Where did May go???

I can't remember the last time a month flew by as quickly as this May did. I'll give a quick recap of what we've been up to lately.

A few weeks ago all of the local farmers put on "Farm Days". Every other year they all get together and bring a bunch of animals together, and show the kids all of the things that are made from the products we get from farms- they have homemade ice Cream, they make butter, they take all the kids on a tractor pulled hay ride and lots of other fun stuff. My mom came and got me and Logan to go with her the first day and she had such a good time that her and Logan went again the second day. I know a lot of work went into putting the whole thing together and I'm grateful for all the local farmers doing it so my kids can have the experience of "Farm Days".

Logan Lassoing the bull- yes he got it on his first try- must be the cowboy in him.

Logan petting a baby goat- How cute is that???

We ran into Carter who was there with his class on a fieldtrip. (Side Note: I did not send Carter to School in this outfit, this is something they wore in his class for a program so they had them all wear them that day so they'd all match and they could find them- not that I don't LOVE it I just wouldn't want to take credit for something I didn't do :)

HayRide day two with Emily and her kids.

Carter finished his first year of machine pitch baseball. He had a blast and did really good. It was fun to see him and his friends move from T-Ball to actual baseball and it surprised me to see how well they all picked it up. I am sure we have many years ahead of watching Carter Play Baseball.

Camryn had her first 4H horse meet yesterday. It lasted alllll daaaayyyyy looooong, and still at the end she wasn't ready to get off her horse so rather than going straight home we went the long route to ride with her friend Kinley to where she keeps her horse. She did awesome on all of the events- her horse Panda is kind of stubborn so she had to fight him to do what he was supposed to but she showed him who was boss. They have both come so far since the first practice a few weeks ago, I'm excited to see her get better and more confident on him this year. During the first four events Panda would try to go to the gate any time he came near it because he wanted to be done but she wouldn't let him so finally on the last event he just did it perfectly and they got a blue ribbon. All of the other events they got red ribbons. At the first practice he wouldn't do anything unless we ran behind him and threw dirt clods at him so I was pretty proud of her for sticking with it and making him do what he is supposed to.

Have you ever seen a cuter cowgirl?

Camryn and Kinley on Panda and Blue.

Last week I went to Philidelphia for work. I went with three of my coworkers, we didn't have a lot of time to play. We got there late Wednesday night and went to the famous "Geno's" for a phili cheese steak. Thursday we spent all day in meetings and finished a few hours before our flight back. We decided to go downtown to the liberty bell but when we got there we realized it was several elementary school's field trip day and their was no way we would get to go in and make our flight so we walked around a little and then headed to the airport. Hopefully I'll get to go back again and have a little more time to play next time.

Wow, I'm a slacker!!

I have tons of things that I've missed blogging about on in the past couple months. I'm going to try and do a quick recap to catch up (I've also misplaced my camera so most will be without pics but hopefully I find it and add pics later)



Logan turned 3 in March- he loves dinosaurs lately so he wanted to have a dinosaur party. I made a cake and put some little plastic dinos on it and he thought it was the greatest thing- I don't look forward to the day that I have to do more than that to make it be a "dinosaur party". I took him and Camryn to the Cortez rec center and then to McDonalds to celebrate his birthday (Carter was with his dad in Mesa so he missed the "party"). Logan is seriously at the best age right now, he is such a little stud. I'm so lucky to get to hang out with him every day and hear the funny things that he comes up with. I'll finish the post with one funny Logi story- The other day we were driving on the road that goes right behind the dinosaur museum. For some reason there is a set of double doors that is on the second story of the museum but there aren't any stairs to the door so it's just on the side of the building. As we passed Logan said "Hey that's weird I wonder what that door is for" then after a few seconds of thinking about it he said "oh wait, I know- it's for the teradactyls to get it!" I love you little buddy, happy (late) third birthday.



As I mentioned above Carter and Jeremy went to Mesa. They went with Jeremy's dad and Dallin and went to a few spring training baseball games. They all had such a good time. It's been a tradition for the past few years for the boys to go, this was the first year they took Carter- he had a ball. He is really starting to love baseball. His attention span isn't the longest so any time he sits for that long without complaining (OK he did complain a little) you know he must like it.



Last month I had a coding conference in Las Vegas. I wasn't really looking forward to it cause I knew I'd be in class all day and since I was planning on going alone I thought the nights would be pretty boring. A couple days before I left I was talking to Chanelle and when I told her I was going to Vegas she asked if she could join me, so after figuring out what to do with her kids for the week we were off. I was so glad she ended up coming, we had such a good time each night. One night we went to Penn and Teller- it was just OK, not something I'd recommend highly. The second night we went to Mystere- it was awesome, I loved it. We walked up the strip a couple times and saw some of the free stuff- the water show at the Bellagio was a personal favorite. I'm really glad she came, it made the week so much fun.



Camryn just finished another year of tumbling. She did so good this year. She can almost do a backhandspring all by herself. She has mastered the backwalkover. I love that she loves tumbling cause it was one of my favorites as a kid.



We've started riding the horses a lot. Camryn is now doing 4-H and has loved the two practices that she's been to so far. I really enjoy going with her and watching, it brings back so many good memories. She has lots of friends that do it too and she looks forward to it every week. Her horse is a little stubborn- she gets a good workout trying to control him but she does great and is getting better and better.



Carter is almost done with his first year of machine pitch baseball. He has been on Kyler Perkins team and has loved every minute of it. Kyler has been great with him and he's learned a lot this year. He is pretty good and get's a hit almost every time he gets up to bat. He has played third base most of the time. He is such a little baseball stud- I love watching his games.

So much to blog, so little time

I seriously have at least ten posts to do but just don't have time so here's a funny story that won't take too long that I thought I'd share:

My visiting teacher came over and she is in nursery with Logan and she said that the last week in nursery all of the kids were playing a game and she asked Logan if he wanted to play, to which he said:

"Do you know what SpongeBob would say about that?. . . Boooooooring"

I'll catch up soon I promise.

Family

For our combined fifth sunday meeting yesterday The Bishop, and a few others he had asked to help, talked about family home evening and different things that have worked for them. Several of them had such great ideas that I thought I'd share and if anyone has things that have worked well for them please leave a comment.

Mary Shumway had a great way to get her teenagers excited about fhe as well as include all of her kids who no longer live at home. I won't be able to do this quite yet because my kids are too young and cell phoneless (I know I'm so mean) but I thought we would try to do a version of it without the phones. Starting last spring the Monday after conference she started a trivia game to see who learned the most from conference. She texts all her kids (including the two in her house) a question about conference. They all then text back and anyoen who gives the right answer gets a point. They continued the tradition last fall and are planning the third round next week. I thought it was a great way to include your whole family when they start moving way to college.

Derek Bethea said that they always do a lesson on Sunday night and an activity on Monday night. Sunday after the lesson they decide as a family what the activity will be so that makes the kids excited for the Sunday night lesson because they know they will decide what they'll be doing the next day.

After the meeting I got thinking about the fact that my kids still LOVE doing things as a family and in a few years they probably won't be quite as excited so I need to take full advantage of this time before it's gone. I decided to take both of their ideas and change them a little to work with my family. If anyone else has good ideas for things that have worked for them, or if you have certain family activities that your kids love, please leave them in a comment.

Broken heart

Last night as we sent Logan to bed he started the normal whining and trying to get out of it routine. I told him if he kept crying I was going to throw away his bionicle guy so he stopped and started walking to bed sniffling. I asked why he was still sad and he said "I think my heart is breaking". I asked why, he said "because I don't even have my own pony". Seriously, how could we be that mean.

Viva Mexico

We just got back from a week in Mexico and other than missing my kids I was not ready to come back to the real world just yet. We had such a good time. My parents and Stacy and Taylor came with us. We boarded the Princess Sapphire last Saturday and began eating immediately, and unfortunately it continued until they made us get off the ship yesterday. We spent two and a half days at sea and got to Puerto Vallarta on Tuesday. In PV (which is what all the locals call it and pretty much after 12 or so hours there we now consider ourselves local) we went on an awesome "adventure" which I would recommend to anyone going there. It started off with a boat ride followed by a very bumpy jeep ride. When we got to the "base camp" in the heart of the Sierra Madres we each mounted a mule and headed up the mountain. At the top we began the exciting trip down which included several zip lines, rapelling, hiking and the most beautiful scenery I've ever seen. It was awesome, if you're going to Puerto Vallarta any time soon see this link for details.

The next day we went to Mazatlan. We decided to do a little more relaxing tour this day so we went to an island called Stone Island and did sea kayaks, road a bananna boat and then just relaxed on the beach. It was also lots of fun.

Thursday we went to Cabo San Lucas. We only had a few hours there so we just shopped and hung out on lover's beach. It was gorgeous and I really want to go back.
Friday and Saturday were spent on the boat getting back to L.A. It was nice to catch back up on sleep, it was really rough to not have time for naps on the three days we were at ports. We basically napped, ate, napped some more, and of course ate some more. We then spent two some what miserable days in the car to get home. The kids were very excited to have us home- thanks to Kera, Nicole, Cristi, Shantil, Rebecca, Cathy and Bryce we didn't worry about them while we were gone. We knew they were well taken care of and they all had a great time with everyone.

Jeremy on the Mule ride, there is some cowboy in him after all!!

Rappeling down the waterfalls.

the zip line race- I lost.

Free fall rappel.

seriously, how cute is he??

In case any questions arise with this photo I need to clarify that the drinks were all on the table when we sat here- at least that's our story and we're sticking to it.

Thanks again Mom, Dad, Stacy and Taylor. We had a great time, can't wait for next time!!!

Finding Joy in the journey

I loved Pres. Monson's talk in this last October conference entitled 'finding joy in the journey" and this morning I was reading it again. It came back to mind as I sat in Relief Society and listened to the announcements which included the status of several ward members who are very sick and nearing the end of their lives (one of which being my Aunt). It made me think how important it is to really enjoy every minute that we have. I have selected a couple quotes from the talk that I especially liked but I recommend reading the whole thing here.

"If you have children who are grown and gone, in all likelihood you have occasionally felt pangs of loss and the recognition that you didn’t appreciate that time of life as much as you should have. Of course, there is no going back, but only forward. Rather than dwelling on the past, we should make the most of today, of the here and now, doing all we can to provide pleasant memories for the future.
If you are still in the process of raising children, be aware that the tiny fingerprints that show up on almost every newly cleaned surface, the toys scattered about the house, the piles and piles of laundry to be tackled will disappear all too soon and that you will—to your surprise—miss them profoundly.
Stresses in our lives come regardless of our circumstances. We must deal with them the best we can. But we should not let them get in the way of what is most important—and what is most important almost always involves the people around us. Often we assume that they must know how much we love them. But we should never assume; we should let them know.

Despite the changes which come into our lives and with gratitude in our hearts, may we fill our days—as much as we can—with those things which matter most. May we cherish those we hold dear and express our love to them in word and in deed."

I am grateful for my life and to all of you who have been an influence in my journey. Please know how much I love and appreciate you.