Happy 8th Birthday Belle

 

I can't beleive that it has been 8 wonderful years with you my dear. I love how sweet you are and how you are always looking out for your little sisters. I am looking forward to your baptism and the many more wonderful milestones for you in the future! We love you!!

Labor Day Weekend a visit from Cousins

We had a wonderful visit over Labor day Weekend. My cousin Harmony and family came for a visit. My kids love her kids and they love to hang out. The last 2 summers she has invited my older kids to spend a week at her house with her kids. She owns a horse training center. Where she has 50+ horses there. My kids are always in heaven.
So we had a great time hanging out with them. We also spent a day working on getting My Uncle's House cleaned up for my other cousin. It was a fun filled weekend.
Harmony and Dan we look forward to your next visit.

Slug Bug

 

The girls lately everytime we are in the car are playing that slug bug game. Where when you see a VW bug they slug you. So the girls down loaded this picture so the could slug each other when they are home. I had to go over the rules of the game and that pictures don't count. I also told them no punching hard. So I can't get in the car without anyone saying slug bug. I remember playing it with my siblings.

Girls Camp

 

This year I was able to go to Girls Camp with Gabby. This was her first year and she was very excited. I was along with 3 other ladies in charge of 17 1st year(12yr olds). They were so much fun. I loved how excited they were to do everything and learn all the camp songs and just have fun!

I was Lucky to be able to work with one of my friends who since I moved out of her ward we don't see each other very often. We had so much fun together!! It made everything bareable.

Gabby had a fabulous time. She made some really good friends that I think she will be friends with for a long time. She is still singing those camp songs and teaching her sisters too. I think they will know most of the songs long before they ever get to go to camp. If you see her you should ask her about the Mormon boy Rap song. It cracks me up.

I was a little nervous at first to go since we were sleeping in tents this year. It all worked out. So we will see if they ever ask me to go again.

I wish I had pictures of the mud ball they played. One girl in our ward I could only see the whites of her eyes. It was kick ball in the mud. It looked like tons of fun!! Gabby loved it!!

The crafts were fun too and they had a slip and Slide. Instead of a polar dip they did a polar slip!

I will say at the end of the week I was so tired I could barely keep my eyes open and was looking forward to a shower and my bed.!
Girls Camp 2011

Goodbye Uncle Robert

Here he is in his garden with Carlee's kids!

 

 

 

At my Grandma's 80th Birthday with Lynn(his daughter)to bad his eye's are closed!

Just before the 4th of July my Uncle Robert suddenly passed away. My kids and family were devastated. He was the guy who was always there for you. He had a fabulous garden and every summer we would go and pick strawberries and rasberries and get veggies. He would also grow pumpkins for mine and Carlee's kids every year! We would go and he would let them pick them from his yard. He also had chickens and my kids loved to go with him to see if any had laid eggs.

Just the week before he passed away he was here at my house playing with the kids and helping Kyle with some carpet work. He was a painter and a jack of all trades. If there was anything you were looking for Robert either had it or knew exactly where to find it. He was always giving the kids gum! He had a stash in his car just in case we either stopped by his house or he came over. My kids were always happy to see him! Robert you are greatly missed and we love you!!

A Hike to the Beach

 

Kyle has been wanting to take the whole family on a hike for forever. Every year I am either pregnant or have a child to small to hike. This year he was determined. He was planning on taking us to lake Ozette. At the last minute we heard about this suppose to be secret hike to the beach that is only mile and 1/2 long. We drove on logging roads to reach the starting point. All the kids packed in with packs of some kind. When we put Lydia's on her she pretty much just fell over it was so heavy for her. So Kyle ended up packing in 2 packs and I don't know how much more. We had 2 tents and all of our sleeping bags and food. It took us about an hour and half to do the hike. There was a lot of roots but it wasn't to bad. Lilly even hiked most of it.

When we got there Kyle took the filter to get some water from the creek and guess what it stopped working. So we ended up boiling all of our water. It was a little unnerving for me to be filling up the water can and see bugs swimming on top of the water. I just kept telling myself we are boiling everything our of it. It worked out just great. Our first day in it was cold and we were fogged in. I was worried we would spend the entire trip in the cold. That whole day Belle wasn't acting herself and I kept asking her if she was OK. She would say I'm just cold. I was cold so I didn't think much of it. Then she was asking if she could go to sleep. It took me all day but it dawned on me to check her head and she was warm. I took her temp and she had a fever of 101 something. I felt so bad. I gave her some Tylenol and put her to bed. She ended up missing a beautiful sunset. In the morning she was feeling better.

The next day was Awesome it was warm and we walked down to the Norwegian Memorial. Around 1900 a ship was caught in a storm and was looking for the sound when he saw light on the beach and turned thinking it was a light house. The ship went down with only 2or 3 survivors. Who made it to the beach and went to the cabin they thought was the lighthouse. Berried their comrades on the beach. Later came back and berried them in the treeline. Norwegian group came and placed a memorial there for them. It was interesting and my kids thought it was awesome. We then played on the beach all day. Lilly loved it she couldn't stay out of the sand the whole time we were there.

We couldn't find any good cups that were cheap enough to hike in with so Kyle bought the cheap sippy cups and we used those for hot chocolate. It worked out good and it was perfect for the little ones. On our last night Kyle and the kids decided that they wanted to make a buoy into a swing. So they found some rope(there was a ton of stuff washed up on the beach and there was plenty of rope) and hung it in a tree. It was fun. We also took glow sticks at night and tied string to them and swung them around at night and the girls would throw them and run after them. They did that one night for at least an hour.
We hiked out the next day!

We had a great time and we decided that we will probably make it a family tradition. I think next time we might have another family come with us.

Gabby's 1st day of school

This year Gabby decided to go to a school on Vashon. She takes a ferry to school everyday. She now has a cell phone so I know she is ok. She has also started Volleyball. She stays after school then takes a city bus to the Ferry and then catches a ferry home. I then pick her up at the ferry dock. She is so grown.

Time Out For Women

 

Time out for women came to Seattle in April. We went to buy tickets in Feburary and they told us they were all sold out.
My little sister posted on facebook that she was looking for tickets. She came up with 3 for Friday night and 4 for Saturday. My Mom Booked a hotel the day before and Kyle said he would watch the kids. We went on Friday hopeing to find tickets and sure enough someone was selling tickets outside that they couldn't use. It was so much fun and I really needed a weekend like that. It ended up being My Mom, Alisa, Carlee and me. Here is a little blurb about what it was all about.

It’s not like any other weekend or any other gathering or any other group of women. And it’s not like any other tour. The TIME OUT FOR WOMEN 2011 "CHOOSE TO BECOME" a full weekend of inspirational messages and music. And this year we're talking about YOUR POSSIBILITIES. It was an inspiring weekend of choosing who and what you want to become.