My Snowsuit!

Brannen LOVES his snowsuit! In this wonderful land where we live, I have to put him in this snowsuit whenever we go anywhere - post office, grocery store, school, etc. He loves to put on his snowsuit! When I put it on him, he always tucks his head way up into the top of the hood - to "hide" as best he can. He is such a squishy marshmallow when it is on. So snuggly. I just had to post a picture to remember how much he loves this thing!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRANNEN!!!

Good morning Birthday boy!

We had a birthday! They boy is officially one year old! I cannot wrap my brain around that fact. This year has really gone so fast. We had a great day with our little one. I couldn't quit taking pictures of the kid! I think I'm kind of frantic to remember him being little - and I take entirely too many pictures.
Reese made him this great party hat. Rae made one for her when she turned 1 - so she was just returning the favor!
Isn't this picture great?!? He LOVED playing with all of his balloons. What a silly one!
Hugging on Grandpa
Party! Party! Party! Party! Just not too close to my face.
He loved this present! Balls flying everywhere, lots of fun music! Great!
Getting a little help with the opening!
Oooooo - Pretty!
Yummy cake. He didn't eat much - just poked at it and rubbed it in his hair - pretty typical for a first birthday.

Oh how we love our Brannen! We had so much fun with him on his birthday!

Tyler the Basketballer

My friend Kenna has an awesome son - Tyler (well, she has four awesome kids, but this blog is for Ty). Ty is a great basketball player and my kids think he is pretty cool - mostly Brady. Brady loves to go to Tyler's games, sit with Seth (Brady's buddy and Tyler's littlest brother) and keep stats of the game. Ty is pretty much a hero to Brady. He is an old boy now too - graduating this May and finishing up his senior year season of basketball. And he used to be one of my primary kids! I'm old! Anyway, our high school just had senior night at the last game and Kenna and her hubby Vance got to escort Tyler as a senior. I got a few pictures, and had to post one. I'm so proud of Kenna! She didn't sob the entire time. A little teary maybe, but no sobbage! Way to go Ken! What a grown up, great, son you have!

Rae has been having a great time playing church ball this year with the most awesome Grover Growlers! We have some really fun girls in our ward, and they make church ball really fun to play. She is one of only two beehives that are on the team - and the laurels have really been teaching them how to have fun playing church ball. This year they got together and bought striped socks to match their awesome pink and black outfits, and awesome sweatshirts they all bought last year. The great laurel girls are really big into unity, and have left an awesome example for the younger girls. Oh yea! I almost forgot the best part! They were an undefeated team this year, and just won the championship! Go Grover Growlers!

Weekend Trip

We had a great weekend. We took a little trip to Utah to have some fun, see some family, and just enjoy being together. It was great! We started in Logan - saw Clint, Ali and family. Rae and Rylee tended everyone while the adults went to dinner and movie. Valentine Fun! The next day we headed to Salt Lake area. We took the kids to the awesome dino museum at Thanksgiving Point. Kelly always takes his summer school kids here, and has been wanting to take our kids.
Reese and Brady make a new friend! They are friendly kiddos.
The whole gang. Wow! We have a lot of kids now! We are crazy!
Apparently, Brannen is the only smart one. He's saying, "Hey guys, does anyone see that MONSTROUS MEGALADON that is about to eat us?!?! Holy goldfish crackers!!!!"
We met Jen and Kyle and their crew at the Lehi Rec center for some fun swimming. Although, Jude didn't seem in the mood to swim - he wasn't too thrilled with the whole thing.
Brannen enjoyed watching the swimmers
Jen and Juder cuddle at the pool at our hotel. The older kids needed more swimming, so we continued the swimming party at our hotel.

Brannen's first swim! Thanks for the awesome swimming trunks Aunt B! We finally used them.
Hanging out at the pool!
We had a good visit with Grama Marge too! We took her to eat lunch at the Mayan - very fun. The kids really enjoyed seeing her. She is doing so well and looks so good. What a lady!

We also stayed with Jennifer and Kyle one night, and went to the Draper temple open house on Monday. It was really nice, but we didn't seem to get a picture. It was kind of a rush day - and lots of lines, so we really didn't have a picture chance. I wish we would have thought about going back to the temple after the tour for a photo of everyone. Oh well, next time.

It was a busy, fun weekend!!!

Winter Fun!

I keep seeing lots of pictures of cactus and sunny days - thanks to Bekki and Jennie's blogs. I decided I needed to post some REAL winter pictures. It is February you know! My kids have been having a lot of fun after school in the snow. There are HUGE snow hills around this place because of all the snowplowing this winter. They arrive in from school later each day - the snow hills are just too much fun to play on, on the way home. We have had lots of snow. Fun stuff!

Happy Valentines Day

We had a great day of love around here. Well, actually, it was a week of love. On Monday, we wrote things we love about each other and then I hug a few of them on the back door every morning - so the kids could read them throughout the week. It was kind of fun. My favorites were- from Rae: "I like love it like when mom like makes like those orange like drinks for like us" (yes, she's taunting me - we are trying to break her "like" habit). From Reese: "I love Brannen's dreamy eyes" (too cute). From Brady: "I love Reese because she always plays catch with me" -- from Reese: "I love to play catch with Brady."




Oh yea, my valentine gave me some beautiful roses! Too awesome! And he received A LOT of cherry chocolates. He loves those things - and I love Kelly!

The Big Move

We spent the weekend moving the computer downstairs in the room by the fireplace. What a chore! Of course, it turned into an all day project because we had to clean as we went. We re-organized the desk area, and threw out so much junk we never use. Took a load to the dump, etc. etc. We got a new desk for downstairs - that I love and I think it looks really nice. We needed our internet connection to be better, and this way we can plug it right in, instead of using an airport. Not to mention just having it downstairs on the main floor is really handy. Anyway, I just had to put up some pictures! And would you look at that Mac! What a thing of beauty!

Rae the Dancer

Both of my girls really love to dance and take dance classes all year. This year in middle school, Rae has also gotten the opportunity to be a "Jr. Brave Cadette", a group that is sponsored by our high school drill team. She LOVED being a part of this. Her group learned a dance, which they performed during half-time at middle school basketball games (Just like the high school! Squeel!). That Rae really loves being involved! She is an awesome girl!

Brannen Boy!

I can't blog without posting a cute picture of our boy. He is so funny lately. Doing so many cute things.
On Sunday afternoon I asked the kids to take him downstairs and entertain him for a while. When they brought him back up a little while later he was not so happy! They had adorned him in a hello kitty belly shirt and matching skirt. They even made up a dance for him to show us. He was not too happy about the whole thing! What is really amazing is that he actually fits into build-a-bear clothing! What a good thing to find out. Now we will have lots of cute new outfits for the boy!

The Girlie Room

The girls and I just finished repainting their room - it looks so good! They wanted matching bedding for Christmas and we found some that they both like. Blue for Rae and pink for Reese (naturally!) We have needed to update the room since Reese moved downstairs when Brannen was born. So we finally did - and we really like it!

Before and After

The BEFORE picture!
And the AFTER!
This boy was really in need of a haircut! His hair was crazy long, and he was getting really tired of mom combing it all of the time. Maybe I should just buzz everyone else in the house too - myself included. Life would be a lot simpler!

Da Boys

I forgot to post a picture of the NFL trip for the year. They guys went to AZ this year to see the Vikings beat the Cardinals. Of course they had a GREAT trip, as always. I think those guys could enjoy doing anything, as long as they were together. I'm glad Kelly has such great friends.

Vacation highlights

We had a really fun holiday break with Bekki, Adam, Dallin and Maura staying with us. We also got to see Jen and her family. They came to the valley and stayed with my dad. We had such a great time just being together. Now we are back to real life and enjoying winter. Here are some highlights of the vacation. A little late - I know - internet problems. Say no more.