Welcome to our World

While M may have been the youngest child in her class at school, she is the oldest child in junior primary.  She made the tough choice to wait a few weeks and be baptized with the next oldest child in junior primary instead of traveling out of state so that cousins could attend.  It turned out well and the girls were baptized on E's birthday together in the building M was blessed in as a baby.  E's mom had the great idea to take some pictures at the building we go to church in the Sunday before and we loved the pictures.  Here are just two.  E's mom also made a collage for the 2 girls to keep and it is now hanging on M's bedroom wall. I was truly inspired by the support and love given to M on her special day.  One of her prized possessions is a necklace one of the other Girl Scout leaders gave her.  She told M and I about the fond memories she had of her baptism day when she was 8 years old.  It absolutely delighted the two of...

My youngest child isn't so little anymore.  5 years old seems like a big birthday to me.  I am so proud of how kind and confident she is becoming.  Her smile is one of the best sights in the world and the #1 thing she wanted to smile about for her birthday was a party with her friends.  Trust me.  I offered to take her to Disney World for her birthday and she opted for a party at our house instead! Much to the surprise of those who know her, my mother convinced her to have a princess party and since 1/3 of her friends were going to be boys we made it a princess & pirate party.  We had lunch (Annie's mac & cheese and Pirate's Booty of course) and helped the children make treasure maps, princess crowns, play pin the princess/pirate in the castle, had them walk the plank in the basement (which was a bigger hit than I expected), play parachute type ocean games, go on a treasure hunt (K.W. did an awesome job running that part since my voice w...

We were more than thrilled to see Hubby and what a perfect place to meet us at -- the Mesa Temple Visitor's Center.  He flew in to Pheonix and took the light rail to meet us there and we had only arrived in our mini van from Tucson about 5 minutes before that.  He quickly changed out of the clothes he had worn in CO's snowy weather and into shorts for a picnic made of leftovers from the house we hadn't eaten yet.  After touring the visitor's center and saving our seats for the pageant, we headed to our hotel and spent the afternoon swimming.  We got some great Mexican food to go and loved seeing the Easter pageant on Good Friday.  Hundreds of volunteers, thousands of spectators and even real live sheep to tell the story of the Savior's last week on earth.  I agreed when M said that was a wonderful way to celebrate Good Friday and remember Jesus.  We highly recommend going and also staying at the hotel just a couple blocks away.  It was faster to ...

I loved waking up this sight in the mornings and eating most of our meals out of doors.  I planned a trip to Tucson during spring break to escape the snow, which we did, but I also fell in love with the place.  I've heard about the Sonoran desert my entire life, but being in the middle of it truly made it magical.  I've decided Saguaros are the neatest plant ever and that if the dust didn't bother N's asthma so much, I would totally snow bird in AZ (if snow birding was actually an option at this stage of my life). The 2 bedroom house I found to stay in was at the end of multiple gravel roads.  Getting there was quite an adventure in and of itself.  The great part was, it was an excellent place to explore without even having to get back in the mini van we drove so far.  Our first morning there we got on good shoes and grabbed walking sticks and set off.  We were only hiking for a few minutes when some jumping cactus got on M's shoe and Grandpa ha...

My children's spring break began on a Friday.  K, D and N had off the entire day and M had an early release day, which included a field trip to a classmate's house to do things like snuggle baby chickens.  We picked her up straight from J's house and headed to Santa Fe for the night.  Believe it or not, we started off our giant road trip without Hubby but took my dad along.  He helped me take the children to the Puyee Cliff Dwellings, where he had taken me as a child.  It was pretty disappointing that we couldn't climb up the ladders like we did when I was a child, but it was still pretty neat to visit a cliff dwelling for a while.  That afternoon children were super excited to head to Albuquerque and the BioPark to see a real live koala.  We laughed at the gorilla sign (here's N's gorilla imitation) and were pretty darn bummed when we got to the koala exhibit and found it empty.  We found out later that the koala had died.  It was st...

When your daughter comes to you and says she knows what she wants to do for her birthday party but knows it won't be cheap but you understand it's really the only thing she wants to share with her friends to celebrate, you pay for a party outside your home for the very first time.  The horse ranch she goes to camps at was the perfect way to start out being 8 years old for this girl.  We had a fantastic time and couldn't have asked for better service. She loved all her gifts and you could tell her friends really knew her and were thoughtful with their choices.  That night she got to go watch friends perform at the middle school "The Little Mermaid Junior" with her daddy and her little sister while I stayed home with K and D and we watched "Avengers Age of Ultron."   The next day M and our Girl Scout troop hosted a country at the Tour of Nations for the first time and loved learning and sharing about Ireland.  T's dad is from Ireland an...