A New School Year

Can't believe our oldest is in the 7th grade. 

Where did the time go???

This is Hunter's last year at the intermediate school. 

He doesn't know what he wants to be at the moment but he knows he wants to make lots of money!

He loves all sports, being outside and of course playing on his ipod and other electronics.  

Madelyn has left elementary school...sniff..sniff.

She is in 6th grade now.

She is going to be playing the flute and is quite excited to learn it.

She too loves to be outside riding her bike, playing night games with the neighborhood kids or reading a good book. She wants to be a dentist when she grows up.

Emily is in 3rd grade!

She is excited to know that 2 of her good friends are in her class again this year.

These kids have recently discovered the TV show called Chuck. They watch an episode or two every day on Netflix. Thanks to Chuck she wants to be a Spy when she grows up.

Brayden is in the 1st grade.

I have been told that his teacher this year is the best of the best. So happy we have a good teacher this year. This little guy has lost his 2 front teeth! 

My little Kylie.

She's 3 now and tries to be such a big girl like her older siblings.

Now that Brayden is in school all day I'm looking forward to spending some one on one time with this sweetie!

Peach Day's

This was our 1st year participating in Peach Day's this year. Both girls decided to enter their latest art projects. 

Madelyn drew and colored with charcoal the owl canvas picture to hang in her room. 

A few weeks ago for Activity Day's she made a 3D hand art. She was given a blue ribbon for her canvas picture and a red ribbon for her hand art.

Emily also drew a picture for her room.

She received a red ribbon for her canvas picture.

When her cousin Rachel Cox spent a few day's with us during the summer the girls made their own 3D hand art. She was awarded another red ribbon!

We had a good time wandering around and seeing what awesome artists we have in our area.

We stumbled across a booth passing out free popsicles! Found us a little bench to get out of the sun and enjoy are cool treat!

11 1/2 inches

Our dear Grandma Joy is fighting her 3rd battle with cancer. This go round she is going through chemo and another type of drug that specifically fights breast cancer. Within the 1st 2 weeks of chemo treatments she lost her hair and began wearing wigs. 

Madelyn for some time has been considering cutting her hair and donating it to someone like Locks of Love, a company that makes wigs for children who have lost their hair due to treatments that fight their disease. Grandma loosing her hair and wanting a wig was the final push this little gal needed. 

Madelyn does not like short hair! So she wanted to make sure that when it was time to donate her long locks she would still have hair to play with.  

Look how long!

 Our beautician said the minimal to cut and donate was 7-8 inches but they prefer 10. 

 Madelyn donated 11 1/2 inches.

That's a lot of hair! 

She was a bit nervous seeing what was no longer attached.

It's still past her shoulders and she can pull it into a pony tail. 

There are times we like the shortness and how quickly it can be done.   

We also miss the long locks and all the hair do's we use to do. She's glad she donated her hair to someone who needs it. Since her hair cut she has mentioned a couple of times that she's never going to cut her hair again!

Sheri

Several weeks ago my sister, Sheri, asked me to take her family pictures. 

 Taking them on bleachers was a cool idea but I'm still not sure I love it for a background. I feel like in each picture the bleachers are a different shade of blue and it kind of bugs me. Oh well.....

 

When we were done with bleacher shots we went out on the football field to play with the tires. 

 This was the best of the three kids together. Babies are so hard!

Grandpa's Work Party

A few weeks ago my dad's work threw a extended family work party at our Washington Rec Center. We got to so swimming, rock climbing and were fed dinner. 

Hunter was the first to climb to the top and ring the bell. 

Madelyn was the second!

Brayden was not the 3rd to reach the top and he almost didn't make it. But with Dad telling him what color to put his hand/foot on next he did it! He was the youngest by far that reached the top and rang the bell.  

He was fantastic! And oh so proud of himself when he came back down. 

He was awesome to watch!

After the rock climbing we played in the water.

When Daddy and Kylie got comfortable with the smaller slide they made their way 

to the biggest one.

She loved it!

They went over and over and over.

Brayden eventually went down by himself but he had Aunt Hanna, Daddy and Uncle Jonathan go with him at the beginning. 

Hunter's favorite way was to go head first.

Emily loved the slide too.

I missed taking pictures of Madelyn in the pool. She was too busy playing with her cousin Carlaya. 

Thanks Grandpa for a fun evening. 

Summer Carnival Cruise

In Nov. 2014 Kory and I decided that we were going to do something big for our anniversary during the upcoming Spring to celebrate our 13 years together. Near Thanksgiving our friends, the Schultz Family came for a visit. They mentioned that they were planning their first ever cruise and invited us along. We decided we could post pone our spring celebration and do it that summer instead.

We booked with Carnival and could hardly contain our excitement for our 4 day/3 night cruise to Catalina Island and Ensenada Mexico. 

Here we are waiting to pull out of the dock on our 1st day. 

Every night we tried something we wouldn't normally eat.

We tried alligator fritters, tasted like a meat ball.  

This was a real thin, thin slice of tuna. Kory does not like fish. When this was brought out he wasn't to keen on trying it. It looked raw but in the end he ate it all. Wasn't too bad he said. 

Our 1st real day we spent in Catalina.

Along with the Schults, Kevins brother and his wife came too. 

It was fun having the 6 of us together.

What our ship looked like while we were on the island.

Kory and I decided to try parasailing. Something we had never done before. After seeing many failed attempts and mostly face crashing on you tube I wasn't too sure about this. 

It was so much fun! So glad we did it. It was so peaceful. There was no jerking and no swerving. We were let up into the air very slowly and the same when we brought back down. Would definitely do that again.  

Formal Night. 

I took advantage and ordered the lobster tail. So tasty! I loved it!

Tried to take a picture at sunset. It was a little breezy out on the dock that night. 

Our 2nd full day we took a buss out to the blow-hole in Ensenada.

Love that I captured the rainbow after a "blow".

Next to the blow hole was a market that we were able to walk around. Most shops carried the same items but was presented in a different way. It was a little disappointing that most items were no longer made in Mexico, they weren't authentic. It was like the shops had all ordered from an Oriental Trading like place and then tried to sell to the tourists. We did eat some fresh carne asada tacos. Everything was fresh! They cooked the meat in front of  you while watching. Even the tortilla's were fresh. They tasted so good!  

Our 3rd day was spent at Sea. We spent the day wandering around. We spent a little time watching an art auction. Some of those paintings looked like Brayden had drawn them. The starting bids were over $10,000. Some of the other paintings looked nice but I still wouldn't pay hundreds of dollars for them. There was a Harry Potter trivia game that we tried to play but I failed miserably at. We watched the Star Wars trivia and only knew one of the answers. It was a good relaxing day. 

The next morning we got up and started packing our bags. We were off the ship by 9 am and began our trip home. We had a wonderful time with friends and being able to spend time with just the two of us. Can't wait to do it again.  

4th of July

For the 4th of July this year 3 families drove to Kanab, Ut to celebrate. We had our family of 7, the Goodfellow family of 7 and the Wright family of 7. Here are just some of the kids waiting for more of the parade to come by. 

Kylies favorite treat thrown were the big popsicles. It was quite hot!

Following the parade we headed to the Goodfellow's property where some of us went for a exploring ride. The kids loved the zebra painted, old suburban, turned off road jeep. 

Since there were a lack of seats due to our large numbers some of us stayed behind with the little ones. They colored, colored and colored. 

When the jeep ride was over we enjoyed a dutch oven cook out. Afterwards we headed back into Kanab to enjoy the firework show. These 3 girls are about the same age and went off on their own without younger siblings in tow.

We all brought card games and had fun sitting around playing while waiting for the show to begin. 

All though I wasn't looking forward to being more than an hour from home it was a good, memorable night. One we hope to do again.