Target pictures

Not as much of a success as last year.


I blame the outfits.
(I never found anything cute and coordinated for really cheap. So I guess we could throw the economy into the blame fest too)


And Tyler.


Cause where did that smile come from?

And why did he only choose to use it during the group shots??? He was very cute and normal smiley for his individual poses later (as you can see on the side).

So I'm not in love with the pictures. But they will have to do. Because there is NO WAY I'm dragging four kids to the studio again until next year. It's a bit of an effort :)

And as for my blogging absense for the last 3 months...I can blame 2 months on my computer being broken, and that our laptop doesn't have my picture program installed (and who wants a post without pictures!!), but really I've just been busy and discovered that the longer you stay away from blogging the easier it is to stay away and ignore the guilt :)

I wouldn't expect the guilt to catch up with me anytime soon....

Soccer cleats: $20

Shin Guards: $10

Long socks: $5

Brendon making the Soccer "practice" Team: PRICELESS!!

**all the sixth graders who made the team made the "practice" team--with three grades (6th-7th-8th) and only 20 spots, it makes sense to only use older/more experienced kids for team, but I'm so glad that they're keeping some sixth graders on to train!!

A blissful beginning

It's been a great week! All the kids love their teachers and classes, and we're even feeling ok about the middle school for Brendon. Ty and I are having a great time playing, shopping and hanging out at home. If only the entire school year could go this well....

Anna's Baptism

Last Saturday Suzanna was baptized and confirmed by her dad.


She loved that one of her best friends, Megan, got baptized on the same day!








And when we went to take pictures in the gym, we got to pose with some cute wedding decorations because the room was filled and it was way too hot to go outside =)






We had a great day and we are so happy for Suzanna and proud of the wonderful girl she is!!

Arizona Museum for Youth

I lucked out and found a culture pass to the Arizona Museum for Youth at the library last week, so the kids and I made the trek over to the East side for the day and had a great time playing together.

I took about a million pictures, but I'll only post a few :D

We put together our own life size monster. There were lots of velro parts to choose from.

Dressed up like monsters.

Put on a monster puppet show.

Made pipe cleaner monsters--actually we were trying to make people, but I'm sure you noticed the monster theme here, and really, are people green???

There were a lot of other fun exhibits (like a black light room), and a nice playroom/lunchroom to eat in, but our favorite thing was playing with the Keva Planks.

Suzanna and I made some couches.

Brendon made a high rise building

and a bridge



I made some stadium sort of thing. Really, we had so much fun playing with them together (but not enough fun to justify paying $130 for a set of 400 to have at home...though I am tempted). It was just great to be in a cool place having fun together during our last week of summer.

Suzanna didn't love the blocks as much as the rest of us, but she entertained herself taking pictures while we built.

Ty also loved the 4 and under play area. If we lived closer, I'd totally get the membership and just hang out with him there while the other kids are at school. They had a slide, fully stocked play kitchen, a craft area, and so much more. He could have stayed there forever.

24th of July Family Reunion

Our family and my brother and his family all headed to Thatcher for a mini family reunion at my parents house for the 24th of July weekend. We had a great time together, and of course got a group shot:





and a picture of all seven grandkids together:





We also had fun watching the fireworks in Pima that night. They were right above us, and I was wishing we had brought blankets to lay on instead of chairs to enjoy the show more.




Phil's sister invited us to the park to play on a water slide, too.



Ty kind of liked it :D

Anna's Birthday

Suzanna had a great time with her friends at her birthday party. We went swimming, played dress up, painted crafts , and did the usual dinner, ice cream, cake and presents.

I think it was my favorite kid's party yet--probably because the guests were so great, and also because I had fun preparing all the girly stuff!!

Anna helped me decorate her cake like a purse. The candles are hiding the licorice handle in this picture, but we both thought it turned out cute. And it sure was easy to make =)

Family Barbeque

My Uncle Loren and his family came down to visit from Utah, so lucky us, we got to join in a barbeque at my Uncle Dale's house in Gilbert. We loved visiting, eating and playing in the pool with everyone!

Sam and Tyler became great pool buddies late in the evening. They had a great time doing their cannonballs and robot moves into the shallow step of the pool.

My other kids were pretty happy, too!

Brendon had some smooth jumps off the diving board =)

And a hot tub too!?! My kids were in heaven. Thanks Uncle Dale and Aunt Suzanne for hosting! We had such a great time!!

Say what you want about Tolleson...

... But they sure put on a long fireworks show for the Fourth of July. So long in fact that my kids were bored by the end of it, wondering when it was going to end.

Maybe they just have short attention spans =)

And I didn't take any pictures. But did you really need to see us sitting in our chairs slurping Slurpee's in one of the many generic warehouse parking lots in our area?

I guess I could have taken a picture of the lovely security guard who was nice enough to let us stay to watch the show. Or of my kids dancing because after all that slurping they were in need of a restroom.

Good times.

Ty's birthday and sneaking out

I missed Ty's birthday while away at girls camp, so we had a very small celebration when I got back. Small because we were all just glad to be together again, and small because we couldn't invite any one else since Ty got the chicken pox. What a nice present, huh?

He's one of the lucky 20% that still get the pox even though he had his immunization.

Even though the poor kid was totally missing out on a real party and only got cash for his presents here at home (he did get some great presents to open from his grandparents the week before), he still loved his little celebration. He can't wait to be well enough to take his money to the store.

And luckily, he doesn't seem to be bothered at all by his "chicken spots" as he calls them. I've only caught him itching twice, and he's been his usual self--except that he's taking longer naps. What a bummer, huh?? =)

My other kids are a bit frustrated that we're a little home bound and that no friends can come over, though we did break quarantine a little yesterday to meet up with my best friend growing up who was visiting from Virginia. Don't worry--I didn't bring Tyler. I left him home napping with Brendon and snuck out with Anna and Jonathan to meet up with her cute family. We had a great (and very short!) time. I only hope it's not another two years before we get together again.

And since I didn't even think to snap any pictures of us yesterday, I thought I'd share an oldie from our graduation oh so many years ago.

Super Girls Camp

Girl's camp was awesome.

I had a fabulous time, and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to be there for the whole week. I can't say thank you enough to Phil who took off work to take care the kids. They all had a great time camping and playing with grandmas, grandpas, and cousins while I was away. Wish I had pictures of them....

Our stake theme was the mutual theme for this year, Be Thou an Example of the Believers, so our girls came up with our fun ward theme of the Tolleson Super Examples. We had fun making up a super hero skit, super hero shirts, super hero cheers for each morning, and discovering our super powers within each night at devotional. So much fun.

And I absolutely loved how focused this year's camp was on spiritual things. My favorite part was the cabin mom meeting each day where we had scripture study led by a member of our Stake Presidency. Loved it!

So even though I've been saying for months that I couldn't wait until girls' camp was over, I'm a little sad now that it is. I loved being there with the girls, getting to know them, playing fun games, hanging out with other great friends/leaders, learning new things in the scriptures, and just being away from my normal routine (cooking...cleaning...kids...cleaning...cooking...kids). I only hope that I can go again next year, and do things even better now that I've learned so much.

I am not sad to be back to my shower, though =)

Brendon's Birthday

Okay, so I absolutely cannot stand to look at the pics of the cats every time I get on the Internet anymore. So even though I really should be doing a million things besides this, I'm blogging.

Two weeks ago we had Brendon's water war birthday party at the splash park we love. It was a beautiful overcast afternoon/evening. Almost too cold for the water war....

We filled up over 650 water balloons (I lost count near the end) to help entertain all the boys. I thought we had a lot of balloons--tubs and tubs full--but they were still gone in no time. The boys played with their water guns after the balloons were gone--we formed two teams, put a line of paint on each boy's arm, and they tried to soak the other team until their paint came off. The last boy with paint still on their arm wins. Make any sense? They had a blast, but I feel bad that the "washable" paint turned out to not be so washable. I'm sure there's a lot of parents who hate me now =) but the boys loved it!

Here's a picture with Jonathan's arm painted.

Ty probably threw the most balloons. He'd been patiently waiting for days as we filled them up.

Brendon totally scored on presents from all his friends.

Brendon had to fake blowing out his candles--with all the wind, there was no way my lighter would work. And he doesn't love cake, so we just put his candles in a melting ice-cream sandwich.

Nate and Damon getting some of the water balloons.

I think the boys had a great time, and I know Brendon did.

We're so excited that Brendon's eleven--and such a great eleven-year-old kid!!

New Additions

Pinkerton

And Mitzi

Yep, Cats.

Never thought we'd actually get them, but an opportunity came to help out some friends and make my kids and husband happy all at once.

How's it going with cats, you might ask?

Well...

The cats are slowly getting used to my wild boys.

Phil (aka the cat whisperer) won them over nearly right away. If only we all had his skills.

Suzanna hasn't met them yet, since she's off playing with Grandma this week.

And the cats and I tolerate each other for now. There have been a few "accidents" and lots of cat hair. We'll see if love blossoms later once we're all a little more used to each other.

I really do like blogging

But it just never seems to get done anymore.

So here's a very quick update of a few of the things we've been up to in the last few weeks:

SPIRIT WEEK




I only took pictures on crazy hair day (my kids favorite!), but they had fun dressing up everyday. I think that every kid loves spirit week, but kids who have to wear uniforms to school everyday REALLY appreciate a change.

THE SCIENCE FAIR



Brendon won first place in his class for his lemon battery experiment. We all learned a lot about batteries and procrastination.

Brendon also tested gifted in Math!! We're hoping that means he can be put in some "honors" type classes at the middle school next year. I'm still very worried about sending him there--and now that the middle school's roof collapsed without warning last week...I'm sooo wishing we had another option.

LOGAN'S BLESSING

We traveled to St. David the first Sunday in May to be with my brother Cory and his family as he blessed their son Logan. We had a great time at the lunch and going to church with them.



Laur'l and Suzanna



Adele

Suzanna loved holding baby Logan. Look at that cute hand! Guess he's already a little camera shy, even in his sleep.

SPLASH PARK DAYS

We've spent every Thursday afternoon at different splash parks around our area playing with friends and getting sunburns.

Suzanna loves to hold her "other baby Logan" -- her friend's baby brother. Such a girl =)

Ty loves anything that resembles a sword or lightsaber.

And Brendon and Jonathan like to throw things in the buckets and wait for them to pour out when they're not riding bikes or scooters around the park. It's great to be able to get wet and then play at the park. Almost makes the hot weather bearable =)


MESSING UP TY'S NAPS

That's pretty much all we've done lately--screw up his sleeping schedule with all our fun. I almost just want him to be done taking naps so we don't have to plan around him anymore. Almost.
Brendon took this picture to prove Ty had fallen asleep at 5 last week while I was too busy making dinner to walk upstairs to check for myself. My kids like to trick me, so one was saying he was asleep and the other was saying he was awake. They thought they were pretty funny getting some "evidence" to prove who was right =)

NEW TENT=READY FOR SUMMER CAMPING

We're tired of squeezing into two small tents, so when we found a great deal on a new tent that will fit us all, we had to get it. Then we had to set it up in the backyard and see how everything fits. You can't tell from the picture, but it's plenty big and we're all excited to try it out for real on some great camping trips this summer!

NOT PICTURED:

Mother's day fun--the kids made me some great cards and I requested new clothes and shoes as my gift. I've been having fun shopping without kids for these. That's the real present!

Another great Father & Sons outing for the boys--and Tyler's first. He absolutely loved it until he was eating breakfast at a table and a big tractor came to pick up some tables close by to take them over to be repaired. He lost it. Freaked out so much about that (and later about a dog)that I've heard the story from many others in the ward =). But what would you do if you were 2 and sitting at a table and a huge tractor was picking up tables right by you?? Totally justifiable freak out if you ask me.

And a great girls' night out for Suzanna and me while the boys were away. We had fun hanging out at the mall, buying a new outfit for her Build-a-Bear, eating out at Sweet Tomatoes, and watching movies until way too late at night.

There's more...but I'm out of time. Hopefully we'll post again before another three weeks go by.

It's about time

....that I post something.


....and that we have a great music concert at the elementary school!






So much better than December's concert.


We had no trumpet malfunctions.


And very little yelling =)

There's nothing like that feeling you get when you watch your kid perform well. He was amazing!! And yeah, I might be a little biased, but he really, really was good!

*photo credits go to Amy (thank you!) since I was a loser and forgot my camera for my child's last elementary school band concert. Man, what kind of mom am I???

Science Center Field Trip

Last Wednesday, the boys and I went with Suzanna's class to the Science Center.

I don't think I could begin to capture Suzanna's excitement for the event. This was the first field trip I've been on with her--and she has been waiting, waiting, waiting!!!

There were so many parent volunteers for the field trip, that we only had one other kid assigned to us (good thing since I was already watching Ty & Jonathan!), and we made our group more fun by hanging out with my friend Liz, her sons Ty & Nate, and Erika's son Jarom (Nate and Jarom are also in Anna's class).



We went to the planetarium first, where they did a very cool presentation on the planets.
Then we moved on to the exhibits.

Is anyone surprised that this was Jonathan's favorite exhibit? A giant nose that you can throw balls into = A five-year-old's dream come true. The best part is when the nose "sneezes" a ball back out!

Ty loved this house. Especially since only kids 4 and under were allowed in. He didn't have to compete for a turn.

He is such a boy!!

And Nate's face sums up how we felt about the last part of the field trip. They gathered all the 2nd graders into the I-Max theater to listen to three weather forecasters from Channel 3. The kids weren't so impressed. I think they just wished they were exploring the fun museum some more instead of listening to more adults talk =)