1st Day Of Preschool 2009

Stella is going to preschool 2 days a week. On Tuesday she goes to our friend Suzy Bruneel's pre-school and on Thursday her and Zoe go to Grandma's pre-school.

Stella is going to be Teacher Grandma's big helper since she can write everybody's names on their papers.

Zoe is SO SUPER excited to be going to pre-school finally.

Our cousins Liv and Taya are also in Grandma's pre-school with Zoe and Stella.

I am so thankful for my mom and her willingness to teach our kids pre-school, they just love going to Grandma's house.

It's Your Day Jed!

Sept. 5th was Jed's day at Flying Pie Pizzeria. Everyday they put up someone's name and you get to go in and make your own pizza for free!! We however didn't read the fine print where you can only do it at certain times of the day. We got there at the wrong time but decided to order some pizza and hang out. They do have good pizza. We then came back an hour later so Jed could make his free pizza.

Starting out with the crust!

Jed has done this before!! He is a dough flipping officianado!!

The kids hanging out and waiting for their dad to be done playing in the kitchen!

Jed decided to make it a take and bake since we already ate about an hour before. He took it to work the next day and baked it. He said it ended up not being that great though. Oh well.

Our Newest Addition

Well it's official!! We have welcomed the newest member of our family in September. His name is Walter the Winnebago. We lucked into this great find and are so excited for the adventures that lie ahead for us. He is definitely a fixer upper but Jed has been so giddy with excitement over all the projects. He recently took off the old roof and replaced the whole thing. He and Tucker and Hannah have worked really hard on it. Jed has even started a blog for Walter. There is a link on this page for it if you want to check out all his renovations.

1st Day of School 2009

Hallie is starting 1st grade this year. Her teacher's name is Mrs. Atterbury

Hannah is starting 4th grade this year. Her teacher's name was Mrs. Bivens but we didn't think it was a good fit for her and asked for a change, so now her teacher's name is Mrs. Gunn.

Tucker is in 7th grade. I cannot believe that my son is already in 7th grade!!! Where has the time gone? He started out at Galileo which is a k-8 school but in mid October he decided to switch to Northstar Charter School. It's a k-12 school and he is loving every part of it and thriving there. I am so grateful for this.

Aren't they precious?? New clothes and all!

Tucker's 1st official Boy Scout Campout

This is Tucker's 1st Backpacking trip with the Boy Scouts. Lucky for me, Jed is the scoutmaster and gets to go with him. They went to Boulder Lake.

Taking a break from the trail.

Boulder Lake

My 2 favorite guys! Aren't they handsome?

Tucker's 1st camput turned out to be a very memorable one for him. While he was carving some wood with his brand new souvenir from Yellowstone it slipped and sliced his hand. It was bad enough to need stitches so Jed had to make a decision. Pack up and hike back to the car for 2 miles and drive to McCall to the hospital, OR stitch up Tucker himself. Those of you who know Jed you know what he chose.

YEP Jed gave Tucker 5 stitches in his hand without any sort of numbing or pain killing medicine. He just happened to have a sucher kit with him. Tucker is a very brave soul!! I asked him if he had to bite on a stick or something and he said he pinched his arm. Whatever works I guess.

Backpacking at Hidden Lake 2009

Super fun backpacking trip into Hidden Lake. We hiked started our hike in the waning light of later afternoon. Uncle Kurt and his Tyler were with us. It was a grand adventure! The light faded faster than we expected. It got so dark that we had to use flashlights, so when we arived at a campsite on the shore of Lost Lake, we decided to make our first nights camp there.

Tired from the late hike in, sleep came easy that night.


In the morning we found that Lost Lake is more of a Lost Marsh. Thick lillypads, and grass made it impossible to get a line out to fish in this shallow small lake. We broke camp early & headed on down to Hidden Lake.

Arriving at Hidden Lake
Big rocks must be jumped off of. Way to go Hannah!

Hannah, trying to help Opa retrieve a stuck fishing lure.
Dinner included the days catch of Trout. Yum!

Opa, Neil and Carter arrived the second day.
Kurt and Opa really helped us on our way out. They were staying another night, but they were super and carried kid's packs and sometimes the kids, up the steepest part of the climb out of Hidden Lake. Thank you Opa and Kurt. We got to see Jessie, James, and McKayla on their way in. Sad to not have enjoyed more time with them, but it was nice to get to leave my tent for them to use. My pack was that much lighter on the way out. Thank you Jessie & James.

Happy 12th Birthday Tucker!

On August 8th, 2009 our oldest child turned twelve years old. Happy Birthday Tucker!! This was a super special birthday for him. Tucker was ordained a deacon in our church and received the aaronic priesthood by his father. He is such a wonderful young man. It is amazing to watch him honor his priesthood and see his testimony grow.

All the family came to celebrate on his special day. We ate pizza and strawberry pie as requested by Tucker!! The kids all swam and played!

We got Tucker a backpack for all of his future scout camping trips and backpacking adventures now that he is a Boy Scout!!

Blowing out the candles on his strawberry pie!!

We always take a picture of the cake, or in this case, the pie!!!!

10 Things I Love About Tucker

1. His kind spirit

2. His desire to do what is right

3. His crazy full head of hair

4. His love for reading

5. His willingness to be helpful

6. His love for all knick knacks and gadgets

7. His respectfulness

8. His obedience

9. His big brown eyes

10. The fact that he still wants to hold my hand

I LOVE YOU TUCKER!!!

Yellowstone Trip Aug. 2009

The fam took a trip to Yellowstone this summer with Grandma and Grandpa Shaw and the Ball and Shaw family. We stayed in Island Park at an amazing cabin and everyone had a blast. We got our family photos taken at the Playhouse at Macks Inn. Most of us also were able to go see a play that they put on at Macks, it was called "Less Miserables", a funny take on Les Mis.

The whole Fam Damily!!

One of the many beautiful works of nature we saw.

At one of our stops we had to hike down to the waterfall, well on the hike there were a few snakes spotted and one stepped on (ask Hallie about it). If you know me at all, you know I am super scared of snakes so my sweet bro gave me a ride over the snakey part. My hero!!

We did some fishing, and more fishing.... And Jed did EVEN MORE fishing, but nothing was ever really caught. Better luck next time guys.

Our friends lent us some super cool rockets to take on the trip. You make your own paper rocket and then launch them into the air by stomping on a 2 liter bottle connected to some pvc pipe which shoots air up through the rocket to launch it into the air. The kids and adults had lots of fun with these. Thanks Ross'!

This is a view from the top of the paint pots in Yellowstone.

The kids got to see some elk up close! They also got to spend ALL their souvenir money at the shops around the park.

Another of the beautiful views we encountered. Christmas card pic????? Notice the hat Stella is wearing. This is THE SOUVENIR that she really wanted and bought with her money, she then proceeded to wear it the WHOLE entire time on vacation and well into the next month. It was super cute.

And YES we did see a bear!!! Jed got pretty close up to it and then the ranger gave him heck!! But it really was the bears fault. It came up to Jed.

It was a good time had by all I think. Definitely one to remember. It was a little weird though to go on a weeks vacation and not have the boats with us. We were all having some withdrawals and decided next time we would bring at least one boat.