Kaylee Turns 12!

I can't believe this girl is 12!  I very VERY distinctly remember every detail about my 12th birthday and my first young women activity.  How is it possible that I already have a child that age?!

This picture below is exactly the expression I was wanting to capture when she opened her main birthday present.  We had been telling her no no to the team parka for almost a year.  It wasn't a team requirement and so therefore wasn't something we wanted to invest in until we knew what kind of commitment she would have to swimming.  Well, this girl is a fish.  She works so hard, she's been dropping times and setting new goals.  She completely deserves this parka!  HOWEVER...hers hadn't come in yet! AHHH!  But what about that excitement on her face?!  She wasn't gonna get that from looking at a piece of paper that had a picture on it of the parka she would EVENTUALLY get!  We knew we HAD to borrow from a friend down the street so we could really get the full effect of this awesome birthday present!

And I got the picture I wanted!  (and her parka, with her name on it, came the very next day!)  :)

Kaylee had her very first activity on her actual birthday...and to make it better it was an activity with her daddy...and all the boys!  The opening song was led by our next door neighbor and of course it was a primary birthday song!  The youth and leaders in our ward are absolutely amazing and wonderful and perfect and fun and the best examples for my little girl (and for me).  I am so excited for her to be part of it all!

While she was gone to the activity her Beehive class presidency ran over real quick to decorate her door!  This was a momma's dream come true!  She has been so excited for this and I just really REALLY wanted it to all be perfect and amazing for her...and it really was...

...just like it was for her momma 23 years ago!  ;)  It was fun to show the girls my 12 year old pictures and read my first journal entry from when I turned 12.  Such great memories!  :)

But quickly moving on...this is about Kaylee!  :)

This girl has the greatest friends ever and they had a fun night together the weekend after her birthday!  I'm always thankful for where we live and the amazing people that are such a huge part of our lives!  I hope and pray that Kaylee and all of our kids will always surround themselves with good friends...good people that will always encourage each other to be good and make good choices!

Hmmm...maybe they aren't as sweet and innocent as I just raved about!  What happened to them?!  ;)

Of course the big highlight of turning 12 was getting to go to the temple for the first time to do baptisms.  What an amazing experience, from getting her recommend to being in the temple.  I wrote more about it in Kaylee's journal, but I just have to say that the spirit was so strong walking up to the temple that day with her.  I can't imagine what it would be like to be inside with all of my kiddos around us!  

Kaylee already has grown and blossomed so much!  I see her writing in her own journal, and reading more, and listening more and taking it all in.  She has always been a huge help to me and to everyone in our home...but that help and unconditional love for all of us just continues to happen.  She is truly one of a kind!  Someone I know I need in my life!  She makes me want to be a better mother...and just a better person!  We all love her so much!  

Happy birthday Kaylee Elaine!

Fall Break Staycation

The last weekend that Matt was gone happened to be General Conference weekend, which was a HUGE bummer!  That is always such a fun and relaxing weekend as a family.  A time to sit together and listen to our Prophet and the apostles and others.  It's a time to talk and think about our Savior and becoming like Him and making our home a heaven on earth.  Matt did text me once or twice during a couple of talks.  He was able to listen while up on the mountain.  And the kids and I sent these pictures of the breakfast and popcorn and fun times he was missing out on.  :)  We still had a wonderful weekend listening to conference.  The kids do a pretty good job of sitting for most of the 4 two hour sessions.  Sometimes they'd be in the back yard or downstairs playing, but the girls seemed to want to listen more than they ever have.  I love to read their notes and see what they take from each speaker.  

The next weekend was Fall Break, and this year (even though it was UW's Homecoming weekend which we probably should've gone to) we decided to just stay put.  We had been super busy, Matt had been gone those three weekends in a row and it was just kinda nice to do something simple!  We just packed everyone up and went to Salt Lake to spend one night there and hit the town.  We walked through City Creek...getting free shirts at the Microsoft store ;) Ate at JBs a couple of times...the kids love that place...it works.  We took trax, went to temple square and the Church History Museum.  We do this often and it never seems to get old, but this time it was different to stay at the hotel, swim, fall asleep in bed to a movie and spend extra time together! 

One picture with all of us!  The sweet missionary had a hard time with the camera.  So we have his finger there too!  :)  Oh well.  We always love being on temple square!  We have many a picture at this spot with certainly more to come!  :)

The Odds and Ends of September

Like Kierra has been saying lately...I don't like September....

I LOVE IT!!  

Maybe it's because it's my birthday month...but really it's just because I love getting back into our routines, but still having the warm weather to play!

The beginning of the month was our...

 

 We are so blessed to live where we do!  We have forever friends here in this ward.  From the adults, to the youth, to the primary kids to the babies...the friendships are amazing!  

Driving up to the campground it was POURING rain!  I kinda wondered what in the world we were thinking, but the night dried up and we had a great time visiting....

Playing catch with hot coals...still not quite sure why...look at those young ones watching and learning from these wonderful examples!

Yummy food!

 

Beautiful singing!

Such a great time! A quick trip, but tons of fun!

The next 3...wait...THREE weekends in a row Matt was out of town!  I seem to handle it better than when I only had little ones, but it's always hard, and this was over the weekends...that's family time...that's hang out time with daddy who is gone all week.  It was a bummer for us!  However, great for Matt! 

For the first two weekends he was able to attend Wood Badge, which is a training for scout leaders...or a big boy scout camp.  :)  They had a great time...and great weather!  :)  I felt so bad for them...but he really learned soooo much!  He came home reminiscing about the leaders and adventures he had growing up and really took in the many life lessons that were also taught.  It was definitely worth it!

Then the 3rd weekend was his hunting trip with some great friends!  We ended up having to purchase another one of these to accommodate.  

It's yummy stuff!  We did jerky last time he came home with something and we haven't done that yet...but the steaks are soooo wonderful!  The roasts too!

And speaking of yummy food!  I laughed a ton at Matt's facebook post of his last supper.  For a few months Matt was contracted out to a company that catered breakfast, lunch and dinner...really a great job for a single guy!  He'd never have to pay for food!  Matt enjoyed it...maybe a little too much!  Actually...he did good trying to stay healthy.  It was crazy to hear him talk about the stuff they had there!

Anyway...that's it for Matt's adventures...now on to Taylor.  

5th grade is the year of fieldtrips, projects, wax museums, Hope of America...it's a busy year!

The first fieldtrip was to Timpanogos Cave!  She had a great time and took TONS of pictures!  I just put a few on here...including this cute one of her with one of her greatest friends!  :)

The rest of September just kinda happened.  Lots going on.  I know it's weird for me to put up a picture of my broken flip flops, but this D.I. find was one of those that you just cherish.  They were the perfect flip flop that had the perfect arch and heal for my flat feet and they lasted me a good couple of summers.  I had to take a picture before trashing them.  :(

Just a cute picture!

Night out with the girls!  (Kaylee is on the far left)  These girls really aren't die hard One Direction fans.  But they had fun getting away from homework and chores to head to the movies!

Harvesting!  One of our peach trees died this year :(  but our other one did pretty good and we still canned peaches and made freezer jam!

My 35th birthday!  The girls even doorbell ditched me with some cards and candy!

Football season!  No my girls are not byu fans....but they have fun causing havoc around the neighborhood (with the help of the Bishop of course!)

Left:  Kierra's last smile with all of her baby teeth.  Right:  Kierra's first missing tooth!  Still so beautiful!  Check out those eyes!

Fun weekends with sisters!  The girls are always coming up with plays, dances, hairstyles, videos.  They have so much fun together.

At the end of September I got to go to the last Relief Society broadcast!  I'm so excited that they will now combine this meeting with the young women and the primary girls age 8 and up.  That means almost all of the girls in this house will get to go next year!  Wow!  I'm excited to hear the words of our leaders at those meetings...especially the first one.

It was fun for me to go up to Salt Lake for this.  This was the 2nd weekend that Matt had been gone and he got home just in time for me to go up there.  Our whole stake had tickets to go and I thought of calling a few people to go up together, but because I didn't know if Matt would be home I thought I'd better just plan to go alone in case I couldn't go at all.  Right away though I found some great friends sitting right at the front of the balcony.  It was a wonderful meeting as always....a great start to what would then be two conference weekends in a row...general and then stake!  Another reason to just LOVE this time of year!

I took some time by myself to walk around temple square.  It was nice to have some time to myself...self reflecting...wanting to be a better person, mother, wife, friend.  The temple and Christus look so beautiful at night! 

I even saw a cute proposal happening.  The girl getting proposed to was up at the top of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and the family was all down below.  It was pretty fun!  I posted it on facebook and right away some friends of mine called and said "Where are you?"  So...I crashed their mother/daughter night and met them for dinner at City Creek!  It was the perfect end to a wonderful September!