Since we couldn't afford a major trip this summer, we spent a few days in the city. One excursion was hiking Mount Timpanogas. I remembered hiking there as a teenager and didn't remember it being too difficult. Obviously, I'm a little older now and the hike was a difficult, but very satisfying one. We hike about 1200 feet in 1 1/2 miles so it was pretty much straight up with lots of switchbacks. Here is our wholes gang that made it to the top.

Here is Syd & TJ learning how to be junior rangers.

The kids found a rock on the ground and had to pose with it - pretend they got hit over the head. I assure you, no one was actually hurt.

We thought this made Syd look like she had bunny ears and just had to get a picture!

We needed proof so here we are somewhere up the mountain. Isn't nature beautiful!

Here are those awesome shirts! Aunt Kimmie and her family joined us for the 4th. Here is Sydnie with most of her little cousins. Madi is missing - I think she was running around stealing shoes.

Well we are gettin there - whew! I'm at least to July. I helped Sydnie & TJ make some fun shirts for the 4th of July (of course I had to make me one too). Here are the before pictures -

And here is the after picture! Don't these cousins look like they are having fun! I will post our 4th of July on a different day - I'm ready for bed!

One of the highlights of 3rd grade that I just have to share with you, is Syd's play. They were in groups of 4 and had to right a play, make any backdrops, props, or costumes, and then perform it in front of the class. Syd's group did a spoof on The Boy Who Cried Wolf. It was called The Cat Who Cried Mouse. I was laughing so hard, I almost fell out of my chair. Her teacher filmed it, so as soon as I get a copy, I will upload it so you can all see. Sydnie played the mindless servant and the narator. Great job Syd!

Okay, so I still haven't got caught up. We took a little road trip for Memorial Day to visit my Grandma. We had a blast! We visited lots of family in my Grandma's back yard, which is beautiful and fun!


We also visited my Grandpa's grave and saw where my Uncle Tommy is buried and where my Great Uncle Brownie is buried (Dad used to tell us the most amazing stories about him).


We got to visit a zoo - look at these scary looking creatures we found! A rare Sydnie, Rian, TJ, and Gavin! We were so lucky to catch them when they were not sleeping!


We also went to a hand's on museum - you'll have to ask Sydnie what she's doing here. We had a lot of fun!

We have had a most enjoyable, but busy, summer. To start off, we got to help watch Aunt Kimmie's kids for a couple of weeks while her and Uncle Bret went job hunting. We had so much fun! These pictures were taken at some parks we took them to. Kim amazes me - I can barely handle 1 kid and she has 3 under the age of 5! What an amazing woman!

Sydnie was in Pirates of Penzance for a town celebration. She was a little Ruth pirate and got to sing - I hope you enjoy watching her. I got to be in charge of props - whew! There were so many swords to keep track of!

Okay, so I guess I am catching up yet again. Here is a quick summary of the rest of 3rd grade. Sydnie got so many reading points at school that she was able to pick a book to have donated to the school. They put her picture in the front cover with an explanation of why. She picked the book Dragon Rider by Cornelia Funke - you should read it!

For our city celebration we do every year, each class got to dress up like a different period of time. Syd's class got cowboys & indians (doesn't she make a cute indian?), and TJ's class (yes, that is TJ) got to dress up like hippies - they did this for a parade. They had so much fun!

One of the big things Syd's class worked on this year was writing research papers. After they learned how, they were assigned a country in South America to research, write a paper, and give an oral presentation in class. This is Sydnie with her poster she made all by herself. She did a great job with her presentation!

I'm finally getting Easter up! We had our annual Easter egg hunt and had lots of fun. (We went to a park after - I will post that later.) We also had fun dyeing eggs - we tried a metallic look this year. Before our egg hunt, the kids drew with chalk on the pavement - Sydnie made bunny ears and below is giving her best bunny face with her creations.

I hope you enjoy Syd's piano recital. She did a great job! Keep up the good practicing!

What's for dinner? It looks like fish sticks, peas, ketchup, & moldy oreos? It definately does not taste like it! This was our April Fool's day dinner - I made the fish stick dinner and Sydnie added the moldy oreos. The peas are actually Airheads rolled into balls. The fish sticks are those wafer cookies spread with peanut butter and rolled in cornflakes. And the ketchup is seedless strawberry jam. We'll see if you can figure out how Sydnie made the moldy Oreo's.

Sydnie and I had a great experience a couple of weeks ago. We went to a temple open house for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Sydnie really wanted to go, so I took a day off work and went down with her G & G. We felt an awesome peace inside, so much so that Sydnie did not want to leave. We stopped at Target on our way home because Sydnie was in major need of a new dress and jeans. Then we went to dinner at a place called Good Wood - the best ribs I've had in a long time. We had a great day - definately worth my day off!

Okay, so Sydnie finished ALL the Harry Potter books and loved them! She keeps saying she wishes there was an 8th book. Wow! She is at about 260 points at school and is the only one in the 3rd grade to be that high! Great job Sydnie! (Now if I can just get her that excited about doing chores~). Sydnie's Aunt Kimmie and family sent her the cutest hair clips ever - hear are the first ones she wore - aren't they the cutest?

For some reason, I can't get this image to go the right way - sorry. I have tried several times. Anyway, this was our attempt at our very own heart shaped pizza we made for our Valentine's Day celebration at home. It was delicious!

Sydnie put this Valentine's box together in about 10 minutes. We didn't find out until last minute that she needed one. I think she did great. She had to dress up on the Friday before (along with the whole school). Then she had to be paired up with a boy and he had to get her treats for her and a drink and sit by her and everything. She was very nervous that whole week. But it wasn't so bad.

Sydnie got some Kinex from her Daddy for Christmas. She has been working on the windmill off and on for about a week. It even has a motor that makes it spin! She finished it up today because she was home sick - that's why the jammies. She is my little inventor/builder!

Isn't the imagination a wonderful thing! If ever I take something out of the box, I have to leave it in the house for a few days so the cats and Sydnie can get their fill of play. Sydnie created herself a sarcophagus. I know it's a little morbid, but wow. She even made creaking noises as she opened the box while she was inside.

Sydnie and me want to wish everyone a Happy Valentine's Day!
We had fun taking these pictures in our matching 'Be Mine' T-shirts.

Sorry for the delay again - my camera broke around Thanksgiving and it took me awhile to replace it. I borrowed my sister's camera to take pictures in between, but haven't got all of them from her yet, but I will. Anyway, here is some cute ones from Christmas.


So my pictures are a little backwards, but oh-well, I am running out of battery power. Our cats even enjoyed the holiday - we got them some new toys and they have loved them!


One of the reasons Sydnie wanted to learn piano was because of this song - Fur Elise, so I found a simplified version of it and she is learning it with the help of her piano teacher. Once she has it mastered, I will put a video up of her playing. She is doing to well with piano.



Here is our annual family version of The Nativity. Our baby Jesus was a little squirmy, but we had a lot of fun!


I took this picture up the road from our house - there is a wonderful lamp post that I just had to use in the background. She had fun blowing the snow at me!


Sydnie has been reading the Harry Potter books and loves them! She is now almost done with book 5. At school she earns points for reading and passing a test on the book she's finished and they get rewards for certain amounts of points. Sydnie was the first in her class to get to 100 which means she gets to choose a book to be donated to her school library. They put her picture in it and put the book in their school library. She chose Dragon Rider by Cornelia Funke. Ahhh - my little bookworm!

And finally, we are caught up. Here is Sydnie and TJ on halloween. In case you can't tell, Sydnie is a Ritz cracker - her trick-or-treat bag is a cracker box. I made her dress in orange to be cheese. It took her weeks to decide what to be - what a creative girl! TJ was an Emoo (I don't know how to spell it, but it's a sad, depressed person or something like that anyway).


I got off work early (the kids didn't have school, again) and we took TJ, Gavin, Sydnie, Gramma, Julie, and myself to a corn maze. Then that evening, we had TJ and his mom over for dinner and trick or treating. For dinner we had 'mummy' pizzas and 'eyeball' carrots. The haunted house in the back ground was by Sydnie at school. She did a great job! After dinner and trick-or-treating, we went to TJ's house and watched 'Nightmare before Christmas'. All in all we had a fun day!

We must have pumpkins in October. Sydnie and I picked out pumpkins to carve. She had her heart set on carving this one because it had a mark on it that looked like a scar. She immediately thought it would make a great frankenstein.


Ewe - digging out the insides! I don't like the way my kitchen smells during this process, but it leaves quickly.



And here is her finished product. What a great creation!