Snow Canyon

Grayson and Lydia loved hiking at Snow Canyon with PaPa Jerry so much that they started begging to go again the minute they saw the red rocks of Dixie Valley. We had a great hike, there is nothing like hiking in Southern Utah. Unfortunately I gave into Lydia and let her wear the wrong shoes and had to carry her the most of the way back since she had developed two major blisters. She was crying and in an effort to get her to stop I started singing some of her favorite songs to her. I would only do this in isolation since not only can I not sing I was out of breath and am also recovering from a cold. So let just say it wasn't very pretty but it was working. Well, as we get to the top of a little hill and look over we see a group of people gathered. With further investigation I discovered some people were randomly getting married along the path. Lets just hope that they couldn't hear me and that I didn't ruin there ceremony. Next time we will be better prepared for hiking.

Kailey Country

We spent a night on our way to St. George in Kailey Country aka Ceder City. Grayson came up with the name Kailey Country. I guess is makes sense, it is where Kailey his cousin lives and as far as he knows Ceder is the Country. Kailey Country is also the home of Abby, Jeremy and Kassidy. Grayson and Lydia love visiting the Cox's especially because they usually get a horse back ride. My favorite moment is when Lydia got chased down by one of the Chickens. Kailey taught one of her the chickens to her for fun. Well while we were all out front Lydia wondered to the back were that chicken started chasing Lydia, she didn't think it was so funny and was scared for her life and started screaming. I shouldn't think it was so funny, she was really scared, but secretly I did. Hopefully they will let us come again soon. Grayson is starting to think he is a real Cowboy.

Our little Troy

We gave the kids the High School Musical soundtrack for Christmas, they had only seen the movie once but I knew they would like the songs. Since then High School Musical has become a very important part of our lives. It's right up there with Superheros and Princesses.

One of my favorite things that has come about because of the HSM absession is Grayson is more open to wearing the clothes I want him too. Grayson used to get dressed in what ever I gave him no questions asked. It was great, I could dress him all up in things most boys wouldn't wear. Well then Porter came along and showed Grayson that he had a choice. Porter doesn't like sweaters or collared shirts which happen to be my favorite. Soon Grayson demanded he would only wear T-shirts and jeans. Then one day Grayson made the mistake of telling me he wanted to wear a brown cordiroy sports jacket he usually thew a fit about wearing because he wanted to look like Troy ( Troy wears collared shirts and jackets in HSM2). So now if I want to Grayson to wear basically anything but a t-shirt, I just have to tell him he's going to look like Troy. I've done this many times with Lydia telling her she'll look like a princess, but I never thought I would be doing it with Grayson.

We recored this performance right after Christmas, since then Grayson has developed many more "cool" moves. He takes his dancing very seriously he is rarely smiling while dancing. If you want to hear what he is dancing to you'll need to pause the music at the bottom of the blog.

Cinderella

Yesturday Lydia and I went to Ballet West's performance of Cinderella. We both loved it. I've been wanting to take Lydia to the ballet for years but have always worried about her being too little. I figured Cinderella was a good show to test her on since she would be excited to see Cinderella in addition to the ballerinas. She did so well and loved almost every minute of it. During the intermissions she wanted to get back to her seat so the show wouldn't start without her. The hardest part was keeping her from raising her arms above her head (she wanted to dance along with the ballerinas). She also yelled out a few times. Like when they were trying the slipper on the step-sisters she yelled out "No it's Cinderella's". Luckily those around us found it to be as cute as I did. I am already looking forward to our next performance

Congratulations Uncle BoBo

This is just one of many funny photos of my brother Jon or Uncle BoBo. Jon just won an election for Education Senator at Utah State. Jon has always been very active in USU activities and is one of the co-founders of the Finals Week HOWL. He was planning on running for Senate for a while now and just found out that he is uncontested. I'm sure he would have won anyways. We love ya tons Jon and are so glad that you're making all you wildest dreams come true.

Saying Goodbye!

Before leaving to go home thursday, Tami and I took our kids down to the Conference Center to see President Hinckley one last time. We got their just as the viewing was starting so we didn't have to wait in line. I hope that my kids will remember the sweet spirit that was there. I still remember going with my dad to see President Kimball. It was a special experience to say goodbye again as the processional went down South Temple. We will miss Prisident Hinckley so much and apprienciate all that he did for us and the church.

Smile!

Last week Tami and I took our kids to get their pictures taken. I thought our biggest problem would be keeping the kids in a good mood. Turns out our biggest problem was just getting the kids to smile, and when I say smile I mean a real smile. Here are some examples of fake smiles. Grayson and Lydia would either freeze and not smile or way over think it. Kate on the other hand wouldn't smile for anything. She spent most of the sitting with her lips pressed together. Good thing she still so cute.

Here are my favorites of each of the kids:

I can't believe how grown up my little boy is getting.

This was the closest thing to a smile we got.

I couldn't pick just one for Kate.

At the end we got the boys in their favorite superhero costumes since this is a better depiction of their every day lives.

p.s. we went to our friend Ryan Thompson (Maggie's brother in law) for the pictures. It was the best experience taking pictures with kids I've ever had. It was the first time I wasn't completely stressed out. He does really great pictures I highly recommend him. Check him out at rltphotography.com

My Sister Tami is staying with me for the rest of January while her husband Joseph is in Texas on a rotation. She has stayed with us for long periods of time lots of times and we even call our guest room Tami's room. Of course I always love to have Tami and her kids stay with us. Porter and Grayson are more like brothers than cousins and never seem to grow tired of each other. Carol and Lydia have been playing better than ever. Usually our divas spend more time fighting than playing.
Having Tami and her kids living with us has given me a small glimpse into what it would be like in a polygamist home. I love having someone help with all the housework. I love having help planning, shopping for and preparing meals. I love having other kids around for my kids to play with. The down side- six kids in one house can definitely be too much at times. Six kids make a lot more messes and laundry than three. And my favorite- the looks people give the two of us while running around alone with all six kids.
When Tami is in town not much gets done except for Shopping. We always manage to find more than enough time to shop. Jared likes to joke that our credit card bills go through the roof when Tami is in town. This trip has been no different. Last Friday Shelly watched our kids for the day and in trying to avoid shopping we thought we would go out to the Mitt Romney Headquarters to make phone calls for his campaign. It was pretty fun, I would recommend it to anyone wanting to help his campaign. Unfortunately his headquarters are right next to South Towne Mall and of course we had to run in a look at a couple of things. And of course we found some bargains we couldn't pass up. We are pathetic.

Last week we went with our mom down to St. George to pretend like we were doing something with our lives. We actually spend most of our time shopping. Porter told Tami "Shopping isn't a fun thing for kids to do," after asking what we were going to do that day. These are some pictures of the kids swimming. Abby and her kids drove down from Cedar for the night. My dad flew down the last day and took the kids hiking. I forgot to send the camera- but they won't stop talking about how fun it was. We were just glad to finish our shopping kid free.

Happy New Year!

So, last night was the first time in like three years that we actually stayed up for the new year. These pictures make the night look better than it was. Having the kids pose for our pictures was probably the most eventful thing that happened. We basically just sat around waiting for it to be midnight. We had planned on spending the night playing games but when it came down to it, I think we were all just too burnt out. Grayson was the only one of our kids that was still awake and loved seeing all the fireworks.