Blue and Gold Banquet

Austin has been waiting for this night since he found out all the things he can earn in scouts. He has been working so hard to earn as much as he could before the Blue and Gold Banquet. He earned his bobcat, Wolf, a gold arrowhead, a silver arrowhead, and a belt loop and pin for basketball, football, and reading. We are very proud of all of his hard work. Cameron and Austin really enjoy working on scout projects together.

Cameron had to put war paint on him after Austin got his awards.

They had a balloon game afterwards and the kids just went crazy with having fun! Alina is there in the pink and purple.

We forgot to take a picture of the cake Austin made for the night before it got cut into. The kids were happy to find out that our cake had almost every piece left in it since there were so many cakes there. If you can't tell what it is the twinkies are sleeping bags and there are Werther candies that are the heads and Austin painted faces on them with frosting. Then he took mini marshmallows and put them on toothpicks to look like a marshmallow roast. He also has candles in the middle for the fire to roast the marshmallows on. There is also a sign made out of popsicle sticks that says pack 1016. He did a really good job!

Not so Easy...

I tried to get a picture with all three of them looking at the camera and I failed. It just isn't possible. We think they're still pretty cute though.

Austin and Greta and School Projects

Greta had a report to do on Leopard Seals and she even had to make a clay model of one. She really enjoyed her project and wanted to take a picture of it.

Austin has been learning about George Washington and made a wig after him.

They both had parent teacher conferences and their teachers raved about them. Austin is still on the highest possible spelling and reading list. Greta is the best at math in her class. We are very proud of both of them.

Young Women's Princess Castle

Greta and Alina helped me make this princess castle for Young Women's. They had so much fun decorating it. Greta is turning into quite the little artist. Alina decided that it needed a wicked step sister in the castle. Can you see where she is? She's the ugly brown creature in the middle. And of course Alina is covering up Greta's beautiful princess. The castle was a big hit for our game that night.

Valentine's Day

So we have this neighbor and friend named Condon Hansen. He's as old as my dad and loves that Cameron is unemployed right now because he's retired and has somebody to play with now. He'll stop by our house to see if I have baked anything that he wants, drop off his homemade bread, or he'll take Cameron to the temple, coyote hunting, or out for a drive. His latest appearance involved him telling us he'd teach us how to make his homemade bread if we agreed to feed him. We agreed. Because of Condon's fine teaching skills I woke up this Valentine's morning to my cute hubby and his heart shaped loaf of bread. I'm such a lucky girl!

Lyndee's Baby Shower

My dear friend Lyndee is having a baby. A baby girl to be exact. Lyndee has an 8 year old boy named Sean and has wanted to have more kids for a long time. The week she was going in for a consult about in-vitro she found out she was pregnant. This is Lyndee's 2nd miracle baby so we had to celebrate.

I accidentally scheduled the baby shower at my house for the same day as my brother coming home from his mission. It all worked out though since their plane got delayed. I was able to stay for the whole shower. We had a really good turnout, around 30 people came.

Lyndee got so many cute new things. I went to help her put her crib up earlier in the week and that little girl is going to have the cutest room.

We are all very excited to meet this little angel and are very excited for Lyle, Lyndee and Sean.

Jamie, Lyndee, Holly, Michelle and Olivia.

Lyle loading up the car with all things pink.

Ryan's Home!!

My youngest brother and sibling Ryan came home from his mission to Peru. I have been so excited to see him, I've missed him a lot.

My parents had the opportunity to go and pick Ryan up in Peru and vacation for 2 weeks there with him. On their way home their plane in Peru was delayed a few hours and then there was major snow in Atlanta and they got stuck there as well. We really didn't think they were going to make it home until the next day, but they came only 5 hours late.

We all met at my parents house to decorate everything with yellow ribbon and pictures the kids had drawn. Then the kids decided they wanted to wear something yellow so we tied bands around their head so they could look like Nephi. That took longer than expected and we were a couple minutes late getting to the airport for their arrival. As we are coming down the escalators they call to tell us they were already at baggage. We are running to get there and run right into Ryan as he's on his way to the bathroom. Not exactly they way a mission reunion in the airport should go. We leave him and go find my parents and decide we should just pretend we haven't seen Ryan yet. But the kids gave us away. It definatley didn't go as planned, but we are just all glad to have him home safely.

Ryan's first time meeting Olivia and Madison. If you look closely you can see that Olivia is doing a fish face, her latest new thing that she loves to do.

Ryan wanted pizza for his first meal home.

Shane and Matthew had all the kids laughing and screaming during tickle battles.

My mom showing all the stuff they got from Peru. We got some cool gifts.

Eating fun dip and checking out Shane's new musical instrument from Peru. It's fun to play.

All of our kids were so happy to see Ryan again. Alina said she remembered him, but when we got in the car to drive home from the airport she said in the pictures his head is round but now it's oval so she thinks she doesn't remember him now. She's so funny. Then Caden saw Ryan's picture come up on the digital frame and he said, "that's who I've been waiting for to come home." He must look different in person to them, but he looks exactly the same to me, just a about 2 inches taller.

And here is Miss Liv out for the night.