Battle Creek

Utah weather has been amazing. .. Such beautiful weather. It screams "get outside and PLAY!" We did our first hike of 2012. It was awesome!! We decided to squeeze in a short hike between conference sessions on Saturday. The children (not kids) played so hard. Crossing a little stream.. throwing rocks in the river.. climbing the mountain. It was awesome. I think I already wrote that, but it was that much fun. It made me so excited for summer. Can't wait for more fun summer times.

Potty Training.. again..

We are back at it. This time I decided to have Lola potty train Lola's baby. It worked great!! Baby potty trained so fast and so did Lola for that day. The only problem.. if I am not all over her all the time she wets.. or even worse.. yep.. I can't even write it. She can do it.. She will go to the potty.. and tell the entire world about it. "Oh yeah!" Lola even has this super cute potty dance. BUT.. She just gets super busy and it's all over. So we had a great day.. but we are back in our diapers. Dang it. I wish she would be like Jacq and just potty train herself. Suggestions?? OK.. I'll start on Monday. ha!

Group effort

Someone (Jacq) is saving all her pennies.. nickles.. dimes. and cans for a kindle.. or a trip to see Ma Deb.. or Junie B. Jones books.. or Pee Wee Scouts books.. (Nerd) She has quite a running list going, but her ultimate goal is the kindle. It fun to see her brothers rally and help.. Aunties.. cousins.. and Grandma's all help in her effort to save for her kindle. Thanks everyone and Good luck Jacq!

Soldier Hollow!

Going to this place once a year has started to kind of become a tradition. My Max likes himself traditions. He likes to identify traditions.. and tell everyone.. "this is one of our traditions." This year the weather was a little tricky. I don't know if there was ever a super good day to go. It was a way warm weather. The hill was super slushy. It was the slowest hill ever. Even though the hill was not a up to par.. the children still had a blast. That means I had a blast too. They found a little hill of their very own and played their little hearts out.  

I heart these two. I think they share a brain. "They are like one!" Just ask them. 

Go Barrett Boy! 

Sissy!

Our pack mule!

I heart "tradition boy."

The little hill.. 

Snow angels.

Relaxing.

Sissy with jax.

Maxer.

I heart her glasses. love. This girl is so much fun these day.

Cousin buddies.

Lola Marie

Cole guy! 

Crazy! This one is mine.

The babies..

This picture of Jen cracks me up. She is an awesome Auntie pulling the littles up and down the hill.

Max is such a helper. Love that. 

Cole guy!

Taylor Jade! 

St. Patricks Day

I never take enough pictures. EVER. This holiday (??) is no exception. I write (??) because I wouldn't really consider St. Patrick's Day a holiday to make a big fuss over?? The children were so stinkin' excited about St. Patrick's Day that we decided to party on!! This mom loves any reason to celebrate. The children built trap after trap after trap.. they built traps the entire afternoon before St. Patrick's Day.. they were catching that leprechaun. All five stinkers woke up to 8 empty traps, but found that the leprechaun left a little Scavenger hunt for them (Thank you pinterest). They giggled and ran all over the house reading the clues trying to figure out were to go next. The clues finally lead them to an awesome treasure.. Maybe they will get that sneaky leprechaun next year!

Happy Birthday Taylor!

We love you girl! xo.

Max's baptism talk.

{I love it that Alexander and Barrett really wanted Max to speak at their baptism. They look up to Max in so many ways. Max pretty much wrote his entire talk himself. Tim asked him some questions and let him put his thoughts down on paper. Then we smoothed out some rough spots together. Love this boy! He is a good boy! I am grateful Alexander and Barrett have him as an example. I am grateful that he is apart of our family! ♥}

{Max's talk}

Hi! I’m Max. I’m Barrett and Alexander’s Brother. I was baptized last year by my dad in the same font as you

I remember when I got baptized I was really excited. I couldn’t wait to become a Member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints and to receive the Holy Ghost. I remember that the water was warm. And that I was a little nervous... Kind of like I am right now.

I want to share a couple thoughts about baptism. Baptism is when you go under the water and become clean. What I mean by “become Clean” is all your sins are gone. One way I like to think about baptism is like a sheet of paper.. when we do something not nice or we do something we know is wrong.. like take my cousins dollar.. or not wear my seatbelt… a mark appears on my paper. Eventually I would have a lot of marks on my paper. There are only two ways to have a completely clean paper. The First way to “be clean” is to be baptized. When Alexander, Barrett, and Avery are baptized today they will be completely clean. Not one mark on their sheet of paper.

As hard as you try you will not stay clean forever. I remember the first time I got a mark on my paper after I was baptized. Right after my baptism we were having lunch at my house and my friend’s brother was bothering us. So I told Collin to go home. That was a mark. I big fat mark on my clean sheet of paper. Eventually your paper will get some marks just like mine got marks. Like Barrett might whine about doing Piano or Avery might take a toy from her brother. Luckily Heavenly Father made a second way for us to have a clean sheet of paper. Every Sunday we can become clean again when we take the sacrament.

I am grateful for baptism. I am grateful I was baptized. I am grateful that you are all being baptized today. I think everyone should be baptized so everyone can be clean and return to our Heavenly Father.

In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen