Speech!

Clark finished his first year of speech!  He did so well and learned a lot!  He is speaking so much more and putting more and more words together!  We will have more years a head of us, but it feels so good to have this much progress.  Clark really enjoyed getting to go to speech every week.  His teacher, Mrs. Lester, did a great job with him.  Thank you Mrs. Lester for all of your work with Clark!  We hope you enjoy retirement!
Clark will move to the home school speech program, with the school district, next year since he will be in kindergarten.  

We look forward to more and more progress!  

Conquering the Tree

We hung out with friends at the park last week.  It has been raining and luckily that day it was beautiful!  The ground was a little wet, but that didn't stop the kids from playing!  

After lunch the kids found a huge tree to play in.  I think Grant was able to get up by himself, but everyone else needed some help.  Bree was especially nervous and needed lots of help.  I went over to lend a hand and got Owen in the tree.  I almost had Mhari in the tree, but she couldn't grip it well enough.  The tree was pretty mossy from all of the recent rain.  Here are some of the fun pictures of the tree climbing experience.  

Bree.  She really was nervous and hates being up high.  She did so good posing for me before she finally asked me to help her down because she was scared.  

Ella.  She was a good sport and helped most of the little people up the tree.  I think Sandra even stepped on her face while she was climbing up.

Grant... natural tree climber!

Talmage

4 monkeys in a tree

Owen

Sandra.  She would stay in the tree all day if I let her.  She also went back with Uncle Nathan and had him help her back up and got more pictures taken from Aunt Tiffany.  Silly girl!

Talmage giving Owen a Minotaur ride. 

We also had the kids play buddy tag, or missionary tag.  Uncle Nathan and I also joined in the fun.  Didn't get any photos of tag tho :(.  Yay for friends, and parks, and trees!  I'm sure we will have many more fun days to play!

36 years and counting

I turned 36 years old last week.  It was another crazy busy day.  The kids had school, Clark had speech, I had a speech meeting for Clark, Grant had scouts and Talmage had a meeting with a Merit Badge Counselor.  My best friend growing up, Taffery, called me on her way to work so that was an awesome surprise.  I also snuck away for lunch with a friend.  Jenn and I went to Chipotle for lunch and then to Braums for dessert.  It was so good and I was stuffed!  I also got tons of FB birthday wishes so that was fun :).

That afternoon the kids helped me make lasagna for my birthday dinner.  Sandra cooked the meat, Mhari cooked the noodles.  Then they helped me layer.  Clark even wanted to help :).  It was fun to have little helpers and get my yummy dinner.  I could only eat one serving since I was still stuffed from lunch.  Grant helped by making the garlic bread and then Talmage made the birthday brownies.  

That night everyone sung to me and I got to blow out my 3 candles ;)

I'm hoping for lots of fun things this year... fun with the kids, time with Jeff, more vacations, getting more fit, and taking lots of pictures!  I was editing our photos from our trip to San Diego and I told Jeff I need a new camera.  I ordered it Saturday and it came in the mail today!  I'm so excited to take lots of pictures with it!  
Yay for birthdays and many more to come!

Cousins!

We spent our evening in Phoenix/Glendale hanging out with family!  Jeff's brother, Aaron, and his family came over to play.  I also invited my family over to hang out at the nearby park.  It was great to let the kids play with cousins that they don't get to see very often!  It was a beautiful evening (especially for Phoenix) and the kids had a great time!

Here is Sandra, Molly, and Mhari :)

Lorna trying to get her cousin Lorali to come up the stairs on the playground!  

Lorna and Lorali sliding

Heather, Deborah, Holly, Leann, Amanda, Christa (holding Tavin), and Burke (I think)

Joe and Dale

Tavin, Abigail, and Lorali 

Ira playing catch with his dad :)

Unlce Mike out playing soccer with the kids!

Clark and Garrett 

Clark and Burke (he's almost 6 1/2)

Holly, Me and Christa
Sisters :)

Clark really loved Grandma's house!  He loved having new toys to play with!

Simon

Abigail

The library... lots of kids place to hang out:
Joy, Sandra

Tomas and Clayton

and Mhari!

We made it out of Phoenix about 6:30 am.  It was a long drive home, but we made it in about midnight.  The kids like to watch movies in the car... it helps pass the time.  This time we did a Harry Potter marathon.  We made it through the first 5 movies (then we switched to other movies).  Here is what the kids look like during the drive.  Sandra and Mhari had friends hanging out on their heads.  Silly girls!

It was great to be away.  It was nice to hang out with family.  We will take another trip some day... when there is time we can get away from work ;).  

I love to see the temple!

On our way home from San Diego we drove by the San Diego Temple.  It was right on the freeway!  It was so beautiful!  It was fun to show the kids a new temple, it was new for Jeff and I too :).    

We were stopping in Phoenix for the night before heading back to Texas.  We got to  drive by the new Phoenix, Arizona temple too!  It was very pretty!  

It is so exciting to see all of the beautiful temples, especially the new ones!  The Phoenix Temple is really close to where Jeff and I grew up so it was really cool to go and see it!

Maybe on our next trip to town we will have time to go into the temple :)

Stuffed Animal Fun!

Our kids LOVE stuffed animals!  They collect different ones, organize them into families, pretend zoo with them etc.  When we were at the San Diego Zoo I figured we would add some interesting animals to their collection.  The girls each got a panda.  The other animals included a fennick and arctic foxes, red panda, polar bear, snow leopard, snake, hamster and a penguin! :).  

The kids were also in charge of packing their stuff for the trip.  Clark ended up with a backpack full of stuffed animals... then his pillow was also packed full of more animals... oh the joy!  Sometimes it's a bit crazy, but it's fun that they still love the stuffed animals :).  

While at the house the kids got to experience playing pool for the first time.  It was pretty hard for them, but they still tried.  They also invented a new game where their animals got to play pool (no pool Que involved).  

Here is Sandra and Talmage playing with their animals :)

Notice all of the animals on the half wall watching them... yup, they created their own audience.  

We love our sweet kids!  They are growing up too fast... and yet, still young at heart ;)

The House!

When deciding how and where we wanted to stay on our vacation we looked into renting a house.  Let's face it, when you have 6 kids it's no fun to go to a hotel (well, for the parents anyway).  We have to get 2 rooms.  Those rooms have to be connected with a door (to prevent annoying the other guests more than necessary).  Then we have the problem of never enough space!  Being cooped up in hotel rooms for too long is just bad news!

Considering that hotels are pretty expensive, renting a house wasn't much different than getting 2 hotel rooms.  Plus, we were able to get a house big enough that the grandparents could join us!  We decided not to stay right on the beach and saved a little money that way.  

The house we got had 3 bedrooms, a game room with a pool table, an office space, formal dining, large eat in kitchen with bar, family room, loft family room and patio with grill!  The kids loved the house and it really helped the vacation feel more relaxing!  I loved not feeling like my kids were being too loud and bothering other hotel guests!  Getting meals done was also a lot nicer since there was a full kitchen ready to work in!  We also grilled several times and ate on the patio since the weather was so nice!

Here are the kids enjoying their dinner outside

The view of the patio area

Formal dining room and pool table/game room.

Jeff at the office desk... working

The kitchen with the large table that seats eight and the bar that seats 4!

The main family room just off of the kitchen.

I think we will be renting a house again in the future.  It sure felt nice to have a home while away from our home!