Bicycle Fun

Here's behind the scenes from taking school pictures with John and Kelsey. The other kids (Jack and Bekah) were feeling a little left out of the spotlight. I can only imagine they won't want to have any part of picture taking in the coming years (eg. teenage school pictures with boys are going to be fun...hah!), but they were sad not to have pictures taken of them. To keep them happy, Mom let them ride Bekah's bike. Shawn came up with this idea...and it made the rest of us laugh!

And Jack wouldn't be outdone by his big sister...so, he had to have a turn too.

Hooray for wheels and little kids! It makes us all have smiley days!

Happy Birthday Jack Jack!

Jack Jack's two years old!? We very nearly didn't get any pictures for his birthday this year. We had a small family party on his actual birthday and had chicken decorate cupcakes to celebrate. He called them "ducks" but just about any bird is a "duck" to him. He actually blew out the two candles we put on the cupcake. He wouldn't do it for the larger cake we ordered for Saturday. Ah well. So goes life.

But he was in love with the fishing pole and magnetic fish that went with it. His brother and sisters were in love with the Duplo Lego set that he got. He got to play with all of his toys later, but it was funny to see how possessive he was of his fishing pole.

Happy Birthday, Jack!

Happy Fourth of July

Happy Freedom Days! We spent Friday morning before the fourth watching hot air balloons inflate and then rise into the sky. The kids were pretty impressed by the amount of fire it took to get the balloons into the air. It was awesome! The wind actually allowed the balloons to go up this year but wasn't cooperating enough to let the balloons play their games. Ah well. I guess you can't have it all.

We had a few "characters" show up this year for the festival. Smokey the Bear (as seen from below) and the pink piggy bank are regular attendees. The Coke bottle showed up after all the balloons had left the field. But the main attraction was the Darth Vader balloon all the way from Belgium. Wow! There were even stormtroopers, Darth Vader, and the Emperor who made their appearance. It was fun!

Speaking of the Coke balloon. It inflates but rarely flies. The crew actually had volunteers from the crowd (preferably those under the age of 12) come roll the air out of the balloon before it got stuffed in the giant bag and put in the trailer. We talked John into helping out with the crew. And before the end of the line, Jack decided to help a little. We got that on video.

All of the kids were pretty good. We all tumbled out of bed and they showed up in their jammies. It was so much fun. Maybe we'll see some of you next year and we can show you around the festivities!

Friday Field Trips

This summer I have tried something "new." It's called "let's keep the kids entertained, busy, and educated all summer long." We've had John practicing his penmanship; Kelsey's been working on recognizing upper and lower case letters; Bekah's been coloring; and Jack has been working on listening. We've had varying results depending upon the week.

But every Friday we've tried to get our work done early to do a little "exploring" around Utah. We've had some fun hiking to a waterfall, checking out the dinosaur museum at BYU, and going to the zoo. Here's some of the memories we've made.

The Hogle Zoo had a Zoorassic experience this last summer. They had lots of dinosaur models around the park. Some of them, like the T-Rex, were life size and somewhat interactive. The eyes moved as though the dinosaur was looking at you and his head turned. It was rather intimidating. Little Jack backed away from T-Rex and growled at him...so tough!

This was at the base of Bridal Veil Falls. The kids decided to go wading in the "pool" made at the base of the falls. John was the most adventurous and was all over the rocks, water, and generally having a great time. Jack couldn't understand why the water was so "hot." I kept trying to convince him it was really "cold" and not "hot." But I think he's a little backward.

I guess this is the only picture I got from the dinosaur museum. Bekah was the only one brave enough to climb up onto the brachiosaurus's vertabrae. The kids enjoyed seeing students working on real dinosaur bones. It was pretty cool! What kid doesn't look forward to field trip day?! It's been fun trying to find fun, free places to make things exciting.

Easter Egg Hunt

This month has proven fun for the kids. They've waited sooo long for Easter to arrive. It's almost as if Christmas was coming. Well, we are celebrating the Saviour, so...I guess there is some correlation. But they've been so eager for the candy too. Ah well, they enjoy all parts of the season.

We had a church egg hunt a week before Easter and that was a lot of fun. Bekah got lots more eggs than her brothers or sister. She's got this game down! Jack had to be coaxed into looking for his eggs; but once they were all found, his shining moment was eating the candy from everyone else's egg and handing back the empty "shell." He didn't care if it was a golden egg or not. He only wanted the candy. Smart boy!

Joe didn't get much into the thing of things. But he was a good sport and let everyone else find the eggs.

And here are the pictures from our family egg hunt. We had two visitors that are the kids' friends. Christopher and his sister wanted to help look for eggs. We had enough to share and it was fun to see them all scampering around the yard looking for eggs.

John kept saying it was too easy. And it probably was, but we're dealing with a large age range here. Jack wasn't as interested in finding the eggs today. He like picking them up and throwing them. Thank goodness we left the hardboiled eggs inside. The joy of finding plastic eggs was enough for them all.

Happy Easter! From our family to yours.

Teaching Jack to "Smile!"

So, Shawn decided to teach Jack how to smile for a camera. And we got some interesting results. Most of the kids know how to pose and smile for their pictures. They all want to see their pictures instantly (thank goodness for digital pictures). Gone are the days of guessing how the picture will turn out once it's developed.

Well, the kids (minus Jack) were all ready to have their pictures taken, and they were more than eager to show Jack how it's done. Well, we got some good shots that really show the personalities of our children.

Say, "Cheese!", Jack Jack!

Autumn Leaves and the Kids

It's been a pretty mild Autumn this year and the leaves have been pretty slow to fall near our home. The maple trees across the street have finally all turned yellow and are dropping their leaves. But the sycamore trees in front of our house are barely starting to turn brown. We'll see how quickly that changes after the next couple of days when the cold storm finally hits.

The kids have loved going across the street to pile up leaves and jump in them. Jack loves to run through them and listen to the crunch! Kelsey and Bekah pretend they have bouquets of flowers and they love to throw them in the air to see them fall again. It's been lots of fun to see them playing.

Shawn and I were remembering back to our first home with the Box Elder tree that dumped bags full of leaves on our lawn. We had such fun piling them together to let John play in them. Ah well. Memories and photos are what we keep of that. But it's great to see all of the kids enjoying the changing seasons.

Shopping with Jack

One of Jack's favorite things to do is go shopping. Not because he gets a lot when we go, but because he can sometimes push the cart. If we're not in a rush (which usually happens when we go to Cabella's or the farm/ranch store), I'll put him down and he'll push the bottom bar of the cart everywhere he can. It's really quite funny. I'm sure he'll get over the novelty as soon as he can walk. But for now, it really makes me smile.

The following video was at the end of April. So, you can see how early he's had this obsession with pushing things around. Ah...he's so cute.

Camping with the Collotons

What a weekend we had! We decided to invite some neighbor friends to go camping with us and we had so much fun, we're planning to do it again in September! Wow! We went up Diamond Fork canyon in Spanish Fork canyon to a small group camp area. There was a huge parking lot available (not that we needed it for vehicles) but it was great for playing glow-in-the-dark frisbee with the teens that came.

The kids had so much fun playing with other kids their age, and even some who were a few years older. That left time for Mom and Dad to socialize with some of the other adults, or clean up, or both! Anyway, the kids keep asking when we're going to get out the sleeping bags and tent again. It's nice to see they enjoyed themselves as well.

This is where Jack stayed pretty much the entire morning after we all got up. He was playing outside of it the night before, but we had so much to do to pack up that he got sequestered to his bed. Contain! We contained the baby! But he was a good sport about it.

There was also a small stream by the campsite and the kids loved wading it in. At one point, I turned around and realized I had at least two pantless children. Bekah and John both had clothes hanging on the fence post to dry...but they weren't finished with the water.

Temple Square

Our kids love going to Temple Square in Salt Lake City. They love the fountains, flowers, and the chance to see the temple up close. Either way, we decided to join a couple of Shawn's friends on a Sunday stroll in downtown. The kids were so excited...and even more so when they saw the "giant" model of the temple in the Visitor's Center. It had sides cutaway so visitors could see what the interior of the temple looks like.

The model was so exact! Down to light fixtures, chairs and paintings. Wow! I was impressed and you could tell so were a lot of other people (there were a lot of forehead smudges on the glass from people trying to get a closer look at the detail!). It was so amazing! This is a definite must-see if you're visiting Salt Lake!

Anyway, the kids came, saw, and moved on faster than the adults. But we enjoyed getting some pictures at some of the fountains. It was so much fun.

After Temple Square, we decided to visit the Conference Center (where the Prophet speaks to the Church). The kids weren't as impressed by the enormous size...they were too busy putting their hands over their ears because someone was practicing the organ. I forget how much of a dampening effect 20,000 people can have on an organ with so many pipes. Ah well. It was fun trying to entertain the kids...especially Jack. He had fun chasing Mom around one of the three feet pillars in the center. Kept him entertained and made me smile. Unfortunately, the video we got of the experience didn't make it. So goes life.

Here's a link to the local paper's pictures of the temple model. Enjoy!

ksl.com - LDS Church shows inside view of Salt Lake Temple through new exhibit (Gallery Viewer)

Hardware Ranch and the Elk

We were looking for something fun to do the day after Christmas...we're not much of the after Christmas sale shoppers...and Macher came up with Hardware Ranch just outside Logan, Utah. The kids (minus Jack) loved the experience. They were a little impatient waiting in line for a chance to ride on the horse pulled wagons...but we distracted them with the camera phone!

And the last child is in among the blankets and coat. Jack Jack was NOT happy to be out in the cold, without lunch, or a nap! He cried the entire time we waited in line (which seemed like forever while he was crying) and for the first 10 minutes of the explanation. Ah well. I had a good time and John still remembers it!