Family Pics 2010

Here are a few of my favorites.

Mister model

It's a good thing he's cute.

Daddy is their whole world. These guys always have a good time together.

This one is my absolute favorite. These boys love each other so much, they really are best buddies. I am so lucky to have such wonderful boys.

Tribute to the end of summer.

I know summer has been over for a while now, but I am slow.

I have to say that I loved this last summer, I was so sad when it came to an end. I guess this is one way to go back to those fun, warm summer days. I don't think we stayed home more than a handful of times during the week. We have such amazing, fun friends and there was always some adventure to go on. We hiked, swam, played at the park, and ate to our hearts content. So these are a few highlights of our last days of summer.

Lots of blue frosted cupcakes.
Breakfast with our sunglasses on.

The flood, this was the worst that we saw.

Chocolate milkshakes in the middle of the kitchen floor for breakfast.

A sandwich break in Kayenta.

And we couldn't leave Kayenta without a picture of a stray dog.

Tyson turned 3. Everytime he hears someone say 3, he says,"Hey, I'm 3."

The boys dug a hole for our underground water storage.

Keep digging Tys, you're almost done.

500 gallons of water storage, good job guys.

I tore the boys room apart for a remodel. It's not quite done yet, so I can't show the finished product. One day.

Building crazy cars on a day we were actually home.

Dylan turned 5.

The county fair, the boys always have such a fun time on the rides.

And of course the demolition derby, I didn't take one picture of that.

Thanks to everyone that made our summer the best one yet. We look forward to next year, we'll see what kind of fun we can stir up next year.

Durango Part II

I am playing catch up before Halloween.

We ended our Durango vacation with a lot of fishing and the train museum.

I have no idea who took this picture, but it is one of only two that I am in, and I am fishing with Dylan and I love it.

Being crazy on the tracks.
This was heaven for my boys, who cares about riding a train for 4 hours, this was so much better. We got to explore inside and out of 5 or 6 retired trains. We spent hours here, Dylan loved the model train set.

Tyson was totally excited about sitting in the conductor seat, he pretended to shovel coal, haul cars, he was very much playing the conductor role.

We stopped in the gift shop and they each got to pick a train, this was the only place they could find to drive their trains. I love this picture.

We had such a great time. It was so relaxing, our house was awesome, it was a little tough to leave. Tyson asks almost daily if we can go back.

Dylan turned 5

Am I responsible enough to have a 5 year old. Yesterday I didn't feel like I was.
Anyway Dylan turned 5 on Tuesday and is so excited. He thinks he can do more things because he is 5. I'll hear him talking to himself and he says he is going to do something because he is 5. We went in yesterday for his 5 year check up, he is 46 1/2 inches tall, 97th%, and 44.5 lbs, 75th%. He is becoming longer and leaner. He also has a sinus infection, 3rd one in less than a year. Darn weeds.
He loves life, rarely ever has a bad day.
Loves playing with his little brother, they can play for hours together.
He is so friendly, he loves to meet new kids and makes friends quickly.
He tries so hard to please everyone.
He is super smart, and loves learning new things.
He is a great eater, he will try just about everything, and if there is dessert, he will eat everything on his plate. I can always tell when he doesn't like something because he says, "yum this is really good", that means he doesn't like it, but he will eat it.
He is learning to play sports, man can he smash a baseball, and he really wants to play hockey.
Boy do I love this kid, he makes me want to be a better person. I am thankful for him everyday.

Durango

In the middle of July we decided we needed a little break. We decided to take a little trip to Durango for a few days of fun with our friends the Anderson's. Marty was nervous to leave, monsoon season started with a bang, there has been a lot of flooding because of the fire on the mountain. We had no idea the water would make it to our house. We have the most amazing friends that watched our house and sandbagged for us while we were off having fun.

I forgot to take a picture of the house where we stayed, it was pretty amazing. The boys had alot of fun running up and down the stairs and playing baseball with the huge vaulted ceiling. They even loved their master closet turned bedroom that they slept in. The closet was huge, it seriously was the size of a small bedroom.

My favorite part was the huge partially covered, multi level deck, and the pond that was about 15 ft from the house. We enjoyed our yummy meals alot more on that deck, well I did anyway.

Marty and his buddy Spencer were rock climbing buddies back in the day and if you go to Durango you have to go rock climbing. We found a great spot for them to go, it took a while for them to get the ropes set, the kids started getting a little restless, there isn't alot of space to run around on the side of cliffs, imagine that. Dylan decided he was going to be the first one up. I love this picture of Tyson and he's thinking Dylan is going up there?

Dylan getting in his harness.
He was pretty nervous at first, and kind of had a little, no huge break down, but he really wanted to do this climb.We just encouraged him and encouraged him and he just took off. Once he decides he is going to do something there is no stopping him.

He made it all the way to the very top of the rope. I almost cried, Marty did cry, he was so excited, now he is going to have a climbing buddy.We spent alot of time fishing. We caught those silly fish with bread, it was like fishing for idiots, we could fish with bread and they would just jump on our hooks. Now that is relaxing, and so much fun.

Second part to come.

Back tracking

July 17th my parents celebrated 40 years together.

We celebrated their special day on the 4th of July weekend.

I took the boys and we went Clay Springs to celebrate the 4th of July. My Dad drove his big tractor in the parade again this year.

My brother surprised them with this sign on the tractor. It made my mom cry. Grandma, my sister in law Tangela and myself rode on the trailor with a bunch of the grandkids, they enjoyed throwing candy at the spectators, no I mean literally throw candy at them. We had quite a few people running from us.

I am thankful for my parents, I've seen them struggle quite a bit the last few months, but their faith in Heavenly Father has never waivered. They know if they always trust in Him all will be well. That's probably one of the biggest things I've learned from them growing up with a large family, they always trusted in the Lord and we always had the things that we needed. Another things is to love my family, they have so much love to give. They love all of us kids, no matter how hard we are to love and they love their grandkids. My dad is so cute with his grandkids, I love to see my boys with him. They have worked hard their whole life for everything they have. They are always busy doing something, traveling, planting, canning, pulling weeds, feeding animals you name it, they are always busy. Rarely do I ever see them sitting idol for very long. I have a really hard time sitting still for very long, it must be where I get it from.

I love my parents, they are amazing examples, I am thankful for the things that I love in my life, that are because of them.

Happy Birthday Tyson!

Tyson is such a great kid. We are so lucky to have him in our family. He loves life, exploring and doing new things. He is seriously so funny, he loves to sing songs and change the words, he thinks it's hilarious. He even uses one liners from movies. He has become quite the little artist lately, painting and coloring is very relaxing for him. He has discovered that gum is pretty cool to chew. That's the first thing he asks for when he wakes up in the morning, "Can I have some gum gum?" With a little mischevious grin on his face. He loves books, movies, swimming, and food. He really is such a fun kid, and has an amazing imagination. He really is pretty entertaining to watch while he's playing. He loves to play with Dylan, he is his best buddy and recently they like to play house and Tyson is the dad and Dylan the son. It's really pretty cute.
We are so grateful for Tyson, I hope he has an amazing and fun year.

He's 3 finally!

Does life get any better than this? Not for this boy.

Tyson's day revolves around a popsicle, but today it was a chocolate ice cream cone.

He sure does enjoy his treats.

Happy Birthday and Happy Father's Day!

Marty celebrated his 30th birthday on Friday.

We had a fun party for him on Friday night with friends, we had all of his favorite things, we ate Subway sandwiches, pasta salad and cookies, and played softball. It was tons of fun. We love you and hope you had a super day.

You are the best dad to these sweet boys. You show them a great example of integrity, hardwork, love, friendship, kindness, laughter, and respect. We love you, your the best.
We hope you super dads out there have a great day.

A Little Vacation!

Last week Dylan and Tyson went to the Valley for a few days of fun. Monday we met up with some of my girlfriends that I grew up. We had a great day visiting and letting the kids play together. 5 boys and 1 little girl, aren't they all so cute?

We enjoyed lots of swimming and playing with friends and spending lots of time with Grandma and Grandpa and Aunt Lisa.

On Wedesday Grandma and I took Dylan and Tyson to The Phoenix Childrens Museum. What a cool place. The boys loved it, I loved it.

Here we are in the "Climber", it is an amazing three story jungle gym made out of leftover construction materials. It was awesome, we couldn't even find the top story, it was a little confusing to get through.
Dylan loved these vacuum tubes, they freaked Tyson out, he kept getting his hand stuck.

They loved the sand table.

Little grocery store.

We spent most of our time in the "grocery store". I think they really liked it because they could get whatever they wanted and wasn't tell them no the whole time, and beside the fact that it was their size.

Tyson decided to ditch the small cart when he saw this baby. He unloaded ever single object off of every shelf. There was nothing for the other kids to play with. He was sure proud of himself though, smarty pants.

Then there was the art room. Tyson loves to paint and saved painting for the last. And it was awesome, they got to paint a castle.

I loved the smocks. Tyson was so happy, and so cute. Doesn't he look like a face card from Alice in Wonderland?

We had such a fun day, I forgot the picture from the noodle forest, next post I'll get it in there. I highly recommend it if you are in Phoenix and you need something to do for a few hours.