Hello again....

Wow, how fast time flies by with all the holidays and other busyness. We had a great Thanksgiving here in Colorado. It was so nice to be on our own time schedule with the meal and all but it was also soooooo quiet. We were able to go home the next weekend for Josh and Steffany's wedding and it was so nice to have everyone together. It was the 1st time in several years that all 8 of the siblings were together and it was a super fast trip but filled up my soul for at least a couple of weeks. Tom and I decided that he would take off the day after new years and we would head out to Utah for the New Year. Christmas was memorable. We had Papa Murphys for dinner on Christmas Eve and had a great Christmas day. We took the kids to see "The Tale Of Despereaux." Its a cute movie and movie popcorn and Christmas just go together. It was a fun day though we missed our families horribly. Luckily we knew we were going "home" in less than a week and that gave us something to look forward too. We left Wednesday night for Utah and Elle as usual got diarrhea about 1 1/2 into the drive. In Aspen Colorado we pulled over for the second time to change her and Tom ran into a grocery store to get some "bum cream". I started changing her not realizing what exactly I was getting into. Brooke started dry heaving.....literally, and I got poo all over myself. My hands and all of my left thigh were covered in a horrible stinky mess. Elle was also covered and at this point screaming at me. Tom came back around this time and after a change of clothes for both Elle and I. We made it to Frank and Amy's house in Payson around 1:30am. Tom and I shared a new years kiss in the car though it was less than romantic considering he was chowing down on some dill pickle sunflower seeds....blech! Frank and Amy were sweet enough to let us camp out at their house and we were able to spend sometime with them the next day. In fact Brooke and Ava got their picture taken at kiddie kandids for free and were soooo excited.
Brooke is still talking about "her" Ava. That evening we went to my parents house for a "New Years" party and got our "karaoke" on.Wow, Tom was never so excited to be married to me for all eternity...but it was fun and I think we all had a good laugh. The next day (Friday) we all just kind of hung out and played some games, then we went on a couples date to Tepanyaki and I had my first sushi. I ate part of a cucumber roll, it had eel, and had fish eggs in it. All night I just kept envisioning baby fish in my tummy. Riley almost died when I told him about it. After dinner we all went to watch Valkyrie. I actually really liked it though as a mom it made me worry about what my kids might see and have to experience in their lives. The next day was Saturday and we went sledding and then had dinner at Jed and Suzanne's. It was so fun to see everyone but as usual went by much to fast. I had wanted to see Krystal and her cute little baby girl, but we just ran out of time. Luckily we did run into Chris and Luke (he is getting sooo big) sledding so that was nice. Any how we are back and you all can expect posts on a nearly daily basis.

Happy Birthday Riley.....

Ok, so we are back, kind of. We still haven't gotten our internet set back up and so that explains the lapse of almost 2 months without a post. We should be getting the internet in the next week or so so things should move along then. Lots of things have happened in the past 2 months. I ended up going home with Tom to pick up the truck and had a nice visit. We were also able to go up to Laketown for Tom's mom's surprise birthday party. It was so nice to see everyone. Well today Riley turned 7. That seems so "big" to me. Tom and I were reminessing last night about the past 7 years and how things have turned out. They are quite different than what we thought it would be but still soooo good. Riley has lost his 2 front teeth this week and looks like a late jack-o-lantern. I am so glad Riley is in our family he is the best big brother and always so helpful. One day he will make a very good husband for someone. We love him so much! We are having a little party tonight with our neighbors and then on Saturday we are going to do something fun. Until next time....

Goodbye old friend....

So life has been crazy as usual but I am learning that will probably never change so we are just rolling with it, or trying too. As many of you know we had tried to sell the Blazer several years ago to no avail. We had it listed on KSL for months and barely even a call. We since we have moved out here Chris has been "babysitting" our truck and trying to sell it. No bites...suprise, suprise...who wouldn't want a 3/4 ton gas guzzler in this economy. Well after several discussions we decided that we would keep the truck, and sell the blazer. That way Tom gets his manly vehicle that can haul stuff and we can downsize to 2 vehicles...what a concept. We decided we should probably list it soon so that we could hopefully have it sold by the time we went home for the holidays. Tom spent all Saturday morning getting it ready and then on the way to see Brookies movie (Igor...stupid, but were we really expecting anything more?) we dropped it off. We dropped it off about 1:00pm and didn't really think much more about it. Well that night I took Brookie with me on a long Walmart trip to pick out a toy with her birthday money. I took Tom's phone with me but conviently left it in the car...nice but typical right? Well after 1 1/2 hours we pulled up home and Tom called me. I told him I was outside and to come and help me get the groceries. Well the problem was Tom wasn't home, he had to take the kids over to our friends, and luckily neighbors, house and go meet someone about the blazer. OOPS!! Luckily the kids were good, and Tom sold the blazer. The problem now is that we are down to one vehicle so Tom is going to make a trip "Home" sometime in the next 2 weeks to pick up the truck. So we had to say goodbye to our little blazer, we got it when Riley was a baby and it had a good run minus the transmission issue while on vacation in California. It will be missed, Riley was actually kind of sad that we were selling it. Oh, and Brookie wanted me to tell Jennie, and Cassie, and Erik that she used her birthday money to get the Mommy and Baby doggy with the carrier from Costco...she loves it and it has red hair like her daddy. Thanks again.

Brookie turns 4!!!

Today is my first born daughters birthday. I still remember the day we found out we were having a girl and how excited we were. I had no idea what a little girl could do to a daddys heart. Tom is putty in Brookies hands and you add another girl in the mix and it is all over. We are so glad our beautiful little Brookie Cookie is in our family. Today we are going to build a bear and then out to dinner...Brooke is shooting for Mcdonalds but we will see. Our computer finally crashed so that is the reason we haven't had a chance to update. Hopefully we will be able to post pictures soon.

My twins?

So I have been joking that Tom and I need to have twin boys next so that we can be done and fill the need for some more testosterine in our house. Well this got me thinking about Brooke and Elle after Suzannes comment I thought about how much they look like each other so here our my twins now.
Brookie at 14 months:

This is Brookie at 15 months:

Elle at 14 months:

Elle at 14 months:

This is my girls today...notice the cheeto lips?

I just noticed how dark Elles eyebrows are compared to Brookes at the same age. She also has less hair than Brookie did. I didn't even think that was possible I guess it all went to her eyebrows huh? Needless to say they are so fun and I am so glad they are close in age, hopefully they will survive teenagehood and still be close.

Homesick...

So I have been pretty homesick this week. I think it's the natural let down from having visitors and just talking to everyone from home and wishing we were there. Tom and I have both been extra homesick this week because Tom's parents are both having a few health issues and we wish we were close enough to run up to Bear Lake on the weekends to help out. I guess that is the hardest part is feeling like we are just far enough away that we can't run home whenever the desire or need hits. We are liking our ward and our area and I have to say the ward is very close knit I think in part to the fact that there are so many people away from there families. I swear 1/3 of our ward is from Utah and moved here for work just like Tom and I so that is comforting in a way. I helped start a babysitting swap group that has been fun and a good way to get to know other couples. I don't think I posted about our new callings. Tom got called to be the Home Teaching Coordinator, and also is the Sunday school teacher to the 12/13 year olds. About 4 weeks ago the whole primary presidency was reorganized and I was called to be the 2nd counselor. I was a little shocked considering at that point I didn't know anyone in the ward. I am really starting to enjoy it and really like the girls that I am in the presidency with. I love being in primary and often feel like it is so easy to feel the spirit in there. The only problem I am now facing is the fact that Brooke as a Sunbeam wants to talk to me and "help" me whenever I am conducting so that should be interesting but I do love being in there with them.

Anyways that's about it not much else very exciting has happened this week just the usual school stuff.

I have been sooooooooooo tired and can only figure that is the, going to bed too late and the waking up too early that is killing me. Also I wanted to give a shout out to Josh and Steffany, they are getting married Dec. 7th and we are so excited and happy for them. Josh is lucky to get a girl like Steffany and I am very excited to add her to my list of awesome sister-in-laws. I thought I would put up some pictures of the babies as they are growing up so fast.

Riley is loving school, but he always has and has adjusted good to the school thing. I am actually loving the early start early out schedule because he is home by 2:45 so we still have a lot of time together. OK, enough of the ramblings...and this was going to be a "short" post. Until I post again.....

A 2 week blitz.... *warning extremely long post*

So I am going to attempt to go over the past two weeks in one post....yes this could be long. The week before the Lutz family came and visited us Tom left for Georgia on that Sunday. I had been feeling under the weather for nearly a week already but didn't think much of it. Tom was gone to Atlanta from Sunday morning till Wednesday night. He was out there for training and from what he has told me it sounds like he had a good time. All week that Tom was gone I was busy working on getting the house ready for our visitors. I felt progressively sicker but figured I would get over it before Thursday as I had already been sick for almost 2 weeks. Tom got home Wednesday and we almost went to the doctor that night but I thought....one more day. Well Thursday came and we were crazy busy getting ready for Candi and Kelly to come. I was so happy that morning as was the whole family. Tom told me to not clean and just sleep so I could get better. I tried to just rest but that turned out to be a bad idea. Tom was suppose to get home around 6:00pm but he stayed to help with a BBQ and he didn't get home until 8:15pm. The house was a mess, and so was I. Tom came home, sent me to a insta care type clinic and got to cleaning. I went to the doctors found out I had a lovely case of bronchitis and was sent home with some meds. I actually was so happy that I had something that I could actually take medicine for. I came home and Tom and I finished the rest of the house and waited patiently or rather impatiently for the Lutz family to arrive. We had put the kids to bed like normal but promised them we would wake them up when the cousins arrived. They got here a little after midnight and we were so happy. When I saw them it felt like home. I was so glad to have familiar faces in my house. I was so happy and so were the kids. We all stayed up, visited and, watched an awesome Hawaii video Kelly made for us. We didn't go to bed until after 2:00am but it was worth it. The next day was Friday and the boys went golfing. Tom was so happy to have his golfing buddy back. Then we went to Old Chicago Pizza (Yummy) to pay homage to the pic of Candi, and then went to a nature and science museum.

Its so funny how it just felt like normal with everyone again. It felt like no time had passed at all and like this is how it should always be. That night Nate watched the kids for us and Candi, Kelly, Tom and I went downtown to The Cheesecake Factory. Tom ordered some nasty pasta dish that tasted like vomit, and Kelly ordered to weird pasta dish without the pasta. My salad and Candi's sandwich were good though I don't think I would go back to eat. The cheesecake was the redeeming factor though next time we will go straight for dessert. On Saturday we woke up packed a picnic lunch and went to a neat park near downtown. It has a stream running through it so we let the kids wade through it and it also has a train and a petting zoo. The turkey was so funny, it would let the kids pet it and just kept puffing up it's chest. It made me wonder what they had done to it to make it so docile.

Elle loved the animals. The hubbys were party poopers and wouldn't come in the petting zoo with us, but they did ride on the train with us. I guess they were too tired after there awesome basketball game. Tom was so stinking sweaty after that, he was wearing a black polo shirt, not the best idea for a hot day. It was so fun to just let the kids play and visit. After we got home we all went swimming in the pool. We had some nice diving contests and even had some chicken fights.




We had BBQ that night with some corn Candi and Kelly had brought, it made us even more homesick. On Sunday we went to Estes Park, and took a little hike in the mountains. It was beautiful. Everyone kept think Jennie and Brooke were twins with there matching outfits.




Erik managed to drop his sunglasses in the toilet and Candi, yes our germaphobic Candi, fished them out washed them and gave them back. I was so surprised and still laugh about it. The best part is Erik lost his glasses and we still haven't found them yet but we are still looking.



On Monday we woke up and the guys went golfing again, Kelly may or may not have shattered a window on a house, and then we all went to a big mall by our house. We had lunch, Candi got chewed out by a security guard for not watching the kids close enough, and Tom found his dream cell phone (a watch). It all ended much to fast and we were so said to see them leave. It's like I told Tom the pain of being away from everyone had turned into a dull ache and then when they left it ripped it wide open again. Luckily we are going to see everyone for Josh's wedding and hopefully we will have some visitors in October (Eli and Asia? Jed and Suzanne?) This week has just be the usual so far, getting back into the swing of things. I promise to update more often now that we are all feeling better (knock on wood).

Still here....

Yes, we are still here. With Tom gone to Georgia and then The Lutz Family visiting us on top of me having Bronchitis we have just been crazy busy! I will update more tomorrow.

The birthday boy!!!

Happy Birthday to Tom's favorite "Home Boy"














We are glad you are our friend even if we have
to put up with violent outbursts....
















We are still your friends even when you are a
disgrace on the boogie board, not enough body
fat for buoyancy right? (Just keep telling yourself that!)

















We even still like you when you get all snotty
and think you are better than everyone...
















But most of all we like you when you are sipping
on a lava flow....















Happy Birthday Kelly, what would we do without
such an awesome travel buddy? We love you!!!
See you on Thursday!!