Another Texas Birthday

Last Monday Isaac turned 10!  He's excited to enter the 2 digit life.  He was in luck and there was no school, and Corey had the day off.  We had crepes for breakfast, then went to Shenaniganz for plenty of arcade games, jump zone, go kart fun.  He invited one friend to go with us.  The kids had a great time.  Then he chose to eat at Texas Roadhouse for dinner!  We had to drive 1/2 an hour to get to one, and it was strange to feel at home in our "Idaho" restaurant.  The rest of the week was pretty  normal.  Here are a few pictures from the birthday.  We're looking forward to a visit from my parents on Wednesday.  Hope everyone's week is fabulous!

popppppp toooooooooooe

This week Astoria discovered her true love (besides flynn ryder). I laid her down for a nap at mom's house on friday and she cried "poppppppp toooooooe" for about 20 minutes. She now associates grandma with popcorn. They had there own picnic and couldn't eat it fast enough! :)

Dan also found his new true love. This amazing popcorn popper. Once you have it, you will never go back to microwave or stove popcorn.

This horsey picture is just too cute to not post. She loves animals and dress up

 The Arctic Circle in Rexburg has a super fun play place that Stori just loves. She can play on it for hours, which is so fun! It is also fun because I love their shakes! Dan took her for a daddy daughter date there and she got her courtesy cone before they played of a few hours.

This week was actually full of big accomplishments: Stori stopped taking the bink! She only had it for naps and bedtime anyway, so I just laid her down without it and that was it! She also had a week-free of TV. She watched part of Tangled at mom's house, but other than that we just color, paint, play kitchen, go shopping, or go to indoor play areas. She is talking so much now and loves to point out everything during sacrament meeting. Really LOUDLY too! JESUS! Temple, Nora, Lila, Kitty, Straw, Outside, Sad/ Happy! etc. etc. it's cute in a non-churchy way. :)
We had fun out at Mom's house on friday and saturday. We crafted away, and lounged a lot. We also got to visit lexi on her birthday.
My belly is growing inches by the day, and I blame that on the Arctic Circle shakes, not the tiny human growing inside me. We are loving life and praying for Spring! Sam's club has some yummy fruit right now and it is just a small taste of summer.

Visitors

Hello everyone!  It has been a fairly quick week.  I did have Wednesday off, and I got over half of my garage cleaned......that is a major accomplishment! 

Joel had to work this weekend, so Megan and her family came to visit.  They brought Bronwyn and Lily with them!  Fun times!    We did a little crafting, and of course, a little eating.  Poor Dan....he was kind of outnumbered...  And, what would a family get together be without a little sickness.....poor Millie... she was feeling much better today thank goodness!  Thomas came to nursery with me.  We had a great time.

Love to all!  have a wonderful week!

Hootenanny and a Hoe-down

The first part of our week was pretty normal- school, work, cub scouts, grocery shopping, mutual, etc.  The second half was a bit more eventful.

Thursday I had a Dr. Appt. and found out I am dilated to between a 2 and 3.  It feels like Spider Ryder may have dropped, so it could be any day now!  Hopefully he will be cooperative and wait until Grandma Faylene gets here though :)

Friday afternoon/evening we took a little trip to Bullhead City (about 45 min. away).  We went to Kohl's & Target, and then out to dinner.  Tyler got some running socks and shoes and I found a maternity shirt to wear to my baby shower since I was really getting tired of the ones that I've been wearing for the last 6 months or so-  All you moms know exactly what I'm talking about, right?  :)

 

 A little blurry, but Tyler took some pictures of the boys

outside Target while they were waiting for me to check out.

Saturday morning I made some banana bread while Tyler and the kids spent some time outside. Saturday afternoon my Visiting Teacher threw a baby shower for Spider Ryder.  It was a crazy day for a lot of people in our ward, so not as many showed up as she was hoping for, but we still had a good turn-out.  It was a lot of fun.  We got quite a few cute little outfits for the baby and several packages of diapers which will be nice.  Oh, and someone gave us one of those Carter's piggy banks for him.  It has a little monkey on it and it is really cute :) 

On the way home from the shower I stopped at the store for a few things and then got pulled over for going about 5 miles/hr. over the speed limit on a residential street right around the corner from our house!  The cop was really nice though and let me off with a warning.  Phew!!  When I got home we had homemade pizza for dinner and then I hurried and threw together some pumpkin cookies to take to our ward party.  The theme for the party was "Hootenanny and a Hoe-down".  There was a DJ, music, dancing, games, a pot-luck of desserts, and a whole lot of fun!  Tyler and I even got to slow dance a few times.  Levi was a little unsure of what to think about the loud music and all the crazy people out dancing and Max was so shy he just hung on to Tyler or me the whole time.  Taylor and Jon enjoyed doing the line dances and hanging out with their friends.  It was a busy, busy, day and we were all wiped out once we got home. 

This morning my brother Jared stopped by for a couple of hours on his (round-about) way home to Boise from Phoenix.  He was there for a training meeting for work and wanted to stop and see us and where we live.  Sad he couldn't have stayed longer, but at least he was able to have some breakfast with us and visit for a little bit!

Lastnight and all day today it has been sooooooo windy!!  The boys had a great time this afternoon catching the wind in a tarp on the trampline.  (Notice the partial fence?  Tyler started taking it down this week and we had a company come out to give us an estimate to fence the whole backyard.  Haven't heard back yet, but we are sooo excited to get the fence done!!)

Random pictures from this week:


The boys playing nerf guns on the trampoline
(with a beautiful sunset reflecting on the mountains in the background).

Snow in the mountains surrounding Havasu!!  Who would've thought!!

The boys and I came across this castle house one day.  It was pretty neat and even had a drawbridge!

 

Max and Levi warming up the bouncer seat for Spider Ryder.

  Tuckered out little boys :)

Well- that about wraps up our week.  Can I just say that we LOVE reading everyone's posts and keeping up on what everyone is doing!  It helps us feel a little more connected even though we live so far away :)

Better late than never

Maizy was in the school production of Peter Pan this year and was a star (narrator). She did it with her cousins Lily, Sam and Asher. As fun as it was, it is nice to have one event over with. They all did so great and looked so cute!

Maizy and Lily. Star and Nana

Mother, Bell and Dan came to visit! We had lots of fun but didn't get nearly enough crafting done. Not to mention how much trouble she is in for not letting me in on her pregnancy! She even baited me by telling me she had gained so much wait and her chin was bigger since she hadn't been running in a while. Oh yeah, and she didn't want spaghetti because it made her sick. What a big fat liar! (although, when you get sick and go the instacare and they give you an IV your mother and sister talk about it on the phone and say "Yup, she's pregnant")

The girls thought it was so fun to have one more girl to dress-up and play with. Apparently Stori now loves everyone BUT me. Yes that is sheet-rock they are playing on! It is now hung in my laundry room/hall/pantry and the wallpaper is supposed to arrive tomorrow!(side note, the mouse is now dead)

Don't ask me...I haven't a clue what happened to this poor cake. Maizy is taking pictures, Happy Birthday Dan!!

Oh wait, here we are, Joel's birthday. He turned the big 37!! EEEK!

Yes, we got Miles on the snowmobile almost voluntarily this time. I think as much as he would like to deny it, he enjoyed himself a little.

Which brings me to Valentines day. Maizy made the cutest little cards for every member of her class. They said "a little bird told me" and there was bird print paper on the front, and when you opened it is says "That you are Kool, Valentine" and it was taped to a pouch of Kool aid. Miles signed his name 41 times with out complaining! Joel came home that night and was holding his arms behind his back and made me choose one and he pulls out this!...okay the picture won't load. But it is a gigantic rock full of enormous calcite crystals! I screamed a little. Greatest valentines present of all time. He even found it at the mine! He also gave me chocolate, but that doesn't really compare now does it? Saturday we spent the whole day scraping off wall paper. It seems like just yesterday Mother and I hung it... twice. I am now, officially caught up!

Hi, this is Kristie.  Today was stake conference, so we had a nice long afternoon...a nap was perfect!  The window was open, there was a nice cool breeze and I could hear the kids playing outside.  It was like a dream only real.  I felt so content.
I thought I'd ask if anyone else has ever had the stomach flu in their family three times in a six month period.  Good grief!  Hazel, Ephraim, and Clara have all had it.  It's not fair.  We're crossing our fingers that no one else gets it.  They each had it on different days so it dragged through the whole week.  My parents come to visit on the 27th, so I hope we're healthy by then . The last time they saw us we were doing the same thing :(  So our week was full of cancelled plans because of the sickness, but we still had a nice valentines day.  We had a fun fancy family dinner (spaghetti) and it was beautiful weather.  Last week we didn't write, but Maddie sang a solo at a federation competition and got a superior rating. That qualifies her for state.  Yay Maddie!  And I ran a 15K last Saturday (there's a picture on Facebook) called the hot chocolate race. It was so fun.
Maybe Corey can try again with the videos...
ok, apparently it made him too mad, so we will try to post them on facebook tomorrow instead:)  Also, we have an official list of items lost in the move, and the most important and saddest...our video camera.  Does anyone have an extra one laying around that they don't know the owner to?  We hope we find it.  Have a good week everyone!

you may feel a little deja vu

Yes, this post might sound a little familiar......but, I hate to not post, so here goes.  The past week was really busy at The Caramel Tree...( what did I tell you? )  I worked every day , including 5 hrs. on Sat.....(didn't get my garage cleaned again!  :(  )  Wednesday we worked until after midnight,  (16 1/2 hrs)  then had to be to be to work by 6:00 AM on Thursday .  So, by the time I got to bed and to sleep, I only had 3 hours of sleep.  Thursday was a 12 hour day!  It was a fun day, though, because Melanie and Stori came in with their exciting news....:)  We thought Friday would be really slow, but it seems people still didn't have their fill of sweets.  We had two people come in before 10:00   (our usual opening time), and that continued until 6:30 which is 1/2 hour after time to close......Did I mention that I am a little old for this sort of fun?  (  actually, I am just fine....so not that old I guess   :)   )

Another bit of "exciting" news....I haven't noticed my pump kicking on all week!   That gives me such great peace of mind!!!  Well, so much for all the boring news.....and, that is actually all that I have. 

Life could definitely be worse!

I tell you this all of the time, but, I just love Sunday afternoon when I can read about your lives....my heart just swells with love for each of you!  ( corny, but oh so true  :)  )

Have a wonderful week, and remember that I love you all so very much!

P.S.   I love the sunshine   :)

We have loved reading the posts so far especially about the new addition to the Radford family!!! So excited!! And about Spyder Ryder due in 3 weeks!  It is so fun that our family is still growing!
Isaac and Clara look so cute in their braces, they have a jump start on Cole, we thought we might not have to get some for him, but he is up next, and not to happy since all his friends are now getting them off. Molly should be getting hers off soon.
i am trying to think of something exciting to write, but the days just all blur together right now. We had Elizabeth's family come stay last Wednesday - Sunday, we didn't know till last minute they were coming so we were gone pretty much the whole time.
Grace and Cole finished up with swim and at districts Grace came in 13 place by less than a second and they took the top 12. she was bummed. Cole made the alternate on a relay team for state, but he didn"t need to swim. Cole starts Golf in 2 weeks, and Grace is taking some time off and wants to get a job! So we are excited to be able to have family dinners together for a few weeks. the kids really miss it! (so do we)
Tate and Lucy get to come early to school with me everyday since i have to be to work by 8 and their school starts at 9:05. I am working through March 7, but am hoping it will continue, but boy does it wear me out, it is a hard class, they are finally getting used to me being there and the girl who used to want to bite me is now giving me kisses and squeezing my neck! ( i think out of affection, but i could be wrong! :) Scott got to go to California the 14-15 for a trade show so he missed Valentines Day, so we just had pink waffles with whip cream. Yum!
Anyway, we love you all and are counting down the days to summer vacation! 
Durst Family

just the usual...

... minus that cool story we wrote.

Dear Stori,
We have something very exciting to tell you. You are going to be a...

Because....

Oh but Stori, don't be sad!! We will still love you sooooooo much!!!

There. That is much better! You are going to be such an amazing older sister! 

The end.

Well, there you have it! We were going to tell everyone at Christmas because we had already had an ultrasound and saw the heartbeat, but I was only 6 weeks along. 

I'm sure most of you knew this was coming already, but we tried to be like Ty and Jen and wait until we knew the gender. Sadly, at the last dr visit they said it would still be 6 weeks because of the way my appointments lined up. LAME. I could pay to find out right now but that won't be happening.  :)

currently 14 weeks-ish and due Aug 20. (store was due july 20). Also, like with Stori, I am measuring almost a week ahead but they'll keep the 20th as my due date. 

 Spider Ryder and Baby Rad 2 will only be 5 months apart! YAY!

Also, we had a Valentines date last night with a few of our closest friends. It was sooo much fun! Thanks mother for watching the stinky cheese! we saw warm bodies for part of the date---dan like it, i didn't.  All the girls got ready together at Haily's house,wore bright red lipstick and got all dressed up. It was kind of like a high school dance without the dresses, which was what we were going for! :) We also watched Skyfall on valentines day at home and both really liked that one. I love my little family of 3 and my huge family of 47+ :) and I'm done now.

Action!

We are cooking up some Dr. Pepper Ribs right now if anyone wants to join us.  They are soooo tender and good and it is a lower calorie version of Outback Steakhouse ribs.  Something like 1/9 the calories or something ridiculous like that.

This past couple of weeks has been very pleasant here.  Nice weather and good company.  I have only a couple of pictures to share but I have a few videos.  I hope everyone can view them.  I know Mel couldn't last time.  We will see.  But first the photos...

Scratch that.  I am going to try to link to them.  I don't have any luck uploading them.  Error every time.

Isaac and Clara, (the Dentical twins) have not only lost their teeth at the same stages but also entered into that rite of passage called Orthodontia together.  They both got their uppers on for a phase I of treatment yesterday.

And now, the teasers for the movies...

Sizzle and Dad have a race.  But who won???

Clara learned a new talent with some friends from school.  Camera shyness sped things up a bit but she still rocks the cup.

Shoulders rides are never more fun than when the kids are doing them instead of the parents.

The pendulum finally swings past the neutral point.  Parents won't always have to carry their children.  Someday, the child will be strong enough to carry the parent.  

And lastly, I would post on here that I finally will be getting my AR-15 and .22 to me in Texas soon, thanks to Dan, but I don't want the government to know that I have them.  So I won't.  Instead I will just say that I am excited to finally have my thunder stick in my possession.  Up next, getting the 12 gauge from Arizona.  ;)

When Kristie gets up from her Sunday nap, she may or may not want to post something more interesting.  WHo knows.  

And Then There Were THREE!

Only 3 weeks now until little Spider Ryder is due!  I guess I should probably pull out all the baby clothes and get them washed AND get my hospital bag packed- just in case this little boy decides to come early. 

Tyler and I were invited to a couple's Valentine's Day party hosted by some friends of ours from church.  It was a lot of fun and we got to know a few couples in our ward a little better including our Bishop and his wife :)  We played the Newlywed Game and Tyler and I came in 2nd place by one point!  It was a lot of fun! 

Our kitchen table has been getting smaller and smaller as we've added more little ones to our family.  It's really taken a beating with the two crazy little boys, so yesterday we bought a new (to us) dining set that we got a really good deal on.  The couple we bought it from is moving to Austin, TX and they weren't going to be able to fit it on their moving truck-  lucky us!

We also bought some of these....... which we'll be rationing out over the next month or so.  YUM!

Taylor went to a Stake Youth Game Night last night and said he had a really good time!  I'm so glad that he's enjoying being a Deacon :)

Levi and I caught some sort of cold/flu bug early this week.  He's feeling better now, but I still have a head cold/sinus pressure.  Hopefully it goes away soon!  It seems like since the beginning of the year at least one of us has been sick on any given day. Will we all ever be well again?????? 

We got a new Elder's Quorum presidency last week so Tyler was released as the 1st Counselor.  One of the new counselors was a Primary Teacher, so it's pretty likely that the Primary President is going to snatch up Tyler to replace our lost teacher :) 

Hope everyone has a good week!

oops

Hey Fam-now that you are all done reading everyones posts, I have decided to write! I am just barely getting to the computer, so my apologies! 

We had a very fun weekend in snowy Clarkston! We had yummy food; Cafe Sabor, La Beaus shake, Clam chowder/scones, fajitas, and apple pancakes. We got to spend time with the Petersons and the Arnolds and enjoy a play. We felt so cultured! I also learned to embroider!!!!! I think I'll really enjoy it! Stori sure loves her cousins. She can almost say her entire name. It sounds more like "Stoweeeee. Row. Rad (and then she mouths Ford). It's pretty cute! She is also very into her books and "color." I let her paint with water colors besides with regular crayons and she just giggles. She also loves to "color" on the mirror with a dry-erase marker while I get ready. Each day we have a picnic and I love it soooo much. She gets the table and chair ready while I cut up her pickles, turkey, cheese, apples, and tomatoes. She is also wearing her backpack whenever she is awake. But anyway....

Last Monday we FINALLY won vball! both games! and we were even short a player! It felt great!

We went swimming again on tuesday and ran tues AND thurs! We had our first time running outside on thursday! Wahoo! 

Dan is still soda-free and riding his bike or running. Still making popcorn, still watching Seinfeld, still donating plasma, still doing great on his weekly Temple trips (me, not so much. I'll do better), and still finding guns for his family! His dad has sent him on another AR-15 hunt! He loves it!

Hope everyone has a great Valentines Day!!! (Dan and I had our date early while in Clarkston! Just the 2 of us went on a snowmobile ride together and loved it! It was so much fun! thanks Petersons)!
Love you all

A little update

So, I have been neglecting my blog lately. Since it is like our little journal and I make blog books out of it I decided it is important to keep up on. SO....my posts may be a little more boring (not that they were ever exciting) but I am just going to have to paste the updates from my personal blog on here. This is what I caught up on today. :)

See Tommy in the Cowboy hat? I lied to him. I'm a terrible mother but they were playing cowboys and we only had one cowboy hat so I gave him the cop hat and told him it was a cowboy hat. Now he loves to wear his "cowboy" hat. I should have never started that. They rode around on the broom and mop all morning. I got a good shot of Tommy's morning hair before we cut his hair. It was getting just a little ridiculous the poor little guy. Millie and Maizy wore their hair in hearts for church. See the picture of that bed? It is amazing that one bed can be filled with so much of what I love! I'm sure Joel would have waited a couple of hours to feel all that love! :) Tommy took one ride on the snowmobile and is now hooked. Before church he came running up with his helmet on backwards and his snowpants in hand yelling "I wanna ride Snow Mo Bil! Snow Mo Bil!" This old door was in our house before. We are currently stripping it and are going to use it for our laundry room door. I am really excited about it. Luckily Joel is patient because he has scraped off 7 layers of paint on one side!

The BUS!

January 30th. Well I was pretty comfortably snowed in my drive way for three days. Besides being out of baking powder we were doing pretty good and I didn't need to drive anywhere. The wind was still howling and it was still snowing so trying to dig out of the three foot drifts seemed futile. Then the phone rang. It was Miles bus. She said "Don't panic, everyone is fine, but the bus ran off the road and we aren't going to be able to get it out anytime soon....because it kind of tipped over" WHAT?! Oh no! I'm snowed in and can't go get him! Luckily I have a sister in town and she was so super nice about it and she and Daph ran to get him. Miles relies on observation a lot because language is harder for him to understand. The driver and aid were awesome and stayed calm. They just unbuckled the two they could get out and they crawled out the window. Because of the way they reacted I'm sure Miles just thought "well, this is weird", and went with it and wasn't scared at all. He just told me "buss fell" and that was the end of that. I watched to see how he would react to getting on the bus the next morning and he didn't care at all! The aid showed up at my house to make sure he was doing okay and then a very choked up driver called to check on him as well. Such nice considerate people in this world!

What a crazy week! I feel like I was rarely home--excited for this next week which promises to be a little more low-key. The highlight of the week was Peter Pan. It was also fun to have Mom, Dan, Mel and Stori here for it! :) There was a write-up in the paper about it today. Here's the link if you're interested:
http://news.hjnews.com/allaccess/article_514cbb92-732b-11e2-af2f-0019bb2963f4.html
You might (not sure because I already have an account) have to create an account to view it but it's free and then you never hear anything about it again. :)
Daphne returned from her FFA annual tour and got her picture (with her FFA chapter) in the paper in Washington. That link is here:
http://www.capitalpress.com/content/mw-Wash-FFA-Ag-Expo-Utah-020813-art
So fun stuff going on! :) Emmy was here again this weekend. It sure is fun to be seeing more of her! She and Daphne got in the mood to make cookies late last night and so we all stayed up too late messing around. I love times like that. Well, it won't be long before my family notices that I am breaking the rule that everyone has to watch the Sunday night movie (Asher's pick. Smurfs. Ugh.)
so I better wrap it up and work on looking like I've been there all along... :)
Love you all!

February means spring can't be far away?

Hello my family!  We have been busy at work,  some weddings and Valentine's Day coming up.  Chris told me that the sales from last year more than doubled from the year before and the sales for Dec more than doubled from last year.  No wonder December was so overwhelming!  Things are going to have to change....there is no way we can keep up.

I forgot to tell you last week that I talked to Kirk and Dannette. They are spending the winter in Puerto Vallarta.  They rented out their home in Lake Havasu City for the year, so they had to find some place to go.   Sad huh! ;)  They also had some exciting news...they have been called as the public affairs directors for Star Valley....which means they will be in charge of everything to do with the new temple.   They are thrilled!  What a great opportunity!

I finally got so tired of listening to my pump kick on, that I gave in and called a plumber.  I had four leaky faucets, a toilet that kept "running", plus a shower that leaked (you all remember that), a drain that didn't work...was that all?  Well, now my pump is no longer kicking off and on every few minutes.... I have two new faucets, one in the kitchen, one in the bathroom, and everything is working!  Hooray!

This weekend Melanie, Dan, Astoria, and I went to Clarkston for the critically acclaimed Peter Pan.  It was really cute.  Maizy, Asher, Lily, and Sam were all stars!

Love to all of you!

Havasu Happenings

Tyler had State Wrestling this week so he was in Prescott, AZ from Wednesday afternoon through early morning Saturday.  A couple of their wrestlers only lost by 1 point and their 120-pounder placed 6th, so they were pretty excited about that. 

Afterwards they went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner and one of the guys completed the 12-Wing Challenge where he had to eat 12 of the spiciest wings on the menu in 6 minutes.  The sauce on these wings is 50 times hotter than a jalepeño pepper and he wasn't allowed to drink, use a napkin, or touch his face during the six minutes, and he was actually able to complete the challenge!  Tyler said it was a great way to end the wrestling season.  On the way home they ended up having to drive through a blizzard.  Who would have thought that would happen here?!  He said it made him realize how much he doesn't miss being cold.

This is a picture of the Senior wrestlers, their parents,
and the coaches on Senior Night last week.

On Thursday there was a science fair that both of the older boys had projects in, so we went to check it out.  Jon did an egg drop with eggs wrapped in different materials.  The experiment was to see which padding protected the eggs the best.  The egg with one whole roll of toilet paper wrapped around it and the egg wrapped in a newspaper proved to be the best protected, while the egg wrapped in foam padding didn't have quite as good of results :) Taylor put together a project with a couple other kids in his class.  It was a chemical reaction project that used baking soda and vinegar (stinky!).   

Yesterday I had a Paparazzi Open House so Tyler took the boys to the park for a little while.  They had fun playing on the playground, throwing rocks into the lake, and chasing the seagulls. 

We were excited to make plans yesterday with Grandma Faylene and my parents for when they are coming to see us and little Spider Ryder in March.  It will be fun to have some family here for a visit again :)

First of all: I am enjoying all of these group texts--you know the ones that tell me I'm receiving a picture text and instead it's nothing? It's always fun to try and guess the rest of the conversation with only Corey's texts showing up! Am I the ONLY one in this family without a smart phone? Is that it? :)
Anyway--for those of you with facebook you already know my highlights--snowed in on Tues, almost snowed in on Weds, and then for the grand finale--on Friday a pencil "accidentally" just went into Sam's ear and got "accidentally" bumped by a girl named Courtney which "accidentally" ruptured his ear drum leading to intense pain,vomiting and high fever...and not one, but TWO trips to the ER. Can't wait for those medical bills to start coming in!
Which leads to--(for those of you who didn't hear me squealing) KEN FINALLY GOT "THAT" JOB!!! The one it only took, what, three years?, 4 tests, 7 interviews, and a plant tour to get. We are really excited. Ken has never had a set schedule not to mention LOADS of great benefits. Best of all he is getting out of a location that has become quite melodramatic--you would think he was the one working with all women instead of me.
Emmy's new apartment is still going SO WELL! I know she is now reading this blog so I won't go on too long about how happy I am about it. Her old apartment got rented by an about-to-be-married couple from here in Clarkston so she just paid her last month of rent for Feb. and slammed the door on that unfortunate chapter of her life. :)
Daphne had her first date last night. They went sledding, came here for taco salad and then went to the Sweetheart dance. I mostly hung out in my room with little Samo but it sounded like they were having a lot of fun and she said they had a good time.
Caleb, Bron, Asher, and Lil are all doing really well--no big news to report on them. Next week is the big dramatic production of Peter Pan. We are all really, um, excited for it. :) Asher, Lily, Sam, and Maiz have all been working really hard to get ready for it. We're excited to see Mom, Dan, Mel, and little Stori who are coming for it.
Which reminds me--we had SO MUCH fun at Mom's. It was the highlight of our January for sure. The kids are still talking about it. We always SAY we aren't going to plan anything and just hang out but it never really works out that way--this time it did. definitely hoping to do it again soon. :)

February?

      This is Kristie. It's been close to 70 almost every day this week.  It's crazy! It doesn't feel like February at all.  We had one day that a front came in suddenly and the temperature dropped, bringing with it wind, rain and hail...and swirling clouds.  It was the creepiest feeling to look straight up and see clouds swirling.  I don't think I'm going to like tornado season here.  I do love being outside right now, but my neighbor was weed whipping when we got home from church and I'm just not ready for that.  It needs to be winter longer.  We're basking in the sun now, but believe me, I'll be crying in the summer.  It's going to be too hot.
     This week was pretty busy with lots of the usual...YW, swim, basketball, piano, visiting teaching, babysitting, birthday lunch with a friend, activity days, scouts.  Corey bought a gun that Dan found for him.  He's pretty excited.  So is Isaac.  So am I.  Now we just need our concealed permits and a pink handgun for me and we're good to go:)
    I spend most of my time scrubbing walls and taking  pens, pencils and markers away from Hazel.  We CANNOT seem to find and hide all of them and she immediately goes to mischief when she finds them.  This girl is putting us over the edge.  I'm remembering it's the age.  The little ones all have colds and are a little extra fussy.  As all my kids get older, I will always remember to empathize with moms of young children.  Never telling them..."just wait 'til they get older, it gets harder" .  Because moms who say that FORGOT what it's like to have tiny ones crying and hanging on legs:) I know nothing will get easier, just a different kind of hard.  :)
     We were invited to go bowling Friday night with a bunch of couples.  We had a great time, and it was a really fun place.  Anyone who comes to visit, we'll go there for sure:)   And last night I went shopping with a friend while her husband and kids came to hang out with Corey.  They all watched Fantastic mr. Fox because they love it:)  (me, not so much)
   Last but most exciting, my parents got their mission call!  They are going to serve for 2 years in the Tegucigalpa, Honduras temple.  It is brand new, will be dedicated in March.  They leave April 1st (unless it's a joke my dad says:)  They are very excited.  The call is perfect for them.  My Dad wanted to use his spanish, and my mom wanted to be somewhere safe:)
Have a good week everyone!
Love, Kristie

Hello from Havasu...

Happy to report that we are all finally feeling better.  Taylor and I are still coughing a little bit, but at least the 2 little guys aren't sick anymore.

Taylor passed the Sacrament for the first time today.  He was pretty nervous, but pretty excited at the same time.  He did a great job :)  As we were sitting in Sacrament meeting, I looked at our bench full of boys and couldn't help but get excited to meet little Spider Ryder next month and wonder what he will look like and be like.  Only 5 more weeks!  I must be carrying this baby way out front because I've had a few people act surprised that I have that long left.  I realized a couple weeks ago at church that we're going to have to move to the middle section of the chapel when he's born so we can all fit on one bench :)

Wrestling sectionals were this past weekend, so Tyler was in Phoenix Friday and Saturday.  They were in 2nd place going into the finals but wound up in 5th place by the end.  Five of their guys will be going to State this week and a couple of them have a really good chance at placing.  After this weekend the season will be over and I'm very glad it's the last time Tyler will be gone for a while. 

We are making plans to fence our backyard which we are all excited about.  Right now we just have a little section right by our house that's fenced, so it will be really nice for the boys to be able to have a little more room to play and run around once we get it done.  We are enjoying the warmer weather now that it's back up into the upper 60's/low 70's during the day. 

Our neighbor-lady, Dottie, brought over some fresh blueberries and lemons the other day.  I searched Pinterest for recipes that called for blueberries and lemons and found a couple that I tried out yesterday. 

The first one was for Blueberry Cheesecake Bars. 

(picture from http://bakedbree.com)

We haven't tried them yet because I made them for our Sunday treat, but they look and smell very yummy!

The other recipe I tried was for Lemon-Blueberry Drizzle Bread.

(picture from www.portuguesegirlcooks.com)

This one we cut into right after church and it is very tasty.  I've never used lemon zest in a recipe before, but both of these recipes called for it, so it was fun to use a new ingredient.
I'm so glad that we have facebook, texting, phone calls, e-mails, and this blog to keep in touch with family.  It helps us feel a little more connected and makes it a little less hard to be so far away. 

Sending you some spring!
Those are our daffodils. They will be in bloom in a couple of weeks! We actually hit *58 this week which was nice, but are averaging high *40's.
Things are going good for us here, keeping ourselves busy. I am still working everyday, at least through the 11th. i hope it continues. I am still working with the basic skills class, and i am kind of getting attached to those little kiddos. We did have a crazy incident this week. The girls i was helping at lunch didn't want the pizza, and before i knew it she had my hair and was pulling pretty hard and trying to bite me. the other little boy I had with us was laughing so hard. it was crazy. I need quicker responses. They really are sweet kids though.
Grace and Cole head to La Grande Thurs. - Sat for swim districts and i wish i could go. They will have fun. The other kids are having fun with scouts, activity days and YW.
We probably will watch maybe a 1/2 hr. of the super bowl, that's just how we roll. We have a court of honor tonight we have to go to :} 
I hope you all  have a GREAT week!
Love Bridget

I wish I could say 'What Super bowl"

In approximately 1 hour, our 500sq ft apartment will be filled with 7 couples, and 4 kids. And not a single one of them was invited! haha kinda. We were planning on getting together with friends at the Foresters apt, but the next thing we know, all our friends nominated our place and started assigning food and inviting more couples. It should  be fun!
Our week in highlights
-going to the Temple
-buying a gun for Corey
-getting a Sams Club card
-getting our first paycheck
-using our debit card for the first time since december!
-swimming with Stori on tues
-shopping with mom on sat
-playing in the snow with Stori
-making valentines cookies with friends
-running on tues (ya, no big deal)!
-vball on monday-still didn't win
-and plotting our Utah trip!
And our hard drive is completely out of space, so no pictures. I still have a video of some of the grandkids dancing down the stairs while Aleisa was home. It's real cute.
Love to you all! And happy Sabbath!

Super Bowl...What Super Bowl?

So, last week didn't start off so great.....I tried backing out of my driveway at 6:30 A.M. on Monday morning and no could do....:)   We finally had a glimpse of  "real " winter......Lynne, sweetheart that she is, came down and helped me shovel one side of my driveway out.   As I was driving to work, I noticed that more than half of the vehicles on the road had snow blades on the front.  :)    It did, however, warm up a little.  We are no longer stuck in our sub zero weather pattern! 

Wade Ball had a knee replacement on Tuesday.  He seems to be doing really well!  Dorothy said that it is already easier for him to walk.

I was off work on Fri. and finally got a few things done that had been simmering on the back burner  ( I sound like such an old lady  lol  )  Those tires did need rotating!  Melanie and Stori came to meet me and we did some pretty serious window shopping!  Turned out to be a really fun day.  It was  hard to watch Stori be so sad about telling the little kitty piano that played all of the notes in little meows  goodbye.....it even had a microphone.....what kind of mom could pass that up?

Yesterday was a fun day.  I got to share in all of the events of Shyenne Ellsworth's wedding.  A really special day!  Chris did all of the catering for the luncheon as well as the the reception, so it made for a busy week at work also.

Love to all of you!