The McDowell Family

Crew's 1st Birthday Party

2011-11-06T23:09:00.000-08:00

So, to celebrate Crew's 1st Birthday we had some friends and family over for a little birthday party. On Pinterest I had seen several one year old cookies and milk themed birthday parties and I loved the idea so I decided to go with that theme. I didn't spend nearly as much time on the party as they did, but I had fun taking some of their ideas and putting together Crew's party.

So, I made and bought a whole bunch of different kind of cookies as refreshments for the party.

I also bought these flavored milk straws our guests could use to drink with their cups of milk. And I bought Dejong Dairy's chocolate milk.

Here is his cake I made him.

I made his birthday banner with this cute circus font I found online and then I put pictures up of each month of his first year of life.

Crew with this buddies Cohen and I think Sabrina (or Whitney Amy you might have to correct me). The babies loved the bucket that we kept the milk in because of the ice. I think they liked the ice more than the cookies.

Lyric, Macie, Mazzi and Carson enjoying their oreo pops.

The birthday boy!

Time to open presents.

Then it was cake time!

Not so messy at first.

Then he realized how good it was.

And then my favorite- he decided, "Who needs hands?" and just stuck his face right in. It was hilarious.

Grandpa McDowell making him laugh.

Time to get all cleaned up.

All better.

Crew and his siblings playing with his new gifts. I think Brock, Dax and Mckynlee were more excited about Crew's gifts than he was. Though Crew loved that they were all playing and interacting with him.

Looks like he had a pretty fun party.

More MerMae Dolls

2011-11-03T18:02:00.000-07:00

Well I did it again. I had made a couple of Mermaids for the Craft Sale I did back in September and I had many friends begging me to make them ones for their daughters who didn't get a jump on those 2 dolls. So I had 4 requests, so I decided to make 5 and try and sell the extra so I could earn money to pay for our family pictures. Well the extra one went quickly. So on top of Dax's birthday and Halloween and getting ready for Crew's birthday I've been making these Mermaid dolls. I took my time, no cramming them in like I did for Mckynlee's birthday, but I definitely need a break from sewing now. But, now I have some $ to get us some cute family pictures!

Makes Me Smile :)

2011-11-01T22:56:00.000-07:00

Brock was reading to his siblings and I thought it was adorable. I just had to take a picture. I love to see my kids bonding like that.

Halloween 2011

2011-10-31T22:46:00.000-07:00

We had a great Halloween this year. We started it off with the school parade. The boys were so excited to get dressed up in their costumes for school. Here is Brock with his buddy Aiden.

Mckynlee and Crew watching the parade.

Daxton the Phantom!

Megatron Brock.

Daxton's class.

I got to help out in Dax's class for his class party. Here they are enjoying their Halloween treats. They got so much stuff and trick-or-treating hadn't even begun.

We then had a little Halloween get together at our house. Our friends the Cooks were visiting from out of town so we had them over along with some of our other good friends for some taco soup, quesidillas, hot cider, witch's brew apple juice and pumpkin bread pudding. My mom had done the apple juice thing with the dry ice and I thought it would be cool to do for the kids. It was fun to watch the smoke come out of the cauldron, but I didn't realize it would make the juice carbonated, my kids had no desire to drink it after that (they aren't soda fans). It least it gave us that Halloween feel.

All the kids, 20 to be exact. It's funny to think that when we all first met and started hanging out there was only 9 kids between us. 4 to 5 years later we know have more than doubled our group.

Some shots of the kids in their costumes before we headed out trick or treating.

Dax got sick of his mask by the time school got out. He didn't wear it trick-or-treating.

Mckynlee playing with Mazzi and Easton before we headed out, with Crew trying to join in the fun.

By the end of the night my kids could barely hold their buckets, they were overflowing. People would just give them handfuls at each house they went to. We have way too much candy, most of it will probably end up in the trash. It's all in the experience though and we had such a great Halloween.

Carving Pumpkins

2011-10-30T22:44:00.000-07:00

The kids couldn't wait to carve their pumpkins this year. We had bought them more at the beginning of the month and they've been asking and asking for when they could finally carve them. We let me do it the night before Halloween so they wouldn't rot.

Brock and Dax did their own, with a little help and Mckynlee told me what she wanted.

I just love trying to get a perfect picture of all my kids, they look so sad hear when they were far from being sad. Oh well, at least they're all looking at the camera.

Just Because

2011-10-29T22:42:00.000-07:00

After Dax's soccer game we saw a street fair and took the kids over. They had free games and face painting and Mckynlee and Dax wanted to get it done. Mckynlee chose an angel.

Dax wanted to be a skeleton.

These are just random pics I took of Crew. He cracks us up with this hat thing he has going on. He loves to put on hats and crawl around and its so cute.

Mckynlee Breaks Her Arm

2011-10-28T22:41:00.000-07:00

Well we had our first broken bone out of the kids. Who would of thought it would be the girl? Last week when we were at our Couple's Halloween party we came home and the babysitter said Mckynlee and fallen back into the toy bucket and broke the bucket and hurt her arm, but that she calmed down and was fine. The next day she complained that her wrist hurt, so we thought she just sprained it. The whole week after she didn't complaining about it unless you touched it and she was always holding her arm close to her body. It was a crazy week with Dax's birthday party and birthday, but I finally got her into the doctor Thursday to find she had fractured both her bones in her forearm near her wrist. So Friday morning we had to head to Riverside to the hospital to orthopedics for her to get a cast on. They didn't have purple casts, but they had pink and she was so excited about that. That's what she tells people when they ask about her arm, that she fell in the toy bucket and broke her arm and got a pink cast and that the doctors didn't have purple. She cried a lot when they were putting it on but once it was on she was proud. I guess the girls have the bad luck in this family. Clint has never broken a bone and none of our boys have, but I broke my shoulder when I was young and my hand as a teenager and now Mckynlee has had her first broken bone. Let's hope its the last.

Daxton Turns 6!

2011-10-28T22:35:00.000-07:00

I can't believe Daxton is 6! Well I can, he definitely seems older at times. Oh how I love this kid, he is so good and helpful and responsible. He was so excited to turn 6. This was his first birthday being in the bunkbed and the balloon situation was tricky, but I made it work and he didn't notice them until he woke up in the morning and he loved having his birthday reminder above him.

He couldn't wait to open his presents.

He didn't ask for much, just 3 things, which made it easy for me. A Mario shirt.

A hat and a video game. All these things I thought were a little old for a kindergartener to want, but like I said he acts older than he is and he was happy.

His birthday breakfast request was Costco's pumpkin muffins.

Crew playing with Dax's gift.

For dinner Dax wanted to go to McDonalds. I'm not a huge fan of McDonalds and it was funny because when we were heading to dinner he said, "Mom, it's my birthday and I want to go McDonalds so you can't say no", I thought it was so cute, because I usually shoot them down when they suggest McDonalds when we want to grab a bite to eat. But his wish was our command and all the kids were so excited about it.

His other birthday request was to attend a football game. Well he lucked out, his birthday fell on a Friday this year so we took him to our local high school football game. He was so excited, he had talked about it all day. He is really getting into watching sports these days. It was fun hearing the kids cheer on the team and watch the game.

Even Mckynlee had fun, she mainly just wanted to watch the cheerleaders and was excited to find out that mommy was one once before. She now says, "I want to be a cheerleader just like you mom".

Crew chillin' with dad watching the game. Clint's parents also joined us at the game.

After the game we headed back to our house where Dax opened his gift from his Grandpa and Grandma McDowell. The Star Wars Lego he wanted!

And then, instead of a birthday cake he requested pumpkin pie for his birthday. This boy loves pumpkin. We were out of candles so he just got one candle to blow out.

I'd have to say he had a pretty good birthday. We love you Dax, Happy 6th Birthday!

Daxton's Mario Themed Birthday Party

2011-10-26T22:25:00.000-07:00

Daxton really wanted a Mario themed birthday this party, so a Mario Birthday Party we gave him. We did his birthday party several days before his birthday so his best friend, Davis, could be there, because he was going to be out of town on Dax's actual birthday. Surprisingly enough finding stuff for a Mario party was harder than I thought. I had to get most my stuff from google images and create my own stuff. The only party favor I had that had to do with Mario was a Wii remote candy dispenser, then we just added some of Daxton's favorite Candy into the favor bags. Here is the table set up. We did mushroom cupcakes. He wanted me to do red and green cupcakes with white in the middle and then an "M" or "L" in the middle of each one for Mario and Luigi (funny that he had such a strong opinion about it), but I tried it and it just wasn't working out, so I convinced him that the mushrooms were a good idea.

Thanks to the Internet I found some great game ideas. I got this "Yoshi Egg Smash" idea from a blog I found. I blew out the yoke of all these eggs and then painted them to look like Yoshi's eggs.

Then I drew this picture of Yoshi for the kids to throw the eggs at during the obstacle course I set up.

Here the boys are waiting to start the obstacle course.

I wanted them to kind of feel like they were in the video game. For the obstacle course they had to climb through the tunnels, throw Yoshi's egg at him for the "Yoshi Egg Smash", fill the bucket with sand, ride on a bike and circle around 3 times, they then had to run under the tramp and pop a balloon which had gold coins in it and grab the coins and then they had to get on the tramp and pop another balloon and get some more gold coins, get off and go through another tunnel and then they were done. They each got gold coins at each station, the balloon pop was what decided who had the most coins. Whomever had the most coins won.

Then we had the boys play musical mushrooms. I printed up these mushrooms and laminated them.

I set them on the floor in a circle and had the boys stand on them, then I played some Mario Brothers music that I had downloaded and we played it like musical chairs, taking away a mushroom each turn.

Here are the boys playing it.

Then we played the skittles game. Have you ever played it? I first played it at my cousin Heidi's birthday when I was little and I loved it. Normally you play with a couple of dice and if you roll a 7 or 11 you suck up as many skittles as you can with a straw until some one else rolls those numbers. So to make it Mario style I made my own dice and put Mario characters on it and every time the kids rolled Mario they got to make their pile of skittles until the next kid got it. The older kids of the group got the concept but some of the younger kids didn't, probably should have waited a year or two to play that game. They had fun though.

Then it was time to open presents!

So I had the kids do another thing I always did as a child at birthday parties and at my own parties and that was "Heavy, Heavy Hangover". Where Dax closes his eyes and I pick one of his friends and they grab their gift to him and say the little saying in a funny voice and bop him on the head with the present and he has to guess who it is. After listening to the saying I realized it probably wasn't appropriate for kids to say, don't know why I never noticed as a child, you know talking about hangovers and stuff, I should probably make up my own version. Anyways, despite that they didn't think anything of it and thought it was fun.

Then it was cupcake time and time to sing to the birthday boy!

The birthday crew! Mckynlee, Daxton, David, Luke, Mathew, Brendan, Carter, Eli, Davis, Aiden, Jackson, Daylen, Jacob and Brock.

It was definitely crazy having all those boys over, especially when they were all on the tramp.

Daxton's loot. He had a great party, I had stressed about it, but it turned out and he loved it.

Ward Harvest Festival Trunk-or-Treat

2011-10-23T23:03:00.000-07:00

This year our ward did a Harvest Festival for our Trunk-or-Treat. Everything was outside in the parking lot. It was a lot of fun. There were lights hanging outside, they had a bonfire and bluegrass music playing. It was different that our ward Halloween Party in previous years and I really liked it.

This year Mckynlee chose to be Snow White for Halloween. We actually bought the costume a month and a half ago, but I wouldn't let her wear it until Halloween, so it's been sitting in her closet and she's been dying to wear it. We straightened her hair to look straight like Snow White, she looked so pretty and she absolutely loved her costume.

Daxton chose to be a Phantom, Crew was a fireman and Brock was Megatron.

At the Harvest Festival the kids enjoyed hot dogs while the adults enjoyed some chili, there was a chili cook off contest.

Savanna and Mckynlee, the two Snow Whites. The funny thing is that last year they were both Tinker Bell. Not planned either year, Katie and I just think alike or I should say Savanna and Mckynlee think alike. Though Katie made Savanna's costumes both year, I have not been so ambitious.

Then Mckynlee found her best friend Mazzi!

Crew eating a pine cone.

Dax playing one of the games set up. The Young Men and Young Women were in charge of doing games for all the primary aged kids. I think the kids had a lot more fun being outside this year.

Brock with his buddy Aiden.

Dax with his best friends Davis and Eli.

The men in our ward playing the blue grass music.

(Bro. Snider, Bro. Caruso and Bro. Knight)

The party, doesn't it look fun?!

Me and my princess.

The princess and her daddy.

Mr. Brock after he finished the cake walk.

Mckynlee getting ready to trunk-or-treat with her friends Savannah and Mazzi.

Getting their loot.

The kids had a blast and were tired and now it was time to enjoy the candy. The got way too much candy!

4th Annual Couples Halloween Party

2011-10-21T19:14:00.000-07:00

We attended our 4th Annual Couples Halloween Party this year with our friends. This year our friends Janitsy and Nathaniel Anderson were our gracious hosts. It was fun as always with friends, food and games and we always enjoy seeing what everyone comes dressed up us. Clint and I get a little more daring each year. Maybe next year we'll shock you!

Clint and I - Cop and Convict

The Nelsons- Where's Waldo

The Hackers and the Thompsons - The Spice Girls (hilarious, might I add) Rob was Scary Spice, Meagan was Baby Spice, Matt was Sporty Spice and Kyra was Ginger Spice.

The Hannons - Clint a 70's dude (I'm assuming) and Kim as Little Red Riding Hood (Only a few weeks after her serious broken leg injury we were so glad to see her there!)

The Uphams - ACDC guy and his groupy! (haha Cristol didn't like being called a groupy, I can't remember what she called herself)

The Chalkers - characters from the movie "Date Night"

The Andres's - Jem from Jem and the Holograms and her arch-nemesis Pizzazz.

The Chathams - Finding Nemo characters, Dr. P. Sherman and his niece Darla

The Gunnells and the Andersons (our hosts) - Dia De Los Muertos (Day of the Dead?). They did not plan this, just happened to pick the same costume.

The Decocqs - Pacmen

The Fergusons - Burt and Mary Poppins

The Grays - Jesse and Woody from Toy Story (Amy made these costumes all by herself, we were all so impressed)

The Harris's - Mile High Club

The Holmes - Charlie Sheen and his girl (not sure if she was suppose to be the girl from "Two and a Half Men" or his girlfriend, forgot to ask)

The Jensens - Greek Characters

Christine Arseneaux (sp?) and Erin Rix, were husbandless for the night - a witch and Adventure Barbie

The Gargalis's - From The Nightmare Before Christmas

The women just hanging out and chatting.

The men hanging out and chatting. It was a fun night, we have such a great group of friends here, we look forward to next years party.

Silly Boy

2011-10-17T19:09:00.000-07:00

Crew is such a silly baby. His new thing is finding either one of Clint's or the boy's hats and putting it on and crawling around. He looks so adorable. The today I was doing homework with Brock and felt Crew pulling at my leg underneath the table. I look down to see this, I couldn't help but smile!

And then I came up stairs later to find him in Mckynlee's bathroom. He had found one of her brushes and was brushing his own hair, adorable!

Witch Party

2011-10-12T23:27:00.000-07:00

This year my friend Kyra started the tradition of having a "Witch Party" where a bunch of us girlfriends dress up as witches and enjoy a night of witchy fun.

My witch outfit was thrown together kind of last minute. Thanks to target and it's dollar spot a lot of us had the same witch hats. And many of us had the same tights, as did Janitsy Melissa and I did.

It was fun seeing everyone in their witch costumes.

It was a night full of fun, eating and games like catch the candy corn and "Witchy, Witchy, Witch" ( or as most people know "Dippy, Dippy, Dip" I was brought back to college days when we used to play that game in our apartment late at night with a bunch of people) and guessing famous witches.

Kyra also put together a witchy craft for us to all do. We all made little boards that said "A Witch lives here with ther little MONSTERS", they were so cute!

The stragglers at the end of the party - Kyra, Meagan, me, Carly, Heather and Susie. I had so much fun, thanks so much Kyra for thinking of this and putting it together. I look forward to it being a tradition.

Daxton's Kindergarten Field Trip To The Peltzer Farm Pumpkin Patch

2011-10-12T22:41:00.000-07:00

I had to the chance to be a volunteer on Daxton's first Kindergarten fieldtrip. The fieldtrip was down in Temecula at the Peltzer Farm Pumpkin Patch. Dax was looking forward to it so much and he was so excited that I was going with him.

Here are the group of boys I was in charge of for the day. Maverick, Daxton and his two buddies from church that are also in his school class, Jackson and Brendan.

This was also Daxton's first time on a school bus. He thought it was pretty cool, as did all the kids except for on the way back when they were all hot and tired. On the way back he said it was the longest ride ever.

All the kindergarten stayed with their own classes. His class's first stop was the petting zoo.

All the kids petting the baby bunny.

They even got to feed the animals.

Washing their hands after the petting zoo.

Next they got to go see and learn about all the different plants they plant there at the farm.

Then they got to meet the pig racers. I wish I remembered the pigs different names. They were a play on movie star names. The pigs get to race each other each afternoon. I was kind of bummed the kids didn't get to see the pigs race.

Daxton's class checking out the pigs.

Next we were off to the corn maze. Daxton and Jackson had been there before and were ready to lead our group through the maze and were so proud to be the fastest group through the maze.

The boys waiting for thier class to get through the maze.

Mrs. McDonal's kindergarten class.

Another class picture.

After that the kids got to go over to where the pumpkins were and pick out a small pumpkin to take home.

And then is was photo opp. time.

After posing for pictures we headed to the picnic area for lunch. The kids had fun, but they were hot and exhausted.

Dax and his buddies, we were sad Davis couldn't be with us throughout the day, but he had to stay with his class.

Me and my little man! I had so much fun on the fieldtrip with him. I was so glad I could go and be with him.

Crew And His Walker

2011-10-10T23:34:00.000-07:00

Crew's saucer turns into a walker and we just barely took it apart so he could use the walker. All our kids were walking by his age so we are trying to help him to get going on that. When we showed him how to use the walker he was so excited. He would get mad when he would walk into a wall or some other obstacle and then he could walk any more. You would turn it around and he would just walk and giggle. It was so cute!

Brock Takes Golf Lessons

2011-10-10T21:23:00.000-07:00

Brock has been asking to take golf lessons forever. Back when he was in first grade we received a flyer from the Boys and Girls club, but we were too late to sign up. So I thought I would just wait until the next flyer. But one never came, I would call the Boys and Girls club several times to find out that either the session had already began or they said they would contact me when one would start. They would never call me back. Well two years later another flyer came home and we jumped at the chance to sign Brock up. He was so excited. So each week for 6 weeks he would go to Summerly Golf course for group golf lessons.

These pictures were from his last day. They had pizza for the kids and then they handed out cute golf trophies that were piggy banks and shirts. Brock loved his trophy and shirt.

They were having a little competition to see which kids could hit golf balls through hula hoops they were holding. No one was hitting them through so they lowered the hoops. Still no one was getting them through really, but Brock was one of the few kids that did. He won a golf ball for doing so. I was so proud of him.

And as you can see he was proud of himself too.

I was so glad he finally got to do this. It has been hard finding sports that he is interested in so I was glad to find he enjoyed golf. Especially since Clint plays golf, it will be something they can enjoy doing together.

Oak Glenn Apple Orchards

2011-10-09T21:17:00.000-07:00

My friend Melissa set a day for us to go up to the apple orchards up in Oak Glen for us to get in our fall feel. Another friend in our ward takes their family up there often and told us about it, so we were excited to take the kids up there to do some apple and pumpkin picking. We almost didn't make it. On our way up there our car over heated and we had to pull to the side of the road. As we were driving to find a car place to see the problem the car all of the sudden seemed to be fine, we were grateful because the kids would have been so disappointed to not be able to go to the apple orchards. We stopped at the Riley Farms apple orchards. We couldn't find our friends so we just decided to go explore just our family.

It was really fun, all the workers were dressed up in old fashioned clothing and they had different activities that you could do like the apple press where you could make your own apple cider. They had archery and tomahawk throwing. Both our boys did the archery and tomahawk throwing. Here Daxton is above shooting his bow and arrow.

Mckynlee just hanging out while the boys did their activities. She was looking forward to the apple picking, since she absolutely loves apples.

Brock shooting his bow and arrow.

And our cute little man just hanging out enjoying being out in the mountain air. After the boys were done doing their activities we went apple picking. I was so mad because I went to pull out my camera to take pictures of the kids picking apples and my camera battery was dead. I was so bummed. After we finished picking apples we were going to let the boys pick pumpkins, but then they started closing down at that orchard. Brock was so upset. So we all got in the car ready to leave. We started to drive down the road to head back and we saw our friends cars parked down at another Riley's Farm entrance. So we stopped and got out and luckily at that section of the farm it was still ok to pick pumpkins and they had a better selection.

And luckily we found our friends and Melissa had her camera so she let me take pictures of the kids picking pumpkins. It was so pretty up there on the hill as the sun was setting. Here is Dax holding the pumpkin he picked out.

He kept changing his mind about what pumpkin he wanted, but he ended up just picking the first one he picked out.

Brock took this pumpkin picking business serious. It was so cute.

He finally found the perfect pumpkin. And he said to me, "Mom this is the best pumpkin ever!"

These pumpkins were obviously more than the pumpkins you could buy at the grocery store, so we only let Brock and Dax pick one. I let Mckynlee pick up a couple for picture taking purposes, but then we put them back when she wasn't noticing because we knew she would forget.

Walking back from picking our pumpkins.

Mckynlee holding Brock's pumpkin.

Just hanging out as the kids played.

Mckynlee with her besties Mazzi and Lyric.

Family shot. All the buildings there were old buildings probably built in the 1800's. After we were done up at the pumpkin patch we went to the restaurant they had there at Riley's farm. It was kind of cool, like I mentioned before all the workers were in old fashioned clothing. The inside of the restaurant was true to the time period. When we finally got to eating it was dark outside and they only lit the restaurant by candles so we were kind of eating in the dark, which was cool. They served delicious apple sauce with the kids meals, yummy sweet potato fries. I got a chicken pot pie which was delicious and the apple cider was amazing. We had such a good time and it was a great family activity, we'll definitely be taking the kids back up there, it was such a fun experience for them.

11 Months Old!

2011-10-08T23:11:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's only one more month until my baby turns a year! Yikes, its going by way to fast. Though, he will always be my baby, when do I have to stop hugging and squeezing and kissing him? I wish it was never. I mean seriously, look at this little guy, how can you resist. He's still not walking, but he doesn't mind, crawling does the trick. He thinks it's funny to shake is head "no" and he loves hanging around his siblings while they're playing. He's definitely growing up. We love you Crew Crew!

Just Some Shots I Took At Daxton's Game Today

2011-10-08T23:07:00.000-07:00

Conference Sunday

2011-10-02T20:48:00.000-07:00

I always say how I love Conference Weekend. My mom established a love for it in me ever since I was a child. Some of my fondest memories with my family were shared on Conference Weekend. Especially on Conference Sunday. My dad would always make omelets, mom would always have an activity for us to do so we would be willing to sit in the room and watch all of conference together as a family. My activities usually involved cross-stitch, latch hook or scrapbooking. She would always get my brothers Lego's to put together. But it all brought us together as a family to listen to the wonderful messages being taught by the leaders of our church. Though I don't remember the talks that were given at that time, I always remember the spirit that I felt and I will always cherish those memories with my family. It's fun seeing my kids get excited for conference. They look forward to it every 6 months, I always have different activities for them to do and they love it. This time around we did it a little different. In primary the Sunday before the Primary President gave the sharing time and gave each child a little baggy of stuff to do during conference. She talked about King Benjamin from the Book of Mormon and how all gathered there tents with their doors open to him to hear his message and she challenged the children to do the same. My kids were so excited to make a tent to watch conference in.

Conference Sunday came along and the kids reminded me about the story of King Benjamin and how they wanted to build a tent just like the people in the story. So I made a tent for them with the tent opening toward the TV so they could watch conference. They had their baggy of games like Bingo that they could participate in listening to the messages. They actually really listened and it was so fun watching them. Plus, it made it so I could enjoy conference also. I'm so glad we're building these memories for them and helping them appreciate the importance of hearing the Lord's leaders speak his message. I definitely think we'll add the tent thing to our traditions for Conference Sunday from now on.

Brock's 1st Cub Scout Meeting

2011-09-29T22:58:00.000-07:00

As I have mentioned before, Brock loves Cub Scouts. He's been begging me to go through this Wolf book to work on stuff with him and with the craft fair, homework, our cruise and other things going on I haven't had much time to sit down and work on stuff with him. Well his first pack meeting was coming up and I wanted him to be able to get his bobcat badge, as did he, so we sat down on Saturday and Sunday and worked at getting all the requirements done so he get it. We were able to get it done in time and he was able to go to his first pack meeting and get his Bobcat badge. He was so excited. He got to pin the mom pin on me for him getting the badge.

He was so cute he got to carry in the colors (I think that's how they say it), it was fun watching him carry the flag. It was a little awkward for him to carry, but he was proud to do it. It is so fun to see him enjoy scouts so much. Good job buddy on getting your first badge.

Daxton Is In Karate!

2011-09-28T22:47:00.000-07:00

Dax has been begging forever for me to put him in Tae Kwon Do, but from what I've heard it's pretty expensive and most places make you sign like a year contract and with him playing other sports I just didn't want to sign him up. One day he came home with a flyer from school that was put out by the city and they were advertising a self defense class that taught the martial arts and it was only $7 a week for 13 weeks. I thought was a great deal and a lot better than $100 a month so I signed him up. He was so excited. He absolutely loves it and is very serious about it. It is so cute.

Not only do they teach him martial arts but they teach them about safety and what to do when they're put in unsafe situations.

He is also taking the class with two of his buddies, Eli and Jackson. All three boys are so cute to watch. It's fun to hear them talk about karate outside of class, it's very serious business. So cute!

Sleeping Beauty

2011-09-27T23:42:00.000-07:00

Went in one night to check on Mckynlee sleeping before I went to bed to find her sleeping like this. I thought it was pretty funny.

Mckynlee And Her BFF's

2011-09-26T16:32:00.000-07:00

My friend Kyra had Mckynlee over to play the other day and took this pictures of her with her best friends, Mazzi and Lyric. These girls love each other, but they can also hate each other. They love to dress up and are adorable together. They are BFF's and they all three have very spunky personalities. We are all scared for when they become teenage girls. But we love them and I'm so glad Mckynlee already has such great friends!

Mommies Crafting For A Cause

2011-09-25T16:05:00.000-07:00

So about a month ago I was at a friend's house watching "The Bachelor" and we were talking and my friend Traci mentioned that a family in our ward, who has a daughter with autism and is deaf, was trying to earn money to pay for an assistance dog for their daughter. I had no clue they could train dogs to help autistic children, but they can, so neat I know. But anyways, this family had found a dog and received it but the cost was $6,000 for the dog and it's training, the person that sold it to them was going to give them time to pay it, but that is a lot of money and they were asking for donations. I had been to a garage sale several week prior where all the proceeds were donated to a girl that suffered from down syndrome. I thought that was so neat that someone did that, but as Traci was mentioning the Jensen family this garage sale popped into my head. We have so many crafty people in the ward and craft items sell for more money than used garage sale items so I thought to myself how cool would that be if we could do a big craft sale and donate the proceeds to the Jensens. Anyways I mentioned this to the girls at "Bachelor" night and they all said it was a great idea. But laughed and said, "you go and plan that Niki". I kind of laughed it off too, though I thought it was a good idea, I knew it could be a big undertaking. Well the thought kept nagging at me that I should put this thing together. I pushed it aside, but again I just felt really strongly that I needed to pursue it, I realized that was the Holy Ghost pushing me so I emailed the Jensens and told them my idea. They replied and said it would be wonderful if I would do that for them. Anyways, so I sent out mass facebook messages to the crafters in our ward and they passed it on to people they knew and we had a huge response. So many people were so excited to help and craft for a cause. I decided to call it, "Mommies Crafting for A Cause". Anyways, it was so fun. I made some plushie items, a car seat cover, key chains and several camera strap covers. It was so much more fun crafting as a service rather than for myself. It was so neat to see the response and so many people were involved in the whole process of helping me put this thing together. I planned it for the day after I got back from my cruise (not purposely), so I was stressed there for a little bit, but so many offered to jump in and take over while I was gone. Well the day came and it was such a success!

Our young woman created signs and banners to put around the neighborhood to advertise for us.

We had so many donations. Many had told me they were donating and what they were donating. But, there were many who showed up with items they had made that I didn't know were donating and people also did more than they said they were going to.

We had everything from baby blankets, to hair accessories, jewelry, clothing, home decor, holiday decor and much more.

We even decided last minute to do a bake sale also, there were so many people who didn't craft that wanted to participate also and offered to make baked goods to sell.

We had a Hispanic man come and check out Clint's tools, luckily we didn't have to tell him they weren't for sale.

The day was very successful and what we didn't sale we had plans to sell at another community garage sale the next week. We ended up earning almost $2,000. It way exceeded our expectations! Everyone enjoyed doing it so much that we decided that we were going to do it again next year for another family in need, closer to the Holidays. We were so excited we were able help the Jensen family so Mckenzie could get her guide dog, Lacy. It was such a neat experience that I was so glad to be apart of. Thank you everyone who helped out and participated, the Jensen family was so grateful for your service.

Our 4 Day Cruise

2011-09-24T21:27:00.000-07:00

Clint and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary this year. We had plans to go on a week long cruise with several good friends of ours this summer and the plans just fell through. But our friends, the Thompsons, decided to do a 4 day cruise instead and asked us to join them and we really wanted to do something special for such a big anniversary so we decided to go with them. It was just a short cruise, but seemed to be the perfect amount of time. We had such a wonderful time. It cost extra to use our cell phones so we didn't have contact with anyone and it was so nice to not have to worry about the kids. It was a much needed relaxing vacation and it was so nice to spend time with just Clint.

Here we are waiting at our "muster station" the first day to go over all the drills if something was to happen to the boat. Our station was at club Rex. We obviously didn't spend much time at club Rex, but the times we did were pretty interesting. We were entertained by the 60 year old woman and her husband and other gentlemen callers that would be dancing with her every night.

Here we are with the Thompsons at our dinner table. Our waiter was Sandy whan (sp? is totally off, but that's how you say his name), he was so much fun and along with the other members at our table we probably had the best table. It's too bad we didn't get a picture of the whole group. We especially enjoyed Gloria and George Lopez, ha ha we didn't really know their first names, I know that's crazy enjoying a meal with them every night and not getting their names. But Gloria, name unknown, reminded us of Gloria from Modern Family and her husband George Lopez, whom obviously reminded us of George Lopez were on their honeymoon and they cracked us up. We also had a guy at our table that looked exactly like John Cleese.

Our first day we spent the day in Catalina. Here we are being ferried out to the island from our ship. Clint and I kissing with the cruise ship in the background. I would say, "oh, how romantic" if Clint's eye's weren't wide open.

Matt and Kyra with the Casino in the back ground.

It's funny we were at a party our friends were hosting several weeks before and they were doing a scavenger hunt and one of the clues had to do with the "Casino" at Catalina. Before now we had never been to Catalina so I had no clue what the clue was talking about. So, Susie, now we know.

Kyra and I "taking the bull by it's horns".

We had a great time on Catalina. One of the things that we did was rent a golf cart to go tour the island. We did have an interesting experience though, Matt drove first and for a little bit he was driving crazy and this local made us pull over and was yelling lunatic ripped our keys out of the ignition and was so incredibly rude and then threw the keys back at Matt and made some other patrol guy follow us. It was ridiculous. The funny thing is Matt is a highway patrol officer, I felt he should have told him that. He was just being silly for a second and no one was around and the guy yelling at us had no authority, it was lame. Anyways, we still had fun despite our little encounter with the crazy guy.

Here we are at the top of the island with views below.

The last thing we did at Catalina was go parasailing. I was kind of scared before we did it, but it was so much fun and not scary at all. I actually thought it was relaxing. We didn't even have to touch the water if we didn't want to. Straight from boat to air back to boat. Here we are taking off.

Clint and I way up in the air.

It was so much fun and I'm so glad we did it. We did have him dip our feet in the water for a second and then they pulled us back up for a second and then pulled us back into the boat.

The Thompson's taking off.

I like this picture of the Thompson's in the air. It looks like they are so high up there.

That night after Catalina was the Captain's dinner, so it was the formal night. We weren't so formal but we did dress up.

After dinner it was up to the top of the boat for some silly pictures. My camera wasn't taking great pictures in the dark, so even though the quality isn't that great, the pictures are still fun. Kyra and Matt being silly.

Clint and I at the top of the ship.

The next day we spent in Ensenada, Mexico. The ship was going to rip us off for the excursions so we found someone once we got off the ship that took us to this place in Ensenada that did the tours and excursions for way cheap. Here we are waiting for our bus to take us on our day of adventure if you could call it that. We did get our taste of Mexico when we had to go get cash, we had a local take us to an ATM. It makes you so glad you live in the USA, it was so gross walking on their streets downtown.. We past one shop that had this huge disgusting piece of uncooked meat on a stick just sitting out in the sun on a ledge. Kyra and I couldn't figure out what it was, but whatever it was it was disgusting and I was hoping it wasn't there for someone to eat.

First stop was horse back riding on the beach. Sounds exotic I know. Not so much though, we had fun, but the horses looked sickly and you could tell that all they did all day long everyday was take tourists riding. We could barely get them to trot. My horse especially liked to sniff the other horse's backsides.

Clint with his horse.

Matt's horse was extremely hungry I guess. It would just stop every second it would see a plant and eat. It was kind of amusing to watch.

Kyra the cowgirl!

After horse back riding we took the bus to La Bufadora. There is a blow hole there where the ocean waves hit this place in the rocks and every 17 seconds or so water shoots way up into the air. Here are Clint and I with the water shooting up behind us.

The Thompsons and us with and ocean view. It's kind of weird being there with this beautiful view, but the area was kind of run down. In the US this would be prime real estate with nice homes. It was definitely interesting how different it was there.

At La Bufadora there was also a bunch of shops. It was so crazy, I had never been haggled so much. I couldn't even think. I wanted to get something for our kids but I felt like I couldn't even browse. They were all yelling at us screaming they had the best deal and pushing their items at us and how they would bring down the price. It was absolutely crazy. Definitely no my favorite way to shop, even if we could get a good deal. I guess we got that true Mexico experience, I was grateful that Clint could speak Spanish, I felt he was able to talk things down lower because of it. The Thompson did get some Mango from there that was amazing there and we bought some churros that were delicious. After La Bufadora we headed back to the city to the tour place for a Mexican buffet, that was so, so and then back to the ship.

The last day on the ship was a day at sea. We enjoyed lounging by the pool watching Kyra and Matt go down the slide into the freezing water (that actually might have been the day before). We enjoyed hot tubing and eating lots of food, the food wasn't excellent, but it was free and there was a ton of it so we had to just keep eating. We also went to a couple of shows while on the cruise, and they were extremely lame so we didn't go to the one the last night. We enjoyed the comedy club, at least the family friendly one, we attempted going to the later one, but they were just horrible. And we enjoyed watching people sing karaoke. Each room had these robes you could wear and buy if you wanted and Kyra and I were set on taking a picture of us all in our robes. So our hubbies consented and we got a group robe shot.
Overall we had such a good time and we were so glad we could go with Kyra and Matt, they are such good friends and practically family to us and we had so much fun with them.

When we got back we picked up Mckynlee and Crew from my in laws and headed home and picked up the boys from school (they stayed at friends houses during the week). They were so excited to what we brought them back. Well we bought them these little guitars in La Bufadora, Dax and Mckynlee loved there's, but Brock was a little disappointed with his gift. I don't know what he was expecting, but he eventually warmed up to it.

My Cousin Elsje And Her Family Come To Visit

2011-09-18T22:11:00.000-07:00

My cousin Elsje and her husband Jay and their kids came out to California for a family vacation. We were lucky to be able to have them over for dinner the Sunday that they were in town. Elsje is a few years older than I and would often babysit me and my siblings when we were kids and I always absolutely adored her. I really do have great cousins. It was so fun to see her, I don't get to very often.

Crew with their baby Lincoln (who is 6 months). What two adorable babies!

Crew liked having a friend to hang out with.

Their other boys Skyler and Jayden playing in the sandbox with my kids.

My kids loved having their 2nd cousins over, is that what you would call them? Anyways, we got one last photo of them before they left (minus Mckynlee who refused to come be in the picture). It was so nice to catch up and chat with them.

Cub Scouts

2011-09-14T18:10:00.000-07:00

So Brock is officially in Cub Scouts. He didn't get to start when he first turned 8 because they were taking a break for the summer, but he got to start a couple of weeks ago and he loves it. He couldn't wait to get his scout shirt and gear and begged me every day to sew on the patches. He looks forward to every Wednesday when he has scouts and will sit and look at his Wolves book for the longest time. I love how passionate he gets about things, its so cute!

Our handsome little Cub Scout!

Pike Position

2011-09-11T18:08:00.000-07:00

So Crew loves to do this, he goes into this pike position and we think it's hilarious.

Let's just hang out like this for a little bit, funny little guy.

10 Months Old!

2011-09-11T18:06:00.000-07:00

Well it's a couple day's past Crew's 10 month birthday, but I wanted to snap some shots and it wasn't the easiest thing. He was on the move and didn't want to hold still for me to take pictures. So, this is what we got.

Sister trying to pin him down of course. So 10 months, we are getting way too close to a year. Well of course he is crawling now and is so much happy for it. Now he can get where he wants to easier and that has made him a happier baby. He can just follow me or his siblings around and he is so content. It's like he feel more apart of the family now, he's right there in all the action. And he is also our little vacuum now that he is all over the place, so we have to watch what we put on the ground. He does super cheesy smiles, will eat absolutely anything you put in front of him (we wish his siblings would follow his example), is a huge fan of the remote (the one that works, not the one that we took the batteries out of, he's too smart for his own good) and is still so much fun to hug and squeeze. We love you little Crew man!

Daxton's First Soccer Game Of The Season

2011-09-10T18:04:00.000-07:00

Well Dax started his first soccer game of the season and he is so pumped. His team is coed this year with 4 boys, which are all his friends, and two girls. They named their team the "Mermaids and Sharks". He loves it and is doing even better this year.

I like this running shot.

I thought this shot was adorable of Daxton lifting up his buddy Jackson.

His team, minus Davis who was out of town, in a huddle with their coach, coach Jeff. I'm the team mom this year, so far barely any responsibility besides assigning snacks, but we'll see. We're excited to watch a great soccer season, there was definitely more action in this game than in years past and it was a lot of fun to watch.

Mckynlee's First Day of Preschool

2011-09-06T17:54:00.000-07:00

Well Mckynlee started her first day of her first year of preschool! Isn't the above picture adorable?! My friend Melissa, her preschool teacher, made the frame and my friend Heather came and took pictures of all the kids arriving on their first day of school. I thought it was so cute!

Mckynlee has been looking forward to this day for over a month now. Ever since the boys started school she has thought that she needed to be in school. So she was pretty excited for this day to come. Except, when the day arrived she had a total melt down. She didn't want to wear the dress that I put her in. Being the mean mom that I am (haha) I made her wear it. She wanted to wear one of her old outfits and I didn't spend all this money on new school clothes (that she said she liked) for her not to wear one of them on her first day of school. Anyways, so she was crying about that all morning and then when I asked her to come out in the front yard to take picture she had another meltdown and refused to take pictures. So I had to bribe her with candy so I could get some first day of school shots.

Showing off her Rapunzel backpack that her Grandma McDowell gave her for her birthday.

As you can see her eyes are all puffy from crying so much. But look what a little piece of candy can do for a girl throwing a complete tantrum, it quickly turns that frown upside down. (just so you know I usually don't bribe my child with candy to stop her tantrums, but I wanted 1st day of school pictures so I was willing to go that route)

Such a cheese!

Once she arrived at her "Little Seeds Preschool" she was as happy can be. Here she is walking into Miss Melissa's backyard to play with her friends before preschool begins.

I love this picture of her swinging on the swing the the sunlight coming down.

Mckynlee's preschool class (from left to right: Julia, Macie, Courtney, Nora, Mckynlee, Mia, Lyric, Miss Melissa, Adam (pronounced "Adash"), Carson and Cooper).

Playing with the parachute getting to know her classmates (though she already knows most of them).

All the kids walking into class ready for their first day!

Sitting on the rug ready for Miss Melissa to start class.

Just For Fun

2011-09-01T17:52:00.000-07:00

I was taking pictures of Brock and his hat and pictures of Crew crawling and Mckynlee insisted on me taking her picture. So, of course I had to because usually when I pull out my camera and start taking pictures of her she gets mad and says, "Stop taking my picture!" Well she definitely hammed it up for the camera this time.

Wearing big brother's scout shirt.

Crew Is Crawling!

2011-09-01T17:50:00.000-07:00

He's finally crawling!!! Crew is our latest crawler starting at almost 10 months old, but we are so proud he is finally there! He started just this last weekend and is officially on the move. Check out the video below this post.

Crew Crawling

2011-09-01T17:47:00.000-07:00

The Wizard Hat

2011-09-01T17:45:00.000-07:00

It was so funny, I go to pick up Brock from school and he walks out wearing this hat. He was the only kid wearing a hat like that and he walked out like it was perfectly normal to be wearing it and he insisted on wearing it the whole day. It was so cute. I guess he made it in PAWS (that is where they go everyday for reading). He said it was a wizard hat, which explains why he liked wearing it so much. He is absolutely obsessed with Harry Potter lately. He's obsessed with the game, the books and the movie. He carries around this pointer stick, which is his wand, all day long and casts spells. So I had to document his handmade wizard hat.

Wearing it while eating snacks, it just cracked me up. I love this kid!

Spencer & Noelle and Family Come To Town

2011-08-29T17:38:00.000-07:00

My brother-in-law, Spencer, and his family came in to town for a family vacation. They live out in Indiana and haven't been out here to California for a long time. So it was great to see them. They came and celebrated their oldest daughter's, Joy, 8th birthday and they also baptized her out her. On Friday, Joy's birthday, we took all the kids to Pretend City so they could have some fun with their cousins. My kids loved it of course, they have been before and still enjoyed it just as much. But, my nieces absolutely loved the place. Here are the kids making art in the picture above.

My nieces Liberty, Joy and Hope. They are so adorable, they are the sweetest girls.

Crew man doing his thing.

Mckynlee, Dax and Crew were big fans of the beach section and spent most their time there.

I like Mckynlee's face in this picture.

Brock was very determined to go to each business to get his time card stamped so he could get some cash from the ATM. He wouldn't relax until they were all stamped. Mission accomplished.

Awww, now he can sit down, relax and watch some TV. I took this picture through the window into the pretend house and thought it was funny that Brock and Mckynlee were watching the TV, since it had this stupid video playing that you would be sure would not catch interest of children.

Mckynlee just looking out the Window.

Brock's favorite area of Pretend City, the control station (not sure if that's what its called).

The whole crew before we left Pretend City. My sister-in-law, Noelle, with my nieces Miracle, Hope, Joy and Liberty and all my kids and Grandma McDowell in the background.

After Pretend City we went to Ballpark Pizza one of Clint's family's favorite pizza joints for Joy's b-day dinner. Here are Hope, Mckynlee and Liberty waiting for their pizza's. Saturday was Joy's baptism and then Sunday we had them all over for a BBQ. Mckynlee couldn't get enough of her girl cousins. She's still talking about them, she loved having them around so much. It was so cute, too bad they live so far away and she can't see them more often.

Crew's First Hair Cut

2011-08-20T17:23:00.000-07:00

So Crew's hair was getting a little crazy. As you can tell from his 9 month old post he was looking a little like Einstein, with hair sticking out on top and on the sides and then it was super short in the back. Something definitely need to be done with it. With Brock and Daxton we just shaved their heads when they were around 6 months old. But I just can't bring myself to cut his amazing curls yet. I know I won't keep them forever, but I just can't do it yet. So I took him to my friend Katie to give it a trim and make it look good.

He was so good while she cut his hair.

It wasn't until the end that he got a little fussy.

All finished, me and my little handsome man. Katie did an amazing job. Though, I have to admit I was kind of sad after. It kind of took that babyish look away from him and made him look older. I definitely think it looks better and I got over being sad about it after a couple of days, it just makes me sad to see my baby getting older and looking older.

Mckynlee and Savanna playing on their couch cushions while Crew got his hair cut. People always said these two girls looked like each other as babies because they both had that curly hair.

They had a great time playing together.

The big sisters with their little brothers. Savanna and Austin and Mckynlee and Crew. These guys just live down the street from us so I have a feeling these 4 will be great friends!

10 Years of Bliss!!!

2011-08-18T13:10:00.000-07:00

10 years ago today I married my best friend! He truly has made me a better person and I love him for it. We are as happy now as we were 10 years ago when these pictures were taken. I can't believe its been 10 years. That seem like such a long time. It seems like yesterday, but at the same time it seems like I've known him forever. In 10 years of marriage we have had 4 kids and lived in 9 different places and have made so many wonderful memories along the way. I am so grateful for Clint and I love him so much and I look forward to eternity with him.

1st Day Of School

2011-08-10T17:06:00.000-07:00

Well summer vacation officially ended for us today and it wasn't long enough for me. We sent the boys off to school today. Brock off to 3rd grade with Mrs. Cowan and Daxton, our first timer, off to Kindergarten with Mrs. McDonald.

Daxton has been so excited. We found out about a week ago who his teacher was going to be and then she sent him a personal postcard saying how excited she was to meet him and he pinned it onto his bedroom wall. He's been ready for a long time and was upset that he didn't come home with homework his first day.

Showing off his new backpack that he picked out.

Definitely one of the cutest kindergartners I have ever seen.

Brock too is very excited to start school, despite his struggles with learning he really does love going to school. So, I'm glad for that.

Brock picked out a Star Wars backpack and a Green Lantern lunch box this year.

The cutest 3rd grader I've ever seen!

My two big boys, I can't believe I have two kids in Elementary now, it makes me feel even older.

Brock with his new teacher Mrs. Cowan. She seems really nice and I'm really excited he's got her this year.

Brock with his best buddy, Aiden. They were in the same class last year and I'm so excited that they are in the same class again this year too!

Dax with his best friend Davis. Unfortunately him and Davis aren't in the same class this year. But, then yet again it might be good for them to be separated from each other for a little bit.

There is quite a crew of them starting Kindergarten this year from church. We kept taking pictures as everyone arrived. Here he is with Davis and Brendan.

Then Jack arrived so we had to take another picture.

And then Mathew and Brielle arrived so we had to get another. Brendan, Jackson and Brielle are all in Daxton's class.

Standing in line waiting to go into class.

The younger siblings who will all be starting preschool this year, playing on the kinder playground. (Lyric, Carson, Savannah and Mckynlee)

Waving good-bye, looking at the picture kind of makes me sad. I know most moms are really sad when sending their child off to kindergarten. I don't want to say I wasn't sad, but he was my 2nd to send off and he has been so ready and excited its been hard. I am sad that those years are gone having him home. He's my little helper and always makes me smile. He's schedule isn't too much different than last year. I think it will be harder for me next year when he goes a whole day. So anyways, here's to another school year, now we're back to waking up early and being on a schedule.

Tunnel Fun

2011-08-09T16:50:00.000-07:00

Sometimes when Crew's siblings try to entertain him he just gets mad. But when Dax put the tunnel they were playing with over his head, Crew Thought it was the best thing ever!

We tried to get him to reinact his excitement on video. So I posted the video below. It's kind of long and it has Mckynlee attempting to sing on it too so don't feel the need to watch it, I'm mainly posting it for the enjoyment of family. Mckynlee is obsessed with the Ariel song and usually sings it at the top of her lungs, but she was a little camera shy when I tried to get her sing it on video and excuse her plummers crack.

Silly Video

2011-08-09T16:44:00.000-07:00

9 Months Old!

2011-08-08T16:49:00.000-07:00

Angel Game

2011-08-07T16:44:00.000-07:00

This year for Clint's birthday his parents got him a bunch of Angel tickets again this year. He got tickets for one game each in the months of June, July, August and September. In June him and I went. Last month he took the boys and this month we had 5 tickets so we took the whole family to the game. It was our last weekend before school started so we made a day of it. First we went to the beach, then grabbed some Cafe Rio and then we headed off to the game. The kids were so excited and had so much fun. Above are the boys posing as the rally monkey.

Watching the game.

You must be very serious while watching.

Lovely beach hair she's sporting, I know.

You can't help but love that smile.

Crew was making friends with the ladies sitting behind smiling at them and getting them all wrapped around his finger.

It was such a wonderful day just spending it together with our little family and a great way to end our summer vacation.

Brock's 1st Piano Recital

2011-08-04T16:29:00.000-07:00

Brock has been taking piano for a little over 2 years now from, Hanna, one of the young women in our ward. Back when I was a young women's leader she was one of my girls and told me that she was going to start teaching. I jumped on it, I know how important learning an instrument can be and learning piano gives you the basics for everything music. Brock has really enjoyed it and has done pretty good the past couple of years. Well, Hanna leaves for college here next month and no longer will be his teacher, we hope to get her mom, but we will miss her a lot. Yesterday he had his first ever piano recital and we were so proud of him. Even his grandma and grandpa McDowell came out to watch. He had to play 2 songs from memory and then he got to play one song using the book. He got a little frazzled the first song, but still did pretty good on it and then he got in the groove and everything went great.

Here are all her students hanging out on the stairs waiting for their turn to perform.

Brock performing one of his pieces.

Hanna's students also combined with her mom's students for the recital. Here are all the students that played.

Brock with his cute teacher Hanna. Hanna went all out decorating her house with piano decorations and she even made a piano cake. It was so cute. And each student got a little gift to take home. In the posts below are Brock playing. Notice if you can in some of the videos his bow. She had all the students bow after their performance and Brock was so adorable. For his bow he would bend his whole body in half. In the last video he waves to everyone before he starts which was pretty cute too.

Pop Goes The Weasel

2011-08-04T16:20:00.000-07:00

Cops and Robbers

2011-08-04T16:18:00.000-07:00

When The Saints Go Marching In

2011-08-04T16:15:00.000-07:00

Lake Gregory

2011-07-31T20:32:00.000-07:00

I had heard a lot about this lake called Lake Gregory up in the mountains just about an hour away from us. Clint and I had actually been up in that direction when we went up with the young women in the ward in the winter, but we hadn't seen the lake and we had never been up there in the summer. I had decided that it was something I wanted us to do as a family before the kids went back to school, so I planned a Saturday to go up there. We invited our friends the Thompsons and the Nelsons we all had a great time, though we did forget to bring our beach umbrella and some chairs and that was a mistake, but a note for next time. Anyways, it's just a quaint little lake up in the mountains, part of the lake is designated for swimming and the other is for canoeing and kayaking and the paddle bikes and the other things like that they have to offer. On the swimming side they also have to big water slides you can go on. It was a lot of fun and we'll definitely go again, we'll just be a little more prepared next time.

The kids were a little grossed out by the slimy dirt underneath, but they soon got over it. (except Brock, he wasn't a big fan)

But the kids did have a great time.

Mckynlee wasn't a huge fan of wearing her life jacket.

My fam chillin' on the beach.

We always have to get a Davis and Daxton picture.

The little girls had a blast playing in the sand and mud on the beach.

Tatum, Tera, Dax, Ashton and Davis.

Me and Mckynlee, Clint and Crew, Ryan and Cohen and Melissa and Lyric.

Brock going down the water slide.

Lyric, Mazzi and Mckynlee, three silly little girls!

After swimming we headed over to the other part of the lake to do some canoeing. Ryan and Clint (Matt couldn't make it, he had to work that day) took the kids in shifts to ride the canoe.

Here they are with my boys and Davis.

Melissa and I watching them out on the lake.

Mazzi and Mckynlee being Mazzi and Mckynlee.

The ladies out for a canoe ride. Me, Kyra and Melissa with Lyric hiding at Melissa's legs. It was kind of relaxing out there not having to worry about the kids. Plus it was absolutely beautiful.

Another shot with my girls. Thanks so much for joining us ladies, we had a wonderful time and can't wait to go again!

Drive-in Movie

2011-07-29T17:05:00.000-07:00

I remember as a kids going doing the pretend drive-in movies for primary activities. My best friend and I along with my sisters would usually find a big refrigerator box and make a limo for our car and take it to the church to watch the movie. It was probably the only primary activity I remember and one of my fondest memories. So, you can say that I was a little excited when our primary announced that they were have a drive-in movie activity. The day before I found 3 boxes and I cut and taped them to look like cars and then the kids decorated them. My kids thought it was the greatest thing ever and probably wished we did projects like that every day. They couldn't wait to climb in once we finished.

Here they are in their finished cars.

Daxton wanted a number on his car like a race car would have. Brock's had a number 8 because that was his age. But, Dax said he didn't like the number 5 so he decided to double his age and put 10 on his car, funny boy. He also wanted to write "America" on the front so I showed him how to spell it and then he said he made up his own word and wrote that on the front to and the word was "rontsl" you can guess what you may at to what that means, he had no meaning, just said it was a word he made up.

Mckynlee had a little help from her brothers decorating her car and then she added her own personal touches with a little purple scribble here or there. Dax drew flowers and rainbows for her on it too.

Brock of course had the number "8" on there as I mentioned before, but he also drew light sabers on the inside and then I was trying to figure out what he had written on the front. It was "M&M's" and he proceeds to tell me that that's what's suppose to be on the car and then I figured out what he meant. He was thinking about how different cars have stuff on them representing their sponsor, so Brock's sponsor was "M&M's" if that make sense. I thought it was cute that he thought of that.

The kids testing out their cars.

Cars parked and ready for the next days primary activity.

The next day the kids couldn't wait until the activity. They were so excited to sit in their cars and watch a movie. The Primary Presidency gave them each 3 tickets. With those tickets they could buy a drink, a big piece of candy and some popcorn. It was so cute. The movie they watched was "Charlotte's Web".

Dax with his buddies.

Watching the movie intently.

They actually sat in their cars for quiet awhile, I was surprised. But by the time the movie was reaching to an end the kids were all running around crazy.

Crew just chillin' wishing he had a car too.

I love this picture of the whole primary watching the movie in their cars, so cute. They had a great turn out and it was fun to see all the different cars all the kids helped their parents make.

Crew's First Time Clapping

2011-07-28T21:32:00.000-07:00

Crew started clapping for the first time yesterday at dinner. It was so cute! He caught us off guard, we weren't even trying to get him to clap. We just looked over and he started doing it.

Doheny Beach Camping Trip

2011-07-28T16:21:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago we had the chance to camp at Doheny State Beach on their group camp site with a bunch of friends. We loved the site because not only it was big but it was right on the beach, you literally walked out of your tent and the beach was right there. Well my friend Amy was able to snag it this year and put the camping trip together for 11 families. It was just for a couple days but we had so much fun. Some don't enjoy camping, but I really do (if I have access to a bathroom), plus we have the added bonus of hanging out at the beach all day. The families that went were the Grays, Nelsons, Thompsons, us, Wagstaffs, Chathams, Andres, Andersons, Chalkers, Eliasons, and the Gargalis's.

Macie, Lyric and Mckynlee hanging out on the first evening that we arrived. They are sitting on a rock at our campsite and, as you can see, the ocean is right behind them. We've done a lot of beach camping, but most sites you have to hike down to the beach, we loved not having to haul all our gear.

Nathan, Brendan, Luke, Davis, Daxton and Eli playing on the rocks.

Getting ready for dinner the first night. Everyone getting ready to say the prayer. I love all the kids ready to go folding their arms, so cute.

Crew, up and ready to go the next morning.

My little beach babe.

Brock was out there first thing in the morning just watching the ocean.

Jessica, Susie and Janitsy watching the kids as they played by the water.

Dax showing me the creation he and his friends made.

Camping hair.

The nice thing about being so close to the beach was I could put Crew down for a nap and then I could go hang out on the beach and just check on him every once and awhile, so nice!

Our little set up, this is where we spent our whole day ( I paid for it too, I didn't put sun screen on my lips and got extremely sun burnt on them)

Hanging out in the morning before heading down to the beach ( my pics are kind of out of order).

The kids playing in the water, we had a ton of kids there between 11 families. I think there was 30 kids between us all.

We just love the sand face, it goes without fail. There is something so tempting about eating the sand.

The best buddies.

Mckynlee and her boyfriend, Jaylen. Or, at least she would like it that way. Mckynlee loves Jaylen and is always asking about him. I asked her if he was her boyfriend and she said yes. They actually shared the same due date (or actually I think he was due one day after her) , but Jaylen came early so he is a little over a month older than Mckynlee.

Greg Gargalis was gracious enough to entertain the kids up at the camp with a game of Zingo, the kids were all big fans.

Dax was very serious about the game, of course.

The other big hit was this wagon that the Chathams brought. All the kids took turns riding in it or pulling it. It was great entertainment the whole time we were there. Mckynlee looks pretty tuckered out in this pic.

Crew after a long day in the sun, now hanging out with his dad by the campfire.

My dirty face boy. A classic camping face.

Ashton and Davis caught this huge crab. The kids are always catching little sand crabs but never have they caught some thing this big before. We were all shocked and all the kids were fascinated.

And of course the moms had to go for a swim. Melissa G. and Rebecca didn't join us and Jessica had already left, but the rest of us decided to go for a mommy swim in the ocean. (left to right: Amy, Heather, Kyra, me, Janitsy, Melissa, Susie and Carly)

Inching our way in.

I usually don't go in the ocean, but there is something so fun going in with all my friends, we get all giddy and act like we are teenagers again.

Mckynlee and Mazzi had a great time playing with the spickett. The kids are in pure heaven when we're camping. Thanks Amy for putting it together, we had a wonderful time!

Happy 3rd Birthday to Mckynlee!

2011-07-24T14:36:00.000-07:00

Well Mckynlee's officially 3! But, if you ask her she'll say she's "6". She woke up to the great surprise of three pink balloons above her bed.

After bouncing on her bed and playing with balloons it was straight to opening presents.

The one thing Mckynlee requested for her birthday was "Tangled". She was so excited to get it. She just stared at the movie for like 5 minutes, just studying it. And then requests in her cute little quiet sweet voice "I watch Rapunzel?" The boy movies do overpower the girl movies at our house.

Several days before we took her to the Disney Store to see what she really was interested in. She absolutely loved this Ariel doll. She loves "Little Mermaid" in the first place and always requests me to sing her the "Ariel" song when she goes to bed at night. Well this doll sings the "Ariel" ("Part Of Your World")song. I know, as parents, what were we thinking getting a doll that at a push of a buttons sings? But, Mckynlee loved it and now has the song memorized herself and she sings along with it all the time. It's funny listening to her at night after we have put her to bed and you hear this little voice singing upstairs.

She also adored this Rapunzel plushie doll, so we got her it, she loves to dance around with it.

This is what she wanted for her birthday breakfast. No homemade waffles or pancakes. If your going to go the cereal route I have to agree with her "Oh's" is the best.

We also got her this dance outfit. She loves to dance and whenever she's at her friend Mazzi's house that is one of the first things she goes for, one of her dance outfits. She'll probably start taking dance from my friend in a couple of months, so we might as well buy her some outfits too. I keep trying to get her dancing on camera, its so cute! But, as soon as I pool the camera out she stops, she is not a big fan of the camera. She loves to look at pictures of herself, just doesn't like getting them taken.

So after Mckynlee opened her presents, we let her watch "Tangled" and then we took all the kids to "Wild Rivers" for her birthday. I think Brock is the only one of our kids that has been to a water park (well Dax went when he was a baby), so that was on our list of things to do this summer, so we thought this would be the perfect time to go. So here are my kids all ready to swim!

The kids had such a great time. They had a huge kiddie area with stuff for little kids to swim in and slides for them to go down. I forced Mckynlee down a couple little kid slides and she wasn't too happy about that, I guess I shouldn't have done that on her birthday, but I was hoping she would like them after. Brock and Daxton loved all the big slides and attractions and Clint and took turns going with them.

My chubby face boy! He just got to hang out and wade in the pool, he pretty much went where ever big sister wanted to go and he was fine with that.

Thought this was a cute, funny picture of Dax drying off before we left.

Brock loved the water park, as soon as we left the boys were talking about the next time we go. We'll definitely have to go at least once each summer.

The water park was right by Grandma and Grandpa McDowell's house so we headed there right after. Grandma was out for the night with some friends, but Grandpa was there to give Mckynlee a gift. First, she opened her card from them and it was a Tinkerbell card, which she loved.

They got her an Ariel dress-up that she had been eyeing.

And also a "Tangled" backpack (which she can use for preschool here in a couple of months), that had two night gowns in it, a Snow White one and an Ariel one. She was pretty about her gifts from them. After the gift opening Grandpa McDowell took us to Ball Park Pizza for a birthday dinner. When we asked Mckynlee what she wanted for her birthday dinner all she said was "salad". We figured the pizza place had a salad bar and that way everyone would be happy so that's where we went.

We came home that night to a package from her Grandma and Grandpa Voorhees, but Mckynlee had fallen asleep in the car. But, first thing in the morning her brothers didn't let her miss it. I was still in bed asleep and they helped her open that box and get her present out. Grandma and Grandpa and gotten her a princess pony castle with 5 ponies in it. Of course she loved it, which I'm sure my mom was happy about. My mom has always loved horses and I'm sure would like if Mckynlee shared that love too.

A picture for Grandma!

Happy Birthday Mckynlee! We love you so much. You can test us often. But, you have so much personality and are so sweet and totally know how to work us, your our little princess and we love you. We love your beautiful smile, your cute little freckles and your adorable laugh and your crazy curly hair. We hope you had a wonderful 3rd birthday!

Mckynlee's "Under The Sea" Birthday Party

2011-07-21T13:46:00.000-07:00

So Mckynlee is really into "The Little Mermaid" lately. I get this newsletter everyday from this lady that makes printables, some of them are free and some of them you have to buy in her shop. She sent out one particular newsletter that talked about a mermaid birthday party she did for her daughter and she made a "Under The Sea" themed printable party pack for it. I decided that I wanted to do that for Mckynlee's birthday so I bought the party pack, it came with invites, cupcake toppers, water bottle covers, candy bar wrappers, a centerpiece and more. Then I had another thought. Awhile back I had bought a mermaid plushie pattern that I had planned on making for Mckynlee, what if for a party favor for all the girls I make them all a mermaid doll to take home. It would be very affordable, probably cheaper that party favors because I had most of the supplies. The only things was the time, I wasn't sure if I would have enough time. Well I had decided this several months before hand but a week before her birthday arrives and I haven't made them. I went back and forth and finally just decided to go for it. It took me two whole days of cutting and sewing, but I was so proud of them and thought they turned out so cute.

So here they all are just after I finished them at like midnight several days before the party.

This is the one I made for Mckynlee, and the first one I made, just to test out to see if I could make 5 more.

This was the invitation we sent out that I got from the party pack I bought. I accidentally bought the dark skinned mermaid pack (was just looking at her hair and thought it matched Mckynlee's), oh well I still thought they were cute.

Hence the "Under The Sea" theme we had her party at our neighborhood pool. I set this table up with all the lunch and treats. The printables came with food label cards and the other things I mentioned before. I made the girls pb&j sandwiches and the mommies had chicken salad croissant sandwiches or "Clam Shell Sandwiches" as they were labeled.

Little "Under The Sea" candy bars.

Mermaid water bottles.

Delicious mermaid coconut cupcakes, using a recipe I got from a friend who's daughter had a coconut cake as her wedding cake and it was the best cake I had ever ate! My cupcakes didn't turn out as well as I liked, but they were still pretty good.

The sandwiches I made for the girls, I cut them out to look like seahorses and clam shells.

The other table had the party favors and her gifts on it. Along with the dolls I also got the girls each a lei and a few other items.

Each of the dolls close up. Here, again, is the one I made for Mcyknlee.

Mckynlee enjoying her lunch!

What a cute bunch of girls, Mckynlee's friend Savanna was also suppose to be there, but she got sick the night before so she couldn't make it. We ran her mermaid and stuff to her afterwards.

Mckynlee blowing out her birthday candle!

All the girls cute little back sides. Patiently waiting for their cupcakes.

Mckynlee, Macie and Mazzi playing on the splash pad.

Cute Savannah F. (yes she has two friends named "Savannah")

Lyric, or according to Mckynlee "Lylic"

All the girls playing in the kiddie pool, or as Mckynlee calls its "The Cat Pool". I guess she was thinking "kitty" instead of "kiddie" and that's where she got the "Cat" from.

Opening her presents.

Holding all her loot.

The mommies relaxing in the shade while the girls swam. (Vanessa, Jessica, Kyra and Melissa)

And then it was time for the girls to pick out their mermaids. I had a few of them throughout the party try to snag one before it ended, they were so excited. It was so fun to see their reactions to getting the dolls. So here they each are with the doll they picked out. (Mckynlee, Lyric, Macie, Mazzi and Savannah). I love what all of them are doing in this picture. Mckynlee and Lyric talking as if "look at my doll", Macie squeezing hers with a big smile, Mazzi cuddling hers, and Savannah just gazing down at hers, so cute!

They also got to take home a sand bucket with shovel, some crayons and a mermaid coloring page that matched all the party decorations.

Me and my little birthday girl! I was so happy with how her party turned out, the girls loved it and us moms enjoyed just chatting and relaxing, so fun!

Brock, Hard At Work Again!

2011-07-16T23:01:00.000-07:00

While Dax was busy helping Clint out in the garage with the work bench, Brock was inside building something of his own. He really loves looking at instructions and putting things together. Like the Lego's for example, he loves putting together Lego's. Well he got an erector set from a friend for his birthday so on this particular day he decided to put together one of the items you could make. He chose to make a plane. I took him all morning, and he got frustrated at times. But he did it all on his own with assistance from no one.

His finished airplane, now displayed next to his Slave 1 Lego ship on his dresser. I'm going to have to put a big shelf in his room for all the projects he has built and put together. We're running out of places to put them. I'm glad he's found these things he loves to do so much.

My Handy Men

2011-07-16T22:55:00.000-07:00

For several weeks Clint has been working on building a work bench out in our garage. Dax has loved helping him and asks him every second Clint if and when he is going to work on his work table. And as soon as Clint is out there so is Dax with his safety goggles and everything. Clint even gave Dax his old tool bag with some extra tools in it for Dax to carry around and Dax was in Heaven! He wants to be just like his daddy and it's so cute!

Dax watching his dad work.

Dax helping Clint screw in the nails.

Clint then gave him some scrap wood and some old nails so Dax started to build his own masterpiece.

He was very serious about his work and it was absolutely adorable!

Sibling Tub Time

2011-07-14T22:52:00.000-07:00

Now that Crew sits up well I've finally let his siblings take a bath with him. Daxton and Mckynlee think its the greatest thing in the world that their baby brother can take a bath with them now and they have a great time splashing around and Crew loves it too.

8 Months Old!

2011-07-08T22:47:00.000-07:00

Another month has gone by and now my little man is 8 months old. Not too many changes. His top two teeth are now trying to get through, he still is as cute as ever and getting countless comments a day where ever we go. Everyone is just mesmerized by his hair and they can't get enough of him and of course we can't either and he eats up the attention with returning cute smiles and coos back to everyone that admires him.

Two Peas In A Pod

2011-07-08T22:39:00.000-07:00

Our friends Kyra and Matt went to Les Miserables and stayed in L.A. for the night so we took two of their kids, Ashton and Mazzi, while they were gone.

Mckynlee and Mazzi were in heaven and were cracking me up at dinner. The two shirtless girls being as silly as possible.

The next morning I did their hair the same and they thought that was pretty cool.

Beautiful girls and the best of friends, so cute!

Slave 1 Finished!

2011-07-07T22:31:00.000-07:00

Remember that Lego Brock's grandparents got him for his birthday that he wanted so badly? Well he's been working tirelessly on it for days. And I mean that, Clint and I would be heading up to bed at night thinking all the kids were asleep to find him working on that Lego at 11 o'clock at night, not to mention he would work on it all day. He would rarely let anyone help, he wanted to do it on his own and after several days of intense hard work he finished!

And he is so proud! Here he is with his Boba Fet Ship, Slave 1. I'm proud too, I'm proud that he worked so hard at something and stayed so focused, good job bud!

4th Of July

2011-07-05T22:18:00.000-07:00

We had a wonderful 4th of July. We started it off with breakfast at Mimi's Cafe with my family before they headed back home to Utah, then it was off to our pool for some swimming with the kids and then later it was off to the local park by the lake to celebrate with friends and watch the Storm Stadium Fireworks. This is our 2nd year doing this. I'm a little disappointed in Riverside County's way of celebrating our Nation's Independence Day, Utah puts it to shame, but we still enjoyed ourselves and enjoyed being together as a family and being with friends. I am so grateful for this great nation and those who died for our freedoms and those who still do, I feel so blessed to have been born here with such privileges. We hope you all had a wonderful 4th Of July!

I just love her smile here, its so adorable!

Look how excited Crew is to be playing with that ball.

Dax playing bing bag toss.

Just a few of my favorite people hanging out on the blanket, enjoying the nice evening.

I bought all my kids the Old Navy flag tees, they were so excited to wear them.

In the attempt to get a photo of everyone looking at the camera in the group shot I took above this picture I managed to get a bunch of shots of Mckynlee dancing.

Classic Mckynlee and Mazzi picture.

Brock using his glow sticks he got for his birhtday.

Brock Gets Baptized!

2011-07-04T16:24:00.000-07:00

I remember always looking forward to this day. Not that I wanted it to come along fast, I didn't, because that meant my little boy was no longer a little boy, he would be a big boy. So a little bittersweet.
But, Saturday he chose to be baptized. It was a very special day with our family and closest friends. He was pretty much embarrassed the whole time. He is not one to like the spot light. He was the only one being baptized that day and all the attention was on him. So of course all the talks everyone was talking directly to him and he couldn't take it. He asked me if he could go sit back by his aunts. When his primary teacher brought him a gift he said he couldn't take this anymore and that it was so embarrassing. On Sunday they have the kids that were baptized go sit on the stand with the bishopric through all of Sacrament Meeting. He couldn't handle it. After the Sacrament he asked the bishop if he could sit down. It was kind of cute. But, besides the fact that he was embarrassed, it was a special day for him. He got his first set of new, nice scriptures. He was able to be baptized by his dad and that night as I tucked him into bed he told me what a good feeling he had and that it was special, he just didn't like all the attention on him. I'm so proud of his decision to be baptized, I know he still has a lot to learn and a testimony to grow. I'm so grateful I have a husband that holds the priesthood who could baptize our son personally. It was such a special moment for me. My father-in-law and my brother, Tyler, gave the talks and they were amazing. I hope that Brock can even remember a glimpse of this special day. We are so proud of you Brock!

He picked out this tie special for his baptism day.

My Family Comes To Visit

2011-07-04T16:07:00.000-07:00

So for the first time since Mckynlee was blessed my family was all here to visit. My parents and all my brothers and sisters. They came down for Brock's baptism and it was so fun to have them all here. I love my family and love when they come to visit, especially when they all get to come. The got here late Thursday night, or should I say super early Friday morning. Of course first thing they wanted to do is go to the beach. So we took them out to Newport Beach for a family day of sand and sun.

I love this picture of my sister Whitnie talking to Mckynlee while they are looking out on the ocean.

Daxton, Clint, my mom and my dad hanging out down by the water.

Crew and Brock playing it safe up on the towels with our stuff.

My dad.

Dax playing in the waves, he's my only kids that will at this point.

My mom, lookin' a bit cold.

Clint out boogie boarding.

Miss Koo, all "beachafide" (I made that word up)

My sister, Haley, playing on the beach with Mckynlee.

Father and son, so cute!

Crew waiting for the water to come up to him.

Look how excited his face is here!

He's not sure about it now though.

The girls. Whitnie, Haley, Mckynlee, mom and me.

Now this was huge. We look over and for the first time in like 4 or more years Brock is walking on the wet sand. As a toddler he would play in the water fine, but once when he was 2 a wave got him and since then he doesn't even want to go near the ocean. He use to let my dad carry him on his shoulders while my dad walked in the water, but later he wouldn't even let him do that. He just felt safe up on the dry sand. So we were shocked to find him so close to the ocean on this day.

Running from the waves. Do I know this child?

I was so proud of him, here he is just walking next to the water. This was so not normal for Brock. Don't get me wrong, he has always loved the beach, but never the ocean, or wet sand as I mentioned before.

And then he just sat himself down and stared at the ocean, it was so cute and out of character, but we loved it. Maybe next year he'll get in the water.

My brother Tyler with my sisters Whitnie and Haley holding Crew and Mckynlee. My cute family.

Ty and Dax looking for sand crabs.

Here is one of the crabs they found. This was the first time Dax had done this before on his own and he loved it.

Clint and I.

Snack time.

Daxton with one of his favorite people in the world, my brother Trenton. For several years now my brother Trenton has worn a bandanna on his head. Well Daxton of course wanted to be like him, so he went searching through the kids dress ups and found this bandanna so he could be just like his uncle Trenton.

After the beach we headed over to Downtown Disney. First we ate at the Rainforest Cafe. We were getting a kick out of Mckynlee. All she wanted was a salad, yes folks she absolutely loves salad, and she kept pouring more and more ranch dressing on it, something else she loves (she would drink it if we let her). We were definitely entertained watching he do that and then eat her salad. She was in heaven.

Crew going after Haley's food.

The main reason we went to Downtown Disney was for the present my parents wanted to get Brock for his birthday. Last time my parents were here we went to Downtown Disney and discovered this new store called Ride Makerz, it's like Build-A-Bear race car style. My boys were in heaven and my mom decided that for Brock's 8th birthday that is what they would get them. So, they surprised Brock by telling him once we went to go check out the store that they were going to get him one. So, he got to pick out his own car and they have a station where you get to put it together with electric screwdrivers. They're remote control cars and depending on what you want to spend you can deck them out how you want. He was so excited. In the above picture he is putting the car he picked out together.

My brothers were super jealous, wishing they could have gotten one too. Boys will always be boys not matter what age.

Brock standing in front of the store.

Brock with his new remote control car. I didn't think to get an actual picture of the car. But here it is in the box.

Then it was off to the Lego store to look at all the Lego's, Brock was definitely in 2nd day birthday heaven. My family was able to stay until the morning of the 4th, we went out to breakfast and then they had to leave. I was sad to see them go, my kids were especially, but we were so glad they were all able to come. We had such a great time.

It's Great To Be 8!!!!

2011-06-30T23:36:00.000-07:00

Well it happened, Brock is now 8! I can't believe I have an 8 year old child. It makes me feel old and it makes me feel like time flies by way to fast. I can still remember clearly the first time I held Brock in my arms. He was an absolutely beautiful baby and a good one at that. He has always been such a sweet child and innocent and now he's reached the age of "accountability" and I still think of him as my baby. But of course he's not, he's the big brother, the one who doesn't like things out of order, the one who is concerned about all our well beings and we love him so much! He was happy to wake up to his 8 balloons above his bed. He was so excited, and I was tired, because I had to wait until he fell asleep the night before so that I could hang the balloons and of course the excitement made it extremely hard for him to fall asleep. I can't even remember when he actually fell asleep.

We consider 8 a big birthday, especially since its the age you can get baptized into our church. So, I wanted to make his day special. I wanted to do a super fun birthday party. He loves Pump It Up and has begged for a Pump It Up birthday party forever. Their parties are pretty expensive and he was only inviting 5 friends, so I decided to just do the pop in and play time and just pay for everyone individually since that would be cheaper. Here he is with all his friends he invited (except Brandon, who was out of town), right before they went into jump. (left to right: Aiden, Kade, Ashton, Roy, Brock and Daxton).

All the kids having a great time playing basketball.

Mr. Crew just hanging out with Kyra. I couldn't fit all the kids in my car, so my friend Kyra helped me out with picking up some of the kids and driving them and being my sidekick for the day. Thanks, Kyra, it really helped me out, your an amazing friend!

The birthday boy!

Aiden going down the slide.

Daxton going down the slide.

Mckynlee had fun too!

Brock and Aiden. Brock and Aiden were in the same class at school this last year. Aiden goes to church with us, but him and Brock are in different classes, so they didn't really get to know each other until they were in a class at school together. They get along so well together and Aiden has been a great friend to him.

Kyra and Tera. Tera also got to come along with her mom as she helped me out. What a trooper hanging out with all these boys!

Roy only came to Pump It Up with us and was going home after so he was going to miss out on the present opening so Brock opened Roy's gift in the car. Roy gave him an Erector set which Brock thought was pretty cool.

The other thing Brock really wanted to do for his birthday party was go to the pool. So after Pump It Up we took the kids to our community pool for pizza, cupcakes, presents and swimming.

Present time.

Brock's friends spoiled him and he absolutely loved each and every single thing they got him, they must know him pretty well.

Brock wanted a Star Wars Themed Birthday. With the activities he chose you don't really focus on a theme so we just made sure the invitations, party favors and cupcakes were Star Wars! I made the cupcakes and used Star Wars confetti as the cupcake toppers.

Blowing out his 8 candles!

Time to play in the water.

Aiden, Ashton and Dax.

Brock and his goggles. We go swimming practically every day and he will not go in the water without his goggles. He love being able to see under the water. He's barely above the water most of the time, he just comes up for quick breaths of air. The problem with that is now he has a goggle tan. If you look closely at any of the pictures we have taken this summer it looks as though he has a 5 o'clock shadow. It's pretty funny.

The birthday crew!

Clint wasn't home in the morning so Brock had to wait until the afternoon to open his presents. He wasn't too happy about that, but what can you do.

Brock wanted this Boba Fet Star Wars Lego ship so badly. But it was going to cost as much as all his other presents combined (Lego's are so freaking expensive). So, his Grandma and Grandpa McDowell ended up giving it to him. We were going to see them until a couple days later and they wanted him to get it on his birthday so they shipped it to the house so he could open it with his other presents. He was so excited to open this present.

Don't we love commercials, especially the ones on the kids channels? Many of you with kids may have seen this Fushigi ball infomercial. Brock has asked for it every time he sees on TV. I thought it was way to expensive for a ball, it was like $20. Dax told me he wanted to get him it. Well I found it on Amazon for $10 so I ordered it and let Daxton say it was from him. I'm glad I got it for only $10, as we open it up its really for like older teenagers and adults. The commercial makes it looks like it floats, but in reality you have to watch this DVD that it comes with and learn how to do illusions with it to make it look like its floating. Did they know who they were targeting when they were showing these commercials during morning cartoons. Anywho, Brock didn't care and he still loved it and he thought he could do the illusions, so that's all that matters.

Then he asked for this digital camera, he actually already got one for his birthday like two years ago. But with his siblings and all the little kids that come over and play with it and toss it around it got broken. He begged and begged for another one. So, I gave in. He loves to play the games on it (as do Dax and Mckynlee) and they are having a great time videoing each other and taking pictures of who knows what.

And then there's "Diary of A Wimpy Kid". He's been wanting to see the movie since it came out, but we never got to it. So by the time it was his birthday it was out so I got it for him. He just finished the 2nd book and wanted the 3rd so we got him that too.

And then there was the Harry Potter Lego video game, he is obsessed now and would probably play it all day long if you let him.

His birthday dinner. Yes, I know he had pizza for his birthday party for lunch, but this is what he requested. Pizza, Dorito's and milk his three most favorite foods in the world! It was easy for me, that's all I have to say.

Then it was family birthday treat time. We had tons of extra cupcakes, plus I let Brock pick out some ice cream. So we stuck a "8" candle on some ice cream and sang to him.

So, I guess it is great to be 8! He had a wonderful birthday and was way too spoiled. We love you Brock, Happy Birthday!!!!!!!!!!!

Daxton's Surgery

2011-06-26T22:12:00.000-07:00

Ever since Daxton was born he has had an umbilical hernia. It's kind of funny, when I was like 8 months pregnant with him I was at the pool with Brock and I saw this little girl there with the strangest looking belly button, it almost looked like a finger was sticking out of it and I thought to myself, "Oh my gosh look at her belly button, so gross". Of course that was just what was going through my head, but one of the many times you look back and say I shouldn't say or think things like that because it will happen to me. And sure enough the baby I was carrying was going to have the very same issue. As an infant his belly button was so huge his shirts wouldn't stay over it, it would always poke out and it was so ugly. It got better as he got older. His pediatrician said they usually go away by the time they are 1. Well he turned one and it was still there. We moved and our next pediatrician said it should go away by the time he was 5 and if not they would do surgery. Well he turned 5 and it was still there, it never has seem to bother him, kids would notice his belly button was funny, but he didn't seem bothered by their comments. I was at a check-up for Crew and I mentioned it to the doctor, Dax refused to lift up his shirt to show the doctor and since it wasn't his appointment we didn't make him, but the doctor was almost positive it was healed. He said he rarely seen them with white kids at that age, usually only Asian and African American kids. Well at his kindergarten check up, to the doctor's shock, it was still there. So we had to schedule him for surgery for them to close it up. The weeks and days leading up to the surgery he had a lot of questions, but didn't seem to scared. Though on the day of the surgery once we got to the hospital and they asked him to take his clothes off and put on the hospital gown he got pretty upset. They said he could keep on his underwear until he went in and when they said that he was willing to put on the gown. They were behind schedule so him and I just got to snuggle in his hospital bed most the morning and watch cartoons. You could tell the worry in his voice as he asked questions. Then came the time for him to take the medicine before he went into surgery it was pain reliever and then some stuff to make him go loopy to calm him down. Well he refuse to take it and fought us like crazy as we were trying to give it too him and he was crying, it was so sad. They had to take him down to surgery and he was crying, they let me lay in the bed with him until they took him to the room. They took us downstairs and we waited. Finally they were able to take him in and once we hit the red line they made me get off the gurney so they could take him in. It was probably one of the hardest things I ever had to do. He wouldn't let go of me and he was crying and they had to pry him off of me and I had to watch them pull him away screaming looking at me. I felt like a horrible mother. Well the surgery went well and they called me back a couple hours later into the recovery room. He had just come too and he told me it wasn't bad and that he didn't remember anything and that he didn't hurt and he didn't feel anything. After that he was a lot more willing to let the nurses do stuff to him. We had to hang out for awhile and then I got to take him home. (I wish I would have gotten pictures of him at the hospital) Anyways that's when the pain started kicking in and the next couple days were rough. Watching him move around reminded me of me after I have a c-section. It was so sad to see him cry every time we tried to carefully move him. He refused to take the pain medication. It was horrible, the first morning he wet the bed because he obviously couldn't move himself and he couldn't yell for my name because it hurt to much, he was left to whisper. I went in when I woke up the next morning to find him crying, it broke my heart. That day he just laid on the couch and watched cartoons all day. At one point I was doing house work and Brock was upstairs, so he didn't have anyone to tell he had to go to the bathroom and he wet his pants again laying on the couch and I came down and he was crying again, I felt absolutely horrible again. Next time I made sure Brock was in the room with him if I wasn't so he had someone to fetch me if he needed. I was able to force medication on him once he did great once it kicked in, but once it wore off he refused to take it again (he didn't like the taste). So he just dealt with the pain. Luckily only those first 2 days were bad. By the 3rd day he was acting more himself and the 4th he seemed back to normal. It was so cute, one of the days his best friend, Davis, came over and brought him a back of goodies with a puzzle, a coloring thing and treats. It was so sweet and it made Daxton's day. And it was great to have those things for him to do that he could do laying on the couch. Anyways, I know that was a long story, but I wanted to document it. The above picture is of him recovering on the couch. We are glad he is feeling better now.

Bucket Of Toys

2011-06-19T22:03:00.000-07:00

Crew's favorite thing right now is his bucket of toys. We have this yellow bucket that we store all his toys in and he absolutely loves it!

You hand him the bucket full of the toys and he loves to pull each one out one by one.

With an occasional chewing on a toy in between. He doesn't like when you dump the toys out in front of him, which his big brother, Dax, and big sister, Mckynlee think he likes and they always do. He gets all fussy, that's just not the way he likes it. He wants to pull those toys out on his own. We think its so cute how particular he is about it only being 7 months old.

And then there is the dreaded sister, he does not like this. Big sister loves to love on her baby brother and she doesn't don't know when to stop and he absolutely hates it. But this above photo is a common scene in our house, Mckynlee hugging him or not leaving him alone and him crying. Maybe one day he won't be so annoyed by his big sis.