Snack Time!

I am still behind on my blogging, but I had to post this before I forgot about it.

Last Sunday, we had breakfast for dinner - french toast, eggs, and sausage. I had to leave for a meeting so Stefan was left to watch the kids. There was some french toast left over so Carson said that he wanted to take a piece for his snack at school the next day. He got a baggie and put a slice of french toast in it. Stefan told him that he couldn't take french toast to school. Stefan then left the kitchen. A few minutes later he heard someone up in the cupboard getting something. Stefan snuck out of the bedroom and into the kitchen to see what was going on. There he saw Carson getting a paper plate down from the cupboard. He then watched Carson take it into his room. Stefan followed him to see what he was up to. He saw Carson put the paper plate into his backpack. Then Carson turned around and was startled to see Stefan there. Carson was looking really guilty, and Stefan was wondering why sneaking a paper plate would be so wrong. Stefan then went to check his backpack, and there he found the paper plate, the bag with the french toast, AND the bottle of syrup!!

When I got home, Stefan told me about the incident. We had a good laugh about it, and thought how funny it would've been if Carson had actually gotten away with it. His teacher would have been so shocked!!

That's Carson for you!!

(By the way, somehow he did manage to sneak just the piece of french toast to school for his snack. His teacher said she thought it was funny.)

Garrett's 3rd Birthday

In June, Garrett turned 3 years old. He was very excited to be be three! He really likes Mickey Mouse so I made him a Mickey Mouse cake. He loved that!! We are so glad that Garrett is in our family. He is an outgoing person and will talk to almost anyone he sees (sometimes it makes me worry a little). He makes us laugh with the funny things he says and does.





After eating cake

Riley's Baptism

On April 21st Riley was baptized. Riley was baptized on the same day as his good friend Ben. He was excited about that! We are glad that he made the right choice to be baptized. It was a very nice day, and are glad for the family and friends that came to see him get baptized.

Our trip to General Conference

When Keslie turned 8 a couple years ago I wanted to take her to Utah for General Conference since she was old enough to go in. That didn't happen, and so this year when I knew that Riley would turn 8 just before General Conference in April I decided that we better take this opportunity to take both of them since it would be a couple more years before we could go again (I am due General Conference weekend in October). We left Carson and Garrett with my parents and Stefan's parents. We knew it would be too hard of a trip to take them with us.

We left on Thursday (not as early as we should have). We had to stop at the dam in Page to show the kids. They were pretty amazed by it!






I wanted to go through Zion's National Park so that added more on to our time. I love driving through the long tunnel. The bad thing was that it was pretty much dark when we drove through, but the good part was that we didn't have to pay the $25 entry fee (which I didn't know about) just to drive through.

Here are a couple of pictures, but like I said it was pretty much dark so you can't see the pictures really well.



We were supposed to make it almost to Salt Lake City that day to stay with my aunt & uncle. Because we left so late by the time we got to Cedar City we were tired and ready to stop for the night. We were able to find a cheap hotel for the night.

On Friday morning we were on the road again. I started out driving. It had been a mixture of rain and snow while I was driving. After a while I got tired and was going to pull over for Stefan to drive. When I started to go onto the exit ramp I applied the brakes, and then all of the sudden I hit a patch of black ice. It spun me back onto the freeway and the car seemed to be sliding all over the place. I had no idea what to do. It was like I was watching it all in slow motion. I was so afraid that we were going to flip. I think the car spun around one full time. By the time it was over with the car came to a stop in the emergency lane. We were all freaked out, especially the kids!! I was so thankful that there weren't any other cars right around or we would have hit them. I know that we were being watched over. We were so grateful that we were safe.

We made it to Salt Lake a couple of hours later. We spent the day touring church sites. First we went to Welfare Square. We learned a lot about the welfare system of the church. At Welfar Square they have DI, an employment center, a grain mill, and a cannery. We got to see the place where they make bread and cheese, and bottle milk. Because it was Friday there wasn't much going on so we didn't get to see a lot of stuff (machines & people) in action.






We went and checked into our hotel and then walked down to Temple Square. We went to the visitor's center and saw a presentation about families. Then we walked around the Temple and the Conference Center. It had been a long day for us so we headed back tour hotel to relax. There was an Olive Garden right next to our hotel so that is where we went for dinner.







On Saturday, we got up early because we had tickets to get into the Conference Center. It was a neat experience being able to be inside the Conference Center. We got to be there when Elder Neil L. Andersen was called to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. After the session was over, we went back to the hotel for lunch. Since we came all the way to Utah for conference, I wanted to go back to Temple Square for the afternoon session to watch it. We didn't have tickets for the Conference Center again, so I was just thinking that we would try to get in to the Tabernacle. Stefan left a few minutes ahead of us to see if we could by chance get into the Conference Center again. Luckily he found someone who was giving away 4 tickets. The bad thing was that two tickets where in one spot, and two were in another so we had to split up, but we were glad that we got to go in again.


I loved the pretty flowers that were on Temple Square!





That evening Stefan went to the priesthood session and the kids and I went swimming in the hotel pool. The pool was supposed to be heated, but it didn't feel heated to me. The kids got in for a couple of minutes and then they were ready to get out. When Stefan got back we went to IHOP for dinner. It had been another long day! We went back to the hotel and crashed!

On Sunday morning we woke up and watched conference on TV in the hotel. After the first session of conference we headed back for home. We didn't want the kids to miss any more school, and Stefan had to get back for work. It was a long drive home.

We made a quick stop to play in the snow.

Garrett

I just wanted to do a quick little post about Garrett. Lately he has been saying some funny things to me that I wanted to remember.

The other day I was trying to take something away from him - I don't remember what it was, but he said in a tough sounding voice, "I am stronger than you!".

Last week he lost or took off his glasses in our green belt. I couldn't find them until the next day. I told him that we needed to go look for his glasses. He told me "no", and then I said, "Don't you want to find your glasses?". His response was "No, I hate them.".

On Monday I was taking him outside to show him something. He went to go get his shoes, and I told him that he didn't need his shoes on. He said, "Oh, no shoes, just our feet!"

Riley turns 8!!

At the end of March, Riley turned 8 years old. I can't believe my kids are growing up so fast!! He got to have a party with friends. We went to the park and the kids had an Easter Egg hunt, and played a little golf (it was a little hard to hit the ball with long grass), and some baseball. They ate pizza and had cupcakes. Riley seemed to have a great time. I forgot to bring my camera so I didn't have it until the end when Stefan brought it to me.




We had to light the cupcake in the box because the wind was so strong and kept blowing the candles out. I was just hoping that the flames weren't going to catch the whole box on fire.

The boys all seemed to have a good time!




The next day, on his birthday, we had to run some errands. We wanted to get Riley a Cub Scout shirt for his birthday so we had to go up to north Mesa to the Scout Shop to get what he needed. We tried to make it seem like this was a fun trip for him, even though we realized that why we were way up in that part of Mesa that there were several stores that we needed to go to. Luckily there was the Bass Pro Shop right there so Stefan took the kids in there so they could see the fish and other neat things in there. Riley also got to practice shooting a gun - a fake one at their shooting range. He thought that was a lot of fun. Then we went to Chik-fil-a for lunch. We chose a place to eat that had a play area for the kids so Riley would think this trip was all for him. :)
That evening we had foil dinners and roasted marshmallows. I put 8 candles in a marshmallow for him to blow out.






We are so grateful to have Riley in our family. He brings a lot of joy to us, and I love his smile and laugh. He is a good worker too!

*I wanted to post a baby picture on here, but I don't have one on my computer since I didn't have a digital camera when he was a baby, and we don't have a scanner.

A Trip to the Tucson Zoo

Over Spring Break I took the kids down to the Tucson Zoo. I personally like the Tucson Zoo way better than the Phoenix Zoo. You can get so much closer to the animals, you don't have so much walking to do, it is way cheaper, and they have a polar bear too. My sisters-in-law came too with their kids. We had a good time, even though it was pretty crowded, and a little on the warm side.











I know it's hard to see what this is a picture, but this is a little monkey. This monkey was so cute, but for some reason it seemed like it did not want it's picture taken. I was trying to make noises to get the monkey to look at me, but it would not look. One time I had my camera aimed and ready to snap the picture, and the monkey looked really quick, and it seemed like when he saw the camera he quickly turned away. I don't know if the monkey was that smart, but it sure seemed like it. I thought it was funny!





The whole crew!


Garrett being silly - I don't remember what why he was doing that.