Random thoughts

 Mason got to meet the scary Easter Bunny at the Cedar Hills Walmart. He actually liked him!  Easter Bunnies are the least real looking dress up things ever!  All my kids met this bunny in years prior and none of them were convinced he was real.  I agree.  At least hide your dirty tennis shoes!!

On a happier note, we came home to this!  It made me feel so loved.  Seriously whoever did this made my week.  I felt love and it was a good way to show love.

Bubble Gum and Egg Painting

What does egg painting and putting bubble gum down prairie dog holes have in common?  All in a night, including dinner with Grandma for Family Home Evening.  This is the gentlest way of eliminating prairie dogs.  There were tons of holes and each kid took a bag and threw gum down the hole. The idea is to get rid of the prairie dogs, to get rid of the holes, so the horses didn't trip in them.

Sometimes the ground wins.  Dang it!

Mason adores Ana, Stacy's foster girl for a few months, and she is so good to take the little kids around.  We really enjoyed her in our family for these short months.

Wild about Dance

 Livvy had a fun year in dance and for their final dance recital she did a modern dance.  She was more or less jungle Jane. They had so much fun.  Nana Bissett was able to come and watch and brought her dog, Bailey.  Livvy was so excited to finally introduce Bailey to Averie.  It was all very happy.  The boys all came to support Livvy, but Cohen wasn't impressed by all the dancing. ha ha

Little Piglets!

The baby pigs have landed!  We got black ones this year and are so excited about it.  Why are piglets so much cuter than grown pigs? I guess that means we are in for another year of 4H!

I WAS THERE! Woman's Conference 2014

 Such a fun and memorable night.  We went to the First General Women's Meeting ever!  Our stake did such a good job making it memorable with a photo wall and an ice cream social but the conference was completely amazing and spiritual.  Livvy was among the youngest who could attend.  At first, I was really nervous that she wouldn't be able to sit through it, but she did great.  The stake handed out papers to keep track of all of our thoughts and feelings throughout the talks.  There was a space to draw a picture.  It was so cute how Olivia drew pictures of her animals (past and present) and her and I praying.  It brought me so much happiness to bring her with me and her Aunts and Grandma.  When we got home, Jeremy had made us the yummiest dinner! J- Feel free to type what it is!  But it was so good.

Catch that Leprechaun!

Leprechaun time! I thought my kids had forgotten about this tradition and I wasn't sad about it, but they had not!  Cohen came home all excited about his idea to catch a leprechaun!  They worked hard with their cousins all afternoon to come up with a sure trap.

That dang smart leprechaun did not get caught this year but left some green treats and dropped a few coins to prove he was there.  He also made a wreck of the traps so it must have at least slowed him down!

Lyman Vacay - Bear Lake

We just love our family vacations with Grandma and Grandpa and all the cousins.  They look forward to it and talk about it every year.  We are so grateful that we get to have these experiences and it wouldn't happen if Jed and Candice didn't feel so strongly about them.  They work so hard to iron out all the details for every family and they do so much work to get food and all the extras thought about and prepared.  THANK YOU THANK YOU!!

This year we went to Bear Lake.  It was an incredible cabin with the most spectacular views. The house was so equipped you didn't even need to leave its walls.  Some of the things we did: tons of crafts, movie nights in the huge theater room, ate and ate, played basketball, hung out, went sledding, played "One-Up" on the tramp, played on the indoor playground, played golf indoors, slide down each level on the slide next to the stairs, had family pictures, played games and so much more.  It was seriously amazing!

 There was no shortage of snacks for Mason.  He just helped himself and no one there was going to say NO!

 Coy and Aleyah had the best time together, inseperable..  I love it.  They explore and imagine for hours!

 The sledding hill was amazing! Endless snow and hills.  You could go forever if you wanted to hike that far back up!  It is hard work getting to the top of the hill!  It's also is very dangerous.  Some adults were all going down together holding hands and Livvy was just in front of them and wasn't on her sled right, so she stopped mid-hill.  As the adults turned backwards in their ride down, they plowed over the top of Olivia.  It was the scariest thing for me to watch.  It was going in slow motion as I screamed for a halt that could not have happened. She is one tough little cowgirl.  She gulped down her tears as much as she could until she got to my arms.  Jeremy to the rescue carried her up the hill.

 She was hurt more than she let on.  She wasn't able to jump on the tramp or anything too rough the rest of the trip.  It was pretty sad.  I sure love this girl and would die if anything happened to her.  Luckily she made it back to her old self by the evening.

I can't say it enough how awesome this long weekend was. Our family pictures turned out to be not great weather, in fact it was down right COLD.  My kids did an awesome job doing their best to imagine it was summer.  So. Much. Fun.