going to make Hunter have gender confusion...

Rob took the girls on a camping trip to Flaming Gorge, so Hunter and I had a few days in Alpine alone. We went to the Lehi parade one morning to see my three nieces walking and tumbling for Utah Flash. Hunter had fun running into the street with Grandpa to get candy:)

Kinzie only lasted in the parade until she saw us...then she sat down and joined us.

Hunter loved all of the cute floats and the fire trucks. The Wolverine mascot for UVU even came up to him for a picture (for some reason I don't have it, even though I viewed it after I took it:(

Hunter's favorite float was the Star Wars float. He was so excited to be wearing his Star Wars shirt:)

After going to the BYU bookstore to update all of our BYU wear, we ate at Brick Oven and then drove up to Bridal Veil Falls.

All of the girls bought these blue wigs at the BYU bookstore and Rob told them he would pay them $10 if they wore it all day. Alyssa will do anything for money!

Earlier in the morning my sister-in-law Natalie painted Hunter's face like Lightning Mcqueen...His idol!

Rob and his girls Hunter and my niece Amber throwing rocks into the Provo river

Rob and I took the kids up to Park City to ride the Alpine Slides. Our half of the ski lift was excited!

The other half started out excited...

Half way up the mountain, Alyssa started to get a little nervous.

Brooklyn got very nervous!

Once we got off the ski lift and started to walk to the slide, Brooklyn got even more nervous.

Brooklyn and Alyssa were really wishing right about now that they we the younger kids in the family and would have to ride with mom and dad. Especially since I kept making sure they knew how to use the brake so they wouldn't go flying over the side of the slide.

Rob and Hunter went first, and Hunter had a blast!

Alyssa went next...Notice there is nobody behind her. Where's Brooklyn???

Oh, here comes Brooklyn:) with Ashley and I right behind her and two more sleds right behind me. I hope the people behind us weren't trying for a record:) Brooklyn applied her brake the whole way down the mountain:)

Finally at the end, she smiled:)

We ended with a stop at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory for ice cream cones.

I will do my best at documenting the fishing trop to Vernal that I didn't go on. At the beginning of the drive up to Vernal, Rob told the girls that he would pay them $ .10 for each doe that they spotted, $ .50 for each buck, $20 for each bull moose (not commonly seen) and $1,000 for big foot. Brooklyn spotted the only bull moose.

However, they spotted a lot of these.

They visited the Dinosaur Museum as usual.

They found the "coolest park ever" and the girls had fun doing all of their tricks.

Brooklyn working on improving her sling shot skills

Every morning the girls ate cereal with Grandpa Bob at their campsite.

Alyssa's fish

Brooklyn's fish

Rob's fish

Ashley reeling in her fish

Call me crazy, but it looks as though Alyssa is aiming a rock at Brooklyn's head:(

The fishing total for this trip was 20. Rob's dad took home 10 and Rob brought home 10. My sister-in-law BBQ trout for us when he got home. It was YUMMY!

Rob and his dad

Cooper and Hunter eating one of the 3 birthday cakes that we had while we were in Utah. Karli, my niece turned 3. Hunter is smiling because ever time Cooper would look away, Hunter would steal some of Cooper's frosting.

Brooklyn & Gracie found this beautiful monarch butterfly on the flower pot.

On the hottest and most humid day of our trip, we decided to hike as a family up to Slide Rock in Alpine. I hadn't been up here since my first year of college when my roommate and I went with our ward. Remember Emily??? Rob was apparently there as well, but it was dark...sorry Rob, I didn't see you:( Anyway the only men brave enough to go down the waterfall were Rob and my brother Ryan. Adam gets a pass because he has a rod in his back:( I chickened out after watching Rob and Ryan go airborne after hitting a big rock...OUCH!

There is the big rock. Ashley and Gracie were the only kids brave enough to go down. They both went on their dad's laps.

The kids had a blast playing down river in the cold water.

Hunter may not have wanted to go down Slide Rock, but he loved going down the slide at my paren'ts pool.

He also loved jumping off the diving board. Although he never quite figured out the rule of not jumping until everybody was out of the way. We had many close calls, but no serious injuries.

Since we had tickets to the Stadium of Fire, we did our fireworks on the 3rd. We also celebrated my nephew Cooper's birthday this day. Hunter was thrilled to see his Lightning Mcqueen cake. These boys both kept climbing up on the bar stools in the kitchen to stare (and try to touch) the cake. Cooper was nice to let Hunter have Mater:)

Rob's firework show get better every year. The night before we did fireworks, Rob was in the front yard lighting off parachutes with the kids. Before long, the boys down the street we in front of my parent's house with their chairs. My mom told them that we weren't having the fireworks until the next night, so the boys mom told them to take their chairs home. They did, but by the next morning, they were back front and center. Their dad told us that night that they were supposed to be on a vacation, but there would've been a family fight if he didn't leave a day later so his kids could see Rob's fireworks show. So cute! I'm glad it was worth it for them to stay! Here are some of Rob's fireworks...

Here are more...Notice he even elevated some of them on blocks and plywood:) Also, notice the field across the street...My brother Dave (who is in Iraq) is usually Rob's assistant, so this year my other brothers helped with keeping this field from going up in flames. Luckily we had another successful year with no fire!

Rob and the kids doing pops and sparklers

Hunter driving his new car amongst the tanks that were about to be lit.

Sparklers are soooo dangerous!

Rob had all of the kids cheering for the tank that they thought would win the race.

Now that it was dark, Rob finally broke out the neon sparklers...The kids were so excited!

This year my sister-in-law borrowed her mom's sound system that she uses for cheer competitions. Natalie made us an awesome patriotic mix of music that played loudly as we watched the fireworks. Rob had impeccable timing...he ended his show right as the last song ended. My dad says next year he is expecting an F-16 flyover:)

Pictures don't do it justice, but here is one anyway.

The morning of the 4th, we raced down to Provo to watch the Freedom Festival Parade. My brother Adam got there at 5:00 am to save us seats. We were so tired we almost didn't go. The parade was supposed to start at 9:00, but Adam had found us seats towards the end of the route. At 9:00 I got in the shower, and by 9:40 we were in Provo. How's that for timing???

Hunter loved watching all of the military vehicles in the parade.

I love this picture with the little boy waving the flag out the window!

Not only did we get to see the old WWII tank, but it also fired of shots.

The night of the 4th we went to the Stadium of Fire at BYU. Here is the fighter jet flyover.

Apache helicopter flyover

This is the flag that was used in the 2002 Winter Olympics and has been rolled out onto the field for the stadium of fire for as long as I can remember. Later that night, we were able to watch a flag burning ceremony as they burned this flag.

SheDaisy was the opening act for the Jonas Brothers. They were fabulous! I love the Stadium of Fire because they broadcast live to the troops around the world. I hope my brother was able to see!

When the Jonas Brothers came out, the girls in the stadium went NUTS! I wasn't too excited for this concert, but they were awesome. I just might have to join the I LOVE THE JONAS BROTHERS fan club that we have in our family.

The girls all took turns checking out the Jonas Brothers with Rob's binoculars. Brooklyn was the most excited for this concert. A few hours before we left my mom's, my sister-in-law's mom stopped by and asked Brooklyn if she was excited to see the Jonas Brothers. Brooklyn sat down next to her and while smiling she said, "I brushed my teeth twice!"...My sister-in-law's mom said, "Your teeth will look nice and white for them." Brooklyn then said, "and I flossed". That was it. From then on it was perma-grin:) I LOVE YOU JOE JONAS!

The kids had so much fun! Alyssa didn't stop smiling or singing the entire time they were on stage.

There were a few bolts of lightning as the fireworks were starting. Luckily we were able to enjoy the fireworks without rain!

After the flag was burned, this torch lit up on the field. Very neat!

Firefighters, Last Day of School, Swimming, St. George, Las Vegas, Harley's...How Long has it Been Since I Blogged???

2009-06-15T13:31:00.000-07:00

The last week of school, the Mesa Fire Department came to visit with Ashley's kindergarten class. Hunter and I were able to go too. As much as Hunter loves fire trucks, he did not want to go near the firefighters when they had their fire gear on! He is definitely one of those kids that would be hiding under his bed if we had a fire! He did, however, enjoy his little walk through the fire truck and was so proud of himself sitting on the fireman's shoulder!Ashley's favorite part was when they each got to take turns holding the fire hose. Hunter didn't want any part of that!

Ashley's kindergarten class

Brooklyn & Alyssa have been taking piano lessons since September and they had their recital in May. They both did so well! I remember being sooooo nervous to play in front of all of the parents!

On Ashley's last day of school her class had a party and an awards ceremony. Ashley's teacher name was Mrs. Mellow and she gave Ash the MOST MELLOW award. She said Ashley got this award because nothing ever riled her. She told everyone about when she fell off the monkey bars during recess and it wasn't until later in class someone went and told the teacher Ashley's chin was bleeding. She asked Ashley if she wanted to go to the nurse and Ash shrugged her shoulders and said, "I guess.". She ended up getting stitches after I picked her up. Her older sister Alyssa needs a lesson from Ashley on not going to the nurse for EVERYTHING!

After her class party we went to the kindergarten musical. It was so cute! If you are wondering which kid is Ashley...she is the one whose mouth is open the widest:) She was soooo expressive during this performance! Ash is my little actress!

Alyssa had Mrs. Vierra this year. Lissy got the MOST MOTIVATED award. Her teacher said that Alyssa would always quickly finish her work and then go up and ask the teacher for more:) I guess that is why Alyssa was sent with LOADS of homework when we went to Hawaii:)

Brooklyn had Mrs. Schafer this year. She didn't have an awards ceremony this year:( But, I'm sure she would've gotten one for being the sweetest! My girls all had such wonderful teacher this year!...Hopefully next year is just as good:)

My girls can finally play Rock Band with us. We have to do it on the no fail mode, but at least they can play:) Alyssa is amazingly good at the drums...she gets that from me:)!!! Hunter was just busy trying to play Ashley's DS. It is really funny if he can just get the game to go to a different screen, he thinks he is winning a game:)

Here in sunny Arizona, we spend many hours in the pool!

Ever since I can remember, my girls have used our waterfall to pretend they are on Splash Mountain at Disneyland...Not quite girls:)

Ashley and Hunter trying to get a sun tan...Keep on trying Hunter...maybe one day you will get one:)

I love summer because I get all kinds of help around the house. My girls love to do tasks that most people dread. Wiping windows, cleaning toilets, unloading dishwashers...it's great! Unfortunately, I would rather do those things too, than pick up toys. I need a kid that likes to do that!

We went to St. George a couple of weeks ago and stayed at my Grandpa's condo. St. George is our one vacation destination where we really just relax. The kids loved being able to eat their cereal outside while watching the small airplanes land at the nearby airport.

No trip to St. George would be complete without a photo shoot at Red Hills. Too bad this picture isn't zoomed enough to see the scared look on Brooklyn's face! She wasn't happy that Rob made her climb up and scoot to the edge:)

The kids had so much fun hiking up the rocks! They were, however, a little nervous to go near any caves once we saw the biggest lizard I have ever seen in my life!

They finally made it to the top!

Rob wanted the kids to climb under this ledge for a picture. None of them wanted to.

After a long search for lizards, Alyssa finally went in. Hunter got close, but he wouldn't actually put his head in:)

Ash & Lulu over looking St. George

Rob's parents drove down from Las Vegas to spend some time with us in St. George. Grandpa Bob played tennis with the girls and watched bats flying around our heads...YIKES! Grandma Jeanne played on the playground with the kids...sorry, no pictures:)

After St. George we headed to Vegas for our nephew's baptism. Here are the kids watching Kitt Kittredge in our hotel room.

After Tyler's baptism, we went to Rob's brother's house for dinner and the kids had a blast playing on this water slide.

Luckily nobody broke any bones while piling on the hammock:)

The girls all played dress ups...they even dressed up Hunter. My poor son is likely going to have gender confusion:( Choncho, you can thank me when you are older for not taking any pictures of you as a girl:) But, I think Grandpa did:)

I guess living in Arizona makes Ashley think that putting on a nice furry coat is playing dress ups:)

Last week Rob's boss was in town and so we went to his house for a BBQ. He took Hunter out to his garage to sit on his Harley.

When Rob asked Hunter if he was going to have one of these when he grows up, Hunter smiled really big and nodded his head yes:)

"Uncle Jerry" (as my kids like to call him) gave Hunter this airplane hat. He also made us some yummy hot dogs that were flown in from New York.

The girls spent about 6 hours swimming in the pool with Jerry's granddaughter Julia. The kids all slept very well that night:)

Happy 6th Birthday Ashley & Our Trip to Utah

2009-05-18T13:58:00.000-07:00

Happy 6th birthday Ash!!! We love this little girls so much! Every year Ash asks if she can have her birthday in Utah because Brooklyn and Alyssa always get to (Brooklyn's is the week of Fall Break and the week before Rob's deer hunt, and Alyssa's is around the 4th of July). By the time May 1st rolls around, my kids have maxed out on their allowed absences. This year she lucked out because my brother Dave is deploying to Iraq:( and we all wanted to get together before he left. It worked out perfectly for her! She was such a good sport spending her whole birthday either at school or in the car on our long drive to Utah.I love her excited expression! I hope my kids always act this excited by the gifts we give them!
Ashley blowing out her candles with the help of her cousin Karli
Ashley wanted a Jonas Brothers party, but with my last minute shopping for party supplies, I was only able to find Hannah Montana stuff. So, all of the drooling granddaughters watched the premiere of the new Jonas Brothers Disney show while they played with the Hannah Montana party paraphernalia. Rob and Brooklyn really enjoyed this new Disney show!
Liberty with her Hannah Montana sunglasses (today she was the Little Mermaid...each day she was something different:) She was rarely Libby!)
Our family with my brother Dave

What do you get with 14 grandchildren under one roof? This! Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of Hunter almost pushing Cooper in the pond:)...or Cooper almost falling out a two-story window...or Jaxon falling off the bed onto a glass picture frame and cutting his arm to pieces...or baby Addison putting her finger in Jessica's hot soup and burning it so bad she had a HUGE blister. I can't believe nobody ended up in the hospital!

Too bad we couldn't keep them all locked up in the Sheriff's office that my dad built for the grand kids...Dad, I think you need to make the bars closer together so they can't slide through:)

Liberty was either schmoozing Cooper or Hunter all week.

Dave and his family (with another baby on the way)

My grandpa just turned 85. He is so amazing! We love him sooooo much! We had a special family home evening in honor of Dave leaving for Iraq. My grandpa shared some experiences about being on the USS Missouri when the peace treaty was signed during World War II. What a great honor it is to serve this great country!

When Dave was in Florida for 5 months doing training, my niece Mckinzie wrote a song in a letter to him. It was entitled "My Marine". My sister-in-law's sister and mom put the song to music and taught it to the girls to sing as a surprise to Dave. There wasn't a dry eye in the room! I will have to post the video of it!

These girls were all so busy playing outside the whole week that we hardly saw them. Why is their skin pink? They thought it would be funny to color themselves with chalk. I don't know if Brooklyn is the only one who didn't have pink skin because she thought they were stupid, or because she was the one that colored everybody else???

Libby moved on to Hunter...he is much more manly than Cooper...I'm glad she is smart enough to see that:)

The boys took a night to take the rhinos up to Hog's Hollow to go shooting. Check out that view!

Two things we learned about Dave this week...He can outrun and out shoot everyone in the Clark family!

What is it about men and guns???

Rob can't wait to buy himself one of these

My little brothers:)

This time I think Hunter is coming onto Libby...He thinks Dave's car is Lightning McQueen:)

When we got home Ashley's kindergarten teacher went to all of her student's homes to read her students a bedtime story. Isn't that sweet?!!! Ashley had so much fun showing Mrs. Mellow her bedroom!

Ragnar Relay, Newport Beach & Disneyland

2009-04-28T10:24:00.000-07:00

This weekend I ran my first race...the Ragnar Relay Los Angeles. 12 of us made up our team called the Village People (named that because we all live in the Villages). We started our route in Santa Barbara and ended in Dana Point. There is no prettier place to run than along the Pacific Coast Highway...Why do I live in the desert???I was the unlucky runner that had 2 out of 3 of my legs cut because of permit issues with cities along the route. I was originally supposed to run 12.5 miles and was suddenly cut down to 3.5. So, I doubled up with my friend Rebecca on one leg, and then our van of 6 people ran our own leg at the Santa Monica Pier. I ended up running 12 miles...I am so proud of myself by the way!!!
We had so much fun running together! I was on the best team, and we all enjoyed being entertained by Wayne and Ryan:) After running so many miles and only sleeping for 2 hours in 2 days, we all got a little delirious...especially Wayne:)
I have never seen so many grown men act like school boys as I did at the finish line. Especially my paparazzi husband that took many photos like this one. Do you recognize the girl in the black sweatshirt? Every man on my team did..."Kelly" from Saved By the Bell. They were all trying to one up the other on who got to get close enough to touch her and who got the best picture of her...sorry "Kelly".
We all ran into the finish line together...I'm not entirely sure why I was the last one in. It was either because I had Ashley running in with me (even though even she is ahead of me), or because my legs were too sore to move any faster. Our van got to the finish line before everyone else, so we were all able to get some well needed massages...I guess mine wasn't long enough!

I have no idea what we placed, but we had a blast!!! I'm ready for another one!

We had a rental car for our van, so this was the extent of our car decor...You should have seen some of the crazy vans other teams had!

I brought this ice pack for my legs, but Alyssa ended up needing it more than I did.

When we were sitting in the hot tub at our hotel after the race, Alyssa decided to swim across the hot tub. Apparently she didn't have her eyes open because she hit the other side...Check out her goose egg!

Since my family was nice enough to meet me in California after the race, we were able to spend the next few days at the Hyatt in Newport Beach. When I signed up to do this race, Rob had desperately tried to keep from going out of town so that he could babysit. Knowing that my mom had a hysterectomy 8 days before I had to leave for L.A., Rob found out 2 days before my departure that he was going to have to be in Maine. As we frantically searched for babysitting options, my mom said she would come down to babysit...Thanks Mom! Poor Rob has been in 4 different time zones in the last week. Despite Rob and I being sleep deprived, we still had lots of fun.
After Rob and Brooklyn played tennis, we all played ping-pong in the courtyard of the hotel. Hunter kept trying to steal the girls ping-pong balls:)

Rob and Alyssa

After eating lunch at a yummy Mexican restaurant (El Terasco), we headed to the pier to watch the surfers.

Brooklyn found a crab that had been partially eaten but was still alive. I'm not sure why she will hold a crab...minutes earlier at the Mexican restaurant, I had to pay she and Ashley $10 to eat a piece of shrimp...They both gagged from the moment the shrimp entered their mouth, until the moment it was swallowed.

Rob and the girls playing jump rope with a piece of sea weed

Ashley scaring away a flock of sea gulls

The kids playing in the sand

We also spent a day at Disneyland. This is Hunter with his glasses on for the 3D Bugs Life movie...Which he didn't like very much!

He did however, like the Pixar parade at California Adventures. Anyone who knows Hunter knows his love of cars. He LOVED this parade!

The girls said their favorite part of the parade was seeing how excited Hunter got when he saw Lightening McQueen...so cute!

And finally...Mater:)

We even took the train all the way around Disneyland this time...Hunter enjoyed the train, but he HATED the dinosaurs...He isn't much on being a tough guy!

Easter Fun

2009-04-14T14:28:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday night we went to the Easter Pageant at the Mesa Temple. It was awesome! It is such a great way for the kids to understand why we celebrate Easter. Hunter was nervous of the soldiers at first, but he quickly warmed up to them and wanted a picture with one. We had great seats this year because we got there 3 hours early to put blankets on the seats that we wanted to save...Even though there was a HUGE sign saying "NO RESERVED SEATING". We were only gone long enough to eat dinner at Sullivans, I swear:) On Thursday Ashley had her Easter Egg Hunt for her kindergarten class. She was really fast at collecting her eggs:) Thanks to 5 years of being trained for family egg hunts! This is Ashley and her BFF Hannah.
For Easter weekend this year, we decided to go camping. When we made our campsite reservations 3 weeks ago, we imagined the weather to be perfect like it was when we went camping over spring break...Not so! Lucky for us we have a heater...Not so lucky for the family next to us that was camping in a tent. The temperature dropped into the low 30s during the night...that family miraculously stayed 2 nights but they were packed up and gone early the second morning. I think I would have gone home midnight day 1! The heavy rain that didn't let up all night on the second night must be what finally scared them away! We were able to dye our eggs up there, but we got rained out before we had our egg hunt:( Ashley was sure excited by the color of this egg that she dyed!
Hunter was really nervous at first. He doesn't like to get dirty, so he started by just watching Alyssa and playing with the stickers.
This egg was Rob's pride and joy this year. An Alexander family goal is to dye the most natural colored eggs so they are REALLY hard to find. I think this is the best one I have ever seen! Paas made a camouflage dying kit this year...It is awesome!
Hunter loved the color of his blue egg! WOW!!!
Anyone that knows Brooklyn, knows that she is quite the "Daddy's girl". Rob is perfect in her eyes! She made this egg that said, "I love Daddy!" Unfortunately for me, it was not followed by an "I love Mommy" egg:( ...that is until Alyssa and Ash made one for me:)
Once Hunter started to put eggs into the dye, he couldn't stop. He would even take the eggs that had already been dyed and put them in a different color. I love babies hands after they've dyed eggs!!!

The kids had fun playing horse shoes. Alyssa and Brooklyn tried to throw from the same distance as Rob...Ashley at least threw them, but not from very far away...
Hunter's idea was the best...To heck with throwing, why not just get a "ringer" this way?!!!

Hunter worships the ground Ash walks on! Anything she does, he wants to do!

I bought hat looms for the girls to make beanies. Since I had to teach myself by reading the instructions, I thought it might be too complicated for them to figure out...it wasn't! They spent HOURS knitting these hats. Even Ashley could do a lot of it...all she needs is a little more patience:)

Alyssa was the most dedicated...Unfortunately for her, she used the baby size loom on her first one and that hat only fits her dog's head:(

My poor left-handed daughters! It took a while for Brooklyn to figure this out, until I taught her to go backwards. Then her fingers could finally do what they needed to do. Once the girls hats were done, they didn't take them off until we got home. They want to start a business selling hats:)...Apparently they think $5 would be nice pay for a hat that takes them 2 hours to make:)

Rob and Hunter took a nap while we made hats

The kids had so much fun at our Easter Egg Hunt this year! They have gotten really good at finding the "hard" eggs! Even Hunter found one that was hidden in the grass. Brooklyn found the most of everyone. After we thought we had found all the eggs, we only counted 73 out of 75. There were 2 missing. Since Rob took a picture of all the eggs when he numbered them, (yes, he really did) he was able to tell the kids what colors to look for. The deal was if anyone found a missing egg, they would get $10 per egg. Ashley found both of them. She got $20 for that, and then she also got 2 out of 4 of the grand prize eggs. (Amazing since she found the least amount next to Hunter) Her prizes were 1 day with no jobs and a Daddy-daughter date to McDonalds, which she was really excited for. After she went last night, she admitted to me that it would have been a lot more fun if the other kids would have been there to play with her.

I think this may have been my first Easter dinner that did not have ham as the main dish. Since we got rained out of camping a night early, we still had all of the stuff to make tin foil dinners. Rob made us some really yummy ones in our fire pit in the backyard.

Alyssa grand prize for the Easter egg hunt, was a mommy-daughter date to get pedicures. We had so much fun together and even got matching toes! Brooklyn and Ash were really jealous!!! Actually, I think Hunter and Rob were too:) Hunter was jealous of the nail polish, and Rob was jealous of my nice smooth feet:) Maybe they need to go have a father-son date:)

I finally pulled Ashley's second front tooth out today. The 1st one came out a couple of weeks ago, but this one was not going to come out on its own. The permanent tooth was already growing in behind the baby tooth, so today I told Ashley it was either coming out with me pulling it, or with pliers (like her first tooth). I couldn't get a good grip with the pliers, so I pulled and pulled with my fingers, and it finally came out. Isn't she cute! Now we get to look forward to the perfectly sized permanent front teeth!...yay!

Rob's Birthday, St. Patrick's Day & Camping

2009-03-23T14:49:00.000-07:00

How do you know when you are getting REALLY old??? Answer: When it takes 3 adults to light your birthday candles:) 36 candles this year for Rob...YIKES! Rob likes pie for his birthday instead of cake, so this year I made 3 (in order to fit all of the candles). It was either that, or buy a Costco-sized sheet cake:) Rob and his brothers played Zarahemla, and the cousins all had fun playing together.
St. Patrick's Day is always an early morning for our family. Almost as early as Christmas...I'm not kidding:) The Leprachaun always brings a little treasure for the kids.

Brooklyn wearing her glasses from the Leprachaun

This weekend we went camping up north of Payson, AZ. We found a great new campsite that isn't as cold as the rim(where we normally go). There was an army of ants nearby that the kids and Rob(especially Rob) were fascinated with. Rob got quite the sun tan holding one of our solar panels that charge our trailer battery while trying to burn the ants. I apologize for not having pictures:)The kids spent a few hours hiding and finding plastic Easter eggs. Rob likes to start training the kids well in advance, so that on Easter they are experts:) The only difference in our real Easter egg hunt, is bright plastic eggs are NOT allowed. In keeping with Rob's family tradition, we dye real eggs in browns and greens so that they are really hard to find. Only a nickel size of the egg has to be seen. Luckily my girls being the girls that they are, we do still get a few pink and purple eggs:) Even after 13 years, I am still not very good at finding these eggs.

The kids always love playing on the top bunkbed in our camper, yet not one of them will actually sleep up there. The only kid that slept in their own bed on this trip, was Brooklyn. We don't get very good sleep while we are camping, but we sure have a lot of fun!

Ashley played with the walkie-talkies for about an hour. She would talk to anyone that would talk to her. After the girls and I stopped responding, she even tried to have conversation with Hunter. Since he has no clue that he has to hold the button down to talk, Ashley had to stay nearby so that she could hear what he was saying with the walkie-talkie turned off. Hunter thought he was so funny and big!

Rob and Alyssa playing Checkers. Rob isn't bored by the way...he's strategizing. Poor Alyssa lost this game after I walked over and asked her a question. She made a wrong move and lost 2 of her Kings to Rob:( Sorry Lulu!

Ashley and Brooklyn riding bikes

Aloha! Hawaii

2009-03-11T13:12:00.000-07:00

We have been home from Hawaii for almost a week now, and I just finished unpacking our last two suitcases yesterday(both of which were full of unused clothes...note to self-next time pack more swim suits and cover ups, and less clothes for the kids). After going through our almost 2,000 pictures that we took, I am also finally blogging our vacation. Rob had to go to the Philippines on business, and when he found out he had a layover in Oahu, he suggested that the kids and I meet him there. We of course didn't hesitate, because the kids and I have never been to Hawaii. Rob seems to luck out by having me travel alone with our 4 kids. I am always most stressed out about making our early morning flights and having to park the car and get all of the kids and our luggage into the airport. At least this time we started out at the right terminal:) It was a breeze this time...not one of the kids had to be wanded or have their bags ransacked at security (this is the first time). The 7 hour flight was great, I can't believe how good the kids were! As we were getting off the plane, Brooklyn looked at me with the biggest grin and said, "Mom, Hawaii is my favorite place ever!!!" How she knew this before we were off the plane, is beyond me. My girls could not stop smiling! Alyssa told me that she likes Hawaii even better than Utah...for those of you who know Alyssa, that must mean Hawaii is pretty incredible! Question: What was the biggest clue to all of those nice Hawaiians that Rob and I were from the southwest??? Answer: When they would say Aloha!, our first response was often Hola! I caught on after the first day...Rob, however, never really caught on:)

Rob took a few pictures of his trip to the Philippines...He went from one tropical place to another. Sitting in the lobby waiting for Rob to check in, the girls sat in awe! Ashley took this opportunity to have a photo shoot:)
After getting settled into our room, we walked down the street and found LuLu's Surf Club. Alyssa (a.k.a. Lulu), had to eat here. The girls were all in love the the server that keep spraying the birds with water to get them to fly away. For the record...he wasn't very cute:)
This is Hunter when he wanted to go into the ocean...

This is Hunter after getting knocked over by a wave seconds later:( He didn't want to go in the ocean for the rest of the trip. This was Day One:(

Sorry dude...I don't think you're tough enough to be a surfer!:)

We spent a day snorkeling and playing at Hanama Bay. This place is gorgeous and the sea life was incredible! Does anyone look good with a mask on???

I'd like to refer to these girls as "my two snorkelers", but that would be misleading. Alyssa did last longer than Ashley, but not by much. As soon as we saw our first fish, Ashley demanded I take her back to the shore. Alyssa lasted for maybe 10 fish and then she wanted out.

Hunter did a lot of burying on the beaches of Oahu. At Hanama Bay he buried his Crocs...one of which we never found:(

Good thing he's so good looking!

Since our underwater camera is floating around somewhere in the Sea of Cortez, Rob and Ashley bought this one from the gift shop at Hanama Bay. Ashley took pictures of everything with this (above water pictures only of course :)...even when it didn't have any film. Yes, I said film. When my kids saw us have to load the camera, they said, "What is that?". They didn't understand why they couldn't take endless amounts of pictures and review them afterwards. Digital cameras are awesome!!!

Some of the fish that Rob and Brooklyn saw

The biggest fish that they saw

Rob in his snorkeling gear

Brooklyn in hers

We saw a lot of these strange looking trees. Ashley and Alyssa decided to play Tarzan and try swinging from the branches.

Alyssa got the highest

Brooklyn- just looking pretty:)

The girls playing in the waves. Hunter...take note!

This is the "Checkered Robot" that we found on the street. He had a cup that said he would dance for money. Rob put a handful of change in the cup...no dance. After realizing he had been a cheap skate, Rob put some dollar bills in his cup, and wallah...we saw the "Checkered Robot" dance.

The weather in Hawaii is crazy...either that or I have gotten used to 365 days of sunshine and blue skies. It rained every day while we were there, but usually only for a few minutes. Then there was almost always a rainbow. See the one over Ashley's head?

Bryan Jones, Rob had Brooklyn take this picture for you. What is a beach vacation without sipping virgin pina coladas by the pool?

The view from our hotel balcony...Diamond Head on one side...Waikiki Beach on the other. I didn't go out on this balcony too many times because we were on the 21st floor. I'm not very afraid of heights, but this made me woozy!

Just a cute picture of Hunter and Ash

One of our favorite things was the Dole Pineapple Plantation. This place is so pretty! We took a train around the plantation and it was interesting to see how pineapples grow. I'm ashamed to admit it, but everyone in my family,except for Rob, thought pineapples grew on trees.

The girls on the train

We did the "2001 World's Largest Maze" at the Dole plantation. Throughout the maze there were 6 stations that we needed to find and then stencil the clue on a piece of paper. It took us about 20 minutes before we found the first one.

We only ended up finding 3. We learned to just listen for someone to yell "I found one", and then try to follow their voices. Brooklyn decided to be funny and yelled that she had found one when she didn't. She laughed so hard when she heard some boys say that they heard someone say they had found a station:) She is definitely Rob's daughter!!!

We had the BEST pineapple ice cream and fresh pineapple.

One of my favorite parts of our trip was hiking through Waimea Valley up to Waimea Falls. We saw the most incredible plants and trees! It was a mix between Jurassic Park and the beginning of Arachnophobia where the scientist find the spiders.

The kids all had to wear life jackets in order to swim in the water. Hunter is smiling only because he has no idea why we are putting a life jacket on him.

The kids and I went out first so that Rob could get a picture. The water was soooo cold! Hunter and some of the girls floated out on boogie boards, but Brooklyn and I jumped all the way in. I have always wanted to do something like this!

Rob actually stood under the waterfall. That is him with his arms up in the air. He said it was so hard to stand and the water hurt coming down on his back.

Love this place!!!

Hunter was happy to be out of the freezing cold water and on our way back down to the car.

We ate at this cute place on the North Shore...We were fooled by it's cuteness.

Would you eat this? I couldn't. I ordered the chicken and shrimp plate, and this is what I got...I'm not sure that was even chicken.

Rob and I quickly learned that when in doubt...order a hot dog. The kids never had a bad meal!

This is the Holana Blow Hole. It was very cool to see. The lady at the Dole Plantation told us that years ago her husband's friend was sucked down the hole while trying to get close...YIKES!

The wind was blowing so hard it almost knocked us over:)

Brooklyn dressed Choncho up with her clothes and sungasses while keeping him warm at the pool...this is better than the pink nail polish that she put on him yesterday:)...Poor kid!

Since Sunday was a "no swim" day, we went to Pearl Harbor. This is us on the boat over to the memorial.
This is a picture of the "Tears of the Arizona". You can still see the oil dripping out of the ship. There is such a reverent feeling at the war sights we've visited. What an amazing sacrifice men and women make by serving in our armed forces. I'm so proud to have my brother in the military!!!

After Pearl Harbor we went to the swap meet at the Aloha Stadium. This is the best place to get souvenirs! We bought a coconut for the girls to try. First they had to drink all of the coconut juice, and then the guy that sold it to us scraped out the flesh for them to taste. Brooklyn drank the most, but we ended up dumping quite a bit out on the grass. I feel sick even thinking about how bad it tasted!

Our girls have been earning and saving their money to spend on souvenirs. This is the best way to take kids shopping. They really only bought things that they couldn't live without. Alyssa even came home with $40 left. She tried this hat on, but didn't buy it...thank goodness!

After the swap meet we drove up to the Punchbowl. I had never even heard of this place. It is a memorial and cemetery for the men that died in wars in the Pacific Ocean. It was kind of like a mini-Arlington.

We always run into so many nice tourist that offer to take pictures for us. Thank you tourist lady!

Isn't the view incredible?!!!

Why are elevators so much fun, and why do kids love to be the one that gets to push the button?

Hunter burying his cars...we never recovered these either:)

Our Sunday "no swim" day ended by being the only fully dressed people playing in the sand...except for Rob, he just couldn't keep his shirt on:)

The girls decided to give Hunter a taste of his own medicine by burying him. We did however recover him:)

A Hawaiian "almost" sunset

This is the visitor's center of the Laie Temple. We saw the neatest presentation there and Brooklyn told us how much she felt the Spirit.:)

We met the cutest sister missionary from Hong Kong that took this picture for us. It was so fun to see the sister missionaries wearing traditional Hawaiian dresses instead of regular clothing.

The Laie Temple

This McDonalds may not look like the ones on the mainland, but the food tastes the same:) Ashley had been begging to go here ever since she found out they were giving Pet Shops with their Happy Meals. My poor deprived kids only get McDonalds when we are on vacation.

Our next stop was the Polynesian Cultural Center. This place is unbelievable! We spent all day here and could've spent another day. The landscaping is incredible and the people are so much fun! This is the kids playing with some balls from some polynesian island (I obviously didn't pay attention to the details). This place has a village with an activity that is native to each island. Great place to take kids!!!

Here are the kids playing a stick game...Poor Brooklyn got stuck having Chonch as her partner. He didn't follow the directions very well:)

Hunter is a pretty shy boy, but he LOVED this guy!

He was nice enough to give us our tattoos.

The kids showing off their first...and last tattoos that they will ever have...Hopefully!

In the village of Tonga we learned how to weave fish with leaves

In Samoa we saw a man climb a cocount tree. The girls thought he must be crazy.

The kids were able to go on stage and do a dance with coconut shells. Hunter even played along. Meanwhile...Rob was chosen to go across the village to learn how to be a cook. Apparently in Samoa, all the men do the cooking.

Rob racing to beat another guy by making fire. I see smoke!!! I see smoke!!!

Can any man really look tough when he is wearing a skirt?!!!...

Or, dancing with flowers in his hair? ...I guess they can!

At the luau we got fresh flower leis...all of us were excited except for Hunter. He couldn't wait to get his off...Ryan Clark, I think he deserves a "man point"!

I'm afraid my girls may never eat pork again. Once they saw these guys take a whole cooked pig out of the ground, they decided they no longer eat pork. They missed out because the pork that was served at this luau was delicious!!!

More pina coladas! The girls couldn't get over being able to drink one out of a real pineapple:)

Half way through dinner, Hunter's head dropped as he fell asleep. This poor boy was such a trooper to go the whole week without a nap.

All of the elementary aged kids were invited to dance on stage at the luau. There was no way Brooklyn was going to go all the way down there, but Alyssa and Ash did.

Our favorite part of the night time show was definitely the fire dancers! Ashley thought it was so funny when they sat down on the fires and caught their grass skirts on fire. Sorry about the dark picture...no flash photography:(

Finally...a beach day! The girls were so excited to use their $2 beach mats that they bought. These were among the few things that did not make it home on the plane with us.

Ashley, trying to get a tanOur hotel was just down the street from the Honolulu Zoo. We had so much fun seeing animals that we don't get to see at our zoo.

This zoo has a great area for the kids.

On our way to the airport, we stopped at the USS Bowfin and the USS Missouri.

From the USS Missouri we were able to get a better picture of the Pearl Harbor Memorial.

It was really fun to go on the USS Missouri not only because this is where the peace treaty for World War II was signed, but also because my Grandpa Smith was on this ship during the war. It is soooo big...yet the inside seems so small. I can't imagine living on this for months at a time.

Heights don't seem to bother these two

This is the spot where the peace treaty was signed. So cool!

Sadly this trip came to an end. Our only regret was that we couldn't stay longer!

Stitches...Again, Choncho's New Backpack and Valentine's Day

2009-02-20T14:16:00.000-08:00

Yesterday about 10 minutes before I was heading out to pick up the kids from school, I received a phone call from the school nurse. I wasn't too alarmed because I either get a phone call or a note almost weekly for my daughter Alyssa. Alyssa is a tough kid at home that NEVER complains, but it seems like the littlest thing will put her nurse's office at school. When the nurse told me she was calling about Ashley, I knew something must be wrong. She told me that she had fallen off the monkey bars at recess and cut her chin. She wasn't even going to tell the teacher, the kids in the class are the one's that told. This is one tough kid!!! She never made a peep or shed one tear at the doctor's office getting her stitches...Me, on the other hand...that is another story. I should always make Rob take care of these incidents because I don't do well with blood. I did okay watching them clean out her cut, and I was even okay to watch the doctor numb her chin. But as soon as he was ready to stitch her up, I started to feel sick to my stomach...really sick! I looked away knowing that this is how I start to feel a few minutes before I faint. I kept getting sicker and sicker and the doctor said, "Are you okay?" At first I said yes, but I quickly told them I was going to pass out. I made it to the chair just as my ears started to close off and I started dripping with sweat. The nurse said, "Put your head between your knees!" I got my head down just in time to keep myself from making a fool of myself by falling to the floor. Phew!!! Next time Rob gets to go to the doctor!I bought this car backpack for Hunter to pack all of his cars in when we go to Hawaii. He LOVES it!
How cute that he fell asleep with it on his back and full of cars!
I had way too much fun making my girl's Valentine's boxes this year. My Cricut helped the "un-artistic me" to be able to come up with something cute. I actually let Brooklyn help make her's.
Poor Ashley only got to pick out the paper for her's. I tend to be a control-freak sometimes!

Alyssa picked out the theme and chose the ladybug and helped "bedazzle" the flower. Rob also helped with the bedazzling:)

All of the girls had their school parties during the same hour. Rob and I were on 20 minute shifts so that our kids would only be parentless for 20 minutes. It didn't work quite as well as I'd planned. Rob had to leave Brooklyn's class because he was paged to move his truck.

The girls were all much happier to be able to introduce Choncho to their friends. He was bummed each time I dragged him off to the next class.

Brooklyn was sooo excited to have her dad help in her class!

Rob and I went to lunch on Friday to celebrate Valentine's Day. So, Saturday we spent the evening with the kids having a fire...

and lighting sparklers.

Rob finally found the big M&M Nascar for Hunter...Sunday we were so excited to watch the Daytona 500 hoping that the car Hunter loves was going to win. We were very disappointed that he crashed and missed half the race:( Maybe next time!

Lemons are WAY Underpriced, Church Basketball and BBQ in the Rain

2009-02-09T18:26:00.000-08:00

I never realized how hard it is to grow lemons...until now. For the last 2 years our citrus trees have been completely unproductive. We have used Miracle Grow, but we still didn't get anything. The first and second years that we had our Mexican Lime trees, we got bunches of limes. What are we doing wrong? We only got 1 lemon this year...that is right, one. Ashley was the lucky one that got to pick it off the tree. It was sad to pick this lonely lemon that we have spent so many hours admiring. :( We are now trying to deep water as well as continue watering with our sprinklers (thanks to the tip from Derek Richey). If anyone has any other tips, please give them to me!!!

Our orange tree gave us 6 oranges this year. Alyssa was the lucky one that got to pick the last orange. I will say, these were the juiciest oranges I have ever eaten. I don't know if it is because we grow incredible oranges, or if we were just so proud of ourselves for growing fruit on our tree this year, that we would've loved them no matter how they tasted.

For church basketball this week, our new ward played the ward that we were just split from. Rob took a little heat for having his wife also cheering for the opposing team. This is all I got of Rob's free throw shots because of a noisy man on the other team distracting Rob (and I) during his shot. The man is pictured below this picture...Many of you may recognize him:) He kept yelling to Rob while he was trying to concentrate on his free throw, "Hey Rob, look at your wife...she is trying to take your picture!"...over and over again.
That's right...the noisy man was Pete Malo. I want to know why the ref didn't call a technical?!!!When it wasn't Pete distracting Rob, then it was our dentist, Eric...Come on guys! Don't you know I have a blog?!!! I have to take pictures of EVERYTHING!
In the end, our new ward lost big time to our old ward:( At least it was entertaining to watch!
Yesterday we decided to BBQ hamburgers before church. As soon as Rob fired up the grill, it began to rain and hail. I had to take this picture through the window in the kitchen because I thought he looked kind of silly barbecuing with an umbrella:) Whenever Rob makes his yummy hamburgers (and they are very yummy), he always makes an extra one in case "something happens". I have always laughed at the logic behind that, and maybe this is why yesterday was the first time he made only enough for each of us...no extras. Well, since it was raining, our newly stained and sealed sidewalk was very slippery. Rob sent Ashley (my 5 year old) in the house carrying my hamburger. As she was running in the house, she slipped on the wet sidewalk, and my yummy burger fell off the plate she was carrying, and landed on the wet sidewalk that was covered in bird droppings that had just washed off the roof due to all of the rain. (Anyone have any ideas on getting rid of birds?) Seriously, why my hamburger?!!! So, since we didn't have an extra one (the only time that we haven't), Rob and I had to share our "Sunday dinner" with each other. I imagine next time Rob will revert back to his old ways of always preparing for the unexpected. Lucky for me our meal was something that was "splittable" for my germaphobe husband!:)

Super Bowl and More Football

2009-02-02T12:50:00.000-08:00

How 'bout those Cardinals?!!! Brooklyn told me this morning that she is now a life-long Cardinals fan. I think we all are now! They almost pulled it off! My kids were all proud to be wearing a Fitzgerald jersey last night. Maybe next year!We went to Rob's brother's house for a Super Bowl party. I found a football cookie cutter at Walmart and so I made these cute football cookies. I spent 2 hours Sunday morning making and decorating 3 1/2 dozen of these things...
On Saturday Rob had another football game and this time I actually got some good pictures...You're welcome Rob! We have to get there an hour early every week so that Rob can warm up and practice (or strategize...I'm not sure). The kids enjoyed watching:)
Hunter...picking his nose...yuck!

My in-laws were in town for the Super Bowl party, so my father-in-law played catch with the girls while we waited for the game to start.

Alyssa catching the ball

Drum roll please.....Here are Rob's "action" shots that he has been begging me to get on camera...

He really is the best player on the team!!!

In the end, all of these awesome moves by Rob, weren't enough. The dreaded "purple team" beat them 12-0 (I think). Maybe next time guys!

What We've Been Up To

2009-01-19T09:57:00.001-08:00

For some reason I have been slacking on blogging. Alyssa told me yesterday that I have forgotten about blogging and I now only care about Facebook...What??? I will admit I have joined Facebook, but how does Alyssa know that I haven't been blogging? I guess the girls have heard me talk to Rob about people that I have found on Facebook. The other day Alyssa came running downstairs to tell me that she was going to change the channel from Fox News to Disney, but she heard Glenn Beck say that he was on Facebook...I think she thought that meant that we were friends with each other:)...I wish! Not much has gone on the past couple of weeks. School has started up again:( That always makes me sad.

This is such a cute picture of Hunter eating his ice cream cone. Why don't kids understand that you can't just lick the top of an ice cream cone?!!!

Rob started playing in a flag football league a couple of weekends ago. Each game he loads my purse with the camera (zoom lens included) and the video camera in hopes that I will catch some awesome play made by Rob himself. I am proud to say that I believe Rob has made more touchdowns than anyone else on the team...Sorry guys! I am also ashamed to admit that the only reason I ever know what is going on with the game is because my sister-in-law always has a male relative watching on the sidelines and keeps the wives updated. We always have a delayed "Way to go Rob!!!"On Saturday we went fishing at the Riparian Reserve in Gilbert. The only kid that was more interested in fishing than the snacks that we had packed for our picnic, was Ashley...She is a die- hard fisherman (or fishergirl). This makes Rob very proud. She has quite the cast!
Hunter had fun organizing Rob's tackle box while I took the girls to the library.

I will admit that I am one of those pathetic sports fans who will jump on the bandwagon of a winning team. I have never been much of a Cardinals fan, until yesterday. Go Cardinals! We made these football cupcakes for the game yesterday...all the while expecting the Eagles to win. Now I'm going to have to buy all my kids Cardinals jerseys for the Super Bowl!

Christmas '08, St. George, New Year's and Vegas

2009-01-03T09:31:00.000-08:00

I love Christmas! We had so much fun following our different traditions and just hanging out together as a family! Christmas Eve celebrations start first thing in the morning when we all open our new pajamas that we wear all day long. These were the kids pjs this year...unfortunately Hunter's red Handy Manny jammies don't exactly coordinate with the girls:)

Ashley decided to help Rob wrap the "pass-around" gifts this year. He of course wrapped the first layer, and then Ashley helped with the rest.
Hunter and I got out first...I love this picture with the present flying through the air as Alyssa threw it to Rob.
For our pass-around gifts, we give everyone a new game and then we play it as a family on Christmas Eve. Hunter got a new puzzle...
Ashley got a Pet Shop game, Alyssa got Apples to Apples, Jr. and Brooklyn got Mystery Date (my 9 year old thinks she is a teenager) I got Clue Jr. and Rob got In a Pickle...we played every one's except for Rob's...we didn't notice the 10+ age suggestion when we bought it:(
We watch a Christmas movie every night the week before Christmas...the Christmas Eve movie of choice was Polar Express and It's a Wonderful Life (that is such a good movie!)
We eat appetizers as our dinner...this year's favorite was Rob's bacon wrapped water chestnuts...YUMMY!!! We always end up throwing away half the food because we make too much, but who wants to only choose between 3 or 4 appetizers?!!!
My favorite tradition would have to be watching my kids do the Nativity. Hunter will most likely always be Joseph (except for the year he was born...he made a great 6 day old baby Jesus). Ashley was the lucky one to be Mary this year, Brooklyn was the angel and Alyssa was a Shepard.
On second thought...maybe Hunter won't be Joseph next year:)...he wouldn't keep his clothes on, and he kept picking up and throwing our baby Jesus...maybe next year he will not be so naughty:)
We also had a talent show this year. Since the older girls take piano lessons, they each played a Christmas song for us. Alyssa played Jingle Bells...

Brooklyn played Jolly Old Saint Nicholas and Ashley sang Frosty the Snowman. Hunter sang and did the actions to Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree...So cute!!!

We also made our Christmas sugar cookies for Santa...Can you guess which plate I decorated? Now guess which plate we gave to Santa? That's right, answer 1: right...answer 2:left...Lucky Santa!!!

For breakfast Christmas morning, everyone gets to choose a box of sugar cereal. I hardly ever buy sugar cereal, so this a quite the treat for my kids...and me...no mess to clean up:)

Hunter liked this cereal so much he hijacked one of the girl's bowls and ate his cereal with 2 spoons:)
Hunter's favorite present this year was his "choo-choo". He played with this all day!

Ashley's favorite present was her own DS

Brooklyn & Alyssa's favorite present was their electric powered razors...these are sooo much fun! I even love driving them. They go 10 mph. When I first saw that Santa had brought them, I was worried that my girls would kill themselves on them. I can't believe how much control they have...they drive it better than I do!

Hunter thinks he is quite the stud in the girl's pink Barbie jeep...Ryan, this may make Hunter fail the "man test".

I don't have a picture of this, but what would Christmas break be at our house without a ride in an ambulance...no, nobody got hurt on the scooters, Alyssa was sick again. Last year you may remember she was hospitalized the day after Christmas for pneumonia...we then spent 3 days in the hospital. She had a hard time getting over that pneumonia and so every time she gets a cough, I worry that she is sick again. On Christmas night the cough she had had for a few days suddenly got worse and she told me she couldn't breathe. We immediately called 911 and the paramedics came and took her to the hospital. They told us she had croup and luckily she came home a few hours later. Next year's goal...no trips to the hospital for ALL of Christmas break!!!

Friday we were sitting at Gecko's eating lunch and said, "What are we doing here in Arizona when our kids don't have school?!!!" So, we packed up the next day and went to St. George to stay in my Grandpa's condo. It was very cold there, but we had a great time. The first day we drove up to Enterprise and played in the snow.

Hunter didn't move much...he just stood still in the snow.

The girls found these icicles hanging from a tree.

Can you guess what my girls want for Christmas next year??? SNOW!

We also went to see the lights at the St. George temple and went to the visitor's center.

Check out this patch of snow at the temple! Crazy!!!

We also went to the Wildlife Museum...Notice the empty parking lot?!!!

Rob put Hunter up next to some stuffed bears...he didn't like that very much...one more lost point for the "man-test".

These are the binoculars that the kids get to use to get a better look at the animals...I think Rob liked the Swarovski scope that he got to use better:)

Apparently, my family couldn't get back to the car fast enough. They all had a race, and as you can see Hunter came in last. But everyone was there cheering for him when he finally made it!

Back at the condo we spent an hour watching an old Nascar race with Hunter's favorite "Memomem" car. He seriously stood next to the tv cheering for an hour.

Then we were off to Vegas to spend New Year's Eve with Rob's family. The adults spent a lot of time playing Mario Cart. The kids spent a lot of time swimming. Kris was nice enough to heat up his pool and hot tub.

The kids did sparklers

Oops...one more lost point for the "man-test". Who put a pink lei on my son?!!!

Our Martinelli's toast to the New Year

The kids went sledding both days that we were there.

My mother-in-law went sledding too. She also made snow angels with the kids.

More sledding...

Doesn't Hunter look like the boy on Christmas Story?!!! At least he never got cold!

More sledding...

Hunter loved sledding, and he loved watching everyone else sled...unless it was me. The second I would even say that I was going to go, he would start crying hysterically. He was worried because the first time I went down with Ashley I was screaming...who doesn't scream when the sled down a hill?!!!

My in-laws had so much snow at their house! This is the kids sitting on a snow bank in front of their cabin.

Ashley making a snow angel

Look at these giant snowmen that Rob and his dad made. Rob's on the right and Bob's on the left. They were the biggest snowmen I have ever seen!

It was very sad for all of us to leave the snow, but...I sure love the 70 degree temperatures back here in Phoenix!!!

Happy 2nd Birthday to Hunter!!!

2008-12-19T12:43:00.001-08:00

I can't believe my baby is already 2! I absolutely ADORE this kid!...he is the best little boy in the world! Unfortunately this child wasn't strategically planned with fertility pills like my 3 girls, which explains his unfortunate birthday 6 days before Christmas. To make up for this, we have decided to have his birthday party on Nov. 19th every year instead of Dec. 19th. He is just getting cupcakes and his favorite dinner on his actual birthday. It worked out well for us this year because most of my family was in town for Thanksgiving. I love this picture because Gracie and Alyssa are puckering their lips as if they are trying to blow out Hunter's candle...Oh yeah, Alyssa did blow his candle out before Hunter even got a chance to look at it...Don't worry Chonch, I re-lit it for you:)This is officially my first homemade birthday cake for any of my kids. Hunter LOVES anything with wheels...especially dump trucks. I found this cupcake-cake kit at the craft store and I knew I had to try and make it. It was soooo easy and turned out really cute...Hunter loved it!
Of course Hunter chose one of the wheels as his cupcake...hence, the black frosting all over his face.
Everyone gave Hunter some type of truck. Boys are soooo easy to please! After having 3 girls, I had no idea that little boys could be so much fun!
Who would wrap a little boy's birthday present in pastel pink wrapping paper?...Answer-My brother Ryan. This was carrying on the "Man-test" that my brother has going on with Hunter and his son Cooper. This time it backfired on Ryan, and Hunter annihilated Cooper! Ryan bought Choncho a dump truck as his real gift, and bought a pink comb and mirror as his "Man-test" gift. I am so proud to say that when Hunter opened the mirror and comb, he IMMEDIATELY threw it to the side. He had absolutely no interest in that. Cooper, on the other hand, had plenty of interest in playing with the pink girly gift:) Notice Cooper peeking over Hunter's shoulder with great intrigue!!!
Here is Hunter in "Dump Truck Heaven"

And here is Cooper, combing his mommy's hair:) Hunter wins again!!! At least Cooper is pretty!!! :)

"A Christmas Carol" at Hale Theatre & Wacky Hair Day

2008-12-12T12:45:00.000-08:00

It has been a few years since we have seen Charles Dickens' play "A Christmas Carol" at the Hale Theatre. I am so glad that we took the girls this year, this story always reminds us of the true meaning of Christmas. We went with the Miners and the Ashbys...can you see Chris smiling at the camera in the background? My girls didn't know what to do with themselves being the only girls with 6 cute boys. Cameron Ashby was kind enough to babysit Choncho for us. I think Hunter would have been scared to death by all of the ghosts in this play:)We were lucky enough to be one of the first ones out of the theatre so my girls were able to get their picture with Ebenezer Scrooge. I think Brooklyn was a little nervous! He also gave each of the girls a chocolate coin...he's a nice guy after all!
Snow??? in Gilbert, AZ??? Afterwards the cast all stood out in front of the theatre where they had fake snow (made of bubbles) falling from the rooftop. Very cool!!! It actually felt like Christmas...for a moment anyway. We miss the snow! However, I will say that I love how we can walk around the neighborhood every night and look at Christmas lights (a.k.a. make sure Rob has no competition) with only a slight breeze.
We stood outside pretending to be freezing...my girls don't know what cold is!!!
Wednesday was Wacky Hair Day at school...this is all we could come up with...Good thing Brooklyn has so much hair!!!

Since Ashley has afternoon kindergarten, she didn't get her hair done until later...hence the picture all by herself:(