Maddie turns "4"

Wednesday was Maddie's birthday. She was so excited to turn "4". After breakfast we rushed to the movies to see the "Bee Movie". Daddy came home for lunch and the birthday party.

Maddie wanted a butterfly cake.
She was so pleased with Grandma and Grandpa Christensens gift. It was the mini princess's she's holding in her hands along with the yellow outfit. Thankyou Grandma. Maddie says she had a "Greeaat Birthday".

Scavenger Hunt

Our family generally gets home from church about 11:30. We have lunch and then start cleaning up both the breakfast and lunch dishes, by 12:30 we're usually done. After lunch Emily goes down for a nap, everyone else lays down for about 30 min. Sometimes we fall asleep and sometimes we don't. We generally spend about an hour in a half playing games with the kids, we then read a few books and then everyone gets bored. So the T.V comes on, the WII is played and movies are watched for the rest of the day.

Kory and I have been saying for a while that we need to come up with more sabbath day activities to do with the kids. So this past week I found this idea on the internet and changed it a bit to fit our needs. So sunday after "rests" this is what we did.

We all met in the family room and I read the first clue to begin our scavenger hunt. clue #1 A family that reads together has fun learning together. Clue #2 was found inside one of their favorite books. They brought the book back to us, we read it together and then read the clue, A family that searches the scriptures together learns how to become an eternal family. Of course clue #3 was discovered in our scriptures. After reading some scriptures daddy read the clue, The family that sings together feels close to each other. That clue led us to the piano where we sang a few primary songs and then read clue #4 The family that has family home evening together grows together. This led us back to the family room where we always have family home evening. I talked for just a few minutes on the importants of family. We then found the next clue hiding underneath a couch cushion. Clue #5 read Watching good television programs and movies together can be fun family entertainment. We spent a few minutes talking about some of the cartoons I won't let them watch and compared them to some better ones. The next clue was found among our movies. Clue #6 read Going on vacation can bring a family closer together. We talked about our upcoming vacation to Utah. The following clue was found taped to the van door(the van is used when we go on vacation). Clue #7 said A family that works together gains respect and love for one another. This clue led us to the front door of our shed where the next clue was found. Before we read it we thanked the kids for all their help in the past weeks working together on our shed, pulling weeds, taking care of the garden, etc. The next clue #8 read, A family that prays together feels close to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. This led us back to the family room where family prayers are always held. We discussed how we can be a little more reverant during prayers. That clue was hidden under the couch #9 said, A family that plays togehter learns to love being together. This clue led the kids to the game closet. Their was a note telling them to pick one game and take it with them. They also found the next clue in the closet. When they brought it back to us we just read the following clue. Clue #10 said A family that has meals together gets to know each other. The last clue led us to the kitchen table where we proceded to play a few games together. After we were done I thought we could have made cookies together and eaten them around the table while playing games. I decided though I really didn't want a cookie making mess on a sunday.

The kids had a blast doing the scavanger hunt and have asked daily since when we can do it again. I didn't think to take pictures but it was a fun little activity that helped take up some time and kept us together as a family. Just thought I'd pass it along.

Picnic and some fun.

Last week I along with a friend took our kids to Fain park for a picnic and to feed the ducks. Kory even came be to eat lunch with us on the grass. I'm going to assume that becuase we were there at the hottest part of the day, is why we didn't see a single duck. We looked and walked almost around the whole pond but never did see a duck.
While walking around the pond in search of the ducks we did find some massive boulders.

Along the way we came across a very little pond of water. We let the kids dip their feet.
The water was shallow and clear enough that the boys were successful at catching one very small crawdad. Despite their best efforts the little tadpoles were too quick for these two 5 year old boys.

Game Night

Last Friday we had a ward activity "Game Night". It was very informal and a lot of fun. Everyone brought a board game and a finger treat to share. It was great to see the kids get into the games.

This game, I think is called Caroom. Kory and I played this and it was really fun. Kory's been talking about it since. He'd like to find it. It's supposedly an older game and very hard to find. The couple that brought it found theres in a 2nd hand store.
My camera will only take 17 pictures so I'm very picky at what picts I save and which ones I delete and retake. I know I had 17 good pictures to go through but somehow only these 4 loaded to my computer and when I went back to my camera the others were gone. The pictures almost make it look like a primary activity but it was a ward activity with many adults present.

Softball

Kory joined a Softball League several weeks ago. There are no practices just games every tuesday night. The games start from 6-9pm on the hour. Generally the kids and I will go to the 6/7 o' clock games but the others are a little too late. It's been fun to watch. Next to the field is a little playground area for the kids to play at. They call it the "little park".
Kory and another teammate takes turns pitching.
This game Kory hit a home run and scored the 1st 2 points of the game. It's been fun attending the games.

Make your own person..

So yesterday we did an activity that we have never done before. I pulled out some magazines and we cut out different parts of the body. Then put a person together in our own way. The above was the last one we did. We must have been tired as we forgot to find her some legs.
Maddie wanted to do a prophet so we found a background for him.
Hunter did a really good one. Before I could take a pict. he tore all the pieces off and glued these guys in it's place. He cheated on these by just cutting the whole body out but he had fun. He also wanted a background. It's harder then it looks. I tried to do more details by cutting out a different mouth, eyes, and hair and putting them together, but I gave up and helped Maddie with hers. We sat at the table for almost 2 hours cutting and gluing. It turned out to be a fun project.

Oh What Do You Do In The Summer Time?

With the price of everything going up including gas I'm doing my best to stay close to home. When we do leave the house I try to get all the erands ran at once. We've been doing pretty well at this. We went 3 weeks before having to fill the van up as before it was 1 1/2 -2 weeks. However, not leaving the house nearly every other day has caused a boredom problem at home. The kids started watching more cartoons then ever, more movies and playing more WII. It's hot enough outside that I don't want to be out there for very long so I hate to push the kids to do something that I don't want to do. We have a nice swing set but the slide and swings get too hot.

So a few days ago I found this idea on a website for the holidays but I thought we could use it for this summer. I took a mason jar and had the kids glue tissue paper all over it.

They each had a turn to paint the glue and place the tissue paper. Meanwhile on slips of paper I wrote things that we want to do this summer. The plan is for each night before bedtime a paper will be pulled and we will do that activity the following day. It will give us something to look forward to for tommorrow.

Some of the ideas were a little excessive and we may have to put them back in the jar for another time like going camping, going to grandma's house, etc. We are planning on doing these things but they're for a scheduled weekend when daddy can go with us. The goal is to only leave the house 2x during the week. The activities they came up with were going to the park, going to a friends house, go swimming, feeding the ducks, etc. I was impressed with the ideas they came up with for days we stay home all day long. Some of them were toe painting, making a paper sack animal puppet, make a collage of good vs. bad foods, inviting a friend over, potato stamping, a water balloon fight, tracing their bodies and color them, make a etch a sketch, (This is so much fun they love it), and of course making cookies and cupcakes. I've written everything down twice and put it in the jar. When we empty the jar we'll do it again. If you have any fun activity please let me know about them. These activities are something we do together during the day. Something that uses are hands and imaginations.

Shingling The Roof

So the roofs been shingled for over 2 weeks now. I'm just late posting the picts. Hunter and Maddie wanted to climb up the ladder and help daddy. Maddie is definetly my girl. She didn't care for walking all over and was very content to just sit there and watch. Hunter on the other hand couldn't sit still. He was quite the helper to his dad. Daddy was constantly asking for his help with getting more shingles and staples for the gun. He has no fear.

Schools Out, Lets Shout!!

Yesterday was our 2nd annual "Schools Out, Let's Shout" Primary activity. Maddie made sure she put plenty of sunscreen on.
Emily was quite content to play with an empty water gun.
That is Maddie sitting on the top of the slide.

Hunter's all about the water.
Thankyou Kye for sharing your popsicle with Emily.
Little show off.
When the wind picked up making it a little cold for the water. Hunter found his way to the sand box.
Emily didn't want to look at the person holding the camera. Could have been a cute pict. of Emily and me. Stinkerbug!

Memorial Weekend

It all started last friday evening when my brother Travis arrived from Hurricane, Ut. Saturday morning he and Kory went to the shop and worked on a birthday present for his wife who is turning "21" this friday.

Saturday at noon my sister Sheri and her husband Jason arrived along with my brother Matt who came for the weekend too. We rented Super Mario Galaxy for the weekend. This is what Uncle Jason and Hunter did almost the entire time they were here. They were both so pleased to find that Sunday evening they had beat the entire game.
Uncle Jason giving his thumbs and wrists a rest from the WII helped Maddie build a castle for her polly pocketts
Maddie and Emily loved being spun across our wood floor by their Aunt Sheri and Uncle Jason.
Emily is continuing to do an awsome job on the toilet. During the day we remain accident free and she is starting to wake up with a dry diaper. YEAH!!!!
Despite the almost constant rain we received while our house was full of guests my brothers helped Kory with the shed. They didn't seem to have a problem helping place the trusses, and sheeting the roof. Yesterday Kory started placing the paper so we can soon start to shingle the roof. Kory may be on his own for this part. I didn't realize I had such a fear of heights. I like my feet planted firmly on the ground.

Very rarely do we have family come to us. So this was great that I had so many siblings come for a visit. We hope for more visits in the near future.

Pee Pee

I pulled down our little potty about 2months ago for Emily (she was 18 months). I really tried with her but she just didn't get it. I never put the potty away and then last week she started saying "pee, pee". So we've begun again. I know it's a little early but Maddie was accident free at 21months. Emily will be 20 months next week. Since last week this girl strips down to her nothen's everytime she dirty's a diaper or she wants to go sit on the toilet. Monday I was sick and really didn't have the energy to take her potty. She ran around the house most the day naked because I couldn't keep a diaper or panites on her but she pee'd 4 times in the toilet. Yesterday she did very well again. This morning she woke up, came running into my bedroom saying "pee pee". I rolled over felt her diaper and it was warm. Assuming she had already wet her diaper I tried distracting her but she wouldn't have it. I kicked myself out of bed took her to the potty and she actually went. If we can keep this up she just may follow in her sister's footsteps and be potty trained by 21 months. We have about 5 weeks so wish us well.

Future Shed

Our home office has also been being used as a shed (being we don't have a garage). It currently has an exterior door, air compressor with hoses, tool box, nail gun and many other tools I won't list scattered throughout the room. Our office used to host a wheel barral, 2 shovel's, a rake and a pick axe. Deciding these weren't the most safest to keep inside a house we have hid them outside. We just didn't want sombody to walk off with these items. We've wanted to build a shed since we moved in a year ago and now have the resources to begin. The past 3 weeks we've been working on the initial prep. Hunter had so much fun helping his daddy get ready for concrete.
The cement was finally delivered this past friday.
Monday night Kory started to work on framing the walls.
Having only a few hours the past 2 nights I think we've done pretty well. We've got the 3 walls framed and are curently working on the 4th. This last wall will take a little longer as we need to frame in a regular outside door and a roll up door.

It's coming along rather nicely. We have gone to Home Depot and Lowe's several time looking at their sheds. We decided to make our shed 12x16. I knew it was going to be large but now seeing the walls go up it's bigger then I anticipated. We will have plenty of room for all the tools, bikes, outside equipment, and our holiday decorations. Can't wait for the finished product. It will be nice to have more shelving in my closet with all the seasonal items outside.

Cute Kids...

What adorable little kids we've got.
Hunter 5 years old

Big brother...What a helper.
Madelyn 3 years old.

The joy of having a sibling.

Emily 20 months old.
Sisters, they have so much fun together.

Thankyou, Kerrianne for the memories I will always treasure.