9 YEARS

Don't really know what to say...we just celebrated nine years of marriage with Lukas and an ice cream cake!!! I didn't get any pictures of the cake before we ate it all, but it was great!!!

7 Years Old!!!

My Lukie is seven years old.Having cupcakes with Papa.


At Cracker Barrel with Papa.
Showing his muscles.
Not letting his brother show him up! This is the way Sammie shows his muscles. Sometimes I think he is going to pop. What you cannot see in the picture is how red his face is getting.

Making cupcakes.
Helping make cupcakes.
Even the little ones get to help.

Lukas celebrated his seventh birthday on Tuesday, Dec. 11th. We made cupcakes and then met Papa for lunch at the Cracker Barrel. He then came by and had some cupcakes. He then went golfing with Papa and his cousin Nickolas. He had a great day.

Guitar Recital

Drue has been taking guitar lessons for a few months. A great friend of ours told her that if she got a guitar, she would teach her to play. We went out and bought her a guitar from Wal-Mart for her birthday. It works well but is not the best sounding (the last two strings make more of a twang sound). You see, we didn't want to invest a whole lot of money in case she didn't really like it. I remember taking piano lessons!!!

She and another girl from the virtual academy take lessons together. Her teacher decided to have a recital for the girls. It was so sweet. They took turns playing songs with the teacher singing and then played one all together at the end. They both did a wonderful job. After the recital, she asked if she could get a nicer guitar. After all her hard work, and a conversation with her dad, he has decided to purchase her a nicer guitar. Now I am researching and looking for a nice one, not too expensive, not too big--and have no idea what I am doing.

I have a video, but it is taking forever to upload. I will try again another time. I don't really have time to wait right now.

Rail Road Park

On the front of the train with Daniel.
Such a cute picture I just couldn't pass it up! She was actually disobeying me by sneaking into the front of the train.
In the cattle car.

A friend and I took our kids to the rail road park in Scottsdale. They had a great time. The weather was a little warm. It was in the upper 90's I believe. They played for hours on the playground and then we rode the train. The younger kids (all but Drue) rode in the cattle car. When we first took off a little boy sitting with his mom yelled at me and said, "Your little girl is crying." That mom looked in the car and saw that Lukas was holding her and trying to calm her. She eventually settled down. She ended up enjoying the train ride. We will try and go back when the weather is cooler.

Individual Photos

Drue 10
Lukas 6
Samuel 3
Launa 2
All 4! Three participating.

We went the railroad park and attempted to get some pictures of the kids. I think the sun was too bright. We will try again when the sun isn't so bright.

Way to Go Drue!

Drue was enrolled in Title I Math through the Virtual Academy. The program gave away Dairy Queen gift certificates to the students in each class that completed the most Study Island games. Study Island is an internet program that prepares the students for the AIMS test. Anyway, she won in her class and received $10. She took us out and still has $2 left. On another note, she did so well on her AIMS test this year that they promoted her out of Title I. We are so proud of how well she is doing in math now.

Toy Museum

Lukas and his robot
Samuel and his robot
Drue and Lukas playing Manacala
Launa playing Manacala
Drue's robot

The kids and I went to a toy museum for a field trip. They had all kinds of toys and games. A lot of the museum was hands on. They had a lot of fun. These robots were felt covered squares and they had buckets of toys with velcro on the backs. There were four robots to be decorated.

Drue's Soccer

Well, soccer season is over and we have since moved on to volleyball. But, here are the pictures from one of her soccer games. She has improved so much. This is her first year playing on an all girl team. She enjoyed it a lot more.

My poor girl!

Each night, the kids go upstairs and take showers. Girls in one the boys in the other. They get on their pajamas and then come down stairs. Unless there is trouble (screaming, yelling, door slamming, etc.), I stay downstairs and wait for them. This particular night as the kids were upstairs after their shower I could hear the laughter. You know the kind that means they are up to no good! This proceeded by, "Go Launa. Go show Mom." I already know this means they have done something to her that they think is 50X funnier than the normal person. Well, my oh so cute 2 year old comes down the stairs looking like this.

Lukas bought these "Billy Bob Teeth", which he calls "Bobby Teeth", quite a while ago at Wal-Mart. He has gotten his 88 cents out of them many times over.

Launa likes them because it makes everyone laugh. And yes, they laugh the whole time she has them in her mouth.

I figured for her sake I would add this picture taken today. My cute girl with normal teeth!

California

We spent a very long weekend in California and had a lot of fun. I, however, could not find my camera and when Drue finally remembered to take hers out and take pictures, her batteries died. I will recap and you can picture the events in your head!

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First, drove out to California on Thursday afternoon. Mom had sent the kids each a $5 gift certificate to McDonalds for the trip. We stopped at on in Blythe, just over the CA line. I let the kids play for about 30 min then each order and pay for their own food. That took a while! Then on the road again, eating-to keep them occupied. They did very well the whole trip out. We got a little turned around during some construction, but made it safely to Anaheim around 4:30pm. We then changed clothes and went to someone's home for dinner. We stayed at a home just across the street from Knott's Berry Farm. (If I knew how, I would add a link there like Kelly does so that you would know what that is. Maybe I will figure that out one day) Anyway, the kids enjoyed driving by that each time we left and came back to the house.

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Friday, Lance and I attended some training classes and the kids were disperesed in different places with different people watching them. They had a great time. Then off to TGIFriday's for dinner. The restaurant was inside Knott's Berry Farm and we sat on the patio. There was a roller coaster to walk under before you entered the restaurant. The kids and Lance hung out there until the coaster came over them, twice. I was too scared. The roller coaster was made of wood and looked to be 100 years old. Thinking back, it would have been better to be squashed with them than watch them be squashed. Next time I will stand with them. After dinner and friend came over and watched the kids and Lance and I went out.

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Saturday the kids and I toured a little of CA while Lance went gospel door knocking. He had much greater success than we did. After driving for an hour, we found 4 horses pulling a stage coach right by the house we were staying at. We decided to meet Lance at the park and play. Then we napped. Well, all but me and Launa! She wasn't interested in sleeping. Then off to someone's elses home for dinner.

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Sunday night we drove down to San Diego. The drive took about an hour and a half and was beautiful. I have gone to the ocean my whole life, but this was the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen. On Monday we went to the San Diego Zoo. It was free day and I think everyone knew about it. They are only about 20 min from the border. So everyone in Mexico thought they would come to. By 1pm we had to leave. There were so many people we were walking single file, shoulder to shoulder. I felt like a herd of cows. The kids were tired so that did not help. Anyway, it was a wonderful zoo. See above pictures. The animals were so close you could almost touch them. The gorillas put on a little show for everyone watching. They have such a sense of humor. The kids had so much fun and slept all the way back to Anaheim.

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Tuesday was a little time at Downtown Disney (in the LEGO store), the Science Museum and then home. Lukas said he wasn't sure if we should go to the Science Museum because we had already had so much fun in the past few days. After a little talk, he decided it was still ok to hit the museum.

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Now we are back in the real world of school, laundry and cleaning house.

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Sorry about the long post. I wanted to get the whole weekend in one post.

My Sweet Oranges

Lukie had his first ever soccer game on Saturday. This is the boy who cried while I was in the office signing him up to play. Now he has decided that he LOVES soccer. He wore his "costume" (as he calls it) for two days after he got it from his coach. He was upset with me for making him take it off. His game went great. He played goalie and stopped the other team from scoring a goal. The best part, he scored a goal! I could hardly believe it. I screamed so loud. I actually had wet eyes! I felt so lame.

Drue also had her millionth (as Lukas puts it) soccer game on Saturday. I was watching the younger three run around and was not able to take any pictures of her. I will get some this weekend while Dad is watching the other kids. I will highlight her game then.

My Parents

My parents came to visit at the beginning of August. We had a great time. We stayed at their time share condo and swam. Then we went up to Prescott. The guys played golf and we hung out at the mall, had lunch then headed home. My mom has more pictures that I can post when I get them.

Playing with Dad

Lukie doesn't go so high!

The kids love to be thrown by Lance. Drue doesn't get to be thrown anymore. And as you can see, Lukas is probably not going to get too many more throws.

Family Photos

It's not often our whole family gets in a picture. Here are a few of all of us and then some parts.

Drue, Sheri, Lance, Launa, Sam, Les (Lance's dad), Nick (our nephew)

The lake

Lukas, Daniel and Sammie taking crawdad catching lessons from Bro. Sam
Lance helping the girls with their crawdads.
Sammie hiking.
Launie hiking.

We took the young people up to Woods Canyon Lake for a day trip. It was a long drive but well worth it. I even had to put on a jacket by the end of the day. Most of the day was spent catching crawdads. There was a bucket full before we left.

Launa and Sam had so much fun exploring. They wore me out. I finally had to just sit where I could see them and instruct them not to go further than they could see me. They all had so much fun.