Birthdays!

The end of October is always a party week at our house. With Andrew's birthday, Halloween and Emma's birthday, we have fun all week long!
Andrew's birthday was on Sunday. We had the primary program that day too (another busy day!), so we had to get to church early. He was very patient in waiting to open his presents until after church :) He is nine this year. I cannot believe my little chubby baby is so grown up! He is such a joy to have in our lives. He is by far my easiest child. Not that I am picking favorites, just saying that is very easy going. He's always happy and easy to please. Never complains, never wants what he doesn't have. It's just his personality. I never have to nag him, he just does what he is supposed to. That has just always been him. He is a great kid to be around. He makes a room light up by coming in. He has such a happy personality. I love this little guy! Well, big guy now. Happy Birthday Andrew!

$50 from Grandma and Grandpa. Awesome!

Football cake for my football loving boy!

Emma's Princess castle cake. It is lopsided and funny looking, but she loved it!

All she really wanted was her very own pink camping chair! She was so excited :)

Emma was next. The big 4 this year! Now that is hard to believe. It is wonderful to have my youngest not be a baby anymore. It makes my life so much easier. I feel very blessed to have a girl in my family. She is constantly reminding me to how lucky I am to have a girl buddy :) She is always by my side. Cooking, cleaning, playing. I just love how "girly" she can be. We have so much fun with tea parties and hair bows. I love spending so much time together while the boys are in school. What a great blessing my children are to me. I love watching them grow and learn as they become older each year.

A quick trip to the park

We have a tradition in our family that every year for the Priesthood session of General Conference, we drop Jeremy off at the church and then head to the park. I think I started doing this when I had small, cranky kids and could not imagine another night at home alone with them! The park always is fun. Anyway, we do it twice a year and pick up a pizza on the way home. This year, I was so tired from being at football all day, but of course the kids did not want to give up a couple hours at the park. Now that Ethan is 12, he went with Jeremy and the rest of us enjoyed a great evening outside! I love the cooler weather we have had lately. It almost makes the summer worth it :)

The highlight of the night was the big irrigation pond we found!

Eli asked if he could get his feet wet. This wasn't quite what I had in mind.

My little monkey.

Andrew thought he could fit in the baby swing. Getting him out was a bit tricky :)

Tis the Season...

For football that is. Our lives seem to revolve around it. Between games on Saturdays, 3 days of practice during the week, NFL and college games, by boys don't seem to get enough of it! I'm not sure I really understand the love of football. It really must be a boy thing.
Their games are really fun to watch though. It is SO much more enjoyable than soccer! I really look forward to Saturdays. It's been fun to travel to different (and cooler) places. I just wanted to share a few more pictures. Andrew got his first touchdown Saturday. It was awesome! I could barely take pictures I was jumping up and down so much! Ethan caught a great punt return and ran for 20 yards or so before being tackled. It was a fun filled day.

There goes Andrew for his first touchdown. He broke 4 tackles on his way. Awesome!

Andrew takes football very seriously. He is always very serious about doing his best. If he sticks with it, he'll be really good someday. He has a lot of focus and determination to get better.

My two football boys. I'm so proud of them this year! They are working hard.

Ethan's awesome catch!

Clay, Andrew, Ethan and Cole. They have been friends for years and playing football with each other has been a great experience.

More Football

Ethan had his first football game this week. It was a home game. To be honest, I was dreading it. It was a crispy 110 degrees at the start of his game. We had to be there 2 hours early. That is 4 hours out in the heat too long. Thankfully Jeremy brought his big shade. That made all the difference in the world. It was at least tolerable. I felt bad for those poor boys out there playing. They all made it through okay though.
Ethan's team won 42-0. They have a couple of extraordinary players on their team. Ethan got quite a bit of playing time. He's definitely learning so much this year. He's still the smallest, but he's hanging in there! We can't wait until next week!

Ethan heading onto the field.

Emma hanging out in the shade.

That is Ethan in the middle, yes the smallest one!

Believe it or not, there was a kid on the other team smaller than Ethan!

Scout Camp - Better Late then Never

I realize that I am running two months behind on this one, but I finally got some pictures (Courtesy of Hank a.k.a Cole's grandpa!). Ethan had his first chance to attend scout camp this summer. It was the week of his birthday, so they let him go, even though he wasn't quite 12 until the middle of the week. I honestly can't believe he's old enough to leave me for a week! The only reason I really was okay with it is because Jeremy is the assistant scoutmaster and went along! At least for the first 4 days, then he had to head home for work.
I was such a great experience for him. He worked hard and earned 4 merit badges and started 2 more. He was up at 6:00 every morning and not in bed until 10:00. He was exhausted by the end of the day, but he survived! It was a great opportunity to get to know the boys in his troop and experience the great outdoors.
I was a little sad to miss his birthday, but he didn't seem to mind. The boys gave him a little pie with a candle in it. He had a fun time and learned many new things. I am so proud of him and the great accomplishments he is making in his young life!

Jeremy serving up some dutch oven dessert.

Ethan and Cole working on their canoeing merit badge. They had to capsize their canoe, then get back in.

This time they had to swim the flooded canoe all the way back to the shore. It was their favorite merit badge. Lots of work, but fun too!

Working on the rifle shooting merit badge.

Wilderness Survival merit badge with Cole and Brandon. They had to build a shelter and sleep in it overnight. They were roughing it!

Here are all the boys. It was a great week!

Football

Well, we've finally entered the world of football. I'm not quite sure what I think about this yet. I won't lie, the practice schedule is really tough. The first three weeks were 5 days a week. The boys would get home late and still have to shower and eat dinner. It made for some super cranky school day mornings. Thankfully Jeremy has gone to most of the practices and I can keep the little guys home and at least get them to bed on time.
On the other hand, it's been a really good experience for Ethan and Andrew. Jeremy has really had a great time going to practice and helping them learn what they need to know.  He is SO excited to have boys in football :) 
 Ethan is on the majors team. 12-14 year olds. He missed the age deadline for the younger group by only a week. So he is the youngest and smallest on his team. He's hanging in there are doing really well in practice. We're proud of him!
Andrew is on the youngest group. 6-8 year olds. So, he is lucky. He's one of the biggest on his team. He had his first game this past Saturday. He did so good! He is a running back on offense and defensive end on defense. He hurt his foot and missed the second half. He was heartbroken, but could barely walk. He's better today, but it will be sore for a while.
Ethan's game was cancelled, so he has to wait until this Saturday for his first one. It will be here, so very hot! I have sat through 6 years of soccer games and I don't think I was ever so excited as I was watching Andrew on Saturday! Even the little kids were so fun to watch. I am so impressed at how good those little boys do. We are really looking forward to the next few months of games. I'm sure I'll have more pictures soon!

Andrew and his proud Dad. Jeremy is in heaven with all this football :)

Andrew's best friend Clay is playing too.  They are having a great time together.

Andrew on offense.

Go Andrew!

Ethan's Backpacking Trip

Ethan got to go on  his first scout backpacking trip last weekend. It's hard to believe that he is old enough for me to send off on an overnight scout trip. I was secretly hoping Jeremy would go, so that I wouldn't really feel like I was sending him off a long. Of course he had to work, so Ethan was off with 2 scout leaders, 4 other boys and one awesome Grandpa volunteer! Cole's grandpa came along and took all of the great pictures. The boys loved having him. He is a lot of fun and knows a ton about scouting.

The boys left Friday morning and hiked up near Lynx lake in Prescott. They slept on the ground, with no tent. They cooked all of their own meals and hiked in all of their supplies! I was really proud of how well they all did. Ethan's pack weighed in at 31 pounds. He was sure it weighed 100! That is pretty heavy though for someone who only weighs 89 pounds. He had such a great time! I am so thankful for the scouting program and the adults who volunteer their time. I am also so grateful that Ethan has such a great group of boys his age. What a wonderful opportunity to learn and be independent. He had a great time!

The scouts and leaders after the hike. They were tired and dirty, but had a fantastic time!

Ethan and Cole, ready for the hike.

Ethan found a couple horny toads.

Ethan and his fellow scouts, Cole, Tanner, Austin, Brandon.

Cooking a spaghetti dinner.

Ethan carrying wood for their fort.

The boys' fort!

The Photobooth

Nathan and Keri had a photobooth at their reception in San Diego. It was one of the greatest ideas ever. We all had such a blast taking silly pictures! What fantastic idea. I just thought I'd share some of the funny pictures we ended up with.