Where has the time gone?!

I'm not very good at keeping this blog updated. McKay checks it regularly and reminds me all the time that I am slacking. So here is an update of things that have taken place over the last four months.

Colton outdid himself this year with his gingerbread house. It took 4 batches of dough and a couple batches of royal icing to get it all put together, but it was impressive! I look forward to a couple years off while he is on his mission!!



Bill won a Hummer limo ride for us from Adams G3. We were going to go see the lights at Thanksgiving Point, but because of the snowstorm they closed the light show down, soooo.... instead we rented a DVD and rode around on the streets of Orem and PG while we watched it. Fun family time!!











Kaden loves to go fishing with his papa. This year he got to experience ice fishing and he loved it. He even caught a fish!







McKay is playing lacrosse again (still?). I didn't know this was a year round sport! To bad they keep charging us every time the seasons change. He is now playing High School lacrosse. Tryouts for the PG teams were held in the BYU indoor practice field. He made the Freshman/Sophomore team. He is having a lot of fun and hopefully I'll have some better pictures to add as the season progresses. Right now he is trying to decide whether to play middie or attack. He scored a goal during one of his tournament games a couple weeks ago and this past Friday he scored another in his game against Alta. This is a young team and they are still learning. A lot of them haven't been playing any longer than McKay has (one year), but I think they have potential. They will only get better over the next four years!



And finally (and I do mean finally!) it is now official: Devin and Krystal are engaged. They have been talking about it for months. The temple was reserved about 2 and 1/2 months ago and the reception place was booked about the same time, but I wasn't allowed to say they were engaged yet. But now the question has been asked and answered with a "yes" and a ring was given so I can tell everyone. Devin and Krystal are engaged and they will be getting married August 4th in the Salt Lake temple!!! Welcome to the family Krystal. It will be nice to have another girl in the family. There was definitely to much testosterone!!

A Mouse in the House

I guess the title says it all, but here's the story... This morning I went downstairs to the food storage to get a box of cereal. When I opened the door there was a bag of macaroni on the floor. I picked it up and noticed it was no longer full and I thought, "Wow, the boys must have been hungry!" Then I saw that the bag was chewed through and on closer inspection of the shelves found the tell-tale droppings. Yes--we have a mouse in the house and not just any where in the house, this mouse decided to take up residence in my food storage! I patiently?? waited for Bill to come home from his night job and when he walked through the door exclaimed, "You've got to help me. There is a mouse in the food storage!" He, of course, walks patiently downstairs and gets the wheat bags out of the storage room and then declares he needs to get ready for his day job. So, I grab the shop vac and a lantern and head downstairs. I remove a lot of the buckets, of course leaving a clear path to the stairs in case I need to run screaming up the stairs. I got the mess cleaned up, threw away the damaged packages, and set out mouse bait luckily never seeing the little fiend. All in all I figure we have an Italian female mouse since the only things it ate where 4 packages of pasta and a bag of chocolate chips! But then I got to thinking....female mice have babies!!!! Just how fast does a female mouse reproduce? Note to self: Google mouse + reproduction.

Red Letter Day

When I told McKay that he had a red letter day on Saturday he asked, "What does that mean?" Well McKay, that means that you had a day of special significance. On Saturday McKay was awarded his eagle and then scored a goal at his last lacrosse game! I'd call that a red letter day for sure! We are very proud of McKay. At the eagle court of honor we were supposed to have a chance to introduce our eagle and Bill and I fought over who was going to GET to do that. I won, but then that portion of awarding the eagle was skipped over so I want to just say a few things now. McKay is a great kid. He is what I would call heroic when it comes to his school work. Things don't come easy for him. He has to work twice as hard as most kids when it comes to school. But he does it. I have never had a kid worry so much about his grades and it shows. He has been on the honor roll every year and most terms he is on the high honor roll! McKay has the gift of empathy. This was evidenced to me when I received a note from his first grade teacher who observed him on a cold winter day give his coat to a little boy who didn't have one. He sees what people need and he gives of his time and sometimes his possessions. McKay always tries to do what's right. I sometimes call him my little Nephi because if he sees that his brothers aren't doing what they should he sets them straight. As you can imagine his brothers receive that criticism about as well as Nephi's brothers did (although he hasn't been bound by cords yet!). His dad wanted to make sure I expressed how impressed we are with his hard work and determination and his strong faith. McKay, you will do great things with your life if you stay on the path you are on now! We love you!!

Graduation

We had a wonderful week with Seminary graduation on Sunday, May 23rd and then High School graduation on Friday, May 29th. We are so proud of Colton. He played with the orchestra during graduation and looked very handsome in his cap and gown. After much deliberation between attending BYUI and Dixie State College he has decided to go where it's warm and attend Dixie this fall on scholarship. Way to go son!!

Mother's Day

Imagine my surprise when I walked home from church on Mother's Day to find this sign wrapped around my house!! In case you can't read it, it says: "MOM, YOU'RE THE GREATEST. WE LOVE YOU THIS MUCH--------->mommie-------->" I couldn't have asked for a better present!!

I've Got Two Tickets To Paradise

Well, it was close anyway! To me Tahiti will always be paradise with Maui a close second, but our week in Florida was relaxing and above all WARM!! Bill and I left our boys home freezing in the May snowfall (is it supposed to snow in May?!), and flew off to sunny Florida to celebrate 25 years of marriage. We spent most of our time in the Keys where we lazed on the beach, watched the sunset, and ate lots of good food. The key lime pie was to die for!


On Saturday we headed down to Key West. Just outside of Marathon we crossed Seven Mile Bridge. Incredible!! You had the Gulf on the west side and the Atlantic on the east side. We usually hold our breath when we go over a bridge (just a silly little thing we do with the boys!), but there was no way we could hold our breath that long!!

Sunday we found a small branch in Marathon Key. When I say small I mean small!! The vistors out numbered the members (there were only 5 plus the Branch President!). But it was a great experience and so wonderful to hear their sweet testimonies. We were afraid we were going to have to travel either west to Key West or east to Key Largo to find a sacrament meeting since our GPS couldn't find an LDS church in Marathon, but as we were driving back to our motel on Saturday I noticed the familiar sign. It felt so comforting to know that there was a church and members nearby. We were so excited when we found the building!!


Our last couple days we decided to head up to Miami Beach and check out the beaches there. It was beautiful! The water was an incredible shade of turquoise and the beaches were gorgeous. It was over far to soon and then it was back to Pleasant Grove and reality! One little tip for anyone planning a trip to Florida: denim pants (even if they're capri's) and high 80"s weather with 80% humidity do not go well together!!!

Adventures in Moab

I didn't know whether I should title this post "Adventures In Moab" or "Moab Madness". It was a little of both, but overall good fun and good memories for all! For spring break this year we decided to pull the trailer down to Moab. It was one way to get all of our boys to come on a trip with us since what two boys with jeeps can resist the sand and rocks of Moab?!!

We camped at Dead Horse Point (absolutely breath-taking!) and spent a couple days in Arches. We had fun hiking and the boys had fun climbing on everything they could climb on! It was a bit cold at night, but great hiking weather. We had fun taking pictures of us "holding up" balancing rock and "jumping over" it as well.

That was the adventure part, now for the madness.....JEEPING!!! I will be the first to admit that I am NOT an adrenaline junkie. My heart was pounding the whole time we were on "Baby Lion's Back" and "Fins and Things". Thank goodness we didn't make it to "Hell's Revenge". Who thought this stuff up? And who decided that jeeps were meant to climb straight up and straight down these rocks? What about gravity?!! I will admit that Michael had me in tears once. The rest of the time I sat in near horror as the windshield filled with nothing but sky and then nothing but sand as we went up and down. By the time we were finished my arm ached from gripping the handle above the window. The whole time I am praying, "Please get us out of here safely!!" I love spending time with my boys, but stuff like this makes me long for a girl who would love to scrapbook with me!!