Before reading clear your calendar

Many have asked if I was still blogging.

The answer is yes, just not very well. Here is a really quick overview of what has been going on with us.

Before school started (yeah I know I did not blog about this, that is why I am doing it now)


Our three oldest made a lot of kids eat their bubbles during our swim season. They did really well and they worked so hard!

After school started...




we went on an extended family campout! What a party we had!

Shortly after that....


I had a birthday and got....


The coolest gift ever. Thanks BABE! You are incredible!


Saige lost some more teeth.






Summit had a birthday


This is my attempt at shooting a video with my iPod Touch. I found very quickly that the touch screen is pretty touchy, that is why is stops a bit short.


Savannah completed her quilt. I seriously cannot believe how well she has done with it. In fact, the other day I was witness to a conversation about a baby rag quilt. The lady who owned the quilt said "Yeah, my sister made it, she is amazing!" Not to lessen the greatness of the task, but I felt like saying, "well my 11-year-old just completed a full sized one all by herself." I decided to hold my tongue.






The older three played soccer this summer, and they all loved it!


Then came the days we had been waiting for an planning for since January of this year

WE WENT TO CALIFORNIA!!!!!!!

We chilled out in the hot tub!


































We went to the beach and loved every minute of it!













We went to the Santa Ana Zoo (Home of the 50 monkeys) and the kids got to ride an elephant


We ate at The Cheesecake Factory (always a document-worthy experience)




We went to church with Great Grandma Alberta! We had such a great time with her and LOVED hearing stories about when she grew up and dating Great Grandpa!

Then came the most anticipated part of the whole vacation.

DISNEYLAND!!!!!


















This is of the Haunted Mansion. After that creeepy intro no one wanted to go without a parent. Can I just cling onto these days and never let them go?????



While Blake and the older kids were riding Indiana Jones, these two monkeys and I swung around Tarzan's Treehouse.








That concluded Day 1

Thus begins Day 2. Since California Adventures did not open up until 9 we went back over to Disneyland and took some photos.












Sedona was our navigator!






















































We had so much fun and cannot wait to do it again!!!!!












Halloween is always a great time.


Summit has been asking for Buzz Lightyear wings like Andy's (you know in Toy Story), anyway Blake found a perfect box and they made these together. It made for one happy boy!














Family pictures at the Temple. Again, thanks Marcie for your help.

For Thanksgiving we went to Utah to spend with family! We had such a good time, I forgot to take pictures.


















But I did get pictures of Ice Skating.

Next came hunting for our PERFECT Christmas tree!

We met Kjell's family, Sean & Becky and David near Woods Canyon Lake. Since we were there before everyone else we did some exploring for ourselves.




















Once everyone got there, we went hunting.





We found it, cut it down, hauled it up the hill, loaded it into the trailer we borrowed from our awesome neighbor, had some fabulous hot chocolate and then drove it home and.....




Decorated it!








We love Christmas!!!!! Especially all the activities that happen. Like....


Saige's Christmas Program












and our Ward Christmas Party.


Savannah & Sierra made their friend some Christmas gifts.

And last but definitely my "baby" turned 3!!!!!


She chose to go to Arby's for lunch (I think Dad had some influence on that).


After licking the brownie bowl! YUM!!!


Waiting for Spaghetti and Breadsticks to be served.


The photo of the newest plate in our collection. Thanks Mom & Dad for this awesome birthday plate. It is PERFECT!!!!!
















So either that was not very quick, or we just had too much happen. One of the three!

Let the Projects Begin!

Except I have to say, Savannah pretty much did this one by herself. I helped her come up with the idea and the process, but she did the whole experiment. She wanted to know what would take permanent marker off a penny the best. So..

She colored 10 pennies with permanent marker...


Put a tablespoon of each liquid in a cup and put a penny in each one...

Then we put it up high and let it sit for 24 hours.

Here is the poster with the results. By the way a special SUPER THANKS to Marcie, who let me use her Cricut for this as I am the only living person on this earth without one of my own (HAHAHA).

I think it turned out so great!!!!

First Day of School

Believe it or not I started this two weeks ago (that is when school started). I totally thought I would have this done by now, but life has gotten in the way. Life tends to do that, eh? Well at least I am getting it up. So here we go...

You know, sending my kids off to school always fills me with so many emotions. Sad, cause I have loved having helpful older kids to help around the house and to entertain my younger two. Happy, cause I don't have to break-up fights all day long (or even just listen to it). Scared, cause what if the other kids are mean to them. Excited for the things they will learn. Pride, cause I know my kids do so well in school. And probably a hundred other emotions that I don't have time to write about. So of course the moment their alarms went off they were up and at 'em (if only I could figure out how to wake them up like this every other morning).






















I love walking my kids to school. I get a chance to talk to them about their upcoming day. I get to hear all about their excitement and I get to be the last person they give a hug to before they go off to school. Just a little reminder for them that I love them (not to mention for me). I love catching Saige's kisses.


Here is Saige in her 2nd Grade class.


Sierra in her 5th Grade class.


And Savannah in her 6th Grade class.

As I walked back home I felt such a swelling of pride as I heard over the intercom the Pledge of Allegiance. I cannot help loving that the Pledge is still said. LOVE IT!!!!

Then came the HOT walk home.






As you can see Sierra was a little sad by the end of the day. She had a great day, she was just a bit concerned about her friend who was still on oxygen related to her asthma. She was so afraid for her. That is just Sierra, she is has so much concern for others.

I LOVE MY GIRLS!!!!!!! (and I love my boy, but this post is not about him. And I love Sedona, who is a girl but this reference to "girls" did not include her, and again this post was not about her)

Let's Ride!

So these are picture before Sedona's accident that I previously posted and you can see how much she is enjoying her riding her bike.






Now it is a different story. She won't ride at all if I am not holding onto her. She just screams and cries. She says "I just want to walk!" It is so sad. I am determined to get her loving her bike again. It just may take some time.

Summit has been so anxious to be able to ride his bike without training wheels. He has two friends down the street that ride like pros and he really wants to join them. We have taken them off several times only for him to more-or-less give up and have the training wheels put back on just so he can ride. So a week ago Summit came in and asked if I would take his training wheels off, again. So like a good mother I went out and took off his wheels and held onto the seat so he could give it a go. Well, he took off!!!! He got a little nervous when he noticed I let go, but he stayed up and kept going.











It did not take him long to decide that he didn't even need me to help him start. And right off he loved going up and down the end of our drive-way.

Sierra has been so excited that she now knows how to ride with NO HANDS!!!!! So it begins!

Can you tell?

Okay, so for Christmas Savannah got a sewing machine. She was so incredibly excited about this gift. As most all of you know I am not a sewer. So this has been quite the challenge for me to be able to help her. This is our second big project that we did.

Savannah really likes this!

And just in case you could not tell click on the following picture and pay attention to the face.


I should have taken a picture of her wearing the finished product. Um!!! Well, perhaps I will get that posted a bit later.