Our Many Travels

Or perhaps I should title this "How Many Pictures Can I Fit in One Post!"
We have been travelling across country! Savannah went on her "first" airplane ride (that she can remember anyway).The pilot decided to help the kids make up for time they were missing at school and taught them all about flying an airplane. They each got a chance to sit up in the cockpit and LOVED it!Here are my well-trained travelers in the airport at the "rainbow wall".We got to Aunt Shannon's house in Nevada and spent lots of time exploring the Lost City Museum. Notice Savannah is always posing.......where did she get that from? Joshua was so excited to find a Joshua Tree that we had to take a picture with it!

Savannah found some friends across the street and has been having lots of fun playing with girls her age. (Aunt Shannon's only girl is 14!) Daddy, can you add this to my Christmas list?

There was even a chance for a sleepover at her cousins house! Thanks, Courtney and Sierra, for making Savannah's first sleepover a memorable one!

After one day of rest, we were off to BYU to show Shelby and Caleb THE BEST university in the world! Now, all of my Utah friends, PLEASE don't hate me for coming to Utah and not visiting you......we were only in Utah for less than 24 hrs. and I knew this would be a whirlwind trip as it was without trying to meet up with my friends. I will catch you next time!

I thoroughly embarrassed Shelby by taking pictures of her in front of HOT college guys with my HUMONGOUS camera because it isn't cute and pink and tiny. So the only pics I got of her at BYU are of her back!

We drove up the Salt Lake City and spent the night at my cousin Sonda's house. The kids got a chance to meet their 2nd cousins and I got to *finally* meet Sonda's family. The boys played the playstation while Savannah and Tiara played girly princess stuff. We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. THANKS SONDA AND DAVE! You guys are great!

Then it was off for a visit to Temple Square! Savannah, Samuel and Joshua had never been there and Shelby and Caleb can only vaguely remember, so I had to sieze the moment and GO!

It was the first time I have been in the new conference center and I was AMAZED at how huge it was! It was fun for the kids to see in person what they see on TV when we watch General Conference.

And of course, the Salt Lake Temple is a stunning sight. We loved seeing all the brides (notice we even got one in our pictures) and couldn't believe how busy it was!

The Church Museum of History and Art was a fun place for the kids to explore. They had this cute interactive children's exhibit where we spent a lot of time.

We got out of town before the big BYU/Utah football game (boohoo, BYU lost.....) and drove down to see my sister Krysten's family.

Of course the cousins had fun together being wild and crazy and I got to see my latest nephew (well sort of.....)

After spending the night, we drove to Panaca, NV (where I call HOME) and went to church. It has been over 10 years since I have been back; it was smaller than I remembered, but I fell in love with it all over again. As a matter of fact, I have spent all night trying to figure out how we could move there! Unfortunately there are not many jobs outside of teaching and farming in Lincoln County, and I don't think my husband's Chemistry/MBA degrees would be put to good use there.

We met up with Uncle Glen and Aunt Shannon's family and had a cookout at Cathedral Gorge.

The kids had fun exploring the moon caves and climbing to the top! It is incredible that we had 11 kids there and no one got hurt!

How could I not miss this??? There is so much beauty in the desert!

We took the kids to the Spring (our old swimming hole) and let Uncle Glen initiate them into the JOY of a moss fight!

I can't believe we got our fussy teenage girls in there!

AGAIN, I say, HOW CAN I NOT MISS THIS?!!!

Farewell, Panaca! I can't tell you how good it felt to finally have my children HOME experiencing the joys of country life and having fun at all our old hangouts!

It's GREAT to be EIGHT!

Yesterday, Samuel got baptized! He was so excited for this day to come!

It was fun for him to be baptized with his friend, Nathan.It was a bit of a long day, since we went to church from 1-4 and then had his baptism at 5. We ended up just staying after church and eating sandwiches between church and the baptism, but we all survived!
James (Chris' brother) and Sandra and their kids came. It was fun to see them again, even if it was just for the baptism. We really need to get together more often!
This picture pretty much sums it up....when you feel this good, you just gotta scream! Yes, this is the wild and crazy Samuel that I love!

Reflections

I will just start off by saying these are TERRIBLE pictures! Obviously, I am winning no awards with these! Caleb, on the other hand, won 2nd place in his school reflections competition in the photography division.

He took this picture with a disposable camera when he was on a scout trip to Pennsylvania a few weeks ago for the Medal of Honor Experience. It was taken in the Medal of Honor Grove in Valley Forge, PA. When he came home with his little disposable camera, he told me that there was a picture on there that he wanted to enter in the reflections competition. Knowing how poor of quality those little cheap cameras usually produce, I wasn't expecting much. I was pleasantly surprised when I picked up his picture from the photo shop! It turned out great! This picture doesn't do it justice because we had to have it wrapped in plastic to prevent it from getting messed up and the lights and camera flash are reflecting off of it. I will try to get his original from him and post it if I can.

Birthday Boy!

Samuel celebrated his 8th birthday with an astronaut cake and an "out of this world" sleepover!

We played video games on the wii,

survived the asteroid belt that took over our basement,

and dug through moon rocks with our robotic arm looking for martian treasure.

As you can tell, with five eight year old boys, no one stood still for long! (and I loved how the pictures showed that!)

Samuel wanted to take popsicles to share with his class at school. What a great idea! It saved me the time of making cupcakes and the kids LOVED them!

Birthday Girl

Savannah started out the day with a playdate and fancy lunch with one of her best friends.Then dinner out with mom and dad at our favorite Chinese take-out place (which is a hole-in-the-wall kind of place, but she ABSOLUTELY had to eat there!) for yummy beef with broccoli. Then we were off to Chuck E. Cheese for a little fun! Savannah hit the jackpot on this game and was a little concerned about all the tickets coming out....... UNTIL she realized she could use them to get THESE lovely treats!Then back home for a birthday celebration complete with a Diamond Castle puppy cake!AND a life-size Diamond Castle Barbie Doll (who slept in bed with her all night last night despite the fact that she isn't the least bit cuddly!)
Wish you could have been there? Check out the video below.......

Seems a little crazy that 5 years ago this little bundle of everything pink and girly entered our lives after 6 weeks of bedrest praying that she WOULDN'T come out and 4 weeks of walking praying that she WOULD come out and now we can't imagine life without her!

Happy Birthday Savannah!

ELECTION DAY

Did you?

I went to the polls at 8:40 and finished up by 9:00 a.m. I was voter #904 which is amazing considering our polling place typically averages 500-700 voters per election! My husband tried to go when polls opened this morning at 6:00 a.m. and was promptly discouraged due to the incredibly long lines. Apparently the early morning people had an hour plus wait!

I voted for McCain/Palin. My dad would never tell us who he voted for or even if he was Democrat or Republican for that matter. I think he lost an opportunity to share his values with his children, along with a sense of civic responsibility, but he will probably disagree with me and that's okay. I am not a political activist. You will not recieve political emails from me telling the world how I vote. But you are here on my blog, in my home (in a sense), so I will share with you the main reasons why I voted the way I did. I respect John McCain. I appreciate the person he is and I trust his judgement. I agree with his views on abortion and the war. I like the fact that he has a large family, like me. I like Sarah Palin. She is fiesty and fun and personable. I like that she gave birth to a child with Down's Syndrome rather than choosing to abort him. I think she is a little rough around the edges and she has made mistakes, and if the truth be told, I really hoped that Mitt Romney would be the VP candidate, but I still voted for McCain/Palin.

America is a great country. Today I went to the polls and spent 20 minutes in line to vote my choice. I did not have to fear for my life. I did not have people with guns forcing me to vote one way or another. I did not have to worry about my family while I was away. There are so many things that we take for granted here, and today I am especially grateful for my freedom.

Oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my sweet little Savannah who celebrates her birthday on election day this year!

We Love Teacher Workdays!

Because we have lots of time to do fun things like this......

We seriously could have reached out and touched this little guy!

Here is how we look when Mom begs and pleads and poses us....And here is how we look when she walks back to take the picture!

Savannah's Fort--built by the boys

The leaves were stunning.

We had a great autumn day playing, running on the trails and enjoying the beauties of nature.

Oh, and if you are wondering where Shelby is----lets just say that friends are way more fun than family at this age. Oh well, she missed out on a fun day!