Mormon battalion commemoration

Last Saturday we went down to old town San Diego for the Mormon battalion commemoration. This was our first time going. We probably would have talked ourselves out of it again, but Becky has signed up to help in our stake's booth so we had to go. I'm glad that we did. While Becky was busy doing laundry, Emily and Kaleb were able to make bricks, and play with the toys that pioneer children had.

While we were there we ran into Steve Sowby who Blake used to work for in American Fork about 10 years ago. It was fun to catch up with him and via wife. It is a small world. After the festivities we went up to the battalion and let the kids pan for gold. Over all it was a great day!

Raccoon award

Last week Emily was given a racccoon award for compassion. We are so proud of her. A raccoon award is like being chosen as a student of the month for each classroom. Blake and I were both able to be there.

Blogging

So apparently I don't blog enough so I'm going to catch up.

Over Christmas break we all went down to San Diego and went ice skating. It was great. It was outside and was Kaleb's first time. Blake helped him a lot and by the end he was skating on his own!

Also a friend of ours got married in November and the photographer emailed me this beautiful picture of Becky. I love it!

The other picture is something I found on my bathroom counter. It's always nice to find notes. I just hope they weren't used q-tips. ;)

Kid's rule day

For the past probably 7 years our kids have had something called kid's rule day after Christmas. This is a day where the kids can do pretty much what they want when they want. When they were younger they would spend the day watching lots of movies. This year they spent more time planning. They presented us with a schedule for approval. We were impressed and agreed. We decided that new year's eve would be a perfect day for kid's rule day this year. In the morning Kaleb and I went on a date to play miniature golf while Becky and Emily went to a movie with Blake. Emily got lunch out with Blake; we all went out to dinner together and we finished the evening with Becky and I going for hot chocolate, picking up a movie to watch, and burning our Christmas tree in the fireplace. It was a great fun-filled day. Happy new year to all!

Catching up

Oh good, I just looked at my blog and I'm not as far behind as I thought I was, but there's still plenty to tell. After Christmas we had a week with no visitors and no school. One day we decided we would go feed the birds at the beach. We have never done this before and let me tell you we will never do it again. Have any of you seen the movie The Birds? I haven't but my mom has told me a little about it and how it freaked her out. Well, I don't think I have to watch the movie because I felt like I was living it. When we first got to the beach I think there were two seagulls that we could see. As soon as we pulled out the bag of bread we were surrounded by what felt like hundreds. These things had no fear. Most of them kept to the air hovering less than a foot from your face waiting for you to throw the bread. It took me about 10 seconds to quickly move away from the birds. Kaleb lasted about 20 seconds and the girls were the brave (crazy) ones who lasted until the bread was gone. At one point Becky asked me to hold the bag of bread, but as soon as I saw the gulls beady eyes on me and the bag I pretty much ran away. If that's not bad enough I handed the bag off to Kaleb who was braver than I was. It was terrifying and I couldn't wait to be out of bread. As soon as the girls were done I told Kaleb to run chase the birds away. He enjoyed that part, which happened to be my favorite as well. Amazingly no one got hurt, and I learned a very important lesson: don't feed wild animals.

By the way, the pictures don't come close to showing how much we were surrounded or how many birds there were. I was too paralyzed by fear when all the birds were there to even think about taking pictures. After the birds left I was able to get some good beach shots. The weather has been beautiful!

A great season

We have loved this Christmas season. Here are the highlights: seeing the lights in poway with 5 van loads of friends; having Santa dropped off at the school I work at in a helicopter; having time to run again; getting the kids a trampoline for christmas; and lots of visitors. We are blessed!

A beautiful day for a bike ride

We all enjoyed a great day today. We rode our bikes on the river trail down to the harbor. As a reward we had ice cream cones, fries, onion rings and fried pineapple rings. Good thing we biked home to work off the sugar and fried foods.