The Kerr Konnection

October

2011-11-05T21:28:00.000-07:00

I really need to get out of this habit of blogging once a month, because there are way too many pictures. We had a busy month starting off with a trip to Utah over fall break then came back and jumped right into all the fall and Halloween festivities.

We decided to be a royal family this year. We had Belle, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, Princess Minnie, and of course Aaron and I were the king and queen to all or our princesses.

All the hard work of trick or treating paid off for the girls, not necessarily for Aaron and I. This was the first year the girls kind of took control of their candy, it hasn't been as easy for us to steal any. So, we decided to hit up Target after Halloween to get our own stash, now we are all happy.

This was the best pictures we could get, all they wanted to do was "fly" around on sticks, screaming and running wild.

At least little Luc couldn't run away from me, I love this picture!

UTAH

We were lazy about taking pictures on this trip, I feel like we did a lot more than we took pictures of. We were so excited to go up and see my sister, Jodi's family who has been living in Germany for the past 3 years. We also wanted to watch my brother play football, and I did a race with my sister, Jenny. We also loved rollerblading down Provo Canyon and enjoying Utah in the fall. Fall is definitely the season I miss most, so it was fun to get a little taste of it.Visiting Grandma on her mission on Temple Square.

Maile lost her first 2 teeth on our trip. She never dared pull them out so both eventually just fell out, I think she was so relieved cause she was scared to death to let anyone touch them or do anything that might cause pain.

Thanksgiving Point!

Sleepover in Grandma and Grandpas room

Lucy's blessing

Happy Halloween!!!

2011-10-30T22:33:00.001-07:00

California!!!

2011-09-26T21:50:00.001-07:00

I know our life seems like a big long vacation and to be honest it kind of has been like that ever since Lucy was born. In the 2 1/2 months of her life that little gal has been to Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Hawaii, California, and Arizona. It has been a crazy, fun couple of months and we aren't even done. We head up to Utah in 9 days. It will be our last trip for a while. We have had so much fun visiting these amazing places and being with family, I'm not ready for the trips to end.

Here's another picture overloaded post. ...

We started out in San Clemente where we stayed at Aaron's aunt and uncles vacation home, it was unbelievable. It was the perfect spot, 5 minutes from the beach and 30 minutes from Disneyland. Loved it! After staying there for almost a week we headed up north by San Francisco for Johanna (Aaron's cousins) wedding. We love our trips out there cause they spoil us rotten with huge yummy feasts for every meal, shower the girls with gifts, and keep us entertained all day. What more could you ask for in a vacation? Well, maybe more sleep, we were all exhausted when we got home, I'm still trying to recover.

The girls had been anticipating this trip since Maile's birthday because instead of a party we told her she was getting a surprise in California. The excitement and anticipation mounted since we were there 3 days before they got it. The surprise was Disneyland, we recorded it but forgot to take a picture of them with their faces covered as we strolled up to the entrance and then unveiled the surprise. It wasn't quite the reaction we were hoping for, but they loved it! These pictures were taken the morning we woke up and they realized we had finally made it to California.

Aaron's cousin Kristine and her husband Ben are living at the house in San Clemente so they showed us everything to do there including swimming at Ben's parents house, which has to be the most amazing pool I've ever seen in a backyard. We could have spent all of our days there, it was so much fun. We got a little carried away with our action shot pictures of jumping off the waterfall and rocks, but we got some awesome ones. I didn't include Emmy's little skinny dipping jumps, but those were some great ones too. We were getting ready to go when we looked outside and saw Emmy climbing the rocks with her bare boodie hanging out. She thought it was hilarious and has since tried doing it 2 more times.

These were our 1st attempt at a family photo for our Christmas card (usually we have to have a couple photo shoots) and a picture to replace our outdated family picture in our house that is like 4 years old and is missing Olivia and Lucy.DISNEYLAND!

Livy didn't seem to love Disneyland as much as Emmy and Maile while we were there. She basically just cried on every ride except Its a Small World and she didn't like being close to the characters, but she loved the parade and loved the characters from a distance. Now that we are home, she can't stop talking about Minnie Mouse and how funny Goofy was. She seriously keeps talking about Disneyland all day, so she must have loved it more than it showed. Uncle Spencer came out a few days early so he could play with us at Disneyland, I don't think we could've managed without him and the girls absolutely love him.

Since Disneyland was Maile's big birthday surprise we got her one of those Birthday buttons, so she got lots of extra attention, which she loved.

Aunt Karolyn and Kathy really know how to spoil us.

Love any chance we get to see "amer" and Grandpa Kerr

summer fun!

2011-09-06T20:51:00.000-07:00

Well it has been forever since I updated, so this is just going to be a ton of pictures from the past 2 months. It has been such a whirlwind with having Lucy, then going to Utah and coming back for a bit then off to Hawaii. It has all been super fun, but crazy!!! I had to do this now because in 2 days we are off again to California for another wedding, so if I waited any longer I think I would have way too much to catch up on and it would never get done.

My brother Jake decided to get married in Hawaii! So what better excuse to make a little vacation of it. It was obviously way too much $ to bring the girls, so Aaron's mom made this all possible for us by coming out here to take care of the girls. They had so much fun having Grandma all to themselves. Of course we had Lucy with us, but other than her there were no grandkids on this trip, so we could just go go go. We packed as much as we possibly could into that week. No time for sleep, there was way too much to do. It was soooo fun!

For being in Hawaii, there were a lot of people in the wedding party!

Grandma and Grandpa with the little wahine!!

love this picture!

Seriously Summer was so perfect for a Hawaiian wedding. She looked like a Hawaiian princess with her gorgeous long black hair. They got some awesome and crazy pictures, these were 2 of my favorites that we had, but I know others got some underwater ones and other fun shots. It was an incredibly fun and beautiful wedding.

A bunch of us jumped in before them to make sure Summer didn't drowned with that huge dress on.

Last day as a single man.

Our house was right off of our favorite beach....POUNDERS!! It was all just too perfect.

Da bruddahs

We had to do some shopping at the swap meet even though it can be so hot and draining, the girls never want to take their Hawaiian dresses off, so it was all worth it.

YUMMM

I felt like I was constantly laughing on this trip, it was so much fun with my brothers, sisters and in laws there. We sure missed Jodi, Justin, and Josh though.

We celebrated our 7th anniversary out there! Couldn't have chosen a more perfect place.

INBETWEEN VACATIONS

Auntie Julz came down for a visit, the girls love her!

More swimming days

Lucy is already over 2 months old, crazy how fast time goes once they are out.

We had a phenominal garden this year thanks to Aaron's hard work in getting a sprinkling system and drip system in, everything stayed alive while we were gone for once.

BEAR LAKE

Everyone got to meet Lucy. I felt like I hardly had a chance to hold her cause she was passed around so much

Where to begin....

2011-07-24T21:36:00.000-07:00

So I realize this was like 3 weeks ago, but I already had put these pictures on here just didn't have time to write anything before we left for Utah, so I figured I would share the hospital pictures anyway and then start on our vacation.

I know most of you heard the story, but here's a quick recap. I went past my due date like always so I was scheduled for an induction on July 1st (10 days past my due date) at 6 a.m. The thoughts of another induction kept me up so many nights those last couple days, so I got desperate and tried a million different self induction ideas. I finally had just accepted the fact that I was going to have to be induced. Aaron gave me a blessing that night and I prayed really hard before going to bed and about half hour later I started some intense contractions and they just kept coming so we headed for the hospital and an hour later we were holding Lucy!!! It was so fast and smooth. It was so fun being surprised, well I guess Aaron always said he thought it would be a girl and so did I until the last month or so when people were telling me it looked like I was carrying a boy and I got boy clothes and picked out a boy name, I just started feeling like that was what we would have, but surprise! Another girl, I should have figured. We were so thrilled, as much as I do eventually want some boys I love having 4 girls in a row - it will be so fun!!! Just more tea parties and makeovers!

At the time I didn't even realize how purple and discolored she was, I thought she was beautiful and couldn't even believe I was actually holding her and it was all over, but now looking at pictures she does look pretty scarey! The doctor said she was so discolored because her head got bruised from such a fast delivery and the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck twice.

Grandma Jill with little Lucy

We told my mom not to tell the girls if it was a boy or girl, so when they got to the hospital and saw the baby we asked them if they thought it was a boy or girl. They all agreed it was a boy. Ha ha they were wrong! As much as they said they wanted a brother, they were so excited about another girl.

This was the one I was most worried about. Livy has been so attached and difficult for the past couple months, so I was thinking this would be a really difficult transition for the both of us. Luckily she has been so great with Lucy, it is so cute to watch how concerned she is about her. I know they are going to be best little buddies.

Looking much better and ready to go home

Lucy and her 4 mommies

Aaron gets so many comments from everyone about his 4 girls, but he sure does love em.

Yes, I am still PREGNANT!

2011-06-29T21:32:00.000-07:00

Livy has become so crazy at the pool. She seriously loves to be underwater, she started diving for rings and will even dive for them in the 4 ft. part with some help getting down that deep. The problem is she is so determined to get the rings that she goes for every single one and forgets that she needs a breath. She just jumps in wherever and whenever, she's a bit too crazy for me to feel comfortable with these days, but she is really fun to watch cause she is so good at swimming and being underwater already. She just wants to do everything Maile and Emmy do. She even started diving in yesterday, not all of them look like dives but others are actually really good, if I can ever figure out how to put video on here we'll get some of her diving in and swimming.

Well, I thought Livy's was as long as I'd ever go over, but today I hit a new record for me - 9 days over and probably won't end until I am induced tomorrow which will make it 10! Can't seem to figure out how to get this baby out on my own.I've tried all kinds of things from crazy uncomfortable excercises to nasty teas and castro oil, but no luck. I seriously HATE being induced so I'm dreading that, but I have reached the point where I'm just ready to have this baby so I guess I'm willing to do whatever. The weather has been over a 100 for the past week and finally just started cooling down with monsoon season under way, so I have been living at the pool. My mom came on Saturday which has been so fun and helpful.

Here are some pictures of our pool days. Next blog will finally announce the arrival of the new little one. It's funny cause I've gone over with Emmy and Olivia but nobody seemed all that anxious about the delivery, but this time around we have had so many calls and texts, I think it's because we didn't find out what we are having, the suspense is killing everyone. It has been totally fun not knowing, but I'm not going to lie sometimes the suspense kills me. Can't wait to see what stubborn little baby is inside of me. Thanks everyone for all the love and prayers!!!

Not our typical week

2011-06-19T21:06:00.000-07:00

This has been such a crazy, rollercoaster week. Last Sunday a fire broke out up near the mountains close to our house. It seemed to be just up in the mountains until Tuesday, then homes started being burned and it started getting out of control. Each day brought new activity and craziness to our town. Many people from our ward and many of our close friends have been evacuated since Thursday. Aaron has been working some different shifts to help out with traffic control. Friday there was a second fire that started on the fort which is even closer to us and all the homes just across the highway (less than a mile) were evacuated within 10 minutes, so the streets were pure chaos with firetrucks and people evacuating from all over the place between the 2 fires. Phone lines were tyed up with all the calls being made. I thought I was going into labor that day - it was just wild!! Luckily they were able to contain that fire within a couple of hours before it really got out of control and obviously I didn't go into labor (phew). Things seemed to be getting better yesterday but then today brought 50 mph winds which caused another panic and more evacuations. Planes weren't able to fly and the wind spread smoke and fire really fast. We've been on the pre- evacuation alert. All these pictures are from today, most of them taken in our neighborhood. Today was supposed to be the worst of the wind, so hopefully tomorrow will bring better news. While all this was going on today me and the girls were taking a nice little Sunday afternoon nap (since we only had sacrament meeting today), I was oblivious to it all, Aaron actually came home from work cause I wasn't answering his calls to let us know we needed to be ready in case we were evacuated. YIKES! It has been wild!!

Our neighborhood

Up close

Besides being a crazy fire week we celebrated Aaron's 30th bday on Tuesday and of course Fathers Day today.

For his birthday we had a surprise party at the bowling alley. Even after all the comments from Maile and Emmy that morning like Emmy "mom you forgot to bring the lighter" Maile "Maria is bringing it" on our way there, somehow he really was totally surprised.

Maile decided to help him since it looks like he's about to pass out trying to get all 30!

We had a little family birthday party that night, making Aaron the king receiving his 30 presents, although we did make him work for each one.

30 spankings through the spanking machine

Everything he had to do paid off when he opened the final present and saw it was a paintball gun.

Then we topped the night off with a movie night on the projector outside. It may as well been the girls birthday cause they all had so much fun.

Happy Birthday Livy!

2011-06-05T21:17:00.001-07:00

Maile and Emmy have been talking this day up to Olivia for some time now, I wasn't sure she was getting what they were talking about. But, when the big day arrived there was no doubt about it, she definitely knew it was her speical day. She loved us singing happy birthday to her and was constantly pointing to the calendar with her picture on it, the birthday banner and then to herself to remind us that it was her birthday. Blowing the candles out on her cake and opening presents were probably the highlight of her day.

The girls love bowling on the wii, but have never been real bowling, so we decided to try it out. We all had a great time and just for the record I won with a score of 164, Aaron wasn't too far behind with a 150. My bowling lessons in 4th grade really payed off.

STRIKE!!!

Anxiously awaiting. I think Emmy's balls sometimes took a good 2 minutes to reach the pins.

Livy loves the Baby Einstein world animals dvd and always dances to the song with the sea animals. So, whenever she sees a picture of a turtle she starts dancing. I had higher hopes for this turtle but gave up after a couple failures and this is what we ended up with.

It has been so much fun to see Olivia's personality really start to show this past year. She adds so much to our family and always makes us laugh. She can get so mad at her sisters, but then is always the first to give a hug or kiss. I can already tell she is going to be my little helper with the baby, cause she loves to be a mommy to Maile and Emmy making sure they get their clothes and shoes on and gets after them when they aren't doing what they are supposed to be doing. She loved the attention she got all day, I'm glad she recognized it was a special day for her.

Preschool Graduation

2011-05-29T21:26:00.001-07:00

Emmy loved being a big girl going to preschool this year.

So, I think I've decided I'm finally ready for Maile to start kindergarten. These past couple weeks she is restless and ready for a big change in her life. She is so bored with everything we normally do. She even hid from me for like 15 minutes one day this week, totally sending me into a panic, all because she didn't want to go swimming. She seriously doesn't want to go on bike rides, to the park, pool or anything we normally do. So, it's getting draining trying to convince her and bribe her into doing these things anymore, so maybe it is me who is ready for her to be entertained at school all day since I can't seem to do it anymore. It is going to be a long summer if she is already done with swimming and it's not even June yet. Plus the pool is a bit of heaven to me these days, it is hard for me to go one day without it!
Maile was really excited that she got to welcome everyone to their graduation, she loves being in charge. Emmy was a bit shy for her part but eventually did it.

They both had so much fun with their fabulous teacher Mrs. Laurel.

Daddy with the graduates and "little teeny".

2011-05-15T21:07:00.001-07:00

With one game left in the season I finally got some pictures of Maile's second year of t-ball. I really wish they had soccer down here in the spring cause t-ball just isn't that exciting to watch, but she had fun playing so I guess that is what matters most. We did have some good laughs though, since she was one of the only one's who had played before she was a bit more into it than some. One game while she played pitcher (they get the ball almost every time) she got frustrated that the 1st baseman wasn't ever paying attention when she would throw it, so she started getting the ball and running it over to put it in 1st baseman's glove. Playing 3rd base or any other base far from the action she would run clear across the field to try to be the first one to the ball, sometimes she was a bit too competitive with her own teammates (definitely got that from the Kerr side). Playing catcher is always funny cause usually the coach puts all the gear on them and carries them to their position since they can't really walk with all the gear and then they basically stand there the entire time, but Maile insisted on really playing the part and putting the ball on the tee each time, so even though she could barely walk or see with that helmet, and it took her forever she would tell the coaches not to get the ball cause it was her job. Fortunately she gave up on sizing the ball up 10 times before she swung at it. Poor Emmy just barely missed the age cut off so she's excited to join in next year and especially excited to get her own treat at the end of each game.

Aaron's bball tournament

2011-05-07T21:13:00.000-07:00

A couple years back church ball got a little too crazy down here, so our stake took all the church sports out completely. So sad, cause I loved YW ball and going to watch Aaron's games. In Utah one of his tournament games got so crazy everyone was off the benches in a big dog pile in the middle of the court, (both teams got kicked out of the tournament, but I have to admit I loved that I was there to witness it). Anyways he really misses playing basketball so he got a group of guys from work and church to come out and play once a week. Last weekend was a big law enforcement tournament up in Tucson so him and his bball buddies got a chance to show their skills. Aaron was so excited cause he loves this kind of stuff. It wasn't quite as much fun as he was hoping for a bunch of reasons, but he already is planning how they can win it all next year. So I know he still loved playing bball all day, although I think he realizes he's getting older and his body doesn't work like it used to, I mean he will be 30 in another month!!!

Not the greatest pictures I know, I took what I could with the 3 crazies.They did love the playground there, it had some new toys they were obsessed with.

Of course staying in a hotel is always the highlight, seriously these girls could be happy if we just jumped on the beds, had pillow fights, watched movies, played games, explore and trash everything in that hotel room the entire vacation. They love HOTELS!! What I love is how it feels so magical to leave the room such a mess and come back to find it all in order with clean towels and made beds, what I wouldn't give for that in my house.

Happy Easter

2011-04-26T08:02:00.000-07:00

HAPPY EASTER!!

I really think Easter is one of my favorite holidays. The resurrection and atonement always touches me and this time of year helps me reflect on it more than usual. I also love it cause my birthday is always around this time, plus I love decorating eggs and going on Easter egg hunts, and just the feel of spring makes me happy. This year with it being so late in April I felt like this holiday wasn't rushed and the fun Easter feeling lasted much longer. I wish it were always the end of April. With it being so late in the month I decided I was going to be ambitious and make the girls Easter dresses, but as most things do my good intentions always wait until the last minute. So, on Friday 2 of my friends and all our kids had one big sewing party all day long! My friend had made a dress like this before and claimed it was totally easy (I guess she didn't know what level of a sewer I am). Somehow after a crazy day with 8 kids, lots of snacks and otter pops, a swimming intermission and lots of other intermissions, and so much help from Maria we got them done. I was so proud of our accomplishment I had to take and share a million pictures so here they are...sorry total picture overload but I just loved too many.

Olivia isn't always the easiest to get pictures of so when we have good moments like these I am snap happy. It was a windy day, so she was really concerned with losing her hat, but it made for some great facial expressions.

I feel like she is telling a story trying to convince us that it really is that big.

I think Maile looks so old and sophisticated in this picture, I love it but I don't, cause I'm already feeling like she's growing up way too fast.

Couldn't figure out the timer so no family shots, but we got these daddy/daughter, mommy/daughter shots. Too bad I ran out of time cause Aaron was really hoping for a silky pink tie I promised him, but I plan on getting around to it, so no worries.

This is the crazy Maile were used to.

Crazy girls!

Fancy, proper girls!

As part of their Easter gifts they got purses filled with some jewlery and lip gloss. I promise it kept them entertained the entire sacrament meeting. Olivia was the only one to break into the church bag, it worked out real nice.

Excited about their new blankies which we were hoping would rid them of their other blankies since those are getting pretty trashed. Although, the last 2 nights they insist on sleeping with both. Hopefully it doesn't backfire casue otherwise we will be carting 6 blankies around everytime we go out of town.

The Easter goods

Such a fun day!!!

Breakfast with the Easter Bunny

2011-04-17T21:11:00.000-07:00

This was the only way to get Olivia near the Easter bunny, actually I don't think she realized he was sitting right next to us otherwise she wouldn't be so chill.

I didn't get any pictures of Maile hugging the Easter bunny cause Livy was terrified and wouldn't release the death grip she had on me. She kept a close eye on him the entire time.

Emmy regected the Easter Bunny's high five at first, but then she warmed up to him.

They kept themselves busy while we waited in line to get into the Easter room

This is where Livy spent most of the time, trying to figure out how she could get these treats. I promise that is all she thinks about all day. Even just saying the word "treat" and she perks up and starts looking all around. She LOVES treats!!! way too much.

Once we made it in they had lots of cute, fun Easter games and pictures with the Easter Bunny. It was chaotic though, so I didn't get many pictures of the action except Emmy doing the cake walk for a chocolate Easter bunny. As usual I didn't get many pictures of Maile cause she is always off to find anything and everyone at these kinds of things.

It was definitely worth dragging the girls out of bed.

Our birthday

2011-04-10T20:52:00.000-07:00

We did another Easter Egg hunt party for Emmy, I really am stuck on that theme. Probably because I'm pretty sure that is what my birthday party was every year and I remember loving it, so why not. Although this year we did it the day before our birthday which worked out much nicer, for me at least. I'm still trying to make this sharing my birthday thing work. I'm almost always rushing around trying to finish up getting ready for parties, but this time we actually were ready a little early, so I finally got some good pictures of the things I never remember to get pictures of until it's too late and things are already too crazy! Plus this was my first time trying out fondant and I had so much fun and was so proud of myself with how it turned out that I just had to share. Usually I try to be creative with my cakes and they never work quite like I had planned and they are falling apart by the time the party starts, so I was thrilled that this one totally worked and still was looking good by the time things got under way.

I've always intended on doing Easter cake pops cause they look so much fun on Bakerella's website, but this was my first time with the Easter ones. They were really fun for the first half, after that I was wishing I would've stuck with cupcakes.

Too bad, we don't have some of the best moments of the party with Aaron hopping around like the Easter bunny with his fluffy tail and mask leading them all to the Easter Egg hunt.

obstacle courses

relay races

and cake!

Our birthday started out right with Aaron making our favorite - french breakfast puffs.

Emmy had one request that day- go to the play place McDonalds.

A favorite present- bike basket, horn, and tassels!

I also got a favorite present, just not the physical thing yet so we don't have any pictures. Aaron got me a gift certificate for a new mountain bike! I'm so excited. I've got a couple months to find the perfect one.

I was nice enough to let her get the texas yee-ha and ride the saddle all by herself at Texas Roadhouse.

then she stuffed herself with ice cream after eating nothing

for dinner cause she was too full from treats all day. Whenever it is one of there birthdays we let them do makeovers and get fancy to go out on the town. Well this time Maile wanted to wear that pink dress which clearly doesn't fit her anymore, but she was being stubborn so Aaron came up with the brilliant idea of letting her wear her nightgown underneath with those lovely purple leopard shoes and her bright blue eye shadow. Usually I know they stand out and people are looking at us, but I'm okay with it when they are in just like a princess dress or something, but this time, I was having such a hard time being okay with it. I was so embarrased of Maile, it was almost like I was wearing it, I was so uncomfortable with her outift, it was making me crazy! I didn't want her adding any extra attention to herself, as soon as we got our booth, I hurried her into the corner and made Aaron sit next to her hoping to cover her up. Seriously, I can usually handle the dress ups, but this time was too much. It was so embarrasing and of course Maile couldn't be contained in her corner for too long. By the end of the dinner she was up talking to all the people around us and dancing and showing off her great outfit!

Then it was home for more presents

and a sleepover movie night. We watched Tangled and had ice cream. Obviously the girls were glued! They LOVE that movie!

It was a fun filled day for all of us.

The latest

2011-03-27T21:23:00.001-07:00

Our St. Patrick's Day pot of gold hunt!

Happy St. Patty's Day!!

Maile is really into the pinching thing and will just all of the sudden decide we are playing leprechaun day and if you aren't wearing green she'll pinch you, hopefully she will get over it soon, cause I'm sick of getting pinched!

Our cave hike!

The girls love to go on lion hunts at home and of course it always ends with us finding the lion in a cave, so when they found out we were hiking to a cave it was really exciting until we were actually in the cave then they started to get freaked out, but once we were out and done with the cave they love talking about it.

With BYU doing so well in basketball we decided we would get cable so Aaron could keep up on his march madness. (I say Aaron cause I've never been into basketball, but this year BYU got me hooked) I thought it was really fun even though BYU didn't do as good as we were hoping - now that they are out I'm not as into it, but Aaron is still loving it!

As for me, well I'm just livin large as you can see with another 3 months to go!!

Maile started up t-ball again- she loves that! She is so excited to be registering

for kindergarten this week.

Livy can be such a monster these days! She loves yelling and squawking at us ordering all of us around until she gets what she wants (although that is so hard to figure out).

I don't really remember Maile and Emmy having a terrible 2 stage, but I definitely think Olivia's going through it a little early. Despite her monster moments she can be so stinkin cute and lovable it's hard to get mad at her.

Emmy learned to ride her bike without training wheels about 2 months ago and since then her favorite thing to do is go for a bike ride. She has actually gone on some pretty long ones riding the entire way. I thought we would end up putting her bike in the back of the trailer and her riding with Olivia but she loves it so much, she does awesome! We've gone to the "far far away park", as the girls call it cause it is about 4 or 5 miles away, a couple of times now and she loves it! She is also such a good buddy for Olivia, cause like I said Livy can be so frustrating but Emmy plays so well with her even when she is a grump.

2011-03-08T14:22:00.000-08:00

We've been switching computers and have had issues so I can't retrieve some of the pictures I wanted to post but here are some we took from this past weekend.

Yee- Ha!

We had fun going to our first rodeo here in Sierra Vista with some of our friends. Now Maile wants to be a cowgirl.

The first Saturday of every month Home Depot has a project for kids to come do. The girls love it! We just happened to be there last month during this time, but now that we know I think it will become a monthly activity they will count down to. They think it is so fun using nails, hammers, and they are so proud of their final products. Livy obviously needs a lot of help but Emmy and Maile are very determined to do it all on their own.

Happy Valentines Day!!!

2011-02-14T21:04:00.000-08:00

Our "Fancy Nancy" Valentines dinner (there's a reason Aaron isn't in this picture, he didn't quite fit in without a pink dress). I'm sure one of these times the girls will insist on making him fancy too (too bad you can't tell how awesome my manicure and makeover are in this picure).

Our Valentine treats treasure hunt

Well to be honest, I am obsesed with candy these days especially chocolate and sour things, so really we kind of over did it with the treats this year. This is how I justified buying so many. I'm planning on eating a decent amount of them, especially Olivia's, she doesn't notice those kinds of things yet. And at least the girls are still generous with all these Holiday treats, I know that won't always be the case so I take advantage while I can.

We now have 8 a.m. church (which is why Olivia is ready for bed in this picture), pretty sure we are the only family ward in the world that meets that early. We've had to figure out a whole new system, basically the system is lay all the clothes out the night before, get everything esle ready and out to the car (including some pop tarts for breakfast on the way) then at about 7:40 go into their room, dresses in hand and start getting them dressed in bed with them yelling at me that they are still tired and want to sleep. The curlers or braids the night before seem to work for the hair that is if we have time Saturday night. I really miss our 1:00 church.

Our never ending vacation

2011-01-30T19:40:00.001-08:00

The day my mom left Aaron had to leave for a week, so that wasn't much of a vacation, but when he got back he had a surprise weekend getaway planned for us at a resort in Tucson. It was so fun! The girls (especially Emmys) favorite thing to do is stay in a hotel. So, the girls were super excited about the surprise and wanted to spend all day in that hotel room. We really did spend most the time at the resort, but luckily we talked the girls out of leaving the hotel room to enjoy all the other activities on the resort. We went on a hike up the desert mountain to a waterfall, swam of course, did this exercise trail, and even got to go to my favorite restaraunt - Cheesecake Factory!! It was the best surprise vacation ever!

My Mom was really intrigued by Tombstone so after my Dad left and Aaron was at work we had to go back for more. This time we saw a gunfight and took a carriage ride, gotta love Tombstone.

I put these pictures in the wrong direction, but here's a bunch of pictures from the past month and a half of our never ending vacation. It has been so fun!!! Now it's back to life back to reality unless more surprises come along.
Since Aaron could only stay for a week my wonderful parents made the 13 hour trek back with me and the girls. My dad actually drove the entire way through the night which is amazing considering he falls asleep any time he sits down (I guess other than driving long distnaces).
He could only stay for 2 days, my mom stayed for 10. We had a great time with them these pictures are when we went to Tombstone for a little sight seeing.

We spent 3 weeks in Utah visiting with my family for Christmas, New Years, and my brother coming home from his mission. It was so great to spend time with family during the holidays and to welcome Justin home.

A big wild and crazy welcome home/New Years Eve party!

The girls LOVED the snow and we got plenty of it for a few days! Like always I totally forget the camera when I really wanted it like for our fun sledding day with all the cousins, but we managed to get a couple good ones of the girls playing in the snow. We aren't very equipped with snow gear so the first couple times I think they were suprised with just how cold playing in the snow could be especially with no gloves or snow pants. When the first snow storm hit, they ran out there and took their shoes off to jump on the tramp, I had to rush out to tell them it's okay to leave them on, we aren't in Arizona anymore. Being in this weather finally made it feel like Christmas time.

Of course we had to go downtown to see the lights.

Yep this one is at a Christmas event in Arizona which is why there's grass and not snow.

Traumatized!!!!!

2010-11-18T19:59:00.000-08:00

snake #1

So about a month ago Aaron went out on the patio to get something and as he was standing there looking around for it he heard a rattle but wasn't sure what it was, he started looked around then looked down at his feet and saw a rattlesnake like 6" from his foot. I was in the house and wasn't sure who was in our backyard all I heard was a voice that didn't sound like Aaron yelling "get back, get back!!" to the girls. He bolted into the house and said there was a rattlesnake out there. It was hiding under our grill right outside the door that we pass through about a million times a day, lots of times the girls just run out there, including Olivia. Ohhh,!! I was soooo freaked out (even talking about it now I'm getting the chills)! We weren't sure what to do, cause Aaron didn't want to kill it since it didn't bite him when it had the chance, but the thoughts of him catching it and carrying out to the desert to release it didn't sound like a good idea either. One of our neighbors came over to help Aaron take care of it. I was so nervous for them. We actually got this part on video but couldn't figure out how to download it, but the video is pretty funny because I am so freaked out the whole time, I repeat everything they say in a high pitched scared voice. So, they walked out there with shovels, brooms, rakes, and a big tote to put the snake in (the plan was to catch and release in the desert) while all us girls are glued to the sliding door watching everything from a safe distance. They didn't see it right away but then Aaron says "there it is, it's perched up" , of course I repeated in my scared voice "it's perched up" then they just stand there for what seemed like forever saying "it's coming towards us", I couldn't see it but I could hear it rattling it was making me crazy that they weren't doing anything about it. Then Nick (our neighbor) grabs his broom and slams it down on it's neck so it can't move. Then Aaron tells the girls to come have a look, I hate that idea but they do it anyway, so I decide to venture out and have a look myself. By this time the snake is really mad, it tries to jump and bite and move all over the place, but luckily Nick had a good enough hold on it that it couldn't move other than it's mouth and head which still freaked me out. They decided it was too mad now to try catching it so Aaron cut its head off with a shovel and it continued to rattle. It was so gross!!!!

I was so traumatized the next couple days, I really didn't want to even go outside, I was so jumpy at the littlest bug or anything I saw moving. We still had our tomato plants that were like a jungle (the perfect hiding place for a snake) and our little playhouse was a nice little spot I was sure a snake would be hiding in there and Olivia would go in and think it was a fun new toy and try grabbing it. My mind was just racing with the possibilities. So my paranoia was pretty bad for the first week or so, but then I got brave enough to pick tomatoes and let the girls go out without me scoping it all out first and then our friends come over about 2 weeks later . My friend looked soo freaked out when she walked in and then I hear her husband say yep its a rattlesnake! He told her to just keep walking and don't look down until she got in,. There right under our front door a rattlesnake was totally coiled up in the corner ready to hibernate for the winter. AAHHHH!!! I couldn't believe it. 2 within 10 days, it was so unbelievable. We were having dinner and I couldn't even enjoy it I was so sick to my stomach. I couldn't believe it, we were surrounded. I really felt like my life was ruined. Our backyard is like a sanctuary to me, I love sending the kids back there and I just love being outside but now I didn't even dare to. I already feel like Arizona's got a million of the weirdest looking insects and creatures around, plus there all on steroids, really they are all triple the size of normal things, like the grasshoppers and spiders - HUGE! So, by this point I am just beyond freaked out, I really didn't even dare go in the garage that night. Then the next day I am telling my neighbor about it and she says have you ever seen a gila monster? I didn't even know that was a real thing, well she informed it was very real and my neighbor actually has one in his garage. She told me he found it just walking on the road not too far from here and she told me that they kill people by latching on to them and just injecting poison until you die. GILA MONSTER!!!

That just put me over the top. I cannot believe we live among so many crazy, deadly creatures. I decided we've got to get out of here, I can't handle one more rattlesnake encounter or whatever other creatures are lurking about.

It's been a couple weeks now since the 2nd encounter, but the blood on the front porch remains there, at first I thought it would just be a cool Halloween decoration since it was just a few days before, but since we haven't had any more snakes I think maybe it is scaring the other snakes away cause they know what will happen if they come to this house. Then again maybe they want revenge.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

2010-10-31T21:58:00.000-07:00

The girls already love acting out Peter Pan, but now that we have the costumes it is that much better, I'm sure Aaron will end up getting more use out of this costume than just Halloween.
These girls had lots of happy thoughts and plenty of pixie sticks tonight to help them fly.

Emmy did not like all the walking, by the end she could care less about the candy, Maile on the other hand was her usual chatty self talking to nearly everyone she got candy from.

When we got home and Emmy realized she had a whole bag full of candy, she decided it was worth the long hard sacrifice of walking around the church parking lot! then she was happy.

Halloween Sunday

I know sometimes I go a bit overboard dressing the girls up, but it is just so much fun plus who knows how much longer they will be willing to let me do what I like with them. Maile already can be stubborn when it comes to clothes and hairstyles. I thought they looked so cute in their Halloween dresses, so of course we had to have a photo shoot.

( picture like this make me think Emmy's thumb sucking is giving her the bucky beaver teeth)

A fun week

2010-10-24T20:33:00.000-07:00

Maile and Emmy with their best buddy Katie

This was Livy's favorite part....all the treats. She is such a treat monster these days.

This past weekend was busy, but super fun. Our stake has an annual fall family fun festival with face painting, cotton candy, bounce houses, games, balloons, yummy homemade doughnuts, and tons of other things, it was really fun for the girls.

This was the first year I took on the challenge of making most our costumes (not sure that I'll do it again) way more work than I planned on. I can just be so retarded when it comes to sewing. My goal was to finish them for this weekend so we could wear them more than just one night. I finally got them done Friday, so we made the journey up to Tuscon for trick or treating at the zoo. We didn't realize that all of Tuscon would be there. Seriously if we didn't already drive an hour and 20 minutes to get there we would have gone back home. It was insanely crowded. It took us like 20 minutes to find a parking spot, then we stood in line for over a half an hour before we made it in by that time it was past bedtime and we were wondering if it was really worth it (although, it was fun checking out all the costumes while waiting in line). Once we got in we didn't wonder any longer. There were themes all along the way with pirates, Alice in Wonderland, Star Wars, Nemo, Disney villains and princesses. There wasn't a ton of candy but I don't think the girls were disappointed. The only disappointment was that our camera ran out of batteries so we missed tons of great picture spots, this was the best one we got. At least we have next weekend.

I forgot about some of the park pictures we took earlier this week. We are loving the fall weather.

Sweet Revenge

2010-10-17T20:16:00.000-07:00

About a month ago the girls started calling each other "stupid" and using it on a regular basis. No matter how many times we told them not to say it or threatened a consequence we still heard it. Until one day I told them if I heard it again I would put soap in their mouth. That did the trick for Maile and it seemed to work for Emmy for a few hours, but she soon forgot. When she said it Maile was sure to remind me of her consequence Oh, sometimes I hate going through with my threats, but this time I could tell was a test to see if I would really do the unimaginable. Actually, I wasn't even sure how most people carried out the soap in the mouth punishment. my parents never did that one or maybe I was just so good they never had to use it on me. I asked Aaron how it was done, he said his mom stuck a bar of soap in his mouth for however many minutes. So, I got the soap and Emmy was freaking out, I had to hold her down and stick the bar in her mouth while she cried and screamed for 30 seconds. Since that first round she's had quite a few more including one where she came out of bed, admitted she said stupid and needed soap in her mouth. Aaron sat her on the couch for 5 minutes and she didn't say a word (just goes to show they will do anything to get out of bed).

Well the other night while playing games, I couldn't roll what I wanted to and ended up loosing even though I clearly should have won like 10 minutes earlier so I was mad and said "stupid". I immediately realized what I said and looked at Emmy. She was in awe and looked at Aaron then me and back at Aaron. She couldn't believe what just happened then Aaron snapped her out of it when he said "uh oh does Mommy need soap in her mouth?" Of course the girls were all over that. Emmy has a hard time doing what we ask but as soon as Aaron told her to get the soap she ran off as fast as she could. She came right up to me and said open your mouth Mommy and shoved that soap right in. She loved every minute of it!

Apple Annie's!!!

2010-10-06T21:45:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we had our first preschool field trip. We went to Apple Annie's. It was even better than last year, mostly cause we weren't so cheap. We decided to spend a little money to go on the hay ride and corn maze, but it was totally worth it. The girls had such a great time. I loved it too. It was a perfect fall day and as always it was just so fun to get out of town and do something different.

This place is loaded with picture taking spots, so this post is totally picture overload,. Wilcox is a farm town, so there are fields and fields as far as the eye can see. I loved all the sunflowers and rows of corn, I promise after going there I kind of want to be a farmer with a ton of land to cruise around on in a tractor. I think the girls would love that life too. They LOVED the hay ride!For some reason Emmy was more thrilled about finding #5 than any other number and asked me to take a picture of her by it (I can't remember her ever asking me to take a picture of her, so obviously we did as she said even with her goofy smile and gum hanging out, I'll take a brib free picture any chance I get.This was an eye opening experience for Maile. She loves corn on the cob so she was very observant and attentive to the farmers talking about how they grow the corn, she was fascinated to be surrounded by it throughout the maze.

The favorite activity - the hay ride out to the pumpkin patch

Emmy found her perfect little pumpkin. I kept encouraging her to find the biggest one she saw (to get our moneys worth) but she had her heart set on the littlest one she could find and was thrilled with this one, so I guess that is all that really matters, right?

Maile also found her perfect pumpkin.

If I wanted Olivia in any pictures I had to be in them too otherwise she was screaming bloody murder even with a sucker in her mouth.

Maile and Cannon (Laurel -just thought I'd get some pictures of the beginning stages)

I know I've overdone it with this scene but I love Emmy's little tough girl look with a stick hanging out of her mouth and all.

I love sunflowers, they make me feel so happy. There was something entrancing about the rows and rows of them. I didn't get one picture of the girls focusing on taking a picture, it was like as soon as they were surrounded by the flowers their little minds went somewhere else. I kept telling them to do things like look at me or smile, but they were zoned out in their imaginations. But no matter what the girls looked like in my millions of pictures I kept snapping I loved them all because the rows of sunflowers made it feel so magical and dreamy.We couldn't drive all the way out to Apple Annie's without picking some apples. I don't think Maile would let us leave until we did. That was her favorite memory from last year, so we stayed and had a great time.

Fall first's

2010-09-19T20:39:00.001-07:00

Finally Maile is old enough to play soccer! She missed the cut off by a month last year, I was so sad cause I knew she would love it! So, this year Aaron and I are coaching her team. It has been so much fun! Seriously we have a great time. Maile is loving it! Poor Emmy practices with us but wants to play in the real game, at least she gets a treat afterwards, that always makes everything all better. It is hard to get some video and action shots with both of us coaching, hopefully we'll get some good ones to share. Last Saturday was the first game, Maile got the first goal and immediately shot her hands up (like a touchdown) and just stood there looking at all the fans in complete shock. Once she snapped out of it she came running over to me then to Aaron jumping all over us. That really flipped a switch for her, now she is more aggressive and is only concerned with scoring! She is constantly talking about soccer and is really concerned with who won. Yesterday she kept reminding the coach of the other team of the score and how many more goals our team had.

This year Emmy gets to join Maile at preschool. The first day I dropped them off Emmy seemed so surprised when I went to kiss her goodbye. Now she always reminds me that she gets to stay and I have to go. I think she loves that she is getting to do more and more big girl stuff.

(with mullet)

Little Livy is getting so big! She got her first hair cut, well basically we just chopped the mullet off and she got her first pebbles dew on Sunday. She is starting to play so good with Emmy and Maile, it is fun to see them all interact.

without mullet

Maile's Royal Ball

2010-09-05T20:28:00.001-07:00

Maile has been planning this party for almost a year now. She invited everyone she saw and told everyone about it as we were shopping for the supplies. She started counting down the days to her big royal ball about 2 months ago. The morning of she woke up like 2 hours earlier than normal. This day was to be the pinnacle of her 5 year old life.

The Royal Ball started with the princesses getting makeovers and decorating their tiaras while the knights did some knight challenges to earn their swords and shields to decorate.

Time for the royal feast:

Then came the quest for all the knights and princesses. A witch turned Kamaile into a ghost, in order to break the spell they had to find the sleeping dragon and throw water balloons at him until he dropped all 5 of his eggs, then they had to find all the eggs and bring them to Kamaile to turn her back into a princess. They had to dig through the witches hair to find an eye ball that would give them special power to defeat the dragon.

They woke the sleeping dragon........
!

He was very fierce.

The kids were terrified! ha ha

The eggs were found and Princess Kamaile was no longer a ghost. They were so happy she was back they showered her with gifts and had cake!!!

I'm glad we had her party the day before her real birthday cause then we were able to have fun all day on the real day. We went to her favorite place to eat - McDonalds, played with all her new toys - including a new trampoline, had 1st soccer practice, went to sonic for slushies, and had a campout movie night in the family room. I think her expectations were met, but of course she's already talking about birthday number 6 in 361 days (she asked me today how many more days until her bday). oh boy!

Fun Week!

2010-08-26T20:48:00.000-07:00

Spent a night in Tombstone, this was the highlight of the night, well and the scorpion suckers.

(I'm not so good at the serious western glare, which is basically why we chose the only one I'm smiling in) Guess who was the princess game winner? Ya, the one with the huge nose ring, isn't she beatiful? The girls sure thought Grandpa made a lovely princess.Livy didn't let Grandma and Grandpa get too close unless there was a kiss involved then she didn't seem to be too shy. Once she started she kept 'em comin.

Thinking about it
Going in for a big wet one........

got it! The girls new favorite place in Sierra Vista- the skate park. They wanted to be sure to take Grandma and Grandpa there to show them all their new tricks. I think it's a new favorite for Aaron too,

We had so much fun with Grandpa and Grandma, it was hard to say good bye. The girls keep talking about how sad it is that they had to leave. We love having family come down, but when they leave we have a period of feeling "family sick" , we are dealing with now.

This week

2010-08-15T20:37:00.000-07:00

For the past couple months I feel like it is rare for us to go a day without putting our swimsuits on. It is just too dang hot to do anything else but play in water. We don't get up to Tucson too often especially in the summer we try to avoid it, but Aaron had to go up there so we decided to join him on the drive then ventured off to one of our favorite places there....the zoo. I promise even though I am not much of an animal fan I really genuinely love going to the Tucson zoo. It is so pleasant every time we go. There are a ton of trees (it kind of feels tropical or something, maybe that is why I love it) there's never a crowd, the animals are always active like this time the elephant was totally dancing if you don't believe me I got video (never figured out how to put video on here, but I have proof) the polar bear is always swimming without fail. The tiger usually strolls right past us, no joke we could be skin to skin if it weren't for the glass separating us. Maile loves the monkeys because more than once they have been sitting on the same rock staring at each other for long periods of time. This was a hot one though! I had second thoughts about being there when drops of sweat started dripping off my nose just as I was getting the girls situated in the stroller to start the day! As soon as we got there we headed for the "watering hole" got drenched, walked around, got drenched again, walked around some more, that was the only way to do it. We had so much fun! If I had pictures of myself in this water place I promise I would have the same facial expressions as the girls, we had a blast!

This is one reason why I love Sundays because it is one day of the week where I feel like we actually get dressed up and I actually do something with myself and the girls, so I always think they look so cute and clean, I just had to have a photo shoot this week, but here's how that went: mouths full of treats trying to bribe at least one cute picture of sleep deprived Livy. Bribery does work for Emmy and Maile to hold still but not necessarily to smile and look at the camera.

I just bought these hair things and totally fell in love with them- I love how wild and crazy they are

More from our vacation

2010-08-08T21:38:00.000-07:00

LAMPTON DAYS LAGOON

BEAR LAKE

The water wasn't too cold for Livy she loved it!

The girls spent most of their time playing in the sand

The water was pretty high this year at Bear Lake so there were some awesome sandbars we played on for hours. Loved it!

I decided I am terrible at taking pictures especially when I see others with a camera I just figure oh I'll get a copy (which almost never happens). Anyways I was just so excited to get these pictures from our other camera uploaded only to find out I hardly took any pictures. So here's some of the few from our trip out to Ohio and Maryland.Brooklyn's baptism

Camping at Lake ErieGrandpa and Maile were a hit in the Dancing with the Stars contest. Maile had the time of her life dancing with Grandpa, she still always talks about it and loves to hear that song on the radio.

Aaron and his brothers - Greg and Spencer performing Blue Man for the family talent show in Maryland. Greg and Tacie's family performed this for their ward talent show so they supplied everything. It was awesome! Everyone loved it!

Our Summer Vacation.....

2010-07-27T10:48:00.000-07:00

Happy 4th!

Love this picture!

Uncle Jakey

These were Emmy's best friends in Utah - Grandma and Jane

Cousins getting ready to go into the cave at Bear Lake

1st annual Sorensen Bear Lake reunion!!

This was a first time reunion that I hope will continue cause it was soooo much fun!

I've got a lot more water pictures from that if we could just get pictures off of our camera, so hopefully we'll have a sequel from this Bear lake trip too).

Emmy totally contemplating how to eat her marshmallow

then figures she is already so dirty how much more of a mess could a marshmallow make?
All 9 of us

(ok, except that we haven't photoshoped Justin in for Derek and Jodi in for Jenn yet)

Love the blue eyes.

Half of our trip to Utah was spent camping. Our first camping trip was near Orderville where my Grandpa's family owns a lot of land. We had so much fun exploring caves, 4 wheeling, learning more about our family history, treasure hunts, talking story, and just playing. It is always so much fun to see all my cousins and aunts and uncles since those reunions seem less frequent these days.

treasure hunt

me and my sisters (we miss you Jodi)

Emmy and her cousin Jane were so cute, I'm surprised they weren't holding hands in this picture since that is what they loved to do.

Maryland was absolutely gorgeous!!! look all around us is green. I don't know if it was just cause we've been so deprived of color down here in AZ but seriously I found that everywhere I looked took my breath away with all the huge trees and grass covering every inch of the ground unless there was a lake or something. I loved Maryland and Ohio! (well except for the fact that the humidity left me a sweaty mess). I can't get pictures off our other camera that has most our Ohio/Maryland trip on it, so there will be a sequel to this post with those pictures.

Olivia's first Birthday!!!

2010-06-07T10:33:00.000-07:00

I can't believe this was a year ago. I promise that pregnancy lasted longer than this past year. We had one crazy party for the little gal.

The party planners

chowin down on her favorite meal ever - mac n' cheese
In awe of her great presents
She had fun digging in a little bit but really preferred us feed her.

Of course the day wouldn't be complete without a dip in the pool

As huge and annoying as this whale may be to get to the pool (I have to take the double stroller now so it has a place to go), it is worth it for Olivia's excitement. She loves this thing. She gets sooo excited just to have it in the water even if she isn't riding it.

Man! I cannot even believe my little baby is one! For some reason I have cherished this baby time more than I did with Maile and Emmy (maybe that is bad to admit). Usually I am kind of anxious for them to move on to the next stage, to start walking and talking. Perhaps now I realize how fast they grow up, so I know that day will come soon enough. I love that she is my little snuggle girl. She is way more attached to me than Emmy or Maile ever were yes sometimes it is annoying, but in some ways I love that she loves being near me so much. She is such my little baby even though she turned one and is getting older I will just keep snugglin her and treating her like my little baby as long as I can.

2010-05-27T20:54:00.000-07:00

I know, I'm so terrible with my updates, but I figured I had better get a few in before we go on our big vacation and get really behind.

Olivia's hair was sopping in bubble's after Emmy was through with her.

The other problem is I haven't taken many pictures at all in the past month. The weather has been beautiful so we've started up swimming every day at least once, sometimes 2 or 3 times. On days that aren't too hot we hit up some of our favorite parks, so we haven't been up to anything too crazy just our usual lives, which doesn't give me much motivation to bust out the camera too often. The other excuse I have is the sun comes up ridiculously early here, like 4:30, so we've had to move Olivia into the computer room at night because it stays much darker in there. She was just getting up way too early so we had to choose computer time at night or more sleep in the morning and usually the sleep in the morning wins out. So, there are my excuses. Now on with the blog.

Let me just say how much I love our backyard. Seriously we are out there almost every day. I feel like I"m living my dream when I'm out there watering the tomato plants while the kids run around back there. It is just the perfect little picture I've always wanted. We bought this great play set from our friends who moved. The girls are on that thing all the time. Maile even learned how to pump herself on the swing. yeah!!! Now we just need to work on the other 2.

This past weekend The Gila Valley Temple was dedicated. Since I'm in Young Women's the leaders were asked to help chaperon the youth who were participating in the cultural event the Saturday before. The youth had a bunch of dress rehearsals Friday and Saturday morning to get ready for their big performance that night. Turns out they didn't need us leaders near as much as they thought, okay so not really at all. So we had a fun little weekend getaway. I didn't feel too guilty about Aaron home with the girls since they had been rubbing in all their plans for their fun Daddy daughter weekend. When I woke up Friday morning they asked when I was leaving so they could get on with it.

Did a little sight seeing in Thatcher......the house President Kimball grew up in.An unexpected night at the hotel lead to an unexpected shopping trip for our unexpected swim which lead to our matching workout clothes. lots of fun!

The night of the performance was unbelievable! Youth from 7 stakes participated. After watching some of the dress rehearsals I was curious to see how it would all come together. They did a phenomenal job! President Monson, President Eyring, and Elder Holland attended the event. We happened to be sitting right where their golf cart drove up. It was an unforgettable experience to be so close and to see the excitement and spirit they brought especially to the children. I've never seen children be so attentive, many had tears rolling down there cheeks. One little boy couldn't help but break the silence as President Monson went to shake his hand, the boy about 7 years old said holding back tears " I love you President Monson" then President Monson pulled him in for a big hug. A similar incident happened just as the prophet was about to step into the golf cart another boy, maybe 5 years old had so many tears streaming down his face and ready to gush out his eyes, was standing close bye watching, immediately President Monson stepped over to him and picked him up and held him tight while whispering in his ears. All the parents of these kids were in tears. It was just amazing to see the impact he had on the crowd and on me. I wanted more than anything to have my kids with me to witness this unforgettable night.

These were some pictures my friend took, no zoom required.

4 going on 20

2010-05-02T21:01:00.000-07:00

What started out as me just taking some pictures on a Sunday morning killing some time before our 1:00 church turned into.....

a bridal shoot.

Like so many times before we are lucky to be recipients of many hand me downs from family, neighbors, and friends. Also like so many times before the house is covered in clothes from me switching out the winter and outgrown clothes for the new season and size, but unlike the other times Maile was so excited about all these new clothes. Her imagination immediately began to take off with each new dress was a new queen with a name and story. It is so funny to see how her whole personality and character changes as soon as she is dressed up. Her walk and talk become very proper and fancy, she starts ordering everyone around and looking at herself in the mirror every chance she gets. I couldn't help but laugh and enjoy going right along with it just to see what she was going to come up with next. Ever since all the new clothes were discovered Maile's Sunday dress is already decided weeks in advance. One particular Sunday I wanted the girls to coordinate dresses, but I should've figured this would be an issue because Maile was already set on wearing her "wedding dress". I bribed Maile to wear this dress for a few pictures with Emmy and Olivia, but the deal was after those pictures she could get her "wedding dress" on for some bridals. Aaron got me these lovely flowers for my birthday so we even had a flower bouquet on hand, perfect. She thought she was hot stuff and was willing to do whatever pose I told her. She is a little too concerned with her wedding for only being 4, she kind of talks about it regularly and already feels there is a dilemma between marrying Uncle Jakey and my friend Laurel's older brother Spencer. She loves being with older kids and doing whatever they are doing . Hopefully this ilttle wanting to grow up and wedding phase has come and will go away for another 20 years.

Still cathing up

2010-04-25T20:04:00.001-07:00

So, I know Easter was a few weeks ago, but like I said I'm catching up little by little. These are pictures of some of our easter festivities. We had a Border Patrol Easter egg hunt with lunch, hunt, and even sack races. It was a lot of fun.Yes, I didn't quite have the speed on the sack race, but there are no rules, so I did what I had to do or I guess tried to do. But just take a look at how far back all the kids are.This year the girls actually liked coloring eggs, unlike last year when they devoured the hard boiled eggs before we could even color them..
Livy didn't even need to eat any treats she just loved to empty the baskets and shake all the eggs.

OUR Birthday

2010-04-18T20:56:00.001-07:00

I swore I'd never do a birthday party on my birthday, but Aaron had to work and I couldn't think of anything else super fun, so I did it we had Emmy's birthday party that morning. Getting ready for the party Emmy had her usual moody moments so I kept reminding Emmy it was my birthday too and I was doing all this stuff for her so she had better be nice to me (it made her stop whinning or crying for a minute or two anyway). We did a Dora Easter theme party. The kids had to go across the troll bridge, through the clubhouse, and out to the easter egg hunt. Luckily our good friend CJ was nice enough to be the grumpy old troll, he played his role very nicely. Some of the little kids were terrified, one even sprinted across the rocks barefoot. It was good fun. Later we went swimming and Aaron made us a yummy steak dinner then topped it off with a delicious strawberry cheesecake from Costco. It was a fun little birthday for the 2 of us.Smiles like this make all the work of a birthday party worth it even on my own birthday.Grumpy old troll

Happy Birthday to us!

Uncle Joshy's visit

2010-04-18T20:10:00.000-07:00

Yay! Uncle Joshy came to visit. We love visitors... hint, hint. We tried to show him around this big place, but there's just so much to see. jokes! I hope we kept him entertained enough. He came out here for spring break while my parents went to Germany. I know the girls loved having him around. We took him around Bisbee, out to the border, swimming, easter egg hunts and activites, and played a whole lot of settlers.

Catchin up

2010-04-11T20:55:00.000-07:00

Wow life has been so crazy the past month and a half between vacations, visitors, birthday's, and every day life. I've been terrible with posting so that leaves me with a bunch of catching up to do. ughh! To make it not so overwhelming I'm going to break it up. Starting off with our trip to Utah. We started out in Phoenix where Aaron dared to have lasik surgery. Luckily he isn't blind and doesn't need his glasses anymore, however he doesn't quite have the super vision he had imagined. I was so nervous for him, he actually made the appointment for both of us to have it done, but I wussed out, I wanted him to be the guinea pig first. Even though everything went smooth I still think I'm too chicken for it. We had a great time staying with my cousin Tash and her family. After the lasik we made the long trek up to Utah where we surprised my family. It was so fun and made the long snowy, slow moving traffic journey up there all worth it.! Maile had been talking about surprising Grandpa Sorensen for months now, so the big moment arrived and it was everything we had hoped for. He was shocked! We didn't get there until 11 pm. Saturday night because of the snow. Thank goodness Aaron was nice enough to drive with me, he only stayed 2 days then flew home for work. We stayed in Utah almost 2 weeks then headed down to Vegas where I completed my first half ironman! whoo whoo! We stayed with our good friends from Hawaii and had a great time there. Then after our long 2 1/2 week vacation we headed back to life, back to reality.

Zoo with the cousins - crazy and chaotic, but super fun!

Dinosaur museum at Thanksgiving Point w/ more cousins - loved it!My mom is currently serving a mission as a hostess on Temple Square every Thursday. We had such a great time seeing what she does and getting personal tours of the buildings. She is so amazing with all that she does. I love coming home to spend some good quality time with my Mom, I sure do miss being around her.Any chance Maile got to be around Uncle Jakey she would take it. Even if it was just sitting on the couch watching basketball, she was always right by his side.I think Maile stayed in this position for a solid minute until we made her let go. That girl is the most social, no fear girl. We have to keep a close eye on her cause she would talk to anyone even in Vegas with all the crazy people.We loved the conservatory in the Bellagio and of course the water show. We probably should have just been content with that because the rest of Vegas left me feeling dirty all over.Wahoo! The finish line!!!! Yeah!!!!! There were so many moments during that 6 hrs. and 16 minutes where I thought I would never reach this moment, Basically just during my 4 hours of torture on the bike. We climbed to the top of a mountain then rode down over and over again for 30 miles with a crazy wind then turned around and rode the 30 miles back. I never wanted to be done with something so bad in my life, (well ok maybe delivering Olivia was worse) but seriously I had comparable thoughts like I wouldn't mind if that car hit me right now to put me out of my misery without me quiting. I really thought there was no possible way I could get off that bike and run a half marathon, but much to my pleasant surprise I felt awesome from the moment I took my first step in the run all the way to the end. I always get very competitive when I race but this one all I cared about was finishing. Even with this mentallity I finished 1st in my division and 9th out of the women, I guess it could have something to do with me being the only one in my division, but oh well I'll take it. This race was similar to labor in the fact that as soon as I finished I said ok, I can cross this off my life's to do list and I'm never doing that again, but then by the next day I thought well that wasn't so bad, maybe I could try a full ironman next time. oh, I don't know why that happens. I really did love everything except that miserable bike ride. Also, after that ride the soreness was similar to having a baby from sitting on that dang bike seat forever. I just need to put in time on the bike, for some reason I am so much more motivated to run and swim. This race didn't start until 1 in the afternoon, so I finished in the dark, but Aaron and the girls are always so great to come cheer me on. Knowing they are waiting at the finish line for me to come through and give them a big sweaty hug is enough motivation to get me through the rough moments.I love that some of my BFF's from Hawaii love doing races too. Races are always reasons for us to have a reunion. I just wished we could've hung out more, cause man I love these girls. The next day was nice to just relax and take it easy. We hung out with Cody and Brooke, our good friends from Hawaii. It was so fun to see them again, the girls loved it too! They are already planning our next trip up there....(sorry Brooke and Cody but you showed us such a good time we'll probably have to come up again).Yep I got a little crazy, I did it I chopped my hair while we were in Utah. The last time I had this short of hair was in 9th grade. I am usually way too scared to do anything extreme, but I was having my good friend Lori who I totally trust cut my hair. She had the 12" braid ready to cut off and I was going back and forth whether I should do it or not. I had a single brave moment and then it was done. ahhh! Plus I wanted to prove to Aaron that I dared do it. I surprised him with my short hair when we picked him up in Vegas. It took me a while to figure out what to do with it but now I love it and so does he (at least that's what he says). It was a much needed change for the summer. I guess the next day wasn't all relaxing. Aaron made us do these dizzy races down the hills. He just had to take advantage of me being so sore, otherwise of course I would have won.

Brooke and I were pregnant with Maile and Noah at the same time and they were born a day apart. It's so crazy to think that was almost 5 years ago. They loved playing together.

Weekend Temple Trip

2010-02-21T20:05:00.001-08:00

We had a Stake temple day on Saturday so we decided to make a weekend of it and stay in a hotel the night before. It was a great little weekend getaway. I am always blown away by how gorgeous the Mesa Temple is. We had a great time walking around enjoying the beatiful temple grounds and Visitors Center. As much of a production as it is to get everything ready for the 3 hour drive and then taking turns in the temple, I think it is a neat experience for the kids as well. Back in Utah we could just leave them with my parents and go 5 minutes away, we would go to the temple then rush back to get them. Since we've been here I always think how I really took those days for grantide, but this time when we went to the temple I realized living so far from the temple has its advantages too. Now that we have to drive so far and have the kids with us, we take our time while we are there. The girls are able to have their own little temple experience at the Visitors Center and while walking around the temple we are able to talk with them and answer their millions of questions. It is a fulfilling experince for all of us.
Just recently Kamaile has been much more interested in the Book of Mormon and other gospel stories. Aaron is so good at reading the scriptures to her every night and making the stories come to life. The other day at Joy school her teacher told me during free play time she was assigning parts to act out Abinidai and King Noah. While she's playing with barbies she'll say things like "I'm going to smite you" or "We're going to burn you to death" ya it's a little gruesome. She can act out entire scenes from the Living Scripture movies using word for word lines. In Primary they've been talking about the war in heaven, so I've heard Maile trying to explain it to Emmy. Since then they try to make the other person feel guilty to get a toy back by saying "Emmy you're following Satan right now" or "Jesus is going to be mad at you". Emmy's latest sayings when someone makes her mad is "ok I'm not going to play with you" or "ok you don't get any treats" so after their little war in heaven discussion she started saying "ok Jesus isn't going to send you to earth". I love hearing and seeing what their little minds make up from the things they learn and am glad they have taken such an interest to these stories.

Happy Valentine's Day!

2010-02-14T19:30:00.001-08:00

A whole month of pink!

Aaron kept making fun of me for dressing the girls in Valentine attire for the past 4 Sundays, he said he couldn't wait to see what they would wear on the actual day. Here it is the grand finale! With these girls it could be Valentine all year with all the pink and red we've got around our house. At least we've got our one boy to mix it up a little and boy do we all love him. He really spoiled all his girls today.

"Ain't nothin gonna break me stride"

2010-01-31T19:54:00.000-08:00

YEAH!!!!!
"Ain't nothin gonna break my stride aint nothin gonna hold me down wo no, I've got to keep on movin". These were the lyrics I kept singing over and over in my head. Somehow I did keep movin and actually never hit the wall like usual. I was preparing to hit it at 18 miles cause I always do, but I felt good and kept feeling good all the way to end. It was so great. I was dreading this day basically since I signed up for it, because I knew I wasn't trained like I wanted to be. The night before my cousins husband Josh was showing me pictures of where the course went and what the scenery would look like and that was not helping. It was an out and back course of nothing but weeds and cactus as far as the eye could see. Seriously it was nothing but desert and the road for 26 miles! I ended up running a few miles with some other runners and had a great time meeting them. It was a super small race with only 106 runners, so I ran miles here and there with different people. Most of the runners basically do any marathon they can, many had done over 100 or 50 marathons, some do the 100 milers. Most of them had another marathon in 2 or 3 weeks! I felt like such a wuss since this will do me in for a good 2 years. I loved meeting all these crazy marathon runners. Talking and singing with them made the race go bye surprisingly fast on the barren road. These people had no shame I saw one of my new found friends taking care of business - squatting 3 feet off the road. I don't have the best eyes so I was staring for a bit trying to figure out if I was coming up on an animal or what exactly it was, so of course once I realized I had been looking way too long I felt like an idiot. This really was one of my favorite races ever. Of course the finish line was the best with my cousin Tash and her family and my wonderful supporter Aaron (who watched the girls during my training and put up with my anxiety about this race, he's great) and my girls. That moment alone made it all worth it! As much as I dread those races I can't help but be anxious to do another, call me crazy but I truly love racing!

The key to this race was drinking! Aaron made me promise to drink every water station. I never have been much of a drinker. he he I hate the feeling of it sloshing around in my stomach, it usually makes me nauseous, but I stuck to my promise and I think it made all the difference.

Look at Livy already hungry for one of these

Since it was such a small race I took 2nd out of the girls and 1st in my age group, so fortunately each of the girls got to sport a medal. They thought that was so fun and wore them around all day.

My lovely fan club!

Wahoo! All done!

until baby #4

Topped off the day hanging out with some of the BFF from Hawaii! Super fun! Of course thanks for hooking up with us Julz and JP and mostly thank you for introducing me to Yogurtland - it was phenominal! Why didn't we come up with that place? It was just so perfect.Also met up with Aaron's BFF from Ohio. Maile wouldn't leave him alone, she loved him! Well I guess she'd leave him alone as long as she had others to be all over. She is such the soical girl.

I'm sad I don't have any pictures with Tash & Josh and fam. we had such a great time with them. Thanks for having us! Overall it was a fabulous weekend!

The latest

2010-01-25T19:48:00.000-08:00

Thank you everyone for your sympathy, especially Spencer and David, I could tell you were genuinely concerned with my "cankles" and it was the right foot Spencer in case you hadn't figured it out yet. This Saturday is the big race, ahh! My ankle held up great for my 20 mile run last week, as for the rest of my body- every muscle in my body was in pain, so it is going to hurt!Ever since Kamaile started riding her bike without training wheels last August she LOVES to ride her bike. Just recently I've been taking her on some runs with me. Sometimes me pushing the 2 girls in the stroller and her on her bike or just me and her go and Aaron meets us at a park somewhere with Emmy and Livy. When she committed to going on a long run with me (11 miles)and then actually followed through with it without a complaint I decided she had earned herself a bigger bike. Her poor little legs had to pedal so fast on that thing, so we got her a 16". Now she LOVES!!!! riding her bike even more.

Emmy suddenly decided to potty train herself, which is wonderful cause I wasn't feeling too motivated yet. One night she was doing her usual stall routine but this time added a new one saying she had to go potty. I totally didn't believe her but she insisted so I gave in and let her try and much to my surprise she went without even sitting there too long. We made such a fuss over it that the next day she didn't even need her diaper, she stayed dry all day! Wow! So it continued for 2 weeks now. She has had an accident or 2 but for the most part she is a potty pro!
The only problems now are she knows she gets her potty treats so somehow she manages to push little bits out at a time, averaging 10 pees and 6 poos a day, ya she is really working the system in more than 1 way. Problem 2 is this is how I find her many times. She gets naked then assumes this lovely position touching every square inch of the toilet, sometimes even with her mouth (ya gross, I know) and not just our toilet-every place we go. Ahhh! It gives me the willies just thinking about what she is touching and sucking. It gets worse-sometimes she'll suck her thumb right after or as I'm wiping her or getting her pants buttoned she'll touch my face all over. wahaoooaoa. Seriously I'm so grossed out by this whole new routine of ours. I've never been much of a germaphobe, but she has made me into a freaked out germaphobe when she uses the potty 16 times a day. Ok one more issue she is going to fall in one of these days since she insists on climbing onto the potty the back way and completely straddling the hole before sitting down. I just know she is going to put one foot in and down she'll go. Oh man that girl is not so lady like in the bathroom.

So Mad!!

2010-01-18T08:15:00.000-08:00

As soon as I started having kids I decided my fitness goal would be to do a marathon inbetween each pregnancy. So far I've been able to stick with it, completing 3 marathons. Well I was getting the itch back in the fall but couldn't find any marathons in AZ on Saturdays, they were all Sundays. I came to the conclusion I was just going to have to go up to Utah to do one on a Saturday. I planned on doing the SLC one in April up until about a week and a half ago when I stumbled upon one in Pheonix on the 30th of this month. I don't know how I didn't find it earlier, I was always looking for one sooner and closer, this one was perfect! Only problem is at that point I had 3 and a half weeks to build up to it. yikes! I was in shape for a solid half, so I really had to step up fast! Well I went on a 16 mile run last week to see how I felt before I officially signed up, the run felt great! True I was a bit sore afterwards, but I was surprised how good it felt. Since the run went so well I decided to sign up for the race, something I dont' normally do unless it's a triathlon or a marathon, although I have done one where I didn't sign up, but after running that far I wanted a medal and shirt for it. Well 2 days later I went out for some speed work early in the dark morning because I have to be back for Aaron to go. I had just started and was going hard when suddenly I was on the ground. Seriously I had no time to react, I just dropped! I hit a rock and completely ate it! Yes I'm sure it was hilarious to anybody who may have seen, but I didn't even care I was just so mad cause my ankle was killing and I couldn't afford to miss a single run at this point with the race 2 weeks away! I decided to try to run it off, which after about a 1/2 mile worked but by the end of my 8 miles I was hurting and suffered for it the rest of the day and yesterday. I hate that I already signed up, I have to do it pain or no pain I must follow through. Thank goodness for the eliptical. I did that this morning and it felt great, so we'll see. Wednesday is supposed to be my longest training run - 20 miles and it's my only chance since Aaron doesn't have another day off until the race. OH! I hate this! I'm having major anxiety can ya tell? I've never had a running injury so this is so frustrating to me I don't really know how to handle it. I know my feet are nasty without one being swollen and fat, but at least I have all my toenails and haven't been growing my leg hairs out for months, which is how many of you have seen my legs and feet. he he! I just thought I would show you why I'm giong crazy! But these pictures probably don't look as bad as I make it seem.

2010-01-06T20:47:00.000-08:00

Ok so who knows if anyone even checks this anymore since I've been terrible with blogging for the past 2 months. I actually was thinking of giving up on it cause I'm just so not motivated, but my brother on his mission informed he can look at blogs now, so I promised him I'd do one a week- that is one of my new years resolutions. The main reason I didn't want to keep it up was because of this one- the catch up post is always one I dread, but here goes.

The week of Christmas we actually got snow that stuck! I never thought I'd be so excited to wake up to snow covering the ground. We immediately got out what snow clothes I could find and went out before it all melted away. Thanks to our grass we had enough snow stick to make this snow man, the girls loved it since their favorite show at the time was Frosty. After scarping up all the snow in the backyard we decided to head up to the mountains with some friends to make the most of our fun snow day, cause if it's anything like last year there was only one and it didn't even last as long as this one.

Just when I thought we'd have our first Christmas alone, without any family Aaron's sister Rachel and her family said they would come down from Flagstaff. yeah! It was so great to have family here for Christmas especially since they were moving like 2 days after. Thanks for coming!

Maile loves to talk to everybody! No matter who it is or wherever we go she's always looking for someone who will listen. So obviously when it's her turn to talk to Santa I have to cut it short because she could be up there all day. Although it was funny the 2nd time she sat on his lap she kind of panicked cause she knew she had forgotten something on her list when she sat on his lap the 1st time, so for a moment she was speechless, but then it all came to her and she couldn't stop.Just look at how chubby those cheeks are! She is perfectly square under her chin because they hang down so low. Oh they are so kissable I love 'em!

October

2009-11-05T19:42:00.000-08:00

That's right we had it all Dorothy, Lion, Scarecrow, Tinman, toto, wicked witch of the west, east, and good witch of the north.

All the hard work paid off. These girls were loving it!!!

October was such a crazy, super fun month. Aaron's parents even came out for the last of the month and we did a whole lot of Halloween festivities. I think Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. The girls are obsessed with the Wizard of Oz these days, so we went with that theme this year. Aaron's parents even joined in the fun. We threw their costumes together that day, but they were some of the best.

Halloween Cake pops with the girls! super fun and super yummy!
(thanks for the pictures Lauri) Annual pumpkin carving contest (too bad you weren't here to lose again Spencer). We stayed with the wizard of oz theme, I know it's after Halloween, but we still need a final vote

#1#2 #3

(this one got jipped with the picture, it was even better than this pictures makes it look)

Olivia had such a cute little halloween ensemble for the month

Maile's joy school class parade and songs

We also went out Apple Annie's again, picked more apples, wagon rides, and of course had more of that yummy apple crumb pie.

We also went to the Tucson Zoo for the first time, I must say this was by far the best zoo experience I've ever had.
We're sure glad Grandma and Grandpa Kerr decided to add Sierra Vista to their long road trip across the country.

Apple Annie's and the Pumpkin Patch

2009-10-18T21:24:00.001-07:00

Last year we always heard about the pumpkin patch but never went so I was excited to take the kids this year. It's over an hour drive, so that's always an issue for me. Aaron had to work but some of our friends were going so we tagged along, it was well worth the drive. The girls loved it especially the tractor ride out to the apple trees. Plus it was just fun to go somewhere new. I know picture overload, but there were just way too many perfect picture taking moments.I had high hopes of getting some cute pictures of just the 3 girls, but after one shot with Maile holding Livy while trying to balance on the pumpkin decided to bail on that idea.

While we wait for our delicious cheeseburgers and apple crumb pie! delish!

Emmy had to work so hard to get these apples, but was so proud of herself when she did it "all by herself" which is what she loves to do these days (everything is by herself).

5 at a time, that was Maile's goal to get the most all in one shot, she did pretty good.

I really don't think Emmy ever stopped smiling on the tractor ride, she kept saying "I've never been on a tractor ride before". She was beaming! Of course there's no way I would've ventured out by myself with the 3 kiddos to this place, so I'm glad we've got such great friends who helped me out... Thanks ya'll it was super fun.

Fire Station

2009-10-11T16:48:00.000-07:00

Emmy and Maile are obbsessed with the fire station these days. We pass it when we go running and when we go to church, they try to out due each other by yelling FIRE STATION!!! louder and faster than each other. So, there was a little fire safety fair this weekend which of course they LOVED!

This picture was taken moments before Emmy tipped over head first, luckily she was all padded up.

I think Olivia would have fit in one of the boots, but we didn't try.

A bunch of the neighborhood kids having a good time.

Kamaile's big day (a month ago)

2009-09-27T14:42:00.000-07:00

The big day Maile had been waiting for finally arrived. Not only was it her 4 year birthday, but also her first day of joy school. She thought joy school was the greatest thing ever and wants to go every single day.
Her and Emmy are obsessed with Peter pan these days. We were going to do a fairy party, but we had to incorporate all the boys so we went with a Neverland theme. She loved it! So it made all the work woth it, but I'm not sure we'll try that one again. Good thing my friend Lauri was on top of it and took pictures for me, I'm so bad at remembering pictures during these chaotic moments.

Her castle cake that was on the verge of loosing its top tier the entire time

In fairyland we ate dinner then had a boys vs. girls treaure hunt at pirates cove

The girls found all their fairy costumes

boys found their pirate costumes, but not until after the girls so they had to walk the plank (I don't think they minded)Off to the Indian encampment for face paint, Indian headbands, pow wow and relay race through the tepee and tunnels

Next was Mermaid Lagoon, but we didn't get any pictures of them digging out their sand treasures. Finally back to Fairyland for presents and cake.

Luckily the cake lasted for it's big day beau to top off a great, fun, crazy, lots of work birthday party.

Olivia's blessing

2009-09-19T22:04:00.000-07:00

With most the family there for the funeral we decided to bless little Olivia. Aaron gave her a beautiful blessing.

I didn't get enough pictures in Utah, so I took some more when we got back, she is so precious and continues to be the best little baby, I just can't seem to kiss her enough.

Sometimes it is near impossible to get these girls to take some pictures, but....

after some bribbery I think I got my new favorite picture of the 3 girls

Utah

2009-09-16T21:43:00.000-07:00

While we were in Florida my Grandpa passed away, so we came home for 2 days then set off for Utah. My Grandpa Sorensen died just before his 93rd birthday. The past couple of months his health has been fading fast, it was hard to see him not as active as he loves to be. He lived an amazing life and was such an inspiration to us all.

Everyone made it out to the funeral except Jodi who's in Germany and Justin who's on a mission. Jenni where were you for this picture?

Maile with her cousins Anna and Kate

Maile and Uncle Jake Dawg

Yes Utah was freezing in the middle of August

Loads of fun staying with Grandpa and Grandma

But then there were some gorgeous hot days too, so we did plenty of swimming

Daybreak is my new favorite spot in Utah, we spent a lot of time there running on the trails around the lake, playing at the great playgrounds and of course playing at the beach.
This was our first time driving up to Utah since we've moved down here, mostly cause I hate driving and am such a wuss about it so we had to stay up there for a good couple of weeks before I could handle the thoughts of driving back. I must say though, it was all well worth it. We had such a great time with family and doing all the summer things I love and miss in Utah. The only bad thing about the trip was it made me way too homesick.

Now that our month long vacation is over, it is back to life, back to reality.

Finally

2009-09-13T21:43:00.000-07:00

So, after a crazy couple months I finally feel like I have time to post something, but it's always these posts that I dread doing cause I have way too much to catch up on. This might just have to be a couple of sequels cause it would be way too long.
First off........FLORIDA!!!!

Aaron's grandparents have a home in Florida, so we've been lucky enough to go down there twice with Aaron's family. Since there's so many of us we rent out a house with a pool for the week and parte! Seriously we were livin the life I love....pool, beach, and family perfect combination. Plus it was so refreshing to have so much color all around, it was so lush which is exactly what AZ lacks. I'm having to get used to this look all over again and find the beauty in it.

This was the view from the back of the rental house, it was just so picturess, some days I'd wake up and look outside and think I was still dreaming cause it was just too perfect looking. Then you throw 2 of my beauties in front of it and wow! love it!

It was so fun to bring the girls to the beach since really the only one who's been there is Maile for the first 3 months of her life. They loved it the first night we went and a few other times, but one of the really hot days we tried going and now I can actually say yes I've had a bad day at the beach, I didn't think that was possible, but going with 3 little girls lacking sleep in the middle of a ridiculously hot day to a crowded beach with only 3 adults and 5 children under 3 turned bad fast and we didn't last long. The ocean water in Florida is so warm it isn't even refreshing so after dripping sweat carrying the car seat, bags, and Emmy from the parking lot, across the hot sand left me dripping with sweat so I run into the ocean only to find myself swimming in a warm bath tub, ahh!

But despite that experience there were many good beach moments during the week to still leave me with an obsesion with the beach, it is a little bit of heaven that I wish I could live in every day as long as they weren't like that day. It also made me miss our days in Hawaii of playing football, volleyball, surfing, and playing in the waves. With kids it is a whole new experience, but besides that day it was so fun in a different way, I loved watching them discover this new place and all it has to offer. Finding sea shells, playing in the crashing waves, building sand castles, tasting the salty water (not thier favorite thing, but funny to see thier first reactions to salty water), finding all kinds of sea creatures, it was just so fun to introduce them to one of my favorite places in the whole wide world. I just wish we had a photographer to follow us around while we play cause I always forget to capture these moments.

Aaron's mom made these adorable dresses and skirts for all the granddaughters , so what better place to take pictures with them than at the beach. These pictures did have such potential but on a hot day these were the best we could get.

Aaron's Aunt's sent all the girls thse cute aprons, so of course another picture moment.

It was fun to finally show Olivia off to the family.

Most of all it was just great hanging out with family. We sure miss living close bye. The girls loved being with their cousins and grandparents. We had a great time!

Happy 4th and summer days!

2009-07-12T21:47:00.000-07:00

I know I'm totally late with the 4th of July, but just thought I'd share the pictures anyway.

We woke up early for our ward breakfast and waterfight then went swimming and had a bbq with our neighbors, and topped it off with a night in Lowe's parking lot watching the fireworks. good times.

I love this picture of Emmy -thanks Analia

I don't know what I'd do without our backyard, we are out there every day! The girls have so much fun playing in the sprinkler and pool.
They love playing in the pool with their "guys" (princesses and all their little characters) on the little slide and pool out back.

I'm sorry I couldn't resist. We have been doing a little potty training with Emmy lately, but when you're having fun there just isn't time to take care of buisness, I guess.

Monsoon season is underway, it is my favorite time of year here. The mornings are ridiculously hot, but by afternoon the storm clouds roll in for a nice thunder and rainstorm to cool it down a bit. It has done wonders for our grass and garden.

The Results..........

2009-07-01T21:24:00.000-07:00

I know you have all been dieing to hear the results, so you can plan for your big vacation, but unfortunately we have no winners. I thought someone would figure out my little prank but apparently not. All three of the pictures were of Olivia, I thought it was getting old to post so many of her, so I thought I'd see if I could fool anyone and it worked. ha ha ha! I guess nobody wins that luxurious stay in Sierra Vista, sorry.

Ok, jokes! There really are winners. The winning combination was Emmy, Kamaile, Olivia. Congratulations Analia, Jentz, Kelly, Brooke, and Hanna. Way to go! Give me a call to claim your prize and reserve your reservations. Sorry to all the losers I'm sure you're disappointed, so we have some good news just for entering you still get an all expense paid vacation to Sierra Vista, just not the luxurious package. Way to go everyone! Thanks for participating it was fun to see what everybody thought.
Maile and Emmy have similar looks, but not the exact same anymore, so it will be fun to see what little Livy will look like as she gets older.

A Perfect Mold

2009-06-28T19:08:00.000-07:00

Everyone keeps saying all of our girls look alike, so we pulled out all the pictures and scrapbooks and seriously it is so hard to tell them apart. Here are some pictures of each of them as babies. We want to see if anyone can guess them right. If you win you get an all expense paid vacation to Sierra Vista except the trip down here of course, so try really hard.

#1

#2

I know you've already seen this one of Livy but these 2 are just too similar I had to show it again.

Kamaile

Livy

Little Livy

2009-06-18T21:41:00.000-07:00

I'm always amazed at how fast the time flies when you have the baby. Those last couple weeks and days of pregnancy seem forever and then bam! you have the baby and now it's already been almost 3 weeks. crazy! So we did stick with Olivia Jill, I'm glad so many people like that name, I think it helped Aaron like it too. he he! She has been the best little baby, I know it has only been a couple of weeks so I shouldn't say it too early but I really think she's been the best baby of the 3. She just does what she's supposed to do- eat, sleep, and poop and doesn't fuss too much about any of it. She has been such a joy to have in our home.
So here are some of my attempts at photo shoots. I had such high expectations and as you can tell Olivia is adorable, but my photography skills aren't so great. I tried to be creative, sometimes I may have tried a little too hard.

In my head this backdrop was going to be brilliant, ummm not so much, but I love the look on her face right before she shot poo all over the place.

I always wonder what is going through their little heads when they smile in their sleep.

The big sisters!

Emmy is so cute around Olivia, she loves to get right up in her face, then she laughs and says either "baby likes me" or "baby not crying no more". She loves to hold her or lay right next to her and just study her every move. I think Olivia is still such a mystery to her.

Maile has been very helpful with getting wipes and diapers or putting the binki in when we 're in the car. She is really good with Olivia.

Birthday Boy!!!!

2009-06-14T22:04:00.000-07:00

June 14th is the date
Aaron turned twenty-eight

breakfast in bed started his fun day
followed by a treasure hunt for presents with Maile leading the way

a special birthday dinner was so yummy
topped off with a slice of deliciousness for his tummy

We hope this day had just the right touch
because we love him so very much!

Happy Birthday Aaron!

Finally!

2009-06-02T20:50:00.000-07:00

Here it is the post you've all been waiting for (jokes) I've been waiting for. Aaron posted these pictures last night and I was supposed to give some details, but I zonked out, so here's the story. When I went for my appointment on Friday my cervix was still very thick and I was at maybe a 1 or 1/2 so I wanted to cry again. As much as I did not want to be induced, it was time since I was almost 2 weeks over according to my ultrasound date and my mom was leaving. I really wanted to go in on my own though, so I did attempt the castro oil and thought it had worked when I started having contractions Saturday morning that weren't very painful, but very regular for 7 hours. After 5 hours of them I went into the hospital only to find out I hadn't changed since my appointment the day before. So, we ended up going with the original plan (I was dreading) going in on Sunday night to get thinned out then start the pitocin Monday morning. This might be a bit more detailed than you care to hear but here's how it played out...... There was no way we could leave the girls again and come back with no baby. Maile was so mad the first time when we came back without her.I seriuosly couldn't even believe she was actually out. I'm sure I forgot exactly how I felt after delivering the other 2 but seriously this delivery was so hard, I really didn't think I was going to survive. I thought I was going to pass out, which actually I was hoping for to just pass out and wake up to the baby in my arms. The labor wasn't even that long compared to some people but those were the longest hardest hours of my life! My contractions started around 6 a.m. and I delivered her at 11:20 am. The last 2 1/2 hours were terrible. I was at a 9 1/2 for almost 2 hours feeling like I had to push through the contractions but they wouldn't let me and the pushing lasted like 40 minutes that seemed to be doing nothing but draining me. They thought she was posterior cause she was having a hard time getting past my pelvic bone, once she made it past which was 95% of the pushing she shot right out. The doctor wasn't quite ready, but I wasn't waiting another minute.I still was in too much pain to really enjoy this moment I thought would never come.yummy! Thank goodness she wasn't as big as I thought she might be. 7 lbs. 14 oz. 20 1/2 in. long
Born June 1st 11:20 a.m.

Maile wants to have a baby now....crazy girl!Feeling much better knowing that I was going to survive and she was a healthy little girl

Our 3 little women.

It was so fun to see the girls with the baby they thought would never really be here. Maile might be a little "too helpful". Emmy was a little scared of her at first and actually doesn't dare touch her too much. It's going to be fun.
After that delivery I said I didn't care what Aaron wanted to name her, I had done the work so I got to choose. Then I felt bad, so we were going to talk about it, but didn't get a chance before the birth certificate lady came around and Aaron wasn't there, so I just said Olivia Jill, but there is still a chance it could change. Right now we just call her "baby".

Even though my mom had to leave before we even were released from the hosptial I'm glad she could see the baby and come out for a visit. She was so helpful during that last week and kept me happy while I waited for this little gal.
She looks just like a little Aaron just like the other 2 did.
Grandma Jill with Olivia Jill (maybe) Aaron with his girls

Our new family 4 girls and a boy! Maybe next time we'll work on evening it out.

Yes, I am still here with my big belly and no baby

2009-05-28T21:41:00.001-07:00

Once again no hospital pictures, but at least this week I've had my mom and dad in town to keep me sane. They were hoping to see the new baby that should have been born a week ago, but that still hasn't happened. My dad only stayed for a couple of days and is already gone, but my mom is here until Tuesday so I sure hope I can have her here for a little help when the baby finally comes. I've tried fast walks, jumping squats, running, skipping, hopping, bumpy roads and all it did was give me pain and soreness. I almost tried castro oil today but I'm kind of scared, if nothing happens tonight or at my doctors appointment tomorrow I think I'll kick it up a notch and try some. For now we've just tried to have fun and stay busy to keep my mind off the never ending pregnancy.
.

Good times with Grandma and Grandpa, the girls are loving life!

hiking in Ramsey Canyon

Bisbee

Don't you just love the random art work they have, this is at the "bark park".

We even ventured down to see the border fence. My mom was scared to get out of the car, so we were laughing about it as I took a picture from the car window.

My next post will be of my 20 lb. full head of hair baby.

Still Waiting

2009-05-22T21:02:00.000-07:00

I was hoping the next post would be the classic hospital pictures announcing the arrival of our new little gal (still figuring the name out if anyone has suggestions), but nope instead its just of my enormous belly that continues to stretch and me venting about it.. I'm not sure what it is about going over due that makes me insane this time around. I mean really I've gone 40 weeks what's another couple days right? You'd think, but another couple days is sounding unbearable lately. I went over 6 days with Emmy and don't remember feeling like this. I guess I had high hopes for my doctors appointment today thinking I would basically go straight to the hospital or have him say I'm sure by tonight you'll be in labor, instead all I got was well nothing is happening so I guess we'll see you next week. Maybe my hormones are out of control right now, but I actually started crying on the way home. I don't know if it's just the thoughts of going to church another Sunday with everyone saying oh your still here, if I just don't want to pee every couple of minutes, if I could put a stop to the shooting leg pains, or if I just want to sleep on my stomach again, but seriuosly I don't know how much longer I can take it. Of course I am just dieing to finally hold this little babe in my arms instead of in my belly and to see if she'll be another identical baby like Emmy and Maile were.

I planned to have Aaron take that cute prego picture but forgot, so maybe tomorrow I'll post it, but for now this is the update.

Getting anxious for another one of these

2009-05-14T20:54:00.000-07:00

These past couple weeks have been busy just finishing projects that I had on the to do list before baby comes and since that date always seems sooooo far away I've procrastinated, but when I reached 37 weeks I decided that date actually might come, so I had better get goin. The weather also kicked up like 100 degrees and I'm always a sweaty mess, so we play at the pool each and every day, sometimes twice or like today 3 times, it just feels so dang good, I can't get enough of it. Well it took longer than usual but I've reached that point where I'm totally ready for this baby to come. Just yesterday I started getting way too anxious. I feel like everyone who was due around the same time as me has had their babies. This time around I've had more comments than ever about how ready I look. Seriously wherever I go people do a double take or just have to comment about me looking "so ready" or that I look ready to pop. Some new ones this week have been as I was comparing 2 things at the store a man walked by and said "oh that's got to be nice to have a table to rest things on" another random guy said "pumpkin seed?" what? that's weird. Anyways I realize I'm huge this time around I must be much bigger because I seriously get a ton of comments and have been getting them for the last 2 months, I'm more ok with it now since I'm due in 10 days. I also aquired some stretch marks this time around, which scares me that she's going to be a big one. Thoughts of the delivery always scare me and are on my mind a bit more this time since I've heard some scary stories about the hospital down here. If I think about it too much I get anxiety. As anxious as I feel it is a fun and exciting thought to think any day she could decide to come and I know when she does everything will change for our little family. I'm excited to see how Maile and Emmy will react to a baby, because they've been so into babies and dolls lately (I'm definitely going to watch them closely so they don't try changing her diaper, feeding her all the crazy things they give their dolls or carrying her around the way they do their dolls), but really I think they will love having a new little sister.

As you can tell, we have been loving our backyard and are out there every afternoon. I always took grass for grantide, but boy am I grateful for it these days.

All in a days work

2009-04-27T08:42:00.001-07:00

I've wanted to have grass in our backyard ever since we moved in, but of course there's a lot to it including $, so we've been here almost 10 months now and haven't done a thing to the backyard. Rocks, dirt and cactus definitely are the more popular look around here, but I just haven't grown to love that look and not sure I ever will, all I wanted was grass!!! The only place in Sierra Vista to buy grass is Home Depot, but only during April and May. We started seriously thinking about it the end of March and to make a long story short we decided to bag an irrigation system since our backyard isn't very big. When we started ordering soil and calling around for various things we found out Home Depot received their last shipment of sod that day cause it wasn't selling. This threw everything into high gear and 2 days later we were slaving away to get all the top soil delivered, spread, buy sod, lay it all, and put up a retaining wall all in a days work. We started around 6 a.m. and finished everything around 8 p.m. I was sure that day would send me into labor even though Aaron did all the heavy lifting. Both of us were sore the rest of the week. We still had to get the rest of the soil and plant the garden, flowers and trees, but finally there is color to our backyard! I LOVE IT! I no longer have to give the girls a bath every time they play in the backyard. Now we are just hoping everything will grow since we really didn't have a clue as to what we were doing, but I honestly get giddy thinking of going in our very own backyard and picking fresh peaches, cherries, plums, strawberries, tomatoes and other delicious garden gems while watching the girls run through the sprinklers on hot summer days.

6:00 a.m.

7:30 p.m.

I felt so bad I couldn't help more with the lifting. so Aaron was pretty beat and dirty after our long day of work.

2 days later......done finally!

Our Birthday!

2009-04-14T21:53:00.000-07:00

As most of you know I'm not thrilled about sharing my birthday with Emmy, so she had her birthday party with her friends the day after. Our birthday was reallly fun, it was gorgeous here so we went swimming in the morning, then some of my friends took me to lunch, out to eat with the family for dinner, then we opened presents, had cake, and a movie night on the projector. It was a lot of fun.

A perfect birthday wouldn't be compelete without some time in the pool

All of us girls love doing date nights when Aaron takes us out to eat, since this was a special occasion Maile and Emmy got to dress up for the night. Whenever anybody commented on their dresses they would spin and twirl and make the most of the attention they got.

Happy Birthday to US!!!!

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY!!!!

easter egg hunt

A happy Birthday Girl after a ton of candy and presents

I think she has been singing the happy birthday song to herself for the past 2 months, so it was fun to finally have the real moment.

MORE EASTER EGG HUNTS

Beginning of an easter egg hunt full of empty plastic eggs. Yes, that is right, all those eggs behind us were completely EMPTY! At first I thought it was some mean joke, who just doesn't fill the easter eggs right? I kept looking around for other people's reactions, but everybody just carried on like it was normal. We soon found out we were to go wait in a line to turn our eggs in for a little rubber ducky. hhhmmmm. I'm not sure I'm a fan of those kind of easter egg hunts. The girls actually still had a great time and didn't complain, it was mostly Aaron and I who couldn't believe what just happened.

One by one Maile opened her eggs and said "there's nothing in this one either".

Before they even finished all the eggs they were ready to crack them open and chow down, which is exactly what they did polishing off all 8 of the eggs.

Easter

2009-04-14T21:27:00.000-07:00

It seems with blogging there is either a ton of stuff to blog about, which makes me not even want to blog cause it will take too long or there isn't much to blog about. Right now is one of those moments when a ton of stuff has been going on, so it takes forever to get up to date. I can't upload a lot of the pictures from Emmy's bday party, our fun joint birthday, and easter egg hunts for some reason, but I do have some fabulous pictures my neighbor Sara Neyhart took. She's a photographer and just happened to be passing by as we were attempting some pictures on our own after church on Sunday. Getting great pictures of the girls is near impossible for me, but Maile was all about posing and doing whatever Sara asked. Emmy on the other hand, well I'm really surprised she even kept her hat on long enough for these pictures, we didn't even attempt individuals of her. There were too many cute ones of Maile, so I know its overload of her, but I just have too many favorites.

The New Ride

2009-04-04T20:35:00.000-07:00

So Aaron's been looking at Honda Odyssey's ever since his Dad came out for Christmas with theirs. Our neighbors got a great deal at a dealership out here and after that he became obsessed with finding a great deal and looking all around. Monday morning I was unaware he went to the dealership until he showed up with a brand new 2008 odyssey he was test driving. Obviously I loved it, but thought it was way too fancy and nice and still planned on getting a used one. About 1/2 hr later he calls saying he bought the van. It took a while for me to realize he was completely serious. He really bought the van without us talking about it or anything. Wow! I seriously couldn't believe he actually went though with it without even talking about it. He told me the whole story how he got an unbelievable deal that he just couldn't pass up. So, that was that and the next day we were headed to Phoenix in our brand new van. I don't remember the last time Aaron was so giddy, he honestly was so proud of his deal and so excited it was hilarious. I still don't feel like it's really ours. I've never in my entire life owned a nice car, so to have this thing is almost scarey. I thought I was a high roller in high school when my parents got their 2001 Astro van if that tells you anything about the cars I've driven. I'm still a little scared driving it, but I must admit I totally love it and actually didn't hate every minute of the drive to Phoenix. The girls were busy with their DVD and weren't complaining of the sun on them and being too hot, etc...... I was also much more comfy. What can I say as shocking as the news was I'm in love with the Odyssey.

We planned this little trip up to Phoenix to watch the Easter Pageant at the Mesa temple. Spencer is moving to DC come June so we figure we won't have many more opportunities to visit. Aaron's sister Rachel drove down from Flagstaff. We had a great time with everyone and are sad to think it could be our last get together at Spencers.

Triple Blockdown

2009-03-24T15:32:00.000-07:00

Where's Emmy?

Me on the top or our ladder looking down into her barricaded crib room.

I absolutely hated when Maile learned to climb out of the crib, but I didn't think Emmy would be as venturous enough to do it, welll I thought wrong. About 3 weeks ago she figured it out, but wasn't that excited about it cause she only did it like 3 times mostly because Maile was in there egging her on. After Ohio I thought she must have forgotten about it cause she didn't do it for a couple of days, but then she was super hipper one night and started coming out, when we would go grab her to put her in bed she'd just laugh and run away thinking it was such a fun game. I seriously put her in more than 50 times, held the door shut until she wasn't having fun anymore. This routine continued the next day for nap and that night. Finally I left it up to Aaron cause I couldn't do it anymore and the next morning he showed me his invention that he was so proud of. We took off our closet doors in the computer room, so he bungee corded 2 of those to the side of her crib leaving one side of her crib open, but it was high and rounded so we figured she couldn't get out that way. Nope, the next night that was her new game to climb out the high side and boy was she ever proud of herself for that one. Aaron wasn't about to let her win, so he pulled off one of the girls closet doors and finished the battle off with what he likes to call the "triple blockdown". She cried and had a fit whenever we put it up for the first 3 days and I felt bad completely trapping her like that but now it's almost like she wants it. We give her one chance to have an open crib and tell her if she gets out she'll get the "triple blockdown" so last night she got out and Aaron went in there and she immediately said "blockdown?" and laughed as he put it up. I know we can't do this forever so until we figure out a plan B (or she does) she will get the triple blockdown.

Ohio

2009-03-14T14:11:00.000-07:00

Our long awaited trip out to Ohio is already over. We were looking forward to this trip for so long and of course like all vacations waiting for it takes forever, but once you're there it flies bye and then your back home like you never left. We had a great time with Aaron's family, everyone was there except Donovan and Alissa. After a long morning of traveling we finally arrived and basically went straight to the greatest water park I've ever been to. Even though the girls hardly had any sleep they still had a great time. We spent the night in a hotel there with everyone and played hard again the next day. It was SO FUN! I love when you go with a huge group because we switched off watching kids, so not only did the kids have a great time but the adults got to go on all the rides as well.

My face says it all

All the boys had thier time the night before so it was the girls turn to leave the kids with them and go on some of the crazy rides. This was one of my favorite slides, it's a huge bowl that you go flying into then go around and around, if you have a lot of weight(I was a good reason why we made it around a few times) then you go through a hole into another slide. I was honestly laughing and screaming the entire time....loved it!

This slide was so crazy! It honestly feels like you're getting flushed down the toilet, you come screaming down this tube slide super fast then all the sudden you are just exposed in this huge bowl going around and around until you drop out of a hole and plop into the water. It was a one of kind water slide that I'm obsessed with.

This and the mat slides were the only ones I couldn't do being prego. I was rejected on one of the slides for being pregnant and I tried to act totally offended making them think I was just fat, but it didn't work.

Where am I?? Do you see me camouflaged into the zebra truck? I honestly felt like I could have been the zebra mascot for the water park seeing how it was a African safari theme and I totally had the suit and body for a zebra.

Aaron's aunt Karolyn and cousin Lauren were also there visiting from California. They really know how to spoil the girls with the cutest clothes like these adorable dresses.

Aaron's Grandma lives with his parents, so we enjoyed seeing so much of her.

Both Payton and Cambri were blessed the Sunday we were out there.

No, this wasn't a planned picture this is literally what I did all week long.....stuff myself between my mother in law and brother in law's good cookin, Cheesecake factory, Pinerra's bagels, East coast custard, a yummy pizza place in Pheonix, and a Cafe Rio salad for the ride home (which I couldn't even finish in one sitting that never happens!) I was so stuffed from the whole week, but I sure loved it all. I'm sure the fact that I didn't have to worry about cooking all week made everything even better.
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Maile always loves playing games or reading books with Grandma

Waiting by the tree for a turn on the swing.

Uncle Spence gave the girls the crazy spinning swing ride. No matter how dizzy they'd get they kept wanting more. It was so funny to watch them try running to us after spinning a million times.

We did sack races, dodge ball, hide and go seek at the church one night. then topped it off with going out for some yummy custard ice cream.

The girls had such a great time staying at "Grandma and Grandpa Kerr's" Maile keeps asking when we're going back.

Swiper, NO SWIPING!

2009-02-24T20:26:00.000-08:00

I can't even remember when all of this started, but Maile became obsessed with playing pretend. She is always the princess or whoever the main character is, Emmy is always the side kick, Aaron is always whoever the boy is, and I am always the bad guy, except when I'm Mary Poppins. Usually the story line changes every day or every couple of days, but for the past 2 months it has consistently been a new Dora adventure. Maile assigns us all our roles reminding us constantly throughout the day. Maile is Dora, Emmy is Boots, Aaron is Diego and of course I am Swiper. No matter what the new pretend play is for the day, I am always the bad guy. Aaron was given the bad guy role once and never again, because he was too scary. Seriously Maile didn't dare do a thing when he was the bad guy. When we go to playgrounds with other people around I try to distract Maile from insisting on playing these games but sometimes she is very persistent and I end up chasing her and Emmy around trying to swipe whatever she has set for the moment, I wonder what the other moms or kids are thinking when I try to steal toys and jackets from the girls with them yelling "swiper no swiping!" or just screaming, but really I'm just playing my role as swiper. Or as people walk past our house and hear me yelling "off with your head" (queen of Hearts from Alice and wonderland).

Dora the explora

Every time Maile says she's Dora (which is all the time) that is Emmy's cue to say "and I'm Boots"

Our hike the other day turned into a Dora adventure notice Maile's got to have her Cinderella high heels on, I guess Maile is the high maintenance Dora because she wears them everywhere we go... swimming, shopping, parks, and yes even hiking.

This adventure consisted of crossing the troll bridge, passing the old house, and the picnic table as the final destination. This had to have been their favorite time doing this hike.

Sugar Cookies......

2009-02-16T13:55:00.000-08:00

A sweet smile before indulging on the cookies she just cut

Can you see the flour all over her face (and the bugars)? That was her favorite part- making a mess.

All growing up my mom let me have Valentines, Halloween and birthday parties. We would make sugar cookies, pull taffy, and play games, she always went all out. I have such great memories of making sugar cookies. So, this year was a new experience for me of being the mom making sugar cookies and it wasn't as fun as I remember. I felt like we were in the kitchen all day!!! The girls had fun at first getting flour all over and using the cookie cutters, but after about 5 minutes Maile wanted to eat every dough cookie she cut out and Emmy just played with the dough and ruined all the cookies that had been cut. We made no progress for the first half hour. Once we finally had them all cut and baked the decorating process began, luckily Emmy was napping by now. Maile just wanted to lick all the frosting and dig her fingers through the frosted ones claiming she was spreading the sprinkles around. So seriously about 4 hours later we finally finished decorating the last of the cookies and I was burnt out but of course the kitchen table and floor were covered with flour, dough, and sprinkles, and plenty of dishes to clean, mouths and hands to wash. It seems like I have those moments quite a bit where you have such great memories as a kid of doing things and once you play a different role, it is a whole new experience sometimes great in a different way (like Christmas and Disneyland), but other times like the sugar cookies it isn't quite as great as you remember and I think this will be a once a year thing, cause maybe I'll have forgotten how draining it was this year. Times like this also reemphasize just how great my mom was to let 9 kids do things like this. I also understand now why my mom hates making sugar cookies and never does anymore.

Aaron spoiled us girls with candy and flowers.

Justin's visit

2009-02-05T20:03:00.000-08:00

My brother Justin is leaving on his mission to Macon, Georgia next week so of course he had to make a trip out here to see his favoirte sister before he left. jokes! But seriously I was so excited , I love having visitors. He was basically only here for a day, but we had a lot of fun talking and hanging out. Maile and Emmy absolutely loved it too. The only hard part was saying good bye again.

I sometimes forget just how big he is since he has always just been a "little brother to me. Now he even thinks he's stronger than me or something.

I love Emmy with these goggles on, she looks like a cute little nerd.

Justin got a new camera for the mission so we had fun testing out the underwater feature. I know this is a great shot of me, it's about the only picture I'm okay with since it doesn't show my enormous body. Seriously this pregnancy I'm getting so big so fast and I still have another 3 1/2 months. yikes!

Maile's new thing in the pool is diving for swim rings, I've been surprised how well she does.

The girls loved family night with Justin there to throw them around and play all the games, I'm sure he loved it too.

We are so excited for you Justin and wish you the best.
Thanks for a fun visit we'll miss you!

Kamaile's first dance recital

2009-01-31T14:27:00.000-08:00

Going to dance class has been the highlight of Maile's week for the past 5 months and Friday was the big dance recital. I was curious to see how she'd do in front of a crowd. From the moment I put her new tutu on she was ready to put on a show. She did great and had so much fun performing for everyone. It was just a small audience in the basement where they practice, so I think that helped. I couldn't help but love every minute of it and I was grinnning ear to ear the entire time. I can't believe she's old enough to do this kind of stuff, but I'm sure this is just the beginning of many more performances. I know I over did it with the pictures but I just couldn't narrow it down.

The cute little bumble bee dance class, a group picture was basically impossible, I think these were the best smiles Jane and Maile had.

Jumping on the tramp after dance class for Maile and during dance class for Emmy became routine.

This recital got me all the more excited to have another little girl.

Border Patrol

2009-01-28T20:32:00.001-08:00

People always wonder about Aaron's job so this might answer some questions. for ya'll.

Gotta love it!

2009-01-18T19:46:00.000-08:00

Well, I must say even though I'm still missing family and friends in Utah I most definitely don't miss the cold. True Christmas didn't quite feel like Christmas without the snow and I actually thought for a minute that I missed the cold and snow. Then comes January when in Utah I tend to feel a bit depressed because I'm inside way too much. This January I'm loving the weather, it has been in the 70-80's the past 2 weeks, so we continue to swim, have picknicks, go on bike rides, and play at the park. No complaints here, although I still get homesick for everyone. Maybe ya'll should come down here, just look what you could be enjoying..........

Our neighbor who is a photographer took these great pictures, I love 'em.

I love this picture because Maile's little bum cheeks are always hanging out, usually worse than this, but when you're a kid you don't care. That's about the only time in your life when it actually looks cute.

This is how you can usually find Emmy after 1/2 hour of swimming - wrapped up in her towel with her thumb in.

It's officially another girl!!

2009-01-11T15:02:00.000-08:00

I already spread the word to most of you that we're probably having another girl because I had an ultrasound at week 14, but it still didn't seem a for sure thing cause it was so early. We just had another ultrasound this past week and the result is still the same............GIRL!!! We are totally excited! true we would love a boy eventually, but I can't help but just picture our 3 little girls dressing up and having tea parties. Just look how much fun 3 little girls can have.

Girls just wanna have fun!!!
Maile and Emmy love getting together with the neighbor girls like Nia.