Seminary Graduate

This is Justin before his Seminary Graduation.

The papers in his hand are his talk.

yes, this lucky man was asked to speak.

I am proud of him for graduating from seminary.

End of the Season

Kamryn with her team

Purple Ponies

they were a fun little team to "coach"

PS I obviously love kamryn the most since I only took pictures of her team for the end of the season. (not really, I just forgot to take my camera to the other games, dumb me)

The Best Chaperone Job

Brooke, Whitney & Tisa

One of the greatest gigs I've had as a chaperone is going to Lagoon with the high school physics students. I went with Justin and his classmates last year but it was rainy and cold.

This year I went with Brooke and her classmastes and it was GREAT! It was sunny and warm and a lot of fun. Brooke was with 2 friends so they needed me to tag along with them to even up their group. We went on all the big rides. I was feeling pretty old by the end of the day - warn out, with a headache and feeling a little sick. But it was still fun. And I'm glad my daughter is okay with me hanging out with her and her friends.

Their birthday celebration

Since Jared and Kamryn had a huge friend party last year

I told them that we would just have a little family party

They decided they wanted to go swimming

So for family night last night

we invited grandma and grandpa

cousins, aunts and uncles

everyone had lots of fun

swimming

eating

playing

singing "happy birthday"

opening presents

the big 6 year old

with a HUGE piece of cake

Jared and Kyson

what cute cousins!

Jared with his cobra snake

one of his favorite presents

Their 6th Birthday

Kamryn

first thing in the morning on her birthday

Jared

first thing in the morning on his birthday

I tried to catch them still in bed to say happy birthday but they got up while I was getting ready.

When I said to Jared "happy birthday" he looked at me with this confused look on his face and then said "i forgot"

Kamryn

with her birthday cereal

Jared

with his birthday cereal

at our house you get to pick out whatever cereal you want for your birthday and get the whole box to yourself (you can share if you want but you don't have to)

It was funny taking them to the store and watching them try to decide what they wanted. Kamryn thought she wanted to get Lucky Charms but ended up with her mini wheats. Jared knew the whole time what he wanted and never wavered in his decision.

I cannot believe they are 6

At school for their birthday

with their class

saying the pledge of allegiance

Kamryn getting her birthday crown

Mrs Armstrong fixing Jared's crown

Jared and Kamryn

with their awesome teacher

Mrs Armstrong

they had a fun day at school with their friends. they brought popsicles for their birthday treat.

after school they stopped at grandma and grand-dad's

to show them their birthday crowns.

they were lucky and got presents, a card and a letter from them

they were so excited

they got pillow pets

something they've been asking for

for a long time

at african ice

after dinner

for a birthday treat

their dad was supposed to be out of town but ended up coming home early due to weather and a cancelled flight. since he wasn't going to be there on their actual birthday we had to find another day to really celebrate. we're going swimming on Monday and just having a family party with cousins this year.

A trim and a major new 'do

Kamryn is 6 years old and has never gone to a salon for a haircut.

Her hair does not grow very fast.

She had a little trim by Jared when she was around 2 I think.

My sister trimmed her hair over a year ago at least.

A couple of days we took her to Ashley's salon

for another trim.

the "new" kamryn

not too different

just a little trim

Brooke - "before"

Brooke wanted a major change.

I mentioned that she should donate her hair

She thought that was a good idea.

That pony tail is 12" long

and even more than that got cut off

Brooke - "after"

all grown up and sophisticated

A good Mother's Day

Last year's mother's day was kind of a fiasco so I decided to change my expectations. I decided for the next few years mother's day is going to be all about my own mom and I'm not going to expect anything for myself.

Of course its great when you have no expectations and nice things happen.

Jared and Kamryn gave me the cute little plants that they fixed at school. They also gave me hankies with their handprints on them that they did at primary.

Justin also took them shopping and let them pick out these roses and got me some Godiva chocolates. Yum!

On Sunday morning I worked on fixing dinner that we were having my parents and Paul's dad over for. I decided I'd rather make the dinner and then let others do the clean up.

After church Brooke gave me a present that she'd gone shopping for herself :)

Justin also did some shopping on his own (with a little help from his Dad $$ ) and got me a few presents.

We had a really nice dinner all together and Paul did the grilling. It was great to visit and Susan's family joined us for dessert so they could visit mom too.

I have a WONDERFUL mom and I agree with what my sister said, that it would be the greatest compliment to be told I'm like my mom. I don't know that I'll ever get there.

Taylor's 1st Backpack Outing

Taylor all ready to go

on his first backpacking trip

Taylor with his scoutmaster, Jim

checking his pack for proper fit

Taylor with his buddy Matt

check out those packs

they were just doing a short 3 mile hike

to get used to the packs

they are training for a big hike

at the end of the summer

Most of the group that set out on the hike

Race for the Cure

Susan G Komen

Race for the Cure

Salt Lake City

May 7 2011

We're somewhere in that amazing crowd of 20,000 people.

Susan's friends Melissa, Kara and Susan and me

Susan got us all organized to do race for the cure this year. We'd done it once before, 11 years ago, when my mom first was diagnosed with breast cancer. The race has really grown since then. We couldn't believe how many people were there - it was so cool! When the race first started you couldn't hardly move and it took us several minutes of walking very slowly for the crowd to thin out so that we could walk faster. At the half way point it was so cool to look back and see this huge wall of people filling both sides of the street and then to look ahead of us and see the same thing. It was great to see so many people out supporting this great cause but at the same time so sad to see how many people are affected by this horrible disease. They announced that 1 in 8 women will get breast cancer. Those are terrible odds.