Congratulations!!!

Dennis' sister Alicia got engaged this weekend to Jonathan Smith. They plan to be married in the Salt Lake Temple on August 9, 2008. Woo hoo! Dennis has already agreed to take engagement and bridal photos, so that should keep us busy. :) We are so excited for them.

I know, this isn't the greatest photo. I snapped it as they were walking out of our house after FHE tonight, and the lighting was horrible, but I'll post better ones (that Dennis takes), I'm sure. :)

Mr. Mom

My brother Scott had this posted on his blog and we thought it was hilarious. Enjoy!!

The Next Survivor Series:

Six married men will be dropped on an island with one car and 3 kids each for six weeks. Each kid will play two sports and either take music or dance classes.There is no fast food. Each man must take care of his 3 kids; keep his assigned house clean, correct all homework, and complete science projects, cook, do laundry, and pay a list of 'pretend' bills with not enough money.

In addition, each man will have to budget in money for groceries each week. Each man must remember the birthdays of all their friends and relatives, and send cards out on time. Each man must also take each child to a doctor's appointment, a dentist appointment, and a haircut appointment.

He must make one unscheduled and inconvenient visit per child to the Urgent Care. He must also make cookies or cupcakes for a social function. Each man will be responsible for decorating his own assigned house, planting flower s outside and keeping it presentable at all times.

The men will only have access to television when the kids are asleep and all chores are done. The men must shave their legs, wear makeup daily, adorn himself with jewelry, wear uncomfortable yet stylish shoes, keep fingernails polished and eyebrows groomed. During one of the six weeks, the men will have to endure severe abdominal cramps, back aches, and have extreme, unexplained mood swings but never once complain or slow down from other duties.

They must attend weekly school meetings, church, and find time at least once to spend the afternoon at the park or a similar setting. They will need to read a book and then pray with the children each night and in the morning, feed them, dress them, brush their teeth and comb their hair by 7:00 am.

A test will be given at the end of the six weeks, and each father will be required to know all of the following information: each child's birthday, height, weight, shoe size, clothes size and doctor's name. They will also need to know each child's weight and length at birth, time of birth, and length of labor, along with each child's favorite color, middle name, favorite snack, favorite song, favorite drink, favorite toy, biggest fear and what they want to be when they grow up.

The kids vote them off the island based on performance. The last man wins only if . . . he still has enough energy to be intimate with his spouse at a moment's notice.

If the last man does win, he can play the game over and over and over again for the next 18 to 25 years, eventually earning the right to be called ‘Mother.’

May 9, 2008

My friend Shelly came to visit with her family tonight. Her sister got married here in Utah, so they spent the week here and stopped in for dinner (Hawaiian haystacks at Devin's request). We had so much fun catching up (Shelly and I knew each other in college, and her husband Jeff and Dennis knew each other--then Dennis and I met and got engaged and then married--small world, huh?). Anyway, here are some cute pics of her family, and Aspen and her daughter Emma (who is 10 days older than Aspen). The girls enjoyed playing with dishes, dancing to music, and swapping shoes (are they 2 or 12?).

On Tuesday of this week, Devin had the opportunity to participate in Hope of America Student Showcase, the kickoff event for Provo's Freedom festival. Close to 7,000 fifth-grade students from 60 schools around Utah county shared what they have learned about American values through patriotic songs in front of an audience stuffed into the rafters of the BYU Marriott Center.

The children have patriotism instilled in them early, singing "We're the hope of America, where there's hope, there's America." Students from the Timpanogos Academy danced and sang "All Kinds of People," a song about the different heritages of the citizens of the country. Boys and girls in Russian, Mexican and Scottish outfits danced across the stage, and shirtless boys with spears and girls in hula skirts represented islander immigrants.

Devin loved performing in the event, and every fifth grader is given a chance to participate. The chorus is not handpicked from children who usually enjoy performing. Involvement in the festival helps to teach children citizenship and character.

The annual Champion of Liberty award was also presented at the event, with Lt. Governor Gary Herbert and Kathy Smith (a friend of mine) as recipients. The two were chosen for their involvement with the state's Commission on Volunteers, as Utah has been first in the nation for volunteer hours for five years in a row.

Although Kathy said she was grateful for the award, she said the high number of volunteer hours in the state is due to parents who instill good values in their children.

In it's thirteenth year, Hope of America has become something of a tradition within the valley. All schools are invited to participate, and many teachers return year after year with their students.

Finally, I had to leave you with a darling picture of Connor (sitting up so well!!!).

May 6, 2008

Okay, okay, I know it's been forever. April was an insane month, so I'm trying to catch up. Work was absolutely crazy. I lost two employees at the end of March, so Sue and I were trying to keep the office going by ourselves, which was insane. We took three weeks to post the job, interview, and hire a new program coordinator and office manager. We also hired a summer intern to help us get our databases back up to date. Wahoo! They're all fabulous and I feel as though a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders.

Shaylee has been busy with babysitting, Young Women, and school. This has been a rough term, but the end is in sight! Devin started soccer at the end of April, and he's on an awesome team and loving it.

Aspen is keeping busy as usual. She loves dance and can hardly wait for her recital in June. She's also been learning her lower-case letters and sounds (she has the upper-case down) and practicing her numbers (11-20). For some reason (maybe because "eleven" sounds like "seven"), she counts "one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, eight, nine, ten, eleven . . ." and then she gets stuck in an endless loop. We're working on breaking the cycle. She's also thrilled to be starting play group again tomorrow (we ended up taking off for the winter due to all the illness and new babies that no one wanted exposed).

This is a cute picture of Aspen and Connor hanging out . . .

Aspen is taking after her father and becoming quite the photographer. She took this picture of me while we were waiting at the hospital for Connor to be suctioned.

These are other fun photos from our hospital excursion:

Yes, we finally had to take Connor in to have him deep suctioned (warning, the next section is graphic). Basically, they stick a long thin tube down each nostril and hook it up to a huge machine that sucks the snot (pardon my french) right out of him. YUCK! The doctor and I are trying to hold him down as he screams bloody murder and Aspen frantically pulls my leg calling, "What you doing?!?" It was awful. This was just before our trip to California (see entry below), which seemed to agree with Connor, and he has been doing much better since. We're still being careful.

His sickness, however, does not seem to have affected his growth. We had his six-month appointment last Friday, and he is 29 inches long and weighs 19 pounds 3 ounces. This is a big boy! He's already wearing (and filling) 18-month clothes. YIKES! He is also sitting up quite well (the doctor was shocked) and loves to take baths with Aspen.

Well, that's it for me for now. Love to all!

Arrow of Light

Devin received his Arrow of Light (the highest award in Cub Scouts) at our pack meeting in April. His Uncle Ron (Dennis' brother-in-law) came down from Logan to perform a special ceremony that was awesome!!!

He told the history of the Arrow of Light award . . .

dressed Devin as an Indian brave (in authentic getup) . . .

and presented him to the audience.

Dennis and I were able to present him with the award.

Then Ron presented Devin with a beautiful arrow plaque he made.

I was so proud (and Devin was so excited--can't you tell?).

Friends and family came to celebrate the occasion (Aspen was so excited all to have two of her grandmas & papas there).

Thanks to all those who made this a memorable occasion for Devin and helped him along his cub scouting trail. We love you!

Spring Break at the Beach

Wahoo! We got to spend Spring Break at the beach, and it was a much-needed vacation for all. We are so grateful for Grandpa and Grandma Pearson first of all for having a beach house on Balboa Peninsula in Newport Beach and most importantly for being generous enough to let us use it each year! We always enjoy the time we are able to spend with them. Unfortunately, Dennis could not get the time off work to come with us this year. Therefore, our pictures aren't as wonderful and fabulous as normal, but I had great subjects to work with :-), and I think I did an okay job, if I do say so myself.

Check out these cute pics of the kids on the beach . . .


Yes, I was there . . . not looking as cute as my kids, but just happy to be keeping everything together and glad everyone was enjoying themself.

We took a trip down to Crystal Cove State Park to check out the tide pools. It wasn't great, but it beat spending the morning in the beach house while it was still too cold to get in the water. :-)

Check out this lizard!

My little scavengers . . .

I was lucky enough that Dennis' sister Wendy and her daughter Ellie agreed to come with us on the trip. It's always nice to have an extra pair of (adult) hands on these outings. Plus, Ellie and Aspen are the best of friends (well, until the end of the trip when they've been in a car for 20+ hours that week and have had all the cousin time they can handle).

Aspen wasn't keen on the tide pools because she was wet and had sand in her shoes, but it was too rocky to go barefoot.

Devin has a keen eye for all kinds of interesting creatures (and being the handy photographer I am, I was able to capture it on film for y'all to see).

Yes, I was there, behind the camera most of the time . . . carrying a sleeping Connor and a fitful two year old who was tired, cranky, and hating dirty feet.

Look how big he is!!! Sitting up already.

We made our traditional excursion to the Old Spaghetti Factory while we were there.

Check out this flexibility!

On our last day, Grandma and Grandpa Pearson took us to breakfast at IHOP before we headed out for our 13-hour drive. Woo hoo! It was delicious, thanks! They enjoyed meeting Connor (their 7th great-grandchild), and we always love getting to spend time with them. They were cleaning out their condo and gave our kids some fun toys as well (a jump rope, bubbles, picture viewers, a pink vacuum, and a green easy bake oven from the '50's that still works--the kids have really enjoyed making single servings of carrot cake as an after-school snack).

We decided to drive the whole thing in one shot rather than trying to break it up in Mesquite, unload the car to stay in a hotel, and then get back in the car for 6 more hours the next morning. It worked well. I drove, Wendy handled the kids. Thank heavens for portable DVD players!!! The kids did really well until the last hour. On the way down, we stopped in St. George for a long lunch. On the way back, of course, we stopped in Vegas for In N Out. YUM!!!

We hope for a repeat trip (with Dennis) next year. :-)

Geography

So the phonics books were a little much for Aspen right now--we're still working on the concept of each letter making a sound. She's getting it slowly but surely. Instead, she has really taken to map skills. She can now identify the United States, Canada, Mexico, Russia, and China on a world map. Pretty impressive, huh? I wish my fourteen-year-old could do that! We have some world map place mats, so we've been quizzing the kids at dinner, and that's a lot of fun.