New Years Eve

My parents are getting ready to fill in their pool, so somehow, someone discovered that it is great fun to shoot bb-guns at tree ornaments and maybe strings of lights, safely in an old pool! We get texts almost every night to come join! So New Years Eve is no exception to do this, especially since Christmas items are clearanced!

The kids wait patiently for their turn. We were very safe, I promise :)

An old pool is also a great place to light fireworks!

Drinking hot chocolate and eating lots of yummy treats

Some of us tuckered out before the night was over!

Happy New Year!

Happy 11 years!

This year, Cass and I planned a little get-away to the Majestic Mountain Inn. We left Friday late in the afternoon and totally hit a snow storm coming in. I hate driving in the snow! It makes for fun play though!The room had a huge jacuzzi tub in the center of it, this was Cass' only request! He has a thing for baths.

After dinner and a movie, I had a nice, hot long soak in the tub. Then, Cass Dared me to go run around a tree outside our room really quickly, he'd time me (ha ha)....I totally slipped in the snow and came in with it stuck to my pj's! Brrrrr!

The next morning, we (I) wanted to go shopping in town, we woke up to the van like this! It was a doozy driving around town and all of the shops were closed because of the snow! We found like 2 open and they were 'for old folks only' kind of shops. Oh well. With not much to do in town, we decided to pack up and go home. We wanted to bring the kids some snow so we only cleared windows. The whole way, huge chunks of it kept flying off and I was so worried that it wouldn't make it to Mesa.

Luckily, to our surprise there was plenty for a great snowball fight!

Thanks Mac and Kathy for keeping our kids overnight!

We had a great time!

Gavin's Field Trip

The AZ museum for youth is a great place to have a field trip! I have really enjoyed working with Rachel this year. Here are a few highlights from the trip. Digging for gold!
Brighton wasn't so sure at first and just hung out in her stroller.

Rachel and 2 of her kids

Gavin found some 'gold'!

Inside, there are lots of different rooms for the kids to discover, this was one of many. They spent a lot of time in front of the green screen!

These boys crack me up. Boe and Gavin trying to look scaryNow, trying to look and sound like dinosaurs

The cutest little bunch of preschoolers (and a big sister)!

Afterward, we went to a park to eat lunch. These girls enjoyed swinging....

and teetering

Long, fun, exhausting day!

Thanks Miss Rachel, great field trip!

Brothers ride

Cass, most of his brothers and his dad, were able to go on a 3 day horse riding trip up in the mountains between here and Globe (somewhere). I wasn't so sure Cass' back could handle it. He was definitely sore, but his back did better than he thought, thank goodness!

I know Cass really enjoys spending time with his family and this was a really fun way to do just that!

Sadly, these are the only pictures I have of the fun overnight camping trip we took with some friends.....I have got to get better at remembering to take pictures! Shooting guns for fun has always been enjoyable to me. Guns still make me nervous, but being able to use them with no danger is so fun.
Thanks Houstons and Russells for letting us use up your bullets and use your guns! The trip was really fun, we should do that more often. Thank you mom and dad for watching our children fo us!

Self reliant

When did they get big enoughto make their own pancakes?! The kids have always liked to flip pancakes but this morning, they decided to do it all by themselves! They think they are soooo big now!
Now what am I going to do with all that time in the mornings!! (By the looks of it, I'll be cleaning up after them!)

Happy 30th!!!

For Cass and my 30th Birthday, we wanted to go snowboarding. Our birthdays are only 2 days apart, and it just so happened that the Friday we went was my birthday, so I got a ticket for free :)

We invited all of our siblings along and The Bardins and Spencer (Lindsay has a tiny baby to tend) pulled thru for us! Spencer brought his friend James along as well which was great! All of the guys totally DITCHED us because we are not the best and they wanted to have fun, so Emily and I had our own fun!!
Spent plenty of time on our behinds in the beginning but we got the hang of it really quickly!


Here's Emily in her awesome red bibs!

We had such chapped lips!!

Now he wanted to hang out with me, he was finished tearing it up! Jk Cass did go down one of the big hills with me, and then ditched again (it's ok)

Thank you Sydney for the equipment, wish you could have been there with us!

We went and stayed at a hotel along with the Bardins that night and had so much fun going to dinner and hanging out way too late, laughing and playing games.

Slippin' n' Slidin'

This never gets old! We could do this all day and night. All you need is a LARGE piece of plastic and lots and lots of soap!

The only set back: soapy body parts and some hip/bum bruises!It is always a competition for the boys

Gavin is non-stop, up down, up down

Thanks Houstons for letting us all join in the fun!!

Getting bigger

These pups are gettin so big so fast! We love them to pieces, even though they are ruining our backyard (like it was so great before:)
Gage LOVES them, I think he will have the hardest time of all the kids when they have to leave.
They all have names, great ones like Sunshine, Freckle Toes, and Big Bertha....Some are not gender fitting names but the kids don't bother with all that! the ones with the collars are already spoken for.
Their favorite place to sleep is on this nasty, nasty pillow!