JUMP - for joy!

As I mentioned in my last post, we gave my mom the opportunity to go skydiving for her birthday. I was surprised this was something she wanted to do but thought, "go mom!" Earlier in the week, my little sister, Kara decided she was going to jump with her. As her birthday arrived, I thought that maybe I would give it a try too. Chris was very encouraging as he has done it before. Here I am, signing my life away. There are all sorts of documents that must be signed prior to jumping just stating that if something were to happen, I couldn't sue the company. Positive thinking is always appropriate at a time like this : )

Here I am with my mom getting all harnessed up. My sister Laura is in the orange sweater to the right of me taking pictures. She decided last minute to do it as well. So it was me, my mom, and both sisters. My brother wouldn't do it or my dad.

All ready to go, "hey mom where are your goggles?" I know, this is a total model moment for me. To the left of mom, Laura, Kara and my dad.

Here we are walking out to the plane with our tadem jump partners. Still not nervous at this point. The plane was taking us up 10,000 feet for our jump. It took 25 minutes to get up that high and it seemed like it only took 2 to get back down. I never did get nervous.

Ready to land. This is me and my tandem buddy "Bill."

Mission complete, safely back on the ground. We had a perfect landing. Exactly where we were supposed to be. I can't say the same for either of my sisters, who landed in a nearby feild.

Here is my mom getting ready for touchdown. Her tandem partner was Kevin and he had over 12,000 tandem jumps under his belt.

They landed exactly where they were supposed to as well. What a fantastic time! This was one of the best things I've ever done in my life and I would totally do it again. I loved everything about it, rolling out of the plane, the free fall, getting to "steer" the parachute, and the all around thrill of it all. I am so happy I decided to jump, This was one of the funnest things I've ever done in my life and would do it again in a heartbeat! Thanks mom for a FANTASTIC day on your b-day! Makenna can't wait for her high school graduation, grandma is going to take her skydiving! She would have loved to go with us but you have to be 18, just 5 more years Kenna : )

My moms 60th b-day

This past saturday, Aug. 29th was my moms 60th birthday. We went to Caldwell for the big event. First of all, her kids went in together and paid for her to go skydiving ( a post by itself). My dad a sister, Laura went to great lengths to make sure this was a special day for her. We had a pinata, a jump house, dunk tank, catered hawaiian food and even surprised her by inviting a few of her closest friends to join us. Here is the birthday girl getting ready for her turn at the pinata. It was sort of a luau so this tiki/totem pole pinata fit right in.

This was her birthday cake. Since she went skydiving, it was only fitting that the baker put that on her cake. This is the best cake on the planet. We ordered 1/2 lemon filling 1/2 raspberry filling in a chiffon cake - YUMMY!!!!

Pretending to blow out the candles. It was a little windy so we couldn't keep them lit. Kaycie, Haley and Kyton are right there to help out!

Taking a whack at the pinata. David got a kick out of making it go up and down while she was swinging. We all had a super fun weekend and hope she had the best birthday ever! Love you mom!

Boating with friends

We had the opportunity to go boating with our great friends, the Halls, last Thursday evening. We all had a great time, here are some of the highlights. Jace just chillin' on the boat. He wasn't too sure of this whole thing at the beginning. I couldn't even get a smile out of him. He ended up loving it and asking to go again.

This is Nicole, laughing, as usual. We had a ton of laughs that evening, mostly at Chris's expense while he was trying to surf from the back of the boat. BTW, Nicole might kill me for posting this, but she is a beautiful girl and we always have a blast when we are together. Love ya Cole.

These are some cute kiddos riding the tubes. From L to R: London, Brinley, Ali, Jake and Emily. Notice how Ali is holding on for dear life? Everytime she was on, this is how she looked. I'm not sure what Jake is doing but Emily is holding on tight as well.

My turn. I had Baylie go with me as my insurance that Justin wouldn't try and dump me off the tube. Jake is in the middle of the two tubes, he's crazy, he was bouncing from tube to tube. London was jumping tubes as well and it must be Ali with her on the other tube. This was a FUN time!

Lindsay, London, Chris and Jake taking a spin on the tubes. I can't say enough how much fun we all had. We did miss Makenna as she was babysitting and missed out.

This is a video of Chris in his attempt to surf. He is standing on a surf board. He was actually able to let go a stay in the wave for a few seconds a different time.

Thanks Justin and Nicole for a fabulous evening, all the kids are now telling us that "we need a boat!" If it's okay, we'll keep using yours for a while : )

Back to School

The first day of school finally arrived, yesterday. Lindsay didn't have to go until today since she is a sophomore. The freshman had the day at the high school to themselves so they can navigate around the school without all the upperclassmen being under foot. Everyone was excited in anticipation of the day, including me! Here are Emily and Ali in front of the school. Ali is in first grade this year and Emily in 5th. As a mom, it's my responsibility to make sure I can take every opportunity for embarrassment. Ali didn't seem to mind the pictures but every other girl did.

Mrs. Ramos and Ali. We have heard really good things about her as a teacher and were excited to find out that Ali had been placed in her class. Ali has 2-3 of her friends in class with her too.

Mrs. Brian and Emily. Emily had wanted her for a teacher and we just lucked out with her placement. It seems like every other kid in our ward who is in 5th grade is in this class too, Emily has tons of friends in homeroom! It's bound to be a fantastic year for her : )

Makenna is starting 8th grade this year. We found two of Makenna's friends waiting at the bus stop when we dropped the 2 other girls off, so we offered them a ride. Little did they know, they would have to pose for a few photos! Makenna was so embarrassed and I loved it! She is with Kylie Day and Cambria Roedel.

Emily and Ali getting off the bus after the day was done. Smiles on their faces tell me it was a good day!

Lindsay is a sophomore. This morning dropping Lindsay off at school. She was also embarrassed. I had Makenna hop out of the car to snap this shot, just so she gets a feel for how fun it is to embarrass someone : ) I told both Kenna yesterday, and Lindsay today that I had all morning and if they didn't smile and make the pictures nice, I would stay there taking them until we got a good one! They both cooperated. All the kids received very nice fathers blessings for FHE last night, I'm just sure this will be a great year for all of them! The house sure is quiet this morning, but it's a good quiet.

EFY 2009 posted by Lindsay

This summer I had the opportunity to go to EFY, all thanks to my awesome parents! It was so much fun! I made lots of new friends. We did a ton of fun activities, had dances, service projects and I had a blast and am already looking forward to next year.

The first day there, my mom thought it would be fun to take a picture by the sign for the dorm that I stayed in.

These are the three counselors that were in charge of my company. Kayla, Scott, and Ann. Ann was my counselor. She was a lot of fun.

These are all the girls in my group. Me, Emily, Maesa, Chey, Paige, Anna, Chelsea, Ann and Liza. Chelsea was my roommate-she was from Boise and was quite funny!

These are all the girls in my company with our two counselors, Ann and Kayla.

These are all the boys that were in my company. Blake, Mack, Austin, Evan, Scott, Tanner, David, Nathan and Scott.

Pizza night, we took lots of pictures. This was one of all the girls in my group. Pizza night is a fun night where we just all hang out, eat pizza, act crazy and get to know each other better.

This is part of my company. We took tons of pictures before the BIG farewell dance on Friday.

Stopping to pose! This service project was really fun. We colored mats that were going to be sent to other countries for kids to play with.

This is the finished project. Boy, am I looking good or what? I don't think I was quite ready for the picture : )

During game night, we thought it would be fun to take this kind of picture...so we did. We called it our "circle of friends"

This was our companies flag. All the company names were chosen from the Book of Mormon scripture masteries. Our name was "Choose Liberty".

This week at EFY was so much fun! I am so glad that I was able to go to. Thanks mom and dad for this great opportunity!

No more training wheels!

This post should have been posted a couple of weeks ago, but with all the fun I've been having on facebook, my poor blog has been put on the back burner. I'll try to be better : ) Baylie has been working so hard on riding her bike without training wheels and with the help of Emily and Makenna, she got it done! They helped her a couple of days that I was at work so that when I got home, she could proudly show off her new skill! Her she is posing on her bike, ready to go!

Rounding the corner and looking good!

Headed back my way, so I could get this cute picture of her. She is so happy about this and shows anyone and everyone who will watch her. I can't believe how big she is getting! She heads off to pre-school this year and is just as excited about that as she is about riding her bike without training wheels.

Below is a video of her riding her bike, just so anyone and everyone will see her! GO Baylie, GO!

What a big boy

This is only blog worthy because Jace HATES to get his hair cut. He has never sat in the chair by himself. Usually I have him sitting on my lap and holding his head still so the girl can cut it. It so embarrassing! The other day, I had been preparing him all morning for going to get it cut. I did not want to have him sitting on my lap, again! We got to great clips, and the girl called his name. He immediately grabbed my leg and wouldn't move! I picked him up and put him in the chair. I told him I would get him a treat afterwards if he would please just let her cut his hair without throwing a fit.

Nice! Can you see the madness on his face? He was not happy at all! He did sit there and didn't move. He was on the verge of tears a few times, poor guy!

He followed her instructions perfectly. Looking down when she said, and anything else she asked him to do. He didn't want to look at me for many pictures though. If he did well, look at the previous picture and his mood is obvious!

Cute boy! And, he is finally smiling. I told him he was such a big boy (now, if we can FINALLY get him potty trained, I would pay someone to do it, any takers?). The treat he chose was a tootsie roll, he's so easy!