April's this and that post.

Seth loves to look at the weekly ad.  He just goes through it circling things he thinks are a good deal or things that he likes such as strawberries or cake mixes. 

Jaq's first soccer practice!  She played on a team mostly full of 3 year olds, but I think she did SO awesome and she loved it.  I might just turn her into an athlete after all. :) (Here with her coaches, Matt and Valerie Roan)

My kids play A LOT of games.  Here's Battleship!

Checkers!  (I'll be honest, Seth is patient.  Jaq doesn't quite have the skill set that Seth does but he would rather have someone who can kind of play than no one at all).  #Goodbrother

SOCCER JAQ!!  In her enormous jersey...but with a few adjustments we made it wearable.:)

This was her "game face." Also her mad face.

Ahh dittobug.  Cordelle at Cedar City's bridal show.  The plinko board was a huge hit!  Cordelle decided he wanted to do something more engaging and after the original plinko board he wanted wasn't available, he decided just to go to home depot and make one himself.  We played a lot of plinko that weekend with the kids!

My Fam at Scott's farewell (minus Mark and my Dad). Cant believe he is leaving for New York in a week!  I love this kid and this family!

K, this just kept making me laugh.  We were out and I was trying to feed Collin dinner when he kept making this face!  We were cracking up so hard, there was nothing sour that I was feeding him, he was just being silly and then kept doing it cause we were laughing.  Silly kid!

Even with food all over his face, he's still the most handsome little man ever!

I thought this might be a fun idea.  I keep a calendar on the fridge every month, so I decided to take a picture to document our crazy lives at the end of each month.  IDK seemed like a fun thing to do at the time.....

 

Ma and Pa Morris helping us put in
our fence!  They are the hardest workers I have ever met and cranked this baby out in 2 weekends!  COULDN'T and WOULDN'T have done it without them. Love them!

EASTER 2013

Well, we still didn't have our trailer this year (maybe next year) but this year was special in the fact that ALL of my siblings and their spouses and families were there at least for 2 days!  It was so awesome to see how big we are getting!  I love my family!  It was so fun to get together!  But because Easter is better explained with pictures, I think I will just caption all these pics to describe our trip instead of the usual novel and then throw up of pictures I usually include :)!....EASTER 2013

I won't lie, the mornings were FREEZING until the sun finally peeked out from the mountain we camped next to.  Here is Collin in my mom's trailer being our morning baker!  He did pretty good, but I remembered how hard it is camping with a baby.  Between nap times and feeding and having to be held the whole time, its a lot of work. 

Tallie brought her 4 wheelers down and even Gaven had his own this year, which the kids LOVED riding.  Doesn't Jaq look cute all riding up?

Collin bundled with Cordelle.  It was cold so we had to keep him cuddled even though this age is not well known for its swaddling success.

Mom and Tiffany cooking breakfast!

We always celebrate with easter baskets on Friday morning so they have plenty of time to play with their loot. So here are all the grandkids waiting and freezing in anticipation of finding their baskets. (minus collin who was back in the tent asleep)

Seth is obsessed with battleship and has been trying to save up for it, but we decided to surprise him. 

Jaquelle mastered the mini-bop-it, so we'll see how she does with the bigger one!  Games were a fun idea for easter this year.

Battleship did not disappoint.  You should have seen this kid's face and excitement.  I have video.  It was priceless.  He probably played 12 games of this before we went home.

This year's easter baskets hill.

The kids and their loot.

Collin was asleep for the easter basket hunt, but I think he liked his basket anyways.

Spent the day on the sandy beaches of Green River.  Been camping by green river for 20 years and never knew this place existed.  Its seriously nice sand and an awesome beach!  So fun!

Cordelle is going to die that I put this on the blog and maybe I should take it off especially with him being in the bishopbric now, but it was pretty funny.

Collins first feel of Sand.  I think he liked it, till he ate it, and I wouldn't let him play in it anymore.

Scotty chillin in the sun.

Beautiful picture of the river and scenery eh?

Cordelle being gross.

Scott pretending he's Tongan.

The Pa and Ma.

And finally Friday night, everyone was there and so Scott opened his mission call!!!  This face is posed, yes, but he really was SUPER excited.  He is going to New York, New York Spanish Speaking.  So excited for him.  I was able to have a conversation just he and I before we left camp and I was just so impressed with him.  He is just ready and wanting to go out and serve and help people see the good and be influenced by the gospel.  He isn't nervous or anxious, he just wants to go and give everything to his mission! Perhaps this is more common than not, but I see so many missionaries, fearful of the unexpected or living up to what is a good missionary, but not Scott, there was just pure confidence that God knew him, and he was where he was supposed to be. He said he feels like he has sacrificed a lot and so he doesn't want to hold back.  He cried a little as he talked about the people who had had such a powerful influence on his life in preparing him for this including his family, his young men leaders and his bishop. Oh the boy is just good through and through.  Despite being around people (even many of his own family) that dont always make the best decisions he has remained true and good.  College life has brought out in him optimism.  He has always had remarkable maturity for his age and a great perspective on life, but something about being independent brought out this attitude of joy that is entirely infectious.  You wonder why there are not more people like Scott in the world to off set the evil.  I love this kid.  As a side note and as a tender mercy, he has some lucky numbers.  I think they are like 1135 or something like that.  Anyways he laughs about it, because he always see's those numbers on mile markers, or addresses or randomly through out life.  They just always appear.  Well after he got his call and read it, about 5 minutes later he just kept saying "No Way" No way!  He then explained to us that the zip code for New York, New York were those exact lucky numbers he always saw.  Talk about a tender mercy. God knows us.  God knows him.  That gave him a light I will never forget.

The kids eating my dutch oven lasagna.  Tasted pretty good I thought!

Games in Krista's trailer.

Ahh the campfires.  We're all getting older now, so where most of the boys and were off causing some trouble or playing night games, it was funny to see all of us and our spouses and kids around the fire for once.

Easter Egg Hunt

It was so fun to have my entire family there!  From left to right and in birth order...Krista, Brett, me, Tallie, Neal, Mark, and Scott.  (yes I am the shortest one in my family by a long shot.)

Add in the pa and ma.

being crazy with tallie

and with our spouses...except for Scott :)

At Goblin Valley

Always on backpack duty.

This was their tough guy faces - I can think of something else Seth looks like he is doing.  (with Mason)

Alexa, Seth, Mason, Jaq, Zack and Anna

Little camping baseball

...even Jaq gave it a go!

This place was a gem of a find.  It was this ENORMOUS sand hill just one mountain over from where we were camping (like a 5 min walk).  Pure sand.  So while the boys went out shooting, Tallie and I took the kids and played in the sand.  The softest sand ever, with no weeds....so weird and random in the middle of nowhere. 

Gaven, Jaq, Collin, and Seth right as the sun was setting.

Collin was definitely in sensory overload.  He loved it though.

And this picture just cracks me up.  Can this face of Collin's be any more clear about taking more pictures?

The kids and I on a four-wheeler ride (Tallie and Jim brought them and we had a blast!)

Seth was in boy heaven! 

With a four wheeler just his size, he did pretty good and started to really get the hand of it.

And once they knew they could ride the little one, they figured they were big enough for the big ones.

Overall, a great trip!  It was fun to just see my own siblings and to be honest compared to most years, I didn't see many of my other cousins there.  Love this great tradition!