Boy Scout National Jamboree

This summer I (David) will be going to the National Jamboree in West Virginia and taking a tour of many other states.  This is going to be a great experience.

At the 8-day Jamboree I will be white water rafting, hiking, shooting rifles, and doing many other scout activities.  I am excited to meet boys from around the U.S.

The rest of my trip, which is 2 more weeks, will include visiting Washington D.C., Mount Vernon, Philadelphia, NYC, Palmyra, Niagra Falls, and Ohio.  We will be visiting Cedar Point, an amusement park.  While in NYC, I will get to visit Time Square, the Financial District, the Statue of Liberty, and a Broadway show.

This trip is going to be an amazing experience and I cannot wait for it to begin.

Utah, week 2

Our second week in Utah was much quieter. Ez was teaching a class in San Diego, Alexis was in Grand Junction, CO for a few days, Lily was in Albuquerque, NM, and we took David to BYU Football Camp.

It was fun to have just Joe and Evelyn for a couple of days. One day we visited the little farm at Thanksgiving Point. The kids had a great time feeding and petting the animals. Joe even got his shorts chewed on by one of the calves! Their favorite part was the pony ride.

Joe feeding a very, very hungry friend

Evelyn wiping her hand after an animal licked her too much!

My favorite part of the week was a trip up to Ogden to visit my friend Emily and her wonderful kids. Emily was one of my earliest friends and it was fantastic to catch up with her after not seeing her in about 10 years. Unfortunately, a photo never happened. Boo!

Utah Trip

It was lots of fun to get together with the family in Utah. Here are just a few of my favorite pictures. There really were a lot.

Very creative hiding places...

Scott and Ez hoping the fire for dinner will start before the rain

Our family--last time we took a picture here, Joe was only 1 week old

The family toured the conference center, visited Temple Square, and the Beehive House

Evelyn liked making sure David's hair was always looking good

Uncle Burgess was magical with keeping Claire happy

Jake was the funny MC of the family talent show

Beautiful little Ellie

Lily loved having Aunt Meagan put some bling in her hair
Anders
Alexis and Sarah
Joe performing his Hug a Pug dance
Cute Emery

Vacation

It is summer break! School ended June 7th, Joe turned 6 on the 8th, and then we took off on vacation on the 10th. Already our summer is a busy one. We had a family reunion with Keri's parents, aunt and uncle, and siblings, spouses, and their kids out in Midway, Utah from the 10th-17th.

We all had a nice time visiting, playing, laughing. We spent a day in Salt Lake City where we visited the Conference Center, the Beehive House, and Temple Square. We also spent time in Kamas, at a really fun indoor swimming facility. All the cousins enjoyed an unbirthday party, where each cousin got a small little gift and we gobbled up yummy cupcakes. The adults were completely entertained by a fabulous talent show (which brought many. many laughs). We celebrated Alexis's birthday as well. It was a pretty fantastic week.

The fun didn't end there, either! Alexis went back to Colorado with Jolie and her kids so she and Sarah can play a few extra days. Lily drove home to Albuquerque with Grandma Val and Grandpa Brant for a whole week. Ez flew home to Vacaville, and I am still in Utah, but in the the city of Sandy.

I drove David out to BYU early this morning so he could attend Football Camp for the week. We are so excited for him to have this opportunity. He is staying on campus and will have some really neat opportunities and experiences. It is a bit odd to be hanging out with just Evelyn and Joe for a couple of days!

No Excuses

Well, it has been far too long since we have visited and updated our blog--not without regret, of course. Originally the excuse was something having to do with vacations, but then life just got busier and the excuses kept piling until trying to catch up on the blog just got ignored.

I really will not attempt to catch up on this much lost time. In short, we are all still here, just a little older. Alexis just turned 13 and finished the 7th grade, and has entered teenage life with braces as well. David is 11 1/2 and heading into 6th grade and continues to stay busy with sports. Lily turned 8 in March, got baptized in April, and is looking forward to 3rd grade. Joe just turned 6. We were glad he had a great kindergarten year and are pleased to see his reading skills take off. Evelyn is nearly 4 and had a fun year at preschool. She is pleased to let everyone around know that she now can ride her bike with ONLY two wheels! It is amazing to see how much our family has grown in a little over a year!

Keri spent the last school year as PTC President over at the elementary school. Not sure what possessed her, outside of the idea that she might have something to offer. In short, it was far busier and more frustrating than ever imagined, but good things did happen. Keri (and the rest of the family) is glad that she did not sign up for another year of helping.

Ez continues to stay busy at work and with his church calling. He has taken up running and has found it to be an activity he really enjoys.

I suppose that is the best quick job we can do! Hope to be back a little more often with updates!

Miss Independent

Evie thinks she can do everything her big sisters and brothers can. For a while, she absolutely loved to make toast. We have a toaster oven, so she learned how to use it (pretty much) herself! Funny little lady!

How she gets tall enough!

Enlisting Joe's help this time

Blue and Gold Dinner

David's Blue and Gold Dinner for Scouts was a bit ago. The boys had an opportunity to decorate a cake to share with the families that came. David had a fun time looking at cake ideas and finding just the right one for him--the foosball cake!

He was thrilled to win the certificate for Most Original. Good Job, David!

Brothers

David and Joe have always gotten along just fine, but we have noticed that as Joe gets older, the boys have found more and more ways to spend good time together.

One night Joe was even willing to let David read him his story instead of me! It truly is one of my favorite things to watch my boys become better friends.

New Back Yard!

We are loving the new back yard! I don't think we will miss the pool at all this summer. The kids have so much more room to run and play! The boys can't wait for the basketball hoop to arrive in a couple of weeks.

These pictures are the remainder of the "conversion" process. Pictures of the yard in actual use will come in time!

Another project on the house

We keep saying things like "After this project, we will be done doing things for the house for a bit." Then another project comes. And sometimes another.

About a month ago we decided we finally needed to get a new front door. We got new bark and finally decided on the new plants we wanted in the front yard. That was going to be it for the year. But then we decided it would be great to have a new back door as well, since our slider it pretty terrible. It slides shut so hard, I am so afraid someone will lose a finger! So we now have that idea in the works.

The biggest project we decided to do was to get rid of our pool. Crazy? Absolutely not. We have not enjoyed this pool as much as we would have liked to. It never warms up, so it is not as enjoyable (at least for mom) to swim in. It is not a very big pool, but they placed it in such a way in the back yard that we don't get to enjoy much actual yard.

The pool was pretty easy to get out, it took only a day and a half. We are currently stuck in the middle of fixing the landscaping, which is taking longer due to the rain.

We can't wait for it to all be done so we can get out and run and play and enjoy our yard!

A crafty moment

I learned a great trick. You can take an old t-shirt and refashion it into a cute toddler skirt. I think that it is such a clever idea! It works great in our house since there are plenty of hand me downs I could refashion for Evie to wear now instead of four or more years down the road! I have only done one so far, and it isn't as cute as it could be...but it was quick and easy and a nice first effort to see how I like them.

Evie thinks it is pretty cool. especially because it has pink in it. She sported it the other day, of course wearing as much pink along with it that she could find. Yes, she is dressing herself still!

The shirt

The new skirt

Hawaii

Ez and I have been talking about taking a trip to Hawaii for years, but it has never been the right time. Now that the kids are a bit older and more independent, we decided this was the year to make it happen.

A HUGE thank you goes out to my parents for coming out and staying with the kids while we were not home, and to Ez's mom who came in and filled in the last day as well.

Hawaii was wonderful. We stayed on Oahu with the intention of doing some of the touristy kind of things, as well as relaxing on the beach. We spent the first couple of days in Honolulu. We hiked Diamond Head, visited Pearl Harbor and the Punchbowl Cemetery, as well as a neat botanical garden. We hiked Makapuu Point, we wandered downtown and visited the Dole Plantation. It was busy and fun to just see so many neat places.

One of our favorite parts of Honolulu was our dinner at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse. We've wanted to go there for quite a while, but have never made it. Vacation seemed like the perfect opportunity. The steaks were delicious, just as we have heard, but I think my very favorite part of the meal was their sweet potato casserole. Seriously. I will never be able to eat sweet potatoes again without comparing them to that casserole. Seriously. They were that delicious!

The last couple of days we headed out to the other side of the island for a nice, quiet, relaxing stay at Turtle Bay Resort. We took wonderful, long walks on the beach and swam a bit in the ocean. We also got to visit BYU Hawaii and the Laie Hawaii Temple. Unfortunately, the temple is closed for some reconstruction so we were not able to go inside, but did enjoy the visitor's center.

We spent our last day at the Polynesian Cultural Center, which was such fun! We had a great tour guide and saw and learned a lot. We enjoyed the luau and show in the evening. Directly after the show, we headed to the airport for a red eye home back to reality and 5 children that missed us dearly!

We had such a fantastic time!

Loved these trees!

View from our room at Turtle Bay

On the beach at Turtle Bay

It was a bit windy...

Cool bird in the hotel

We ate at this awesome shrimp truck twice. Yup. Twice.

On the way out...