One year older....

 

 

I love these pictures of Tyler trying to blow out his candles on his birthday cake!  It perfectly shows his personality and the way he acts with his friends.  Nate was trying to blow out the candles before Tyler could so he ended up holding Nate back with his foot while he did it.
Tyler turned 14 last week.  He wanted to go to a wrestling tournament on his birthday so we celebrated a day late.  He wanted to have Nate over for elk steaks and twice baked potatoes with pumpkin cheesecake.  Tyler is a good, crazy, funny, athletic kid who loves to wrestle and play football and is always teasing someone, either me, his dad, sisters or friends.  He makes life so much more fun!

 

 

*For the recipe for this delicious pumpkin cheesecake, go here.

The Top Of The Hill

Joe turned 40 years old this year!  I always thought it would be fun to throw a big party for his 40th birthday for him but he insisted he didn't want a big party or anything, which is very uncharacteristic for him.  We had a soccer game in the morning and a football game in the early evening and a few other things throughout the day so it would have been kind of tricky to get something going anyway.
I hope he had a good birthday.  He is an my favorite person in the world.  He lives his life trying to do everything he can for our family.  He loves to help and serve others, he is funny and loves to joke.  He is tough but he also has a soft side which I love.  I feel so blessed to have him in my life.
We went for a little bike ride in the morning and my parents came to town and took us out to dinner before the football game. The kids and I made a candy gram for him and he got a new socket set. 

 He wanted a layered cherry chip cake with cream cheese frosting.  I couldn't resist putting 40 candles on it!

 

He was able to finish the day off by watching Tyler play football, one if his favorite things to do.  He likes to go to practice after he gets off work and help out.  He loves the boys and they seem to really like him there.  He likes to tease and joke around with them and they do the same with him.  Before the game I guess he told them that he wanted the score to be 40-0 because he was turning 40.  They won the game.  Guess what the score was?  40-0!

 

 

 

A pirate, a princess, a witch and

a LOT of pumpkins!
When we first started planting a garden about 15 years ago, we would plant pumpkin seeds but we would never get very many pumpkins and the ones we did get were really small and then we would get those nasty squash bugs that are so hard to kill so we decided to not grow pumpkins anymore.  That, and it was fun to go as a family to the pumpkin patch.
This year, though, we went to our local nursery in the spring and they had this little free activity where the kids planted some seeds in some containers to take home and grow.  One of the seeds that Braelynn planted was a pumpkin seed.  That little seed took off and grew into a little plant.  When it was time to plant our garden Braelynn made sure that we didn't forget to plant her pumpkin plant and I made sure to have her plant it on the very edge of the garden where I didn't think the little plant would grow very well.
Well, bad karma came back to me and that little plant grew into this HUGE pumpkin plant that just grew and grew.  It produced about a dozen big pumpkins and a handful of little pumpkins.  It choked out my cucumbers (my very favorite garden vegetable) and eventually killed my pepper plants. 
Since it is tradition that we go to the pumpkin patch we still wanted to go and take a hay ride or something but we could never get everyone's schedule together at the same time that they had the hay rides going on.  It makes me sad to think we didn't get to do that this year, especially since next year will be the last year that Veronica will be living at home.  These kids are just growing too fast!
We did get to carve pumpkins and we had a fun Halloween.
Veronica didn't have to dress up this year for anything and went to a movie party at her friends house but she let me take her picture!

Tyler had football practice and then went with his friends to the haunted woods.  It was fun to hear about the three macho boys who got so scared and then made a pact with each other not to tell anyone else that they were so scared.  It still makes me laugh when I think about it!

Samantha is a ball girl for the SUU volleyball team and they had a game Halloween night but she was able to go trick or treating for a little bit.  She had a little bit (ok, a lot) of drama surrounding her costume last minute but she ended up being this cute pirate that we had the stuff for around the house and in the Halloween tote.

Brenna wanted to be a mean witch with her face painted.

Last year a few weeks after Halloween we had to go to Mesquite Nevada for Tyler's football game.  The girls and I went to Smiths to kill time for the hour that they were warming up before the game started.  We walked by the clearance section on the way into the store and saw this beautiful dress that Braelynn fell in love with.  It was $8, complete with gloves, and the skirt underneath that make the dress poof out.

School Time

I love summer vacation and always enjoy it while it is here but then about a week before school starts, when you can start to feel the excitement in the air, I look forward to starting a routine again and having a little more structure to our lives. 
This year I never felt that excitement and, honestly, felt that way for the first two full weeks of school.  I love my job at the school and was excited to start work again but the busy afternoons and evenings, homework, spelling words, just filled my soul with dread and anxiety.  I missed the long cool evenings of summer, having an afternoon to hang with friends or go swimming or just whatever.  Now it's back to bed times and a schedule.  The first few weeks were awful but its ok now.  Homework is getting done faster and everyone is settling in just fine. 

Veronica is a Junior and working hard to get all her college courses done as well as her high school credits so next year she can graduate with her high school diploma as well as her associates degree.  Even with that she maintains a GPA high enough to be in the honor society and enjoy her extra curricular activities.

Tyler is in 8th grade, still says he hates school but I don't believe it!  He is taking honor classes and is in the honor society as well.  He wouldn't take a decent picture so he gets the one with his sisters.

Samantha is in 7th grade and loves having more options on which classes to take and took some different ones so that she can see what she likes to do. She also keeps her GPA high enough to be in the honor society.

Braelynn and Brenna are in 2nd grade.  I kept them together in the same class again this year.  It just makes life so much easier.  After talking to them and last years teacher, we decided it was ok for them to be together still.  They play with different friends are recess and don't seem to compete academically. Their teacher this year is open about the fact that she had a hard time telling them apart and one day they inadvertently wore similar shirts and she teased them about not being allowed to do that so sometimes they ask me to do their hair the same and find clothes that are similar just to try to trick her.  Lets hope they  get it out of their system before they are old enough for it to be a problem!

Brenna

 Braelynn

Annie

Samantha had the opportunity to play an orphan in our community theater's production of Annie in February.  It was kind of a big deal to us, it was the first time she has ever tried out for a play and we sort of didn't give her a choice but to try out.  She did awesome, she was one of the few orphans (besides Annie) that had some speaking parts and a little solo.  She seemed to enjoy it, always coming home from rehearsals happy and singing.

 

bottom row, 2nd from left

 2nd from right

 3rd from left

 Since that kind of stuff (singing and dancing and acting) is very much not one of my talents it was really fun and exciting to watch her be so amazing at it!

Pre-teen

Samantha turned 12 this summer.  Its hard to believe that she is old enough to go to Young Women's and will be going into 7th grade, her second year of middle school. She invited a few friends to go swimming and then come over for Navaho tacos and cheesecake cupcakes.
Sam is so much fun to be around, loves to help out anyone who needs help, is a really good babysitter (the kids love her) and is a good friend and is full of spunk and personality.  She loves to play the piano, run, and play soccer.  She can (and does)  fall asleep everywhere!

She had a little bit of excitement on her birthday, we had the biggest amount of rainfall we have had since 1967, receiving over 2 inches of rain in about 2 hours. It caused some flooding and power outages for a few hours.  If any of you know Sam, you know she just loves stuff like that.  For example, she got her braces put on on Valentines day of this year, got them adjusted for the first time on April Fools Day and adjusted on Brenna and Braelynn's birthday.    It was completely coincidence but for her it was a huge deal and she still talks about it.

We hope you had a happy birthday, Samantha!

Sweet 16

16.  A junior in high school.  Driving.  Wow, how did that happen?
I wanted to do something different for Veronica's 16th birthday so we threw a surprise party for her.    It was originally going to be outside, with lawn games and a fire to roast starburst, marshmallows and hot dogs. A smores bar with different kinds of chocolate, marshmallows, etc.  But we were in the middle of a heat wave with temperatures over 100 and cooling down to only about 85 degrees and no change forecasted so instead we did a float bar. 
Think rootbeer float, cherry coke float  (cherry coke, ice cream, whipped cream and a cherry), creamsicle float (orange soda, whipped cream and ice cream), strawberry and cream float, etc.  There was popcorn, kettle corn, and other kinds of goodies.
I had decorations all planned out in my head for outside.  I rounded up extra chairs, tables, and outdoor games.  I borrowed a projector so they could watch a movie outside.  Red, white and blue decorations made and hidden while she was away at youth conference for a day.  Cute labels made identifying all the food,  it was going to be perfect.
About 2 hours before the party the wind started to blow and it started to rain so we moved it all indoors.  It wasn't the same but it still looked good and she was surprised!  It is fun to have her friends come over.  She is blessed to have a good group of friends.  It makes high school (and life in general) that much better. 
She is a talented violinist, she is driven to accomplish the goals that she sets for herself and has a firm desire to stay true to the things that she knows is right.  She is on track to graduate from high school at age 17 with an associates degree.
I hope she had an awesome birthday and felt extra special on her birthday!

I can't seem to find all the pictures of her party.  Sad.