It's the Little Things...

Oceanside, 2011

2011-09-30T21:21:00.001-07:00

It's that time of year again...

We took our annual trip to the beach with my family a couple of weeks ago. It was wonderful. And it was an especially big deal because it was this little guys first time ever. I think he liked it...

Here are a few pictures of the kids having the time of their lives beaching it up. I have said this before and will continue to say it...there's nothing more entertaining and stimulating and just plain fun for kids than a day at the beach. (In my opinon.) They can spend hours digging in the sand and playing in the waves and never get tired of it. Just perfectly content. It's really the best thing ever.

This is Eden and my sister's littly boy, Ryder. They are both three. They had such a great time together and got along amazingly. Not one fight in a whole week together. Pretty impressive for a couple of crazy littler toddlers. :)

Here they are doing some unprompted hand-holding. Cute, huh.

More smiley-baby pictures...
(this baby is absolutely delightful, that's all I have to say.)

No trip to Southern California would be complete without a meal at our favorite Mexican place. El Pollo Maria...

Eden in my brother's hoodie with her Aunt Jess and cousin Allie. She was so well taken care of by my family. It was nice to have the help. :)

My neice Abbie and Luke...

The toddlers on a walk with Grandma and Grandpa...

My parents with their grand kids... A family picture.

My hair always goes wacky in California. Darn humidity.

We took a day off from the beach to go to the San Diego Zoo. It was awesome!

First stop, the flamingos...

Emily on the Skyfari (Tram ride)

We got to watch them feed the elephants...seriously amazing animals...

Eden's face while watching...

More animals...

Our favorite animals were the Pandas. They were so cute they hardly seemed real. Seriously, check out this one eating some bamboo...

The kids loved the zoo. There were so many amazing animals to see. Other favorites were the gorillas, orangutans, lions, tigers, rhinos, and koalas. The koalas came in as a close 2nd in cuteness to the pandas. But my darn camera died by the end so I didn't get any pictures of them. I am so glad we were able to go and experience such an amazing place!

Favorites

2011-09-08T22:16:00.001-07:00

I'm feeling almost caught up. Here are just a few of my favorite photos from the last few months. Just random moments that I loved.

This picture makes me happy and sad. Happy because it's just so sweet. They're just so sweet. And sad because babies are only this tiny for such a short amount of time. It goes so fast. I never want to forget my precious little newborn--his sweet tiny head, and body, and hands, and legs (and diaper that seems to be falling off). And his hair! He had so much hair! At least I have proof. :)

My Boys watching the NBA playoffs together. I'm so thankful they have eachother.

My two little ones...

Justin is Eden's BBBE. Best Big Brother Ever!

Emily dancing with Luke. He looks just a little freaked out.

Justin is Luke's BBBE too.

Mohawk! And Karate moves!

My boys again...

Sleeping princess...

This moment had to be documented, Eden never naps so I hardly ever have time to myself like this...

Eden loving her brother...

I like how she's squishing his face while she gives him a smooch

I don't know how a picture can be cute and creepy at the same time. But this one kinda is. Luke fell asleep in his carseat so I left him in there and let him finish his nap in the laundry room. When I heard him waking up I went to get him and saw that he had two new friends taking a nap with him. Eden must've put them there. It looked so funny!

That's it!

Still Catching Up...

2011-09-06T13:36:00.001-07:00

Here are some other highlights from the last few months! In my normal life some of these moments/occasions would have a post all their own, but I am still in catch up mode. So here goes:

Justin turned 7!!!

Eden turned 3!!!
Birthday Crown...signed by the whole family...a new tradition I wanted to start. :)

Emily danced...

Eden started sleeping in a toddler bed (she was in her crib a LONG time.)

Luke was blessed...

(Justin made these paper hats for him and Luke-

nothing to do with the blessing, but it was too funny not to share.)

Luke swam for the first time...

We went to Logan (here we are at the zoo)

and Bear Lake...

And most recently...the kids started school.
Justin ready for 2nd Grade!

Emily ready for 4th Grade!

That's it for now! More to come soon. (Hopefully.)

Must. Blog. Now.

2011-08-16T21:31:00.000-07:00

So, I really do have a reason I haven't been blogging. A few reasons actually. So many things have happened in the last three months. Well, not really soooo many. But a couple of things have happened that were really big things, so it feels like so many. Does that make sense? Probably not.

One of those big things is that we moved. Like fully packed up our house that we had been living in for six years and moved. It was Cr-azy. Having a newborn baby and moving is not a great combination. Still way better than it would have been to be pregnant and moving though, which almost happened. But we did it! We survived! And we love where we live and are so thankful for extra space now that we have four kiddos.

The other big thing that has happened in the last three months since I blogged (or has it been longer!?) is that our cute, little baby went from being a sleepy, tiny, sweet, little newborn...to a chubby, alert, smiley 4-month-old. And the only reason I haven't documented his cute little life is because our computer broke in the move. We just used a laptop from Dave's work to hold us over until we bought a new one. I didn't want to download all of our pictures on his work computer...so blogging just had to wait. But FINALLY we have a computer of our own and I want to do a quick update on baby Luke, with more to come on the rest of the family soon. :) So here it goes...months 1-4 in just a few pictures. (This was HARD to narrow down by the way.)

Lukey-Luke, 1 month old...

2 months old...

3 months old...

4 months old...

(Dave said this is kind of a silly picture of him, but he's such a smiley baby...except for when the camera is trying to capture it...so I had to put one of the few smiley pictures I have on here, double chin and tiny little booger and all. :) )

Luke is as sweet as a baby can be and except for being a crummy sleeper is everything I could've ever dreamed of. He's so chill and content just like Justin was when he was a baby. We love him so very much, much, much!
*I thought catching up on baby Luke was the priority...more to come of the rest of our goings-on (did I say that correctly...goings-on, going-ons, comings and goings??) soon!*

p.s. My blog spacing is still lame, I give up!

Easter and more Baby Luke

2011-04-29T12:35:00.000-07:00

Our four shiny, happy children on Easter Day.

Pictures from our Egg Hunt

(mostly of Eden cause she just looked so darn cute.)

And now baby Luke Alan...

Not much I can say exept that he's an angel and we love him lots.

(and lots, and lots, and lots, and lots...)

The End.

Spacing

2011-04-24T23:26:00.001-07:00

O.k. So when I put together my blog posts they are usually spaced all nicely and my captions line up perfectly with my pictures and everything is nice and neat and orderly. Then I go to publish and my posts show up all crazy and wonky and not looking at all how they were when I pushed the "publish post" button. The spacing comes out all weird, and words and pictures that were right by each other show up all spaced out. It bugs me SO MUCH. Does anyone know why? Or how to keep this from happening? I spend forever going through trying to fix it after I've posted and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Any tips would be appreciated. :) Or maybe it's my computer? Or just me? Anyways, please excuse my sloppy looking posts...

Baby Luke

2011-04-24T22:24:00.001-07:00

Welcome Baby Luke

Born April 3rd, 9:45 a.m.

7 pds. 8 oz.

19 1/2 inches long

So, three weeks ago my sweet baby boy was born. I meant to post much earlier than this, but having four kids has really thrown me for a loop. My life has been beyond crazy, beyond busy. I feel like I'm barely keeping up. But it is worth it. So very, very worth it. All thanks to this little guy...

I really cannot believe how much I love him. (I know every mom feels that way.)

Dads too...
Here's the classic, getting weighed picture...A perfect 7 1/2 pounds

Here are the kids when they first see Luke. Emily takes after her mama...super emotional. She started crying the second she saw him...

Checking him out...

Eden holding Luke for the first time, she was so sweet and just kissed and caressed and nuzzled him...she was instantly in love.

So was Emily...

And of course Justin was too...

First family photo

Going home...

So happy to be home...

It's been so wonderful to have Luke here. Most of you know but for those that don't...Luke surprised us by coming three weeks early. I have had all of my babies early, but we still didn't expect to have him quite THAT early. It was perfect though...everything went beautifully and smoothly. The whole experience was amazing as it has been with all of my children. Seriously, there is nothing more exciting than knowing you are going to meet your little baby for the first time, and there is nothing more precious than that moment when you actually do. Nothing. Thank you, thank you baby Luke for coming to our family!!!

Weeks 1-2

2011-04-24T22:02:00.001-07:00

Luke: One week old...

Emily is an awesome helper. Really, I couldn't do this without her...Big sisters are the bomb.
She's an excellent burper...

Eden has been a great big sister too...I can't believe she is a big sister now!

Justin is the best big brother, I knew he would be.

I like this picture of him and Luke...both boys spacing off...

Little stud muffin...

Crazy eyes...

That's better...

One of our first outings...my friend Amber got him all snug for me. :)

Luke: 2 weeks old

So happy to have this little boy here...

Can This Count As Our Christmas Card?

2010-12-12T20:24:00.000-08:00

I'm realizing more and more that sometimes in life you just have to let certain things go. This year I decided that one of those things would have to be the mailing of Christmas cards. I'm a little bummed I didn't get around to it. I love Christmas cards, I love getting them and I love reading them. I really had good intentions for this year...but with Emily's birthday coming up this week and with all of the Christmas preparations I still have left to do I can see it's just not going to happen. So this post is my Christmas card for 2010. But seriously, watch your mailboxes next year...I have really high hopes for next year. :)

So.....MERRY CHRISTMAS from the Gutke Family!!!

(notice Eden's hands...the only way we could get her to hold still was to tell her to do "princess hands" in her lap like Emily...and it worked! For a split second! Justin is doing the manly version of "princess hands." Seriously, pictures with a 2-year-old in them are rough...really rough.)

Now for the updates:

Emily Faith

There is so much I could say about my little almost-9-year-old. I'll start out by saying she is awesome. She got another lead in her school winter play this year and performed in it yesterday. I wish I had a video to post...because she really did an amazing job. She was the Sugar Plum Fairy and it was so fun to watch. She loves to perform and is way braver than I was at her age. In fact, way braver than I am now. :) She has also been learning to play the piano this past year and continues to love taking ballet. She made her school's Third-grade tap team (called "Tap-tastic") and that has been a cool experience for her. She is loving third grade and I'm pretty sure third-grade loves her too. She's an awesome student and for that I am very thankful. Wow! I better stop. I am just so grateful for Emily...grateful for all of her hard work, and grateful for her willingness to take on the role of big sister and oldest daughter and mom's right hand gal. I know it can't be easy to have all of that responsibility...but she takes it on like a champ and never (hardly ever) complains. :) I don't know what I'd do without her...

Justin David

So Justin is 6 1/2. I actually really can't believe that! We are so thankful for Justin. He's as smart as a whip (my dad used to say that...I love that phrase) and as sweet as a boy can be. He loves learning and he still loves facts. He's just rattling off random facts all the time. He knows tons about dinosaurs, and the solar system, and about various states, and maps, and the food pyramid (sorry, that just popped in my head...he just learned about it at school and every meal we eat he has to name the category of every food). He definitely has one of those sponge-y, science-y brains. He's doing awesome in school and is an excellent reader. He just got his report card and his teacher wrote about how well he's doing and what a good learner he is...but then she went on to say how he sometimes forgets to do things and is always leaving things in his desk that he is supposed to bring to carpet time. When I read that it made me laugh because that is SO my Justin...super smart, but a little spacey. He gets it from his dad. :) He still loves sports and played t-ball and soccer this last year. He's an adoring big brother to Eden, and can hardly wait to have a little brother. :)

Eden Elizabeth

Eden is 2 1/2 now. Enough said. Just kidding! I can not express in words how fun and sweet this little girl is, you'd just have to come and spend a day at our house. :) She is constantly chatting away about princesses and ballerinas and the color pink. She's as girly as it gets. She loves dancing around the house in her ballet clothes asking any willing person "Dance with me?" It's the best. We all love and adore her so much and feel so thankful to have her in our family. Not to say she's not a bossy and sometimes very sassy 2-year-old...cause she totally is. But we'll keep her. :) We are enjoying every second of this stage and love hearing all the new things she is learning and saying. She makes us laugh all the time. Thank heaven for little girls for sure!

Dave and I celebrated our 10-year anniversay in 2010. It was awesome. We are still as happy as clams...10-years later. That's all I'm gong to say about that. :)

He's still working hard as an attorney and when he's not doing that he's busy being a devoted father and husband. He's a way funner parent then me...and I'm so thankful he can come home and make our kids laugh every day. It makes me happy.

I am busy being a mom. I guess that's it. But I love it!!!

NTBAAALD

(Name to be announced at a later date)

(Hey! It sounds like Not Bald if you try to say it...that's good for a boy!)

So this little guy is the reason for a lot of things...the reason I've hardly been blogging or taking pictures for the last four months, the reason I haven't been cooking, the reason I'm always out of breath, and the reason I go to bed at 9:00 every night. But he's also the reason I get so excited every time I feel a little kick, and the reason my kids and I are always singing and talking to and rubbing my tummy, and the reason I feel blessed beyond words to be having another little baby coming to our family. Really, so blessed. We can't wait to meet little Not Bald (although I'm sure he will be)...he arrives mid-April! So that's our biggest, most exciting news of 2010! We really can't wait for 2011!!

We wish all of our loved ones a very happy Christmas and New Year. We are so grateful for our many blessings and that includes all of you. :) We are especially grateful for this time of year that we have to contemplate the birth of our Savior and remember what truly matters in life.

Sincerely, The Gutke Family

Halloween 2010

2010-10-25T10:04:00.000-07:00

We aren't going to be able to make it to our ward's trunk-or-treat this weekend, so we celebrated Halloween this past weekend by going to my sister's ward's trunk-or-treat which luckily for us took place a week early. :) So I thought I'd take all my kid's Halloween pictures and post them before the rush next week. :)

Unfortunately my camera died just a few pictures into the actual trunk-or-treating, but here are pics from before we left of Emily, Justin, and Eden...all ready to celebrate...

Emily was a scary witch...

(check out the green nail polish, that was a very important part of the costume for her.)

Justin was an awesome astronaut...

(Emily had her witchy poses down, but we couldn't think

of anything for Justin to do so we told him to try the double-thumbs-up.

Astronauts do stuff like that, right?)

Another thumbs up...

And Eden was a beautiful princess...

(Her favorite, Snow White.)

And here is the beautiful Princess blowing on a dandelion...sweet. :)

Emily was so excited when she realized she could be the mean witch from Snow White that gave Snow White the poisoned apple. She thought it was cool the costumes could go together.

Emily's super dramatic...
This picture cracks me up, check out how wide open Eden's mouth is already...
she really like apples.

Kind of scary to see her poisoning her baby sis like that...

All together...

Happy Halloween, everyone!!!

The Beach 2010

2010-10-04T14:46:00.000-07:00

So, we went to the beach. (again.) We had such a wonderful time with my family...we look forward to this trip all year. Here are the girly cousins...they had so much fun together.

And here are a bunch of fun, beachy pictures...

My Justin...

Kisses from Eden...

(the best ever.)

(O.k., yes that is one of those caramel apple suckers that last forever and are absolutely horrible for kid's teeth, and yes...that is un-rubbed-in suncreen in Dave's ear.)

Grandpa...

Still the same sucker, 3-hours later.

Just kidding. (more like one.)

Eden holding a sand crab!

(and check out all that sand in her hair...it was rough getting it out.)

Playing football...

(Or tossing the old pig skin. Is that the right way to say it?)

The end.

The Wedding 2010

2010-10-04T11:40:00.000-07:00

Going to the beach is always amazing, but the main event of our trip was my brother Dave's wedding in the San Diego Temple. It was such a special day. The San Diego Temple has always been my favorite. After we moved to Utah from the San Diego area my family would travel back every summer to spend a week at the beach and then go visit this temple site while it was being built. Then finally one summer when it was finished we were able to actually attend the open house as a family and I remember how awesome it felt to walk through this gorgeous, amazing place. It's a special memory for me and even though I had only been inside that one time it has always been my favorite. (It's o.k. to have a favorite temple, right?) So I was so thankful to have this opportunity to go inside this beautiful place for the second time in my life for my brother's wedding. :)

Here's the gorgeous couple...

My brother Dave and his wife Jessica.

The kids not very reverently enjoying the grassy hill...

It was windy...

My girls...

(Dave and I are always telling Emily she needs to meet somone from

SoCal so she can get married here. She says she'll see what she can do. :) )
The reception...

There was lots (and lots, and lots) of dancing...

(mormons totally know how to party.)

Especially Mormon Grandmas...

(My cute mom and cute Aunt Laura)

These two really did dance the night away, I loved it...

This was cute, the DJ called for a dollar dance where you paid the bride or groom a dollar (or more) to dance with them...Emily totally got her moneys worth with fun Uncle Dave...

What it's all about ...

Back.

2010-08-30T15:46:00.000-07:00

My blog is dying. Maybe I should let it.
I just noticed that once I get a little behind, I get REALLY unmotivated and then months go by without a post.
So in hopes of keeping motivated I decided to start fresh with what is happening right now. As in, today. As in, the first day of school!

My darling Emily...(sorry, these shots stink. Right into the sun.)

This one is a little better...

My sweet Justin...

(I just have to say that starting 1st grade is such a big deal.

He is gone all day now! Not home by lunchtime like Kindergarten.

It was hard to say Goodbye.)

Eden sweating in her jammies.

We were in a little bit of a hurry and I didn't have time to get three kids ready!

Kisses...

Here they are, my two school-aged children.
I'm so glad they love school and so glad they are mine. :)

Happy 2010-2011 (school year) Everyone!!!

p.s. I hope to re-cap our summer sometime. Little by little. :)

Catalina

2010-06-09T14:48:00.000-07:00

So, I would say this blog is 99% about our kids...there might be a picture of Dave and I here or there...but really, it's mostly about the kids. For good reason too, they are way cuter, funnier and more interesting than we are. At least I think so. Not to say I don't think Dave is cute or funny or interesting, I totally do! But when it comes to blogging...you know what I mean. :)

So, for today I have a post that is 100% about us. Not one picture of Emily, Justin, or Eden in it. But I have good reason for that too! Dave surprised me last week with a short, late anniversary trip to Catalina Island!!! Well, he almost surprised me...my sister accidentally let the cat out of the bag a couple of days before...but it counts. I really love surprises!

So here we are, Catalina Island!

It was absolutely gorgeous there! I couldn't even believe how pretty it was. It's just this tiny little island paradise. It was heaven.

The sun came out right as our boat pulled in and it couldn't have been more perfect...

Our first picture there, taken right after we got off the boat...

I'm a total nerd, but I had to show pictures of our hotel. It was so beautiful and nice.
We ate breakfast every morning overlooking the ocean from the little dining area in the picture to the right...

The grounds...

The flowers...
(really, I could have taken a million pictures of the flowers, there were so many beautiful ones!)

The trees...

The Sights...

The Beach!

So beautiful and relaxing...

What we did...

Snorkeling...

(The water was fr-eezing, but the wetsuits helped and it was AMAZING!)

Eating...

(I think I gained 10 pounds on this trip...there were so many fabulous places to eat and everything we tried we loved. This little cafe had out of this world salads and sandwiches.

Besides eating here we had amazing Mexican, Seafood, and Italian...)

We rented a golf cart and drove all around the quaint little city (town?) of Avalon.

The Zip Line!
O.K., this is one of the coolest things I've ever done...this zip line just opened up in Catalina about three months ago and it was awesome. So fun and scary and thrilling. I'll probably post a video some other time, for now...here's a dorky picture (of me) taken right before...

This is a terrible picture, taken right into the sun...but it shows one of the platforms we zipped on to and off of...it was so beautiful and scenic there...

Like I said, one of the coolest things I've ever done.
We also went mini golfing, did a couple of boat tours and one bus tour,
a little hiking, and even went out to a movie.

This last picture basically sums up the whole trip up for me...I was so happy to spend time with this wonderful man...he really is my best friend and I am so lucky to be married to him. I had the time of my life and am so thankful for every second we get to be together.
Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

Birthday Girl

2010-06-02T08:26:00.001-07:00

Today is Eden's 2nd birthday. This little angel has been on the earth for two years! It's wonderful and crazy and happy and sad to me all at the same time.

So here is a little bit about Eden, age 2.

Eden's favorite things: Stawberries (notice the red stains around her mouth in the above picture...strawberries), babies, dogs, ducks, shoes, dresses, "pincesses", dressing up, jumping on the trampoline, dancing, balloons, baths, swimming, lotion, sunscreen, brushing her teeth, "Yo Gabba, Gabba", "Little Einsteins", books, singing "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" and "The ABC Song", listening to the Chipmunks CD, Neil Diamond, and the Beatles, going to the park, wearing her swimsuit, getting her toenails painted, playing with friends, going on walks, being bossy. :) She is sweet and stubborn and smart and funny and fearless and loving and is a complete bundle of energy and joy. I think everyone who reads this blog knows how much we all love her and how happy she makes us and has made us for the last two years. Words can't really express it. So happy birthday to our baby!

We love you Sweetheart!

Birthday Boy

2010-05-24T12:18:00.000-07:00

Justin turned Six last Tuesday...and after all sorts of celebrating I am finally ready to blog about it. :) We'll start with Tuesday morning...Justin woke up to a breakfast of yummy whole wheat pancakes served on the special birthday plate...

(Sleepy, but excited)

Before heading off to school we let Justin open a couple of presents.

I included this picture mostly because it shows Eden wearing her favorite

accessory...Emily's underwear. (It's clean.)

No friend party this year, but we did do a pizza playdate

at the park with some of Justin's best friends...

Later that night we celebrated as a family at the Las Vegas Mini Gran Prix. Justin (being the awesome kid that he is) won an award in school where he received a full on party at this really fun Go Kart place in our area. It included pizza for the whole family, drinks, tons of tokens, and tickets to go on the cool rides and Go Karts there. It was seriously so much fun! Justin loved every second of it, we all did. It was a perfect way to celebrate Justin...

Merry-Go-Round...

Air Hockey!

Going down the Huge Slide...(so fun!)

Rides!

Eden really wanting to go on the rides....

(Poor thing, the only rides she could go on were the slide and the Go karts)

Our favorite part--the Go Karts. Emily was old enough to ride on her own and she was such a champ. Justin rode with me (which is why I unfortunately don't have a picture) and Eden rode with Dave. I can't even say how fun this was...we were all out there together as a family just zooming around. It was pretty great.

Justin riding the mini cars...he was way into it.

We celebrated one more time on Friday with all of our family here in Vegas.

Here's Justin with his Mario Mushroom cupcakes...

Who needs a friend party when we have so many awesome cousins!?

opening presents...

Justin looking at the scrapbook Emily made for him. :)

Our Birthday Boy!

We couldn't love this little guy (big guy now!) more. We are so lucky to have Justin in our family!

10 Years

2010-05-10T09:04:00.000-07:00

10 Years ago today I married Dave...

There is so much I could say about him on this special day.

Like how much I love him, and how perfectly sweet he has

been to me every day for the last 10 years, and how much

fun we still have together, and how much I love that we

still lay awake every night talking and talking because there is

still always so much we have to say to eachother. How even though

it's been 10 years we still love to be together more than anything else.

And how cool it is that we finish eachother's sentences and always

seem to know what the other is thinking and feeling.

And how absolutely lucky I feel to be his wife.

But I don't want to make anyone nauseous.

So all I'm going to say is how happy I am that I married him.

So very, very Happy.

Hiking

2010-04-29T16:36:00.001-07:00

Last weekend we went to one of our favorite places in Las Vegas...Red Rock Canyon. It is so awesome there this time of year. The sky was blue, the rocks were red (and white) and the scenery was gorgeous. We had such a great time hiking around together as a family, It was just another one of those perfect days...

The kids LOVE climbing and exploring the rocky formations there...

Dave does too...

Some shots of my girls...

(Isn't that blue sky amazing!)

Here are pics of us on our actual hike. My friend found this awesome carrier for us at a garage sale and it was so great to have! Our last hike (see pics below) we pushed Eden up the mountain in a stroller and it was kind of ridiculous. :) Thanks Marjorie!!!

hiking along...

Our favorite hike at Red Rock takes you to a cool, little waterfall, it's only going in the Spring so we had to check it out....

Cooling off...

Emily loved getting wet...

Eden didn't...

I had to throw in this other cute kissing picture...

(we can't stop.)

Here's my attempt to get a picture of Dave and I together...

I didn't realize I was so zoomed in.

We went to Zion's over President's Day weekend a couple of months ago and I never blogged about it. So here are just a few pictures...

It was GORGEOUS!

Here we are pushing Eden up the mountain in a STROLLER. People looked at us like we were crazy. But the whole hike was paved and it was way better than not using it.

A family pic at the waterfall there (can't think of the name.)

We had a super fun time.

Easter Clothes

2010-04-11T15:06:00.000-07:00

Here are my shiny, happy kids in their Easter clothes...

Eden, age 22 months

Justin, age 5 (almost 6)

Emily, age 8

And here is my attempt to get a "sister picture" of Emily and Eden in their color coordinating dresses.

Not even close. :)

I am so thankful for this Easter season. Thankful for the reminder of what a wonderful Gift was given to us by a loving Heavenly Father. These three children of mine are a daily reminder of my purpose here on Earth and I am so grateful.

While Easter clothes are the very least important part of this wonderful holiday we just celebrated...I still really like the symbolism of getting my kids dressed up in clean and new and beautiful clothing. :)

So Happy late Easter everyone!!!

Spring Break 2010

2010-04-06T15:10:00.000-07:00

Spring Break is over. :( We had such a great time together it makes me sad to see it end. Our days were filled with fun, and friends, and cousins, and outings...we definitely made the most of every second.

It gave me such a blue feeling yesterday morning as I sent Emily and Justin off to school after our break. I knew I was going to miss them so much. Thankfully I had this little angel still around to keep me company...

We really did do lots over the break. Every day was a party. I just have to say I have the funnest friends ever and feel so lucky. :) Here we are dying eggs with some of those fabulous friends...

Em and J planning what to do with their eggs...check out their concentration!

My friend Jolynn put on an egg hunt for all the kids after the decorating...they loved it!

O.K., so this next activity was super cool too. My friend Melinda organized an egg roll for a bunch of us. The kids had so much fun racing and rolling their decorated eggs down a hill. It was so funny to watch them!

Waiting to start rolling...

Running after their eggs...

(check out our friend Spencer's super cool slide...)
Eden throwing her egg down the hill, she was so into it!

The damage...

We went to the Children's museum another day, and I have some fun pictures from that too...but this post is already so big, I'll save those for another day. :)

These next few pictures aren't actually from spring break, but I've been wanting to post them anyway because it was a really fun day. My old college roommate and friend Amy and her family came into town and invited us to their fancy hotel for a fun swim date. It was our first swim of the season and it was gorgeous weather. We had such a great time catching up and watching our kids play together. Thanks Amy! It was so fun to see you!

Ready to get in...

Amy and her cute kids...Ella and Tyler

They all got along so well!

So that is just a little bit of what we've been up to. I will probably be posting more Easter pictures soon. I am just so thankful that I have such awesome children to hang out with every day. They make me so happy. :)

Random

2010-02-09T16:20:00.001-08:00

It's been a long time since I've posted and I just wanted to throw up some random pictures and random updates of my three random kids...(just kidding, they're not random, that just sounded good. They're awesome. Way awesome.)

So, we'll start with Eden. Here is a picture from a couple of months ago taken on a Sunday morning right before her first day of nursery. Unfortunately this darling smile didn't last into the nursery room, she hated it. And still does. :(

So Eden is 20-months-old now. She is delightful. That's all I have to say...

She loves walking around in our shoes lately...I know all toddlers do this, but I had to document it. Here she is in Dave's big old clonkers...

Dave takes the kids to Krispy Kreme every now and then on Saturday mornings (and lets me sleep in :) ). The kids love the donuts, and I love them in the hats...
(Eden is saying "cheese"in this picture...actually she pronounces it "deez", but it counts. This is the smile she gives whenever she says "cheese", I call it her "cheese face" and it makes for some funny photos...)

Another "cheese face" picture...

Can't you just hear her saying it..."Deez!"

Now for Justin. His big thing lately is maps. He is obsessed with them, he can't get enough of them. He spends tons of his time poring over our atlas, and instead of playing games during his computer time...he goes to Google maps and cruises over those. I love it, he's such a cool kid...

Here he is drawing a map of the United States. I know it's far from perfect, but I think it's pretty great for a five-year-old. He didn't have a map in front of him or anything...

This is what he does for fun...

Emily is still an awesome big sister...she helps me so much and I am so thankful to have her. I tell her all the time that Heavenly Father sent her to our family to have this special role...and she lives up to it so wonderfully.

Emily's latest news is that she finally started piano lessons a few weeks ago. She's been wanting to learn for forever so she's so happy about it. We found a wonderful teacher (that only charges $10 a lesson!) and it's going great so far...

So that's it...a quick update on our family. We are doing great and I am enjoying every second of these little lives. :) I am so blessed...

Until next time!

Christmas/New Years...late

2010-01-10T20:07:00.000-08:00

Collage time again. I know these pictures are way late and most of you are probably so over the holidays right now... but I just couldn't not blog Christmas...so here we go.

We spent Christmas in Logan this year. We had so much fun visiting with family and doing all sorts of cool things that we don't get to do here in Vegas. We went sledding for the first time in probably four years (sad, I know) and the kids had a total blast. Justin especially loved it, which was great because he is usually really afraid of fast, scary things (like roller coasters.) I was so glad that he was so fearless when it came to sledding. He couldn't get enough of it! Emily and Eden thought sledding was pretty fun too. :)

p.s. I love Dave in his awesome snow boots...

Of note in the following collage: Dave's awesome snow boots (again), and poor Emily chasing her sled down the hill. She had the hardest time getting it up the hill for some reason and kept losing her hold of it. It was sad (and a little funny) to watch her chase it down again and again. Oh, and Eden looks just adorable in her sled.

Ice Skating! One of our favorite yearly traditions. Thank you Grandma!

The Annual Gutke Christmas Party and Nativity...
Dave's Grandma and family put on an awesome Christmas party every year that includes lots of eating, singing, chatting, and dancing around the Christmas tree. We always have so much fun. I included lots of the dancing around the tree pictures for some reason. It's one of my favorite traditions. :)

Another thing we do every year is a Nativity play at Dave's parent's house. The kids love participating and look so darling in their costumes. Emily was an angel, Justin a wise man, and Eden a shepherd. Eden was a kind of naughty shepherd though that liked to steal the baby Jesus from a very distraught Mary. It was sad, but funny...(sorry Ada!)
Of note: Protective Mary (Ada), Mischievous Shepherd (Eden), and the cute cousins reading Christmas stories with Grandma. Another favorite tradition.

Present Time! Here are a few pictures of the kids opening their presents from the cousin gift exchange and Christmas morning.
I also threw in some other Christmas pictures taken before our trip to Utah which I meant to blog earlier but never got around to.
Of note: Our new Christmas tree (remember how much I disliked our old one? Well we finally broke down and bought a new one during the after-Christmas sales last year. It was so hard to buy something we couldn't use for 11-months, but so worth it when we pulled it out this year. I love it.) Justin dressed up as the funniest elf ever, and my kids with Santa at our ward Christmas party...

New Years Eve Party! This year we had family in town for Emily's baptism so we had an especially fun party for New Years Eve.
Of note: Dec. 31st is also Dave and two of his brother's birthday (most of you know Dave is a triplet, right?) so it was really fun because they were all together on their birthday for the first time in a few years. It was awesome celebrating with everyone.
The kids had a great time banging utensils together to ring in the New Year with the Eastern Time Zone on CNN (9:00 p.m. our time.) :)

Welcome 2010!!!

Happy New Year Everyone!!!

A Special Day

2010-01-04T08:53:00.000-08:00

I have so much to catch up on right now. We had such a fun Christmas and a very happy New Year and I have so many pictures to sort through and post. I really hope I can find the time to do that soon. But for now I wanted to make the time to write about the most wonderful and important event that has taken place in our family over this holiday season. Emily's baptism was just a couple of days ago...and we are all still glowing from that special day.

Before:

After:

She looks the same, but she kept telling me all day how different she felt.
We know why.

There is so much I could say about Emily and her baptism, but most of it is just too personal for this blog. So I just want to say it was a beautiful day with so many beautiful moments. My heart is so full of gratitude. Words could never express it. We love you Emily!

Emily is 8

2009-12-28T13:37:00.001-08:00

Emily celebrated a very special birthday a couple of weeks ago...our little girl is 8. Her baptism is in just a few days and every time I think about it I get all teared up. I feel so overwhelmingly thankful to have this little girl in my life, and so very thankful that she is so ready to take this big step in hers.

O.K., before I get too emotional, here are some pictures to document Emily's 8th birthday. This year was an off year for throwing a full out party...but we did have a few of her best friends over the Friday before her birthday for a special late-over. The girls had so much fun, and even though it wasn't an official birthday party, we still had cake... :)

Here are some pictures from Emily's actual birthday...
We let her open one present before school...a little pink CTR ring just like I had when I was a little girl. She loves it.

My parents were tending my sister's kids that evening so they all came out to open presents with us and to go out to dinner...

Emily and her new set of Scriptures...

Everyone wanted pictures with the birthday girl...

My Aunt Julee and Uncle Steve were visiting from Idaho, so they were able to come too! It was so nice to visit with them...

I wish I had some fancy program where I could cut and paste a picture of Justin into this picture because I think it would make a really nice family photo. He was way too busy playing with his cousin Josh to take one more picture. Oh well, here's a really nice ALMOST family photo...

Here's just one last shot of Emily and I from her Christmas dance recital. She looked just like a princess and danced like one too. :)

We love our Emily-girl so much. She is sweet, smart, and full of creativity and I am so thankful to be her mother.

The end.

Our Thanksgiving

2009-12-01T12:10:00.001-08:00

We spent Thanksgiving weekend in Utah this year. We had a wonderful time visiting with all of our family there. Thanksgiving day was spent with my family at my sister's house in Layton. Dinner was awesome and we had such a great time together.

These kids LOVE turkey...

The spread...

The fam...

My mom making her AMAZING gravy...

We spent the day after Thanksgiving in Logan with the Gutke family. The kids had a lot of fun playing with their cousins...

Eden and Ridley enjoying ice cream cones together and Justin meeting his newest cousin, Holland... (Justin's really not scared in the picture...that's just his camera smile. We're working on it. :))

Emily and her cousin Jessi had a lot of fun putting on puppet shows for everyone. The show consisted of some pretty awesome jokes, like.. "Why did the cow cross the road? To get to his friend cow", and "Why was the math book sad? Because it had so many problems."

Justin thought the jokes were so funny he kept falling off of his chair laughing...

Eden and Ada in their matching jammies...

We love visiting Grandma and Grandpa's house!

Thanks for having us everyone! We had a great time!

Snow and Lights

2009-12-01T11:40:00.001-08:00

Snow!

The kids got the chance to play in the snow while we were there. Personally, I can't stand the stuff, but they had a lot of fun!

The snow was really powdery, and not the best for making snowballs...but the kids made them and threw them anyway...

Eden loved stomping around in the snow.

(Until her hands got cold, then she cried.)

Lights!

We went to see the lights at Temple Square with my sister and her family. We hadn't been in years...so it was really fun for all of us...the kids really loved it.

So, I actually did it...for the following picture I stopped a friendly looking stranger and asked if she wouldn't mind taking a group photo for us. It killed me to do it, but I really wanted a shot of our families together. We made like 50 people stop and wait to go by us while our picture was being taken, which I felt really bad about...but it was worth it to get the shot (even though Eden isn't looking.)

Emily and Justin were excited to see the Temple where Dave and I were married.

So beautiful...

Off to see the lights...

Gabe and Justin...

Eden loved it up on Dave's shoulders...

A family photo...

Halloween 2009

2009-11-01T20:08:00.001-08:00

We had such a great Halloween this year! Seriously, I love this holiday and this time of year. The weather was gorgeous (77 degrees) and our day couldn't have been more fun or festive.

So here are the kids in their costumes...all ready to party.

Emily dressed up as Hermione...

(note: when Emily told me that she wanted to be Hermione for Halloween this year I was totally surprised. I am actually a huge Harry Potter fan, but I didn't know she was too. She hasn't read any of the books (not yet at least...I think they are a little too scary for her still) and she has only seen the first movie. But upon reflection I decided Hermione would be just perfect for her. I have had the opportunity to observe Emily during school, during primary, and during FHE and she is totally one of those kids who raises her hand for every question and usually has her hand up before the teacher has even finished asking. She's funny like that. So Hermione stuck. :) )

Justin was Cowboy Woody...

(after two years as Buzz he was ready to move on, but not too far. :) )

And my sweet little Eden was Minnie Mouse.

(she had no say in the matter. :) )

I just wanted to mention here that we borrowed all of our costumes this year (and lent out a couple of ours as well.) :) It was totally a great way to go...it was so nice not to have to spend the money! I want to say thank you so, so much to Cortni, Cheryl, and Lisa for being so nice and lending us your awesome stuff!

Cutest. Mouse. Ever.

Finally time for Trick-or-Treating...(actually Trunk-or-Treating.)

Trick-or-Treating was SO much fun this year because it was Eden's first time ever. She was so funny...

Sometimes she would take the candy being offered...

And sometimes she would only stare at it...

And other times she would just plop herself down in the middle of the parking lot and stare at it some more...

My parents drove out to go trick-or-treating with us which was so nice of them and so fun for the kids!

Almost done...yay for candy!

Our happy family...

We love you, Halloween!!!

Hair

2009-10-15T21:11:00.000-07:00

This post is totally silly, but I think it's still blog worthy. Last week my friend was watching Eden while I was helping at Justin's school. When I came back to pick her up I found Eden in her first EVER ponytails. My friend had done them while I was gone and I just thought it was the cutest thing ever. I know this may not seem like a big deal, but it kind of was to me. I had no idea she was ready for the whole ponytail thing. I probably should have realized it because she's been sporting a pretty sweet mullet for awhile now. :) But I didn't even think to try. I (of course) had to take pictures...

(Thanks Lis!)

This is also a good chance to share this photo of Eden wearing a wig Emily wore for Halloween a couple of years ago. I think it's pretty funny...

Princess Eden

Oceanside 2009

2009-09-27T16:24:00.000-07:00

Every September we go to Oceanside, CA with my family. We always have the most amazing time just soaking up the beautiful weather and spending hours upon hours at the beach. It is really one of our favorite places to be. It was especially fun this year because Eden was old enough to really enjoy it.

In fact, here is a picture of the first thing she did when she saw the ocean our first day there. She just took off running strait for it...

The kids were in heaven...

Me and my Dad...

My Dad and his awesome goggles...

Babies and seaweed are a cute combination...

A couple of wipeouts...

Our little crab friend that almost got Eden's toesies...

Eden was so well taken care of by her sweet cousins...

Some boogie boarding fun...

Emily and Justin caught a wave together...

Eden really wanted to catch one too...

Me and Dave...

Our Beach Babe...

(she really, really loved it)

Eden and Ryder hard at work...

The last Beach photo...

We went out one night to celebrate my mom and my sister's birthdays and take some family pictures...

Justin and Eden, excited for the cupcakes...

Me, my parents, and my sisters...

(two of my brothers joined us for the last day)

My parents with all of their grandkids...

We took one morning off from the beach to use our bounce back tickets to SeaWorld. We only went for a couple of hours...but it was still super fun.

Eden playing the huge instruments...

Emily and Justin loved playing in the awesome bounce house and fort again...

Before we left we had to say goodbye to Shamu...

The end.

I know this was a huge post. If there was a class to take on narrowing down pictures for a blog, I would take it. I'm sure less is more when it comes to blogging, but it doesn't feel that way when I'm going through my precious photos. :) Thanks for bearing with me!

So it begins...

2009-08-24T15:22:00.000-07:00

(note: my camera was on some weird setting for the above picture, but I decided I liked it anyway.)

My squinty kids...

Emily and Justin are at different schools right now. Justin's requires uniforms, Emily's doesn't. I just felt like I should explain Justin's boring clothes. Not that he cares. :) Hopefully Justin will be going to Emily's school next year...

Someone's Excited...

2009-08-19T19:56:00.001-07:00

This is how I found Justin when I went to check on him the night before his first ever baseball practice...

Looks comfy, huh.

He's in his second week of practices right now and loves it so much. Games start the week after Labor Day. He and Dave have been practicing every night together before bed. In fact, they are out there right now. :)
Here are some pictures from their nightly father/son playing catch together ritual. As you can see from Justin's happy face, he really loves to play...

An awesome throw, and catching a grounder...

Check out his getting ready to throw position...he concentrates really hard.

And this has nothing to do with baseball, but this is how I found him when I went to check on him the next night...

Collages are Fun (Bear Lake 2009)

2009-08-08T11:05:00.000-07:00

We went to Bear Lake a few weeks ago with Dave's family. This is our third summer going together, and we had a great time. The kids just think it's the awesomest thing ever...running around in the condo, playing all day at the lake, and being with their cousins and grandparents for three whole days, they were in heaven.

At the end of the trip my brother-in-law took the memory cards from each of our cameras and burned everyone a disc of all the Bear Lake reunion pictures. Needless to say we came home with tons of great pictures...way more than I could ever post. Thankfully my friend just told me about this great photo editing web-site (http://www.picnik.com/) and I was able to make a bunch of collages of lots of the fun pictures. I am way behind the times when it comes to the whole collage thing...I had a lot of fun putting them together though. :) And for those of you who (like me) don't have photo shop but desperately want it but can't afford it right now...that picnik site is great, I definitely recommend it. :)

So, it's collage time...

First day at Bear Lake...we arrived in the afternoon. The kids had fun playing on the playground and of course we had to walk down to the lake. We just need to remember for next time that there's no way we can take all the kids down to see the lake in their clothes and think they'll be content to just get in a little bit. The little ones especially got soaked. :)

Second day was our day at the lake. The kids had so much fun playing in the sand and swimming in the water.

We rented a paddle boat which was lots of fun too...

My brother-in-law took some photos of Justin and he caught some of my favorite facial expressions of his...so I had to post them. :)

Cute cousins and cute grandparents... (my awesome teen-age niece and nephew-Alison and Davis-are pictured above in the boat ride pic)

Day three...we took family pictures! (Thanks Sean.)

(before and after)

Cousin picture...

The whole family...

Day four...we spent the last day of our trip in Logan.

Dave's mom made all the kids the most adorable aprons and they spent the day wearing them. They all looked so cute. They had fun making sugar cookies together and getting those new aprons nice and messy. :)

Every year Dave's mom plans a cousin scavenger hunt and a "cousins forever" game where she reads information about each cousin (like their favorite color, what they want to be when they grow up, etc.) and the kids get to guess which cousin it is. It's always really funny and cute and they absolutely love it. So here are some pictures from our last day...

Thank you Gutke Family for a wonderful trip!!!

Grandma Rachel

2009-08-03T19:43:00.000-07:00

My beautiful Grandma Rachel turns 91 today. Isn't that amazing! She is an incredible woman and has lived an incredible life...I love and admire her more than words can say. She came to visit a few weeks ago and it was so wonderful to see her. I thought it would be a perfect day to share these pictures...

Eden's actually named after the little town
where my Grandma was born.
Eden, AZ

Dave's Grandma (and mine too of course :)) just turned 85 a few weeks ago. Let me just say she is one incredible lady. I really look up to her and feel so blessed to know her and to have married into her family. :) My cousin-in-law just wrote a sweet post about Grandma Barbara with pictures from her 85th birthday party. I was so glad to see them because we couldn't be there. If any of you would like to see pictures of another beautiful and amazing Grandma...click here.
I am one lucky girl to have such wonderful women to look up to!

These next few pictures are from the night we were visiting with my Grandma at my parent's house. They made me happy...so I wanted to share them...

p.s. Today is also a special birthday for someone else in my family. My newest nephew, Holland, was born just this morning! Happy Birthday Holland!!!

The pool and the mountains...

2009-07-20T10:57:00.001-07:00

are two of our favorite places to go in the summertime. I just wanted to share some pictures…

The Pool:

We have been to the pool a ton this summer which has been so fun. Eden absolutely loves the water, Emily is a little fish, and Justin likes it too. :) For as many times as we’ve been though, I actually don’t have a whole lot of pictures. Mostly because I’m always too nervous to take my new camera with us to our public pool. Kind of defeats the purpose of having a nice, new camera, huh. :) Oh well. I still have a few fun shots to share…

(taken at my parent's pool where I'm not too nervous to take my camera. :) )

The Mountains:

It’s always about 20 degrees cooler (or more!) up in the mountains here. So beautiful too…it feels like a whole other world and it’s only about a 40-minute drive from where we live in Vegas. Here are some pictures from a recent trip I took with my friends and their cute kids…

Justin had just gotten this bug catcher from his Grandma the day before we went. He is obsessed with bugs and had so much fun looking for them in the mountains. It was great.

A swarm of ladybugs flew through our site and the kids caught a ton. They were in heaven. Here's a picture of one little ladybug...

The kids also had fun chasing bubbles through the trees...

For some reason I didn't get very many pictures of Emily. :( Here's one of her with her friend Mindy...

And here is Eden with her little friend Kate...

(they were so good at sharing their rocks with eachother :) )

Speaking of rocks...

all Eden wanted to do while we were there was dig around in the dirt and eat them. It kept me pretty busy trying to keep her from doing so. I finally gave in and let her try just one...

Here she is looking around for the perfect rock...

Daring me to stop her...

It's in...

Her reaction...

Truthfully, Eden-in-the-mountains wore me out. :) But, we still had a blast and we'll be sure to go back at least a couple more times before the summer's over. I'm so thankful that even though we live in Hades we still have these wonderful ways to get out of the heat and have fun together!

Eden loves the Trampoline

2009-07-02T16:28:00.000-07:00

Like the fabulously creative title of this post says ( ;) )...Eden loves the trampoline. Playing on there is one of her very favorite things to do. She just runs around in circles and is as happy as a clam. I thought it would be a great place to do a little photo shoot of her...

I think babies are so cute from behind...

Some sunny pictures...

Eden felt like licking the ball ...I think she thought it tasted weird...(I'm glad.)

Gotta love the crazy trampoline hair...

So that's it. Eden loves the trampoline, and I love taking pictures of Eden loving the trampoline. It's a good combination. :)
The end. (again.)

The Joy of Reading

2009-06-24T20:29:00.000-07:00

We have all been doing a lot of THIS this summer...

Which makes me very, very happy.

Justin has been learning to read for the past few weeks. He is doing a great job and I am so proud of my little guy. Of course it helps that he has such a wonderful big sister to teach him. :)

(My favorite books for teaching reading at home have been the Bob Books series. They are what I used to teach Emily how to read and how Justin is learning now. They are great.)

One of Emily and Justin's very favorite pretending games to play is Library. Last week we had Emily's friend Brenna over to play and they set up an awesome little library and had so much fun playing in it, and I had so much fun watching them...and taking pictures. :)

The library was organized so nicely with a fiction section,

a non-fiction section, and of course DVD's.

Here is Emily as the very helpful librarian...

Justin just browsing in the fiction section...Emily is more than happy to give him a suggestion. :)

The end.

(I am never sure about how to end my posts...it seems like the words "the end" always seems to wrap things up nicely. So I just keep on using them. :) )

Eden

2009-06-02T09:57:00.001-07:00

Today is Eden's first ever birthday. Our baby girl is one.

I just wanted to take a minute to say that we really love this baby...

Every single bit of her...

More than words can express.

Happy Birthday sweetie!!!

Meet Fredericka

2009-05-31T20:55:00.001-07:00

Presenting...

Starring: Miss Emily Faith...

As: Fredericka the Frog...

And even though she was thinking,

"What in the world am I wearing?!"...

Our Star was able to channel her inner frog and deliver the performance of a lifetime...

Taking a well deserved bow...

The proud parents with their budding actress...

The End.

The Graduate

2009-05-29T21:52:00.001-07:00

I have been a blogging maniac lately! It's really just because there is SO much going on right now, and I don't want to skip one single thing. It's not slowing down anytime soon either...we still have Emily's school play (she is one of the leads!) coming up tomorrow, and then Eden's first birthday is in just a few days. So bear with me. :)

So, Justin graduated from preschool today!!! It was a big moment for him. And for Dave and I too. I couldn't help but get teary as I saw my little guy marching down the aisle to the music of the graduation song...

Getting his diploma from Miss Sheree...

We will miss her!

Cake time...

Eden loved messing up Justin's hat...

And here is David fixing it for him(I just liked these pictures for some reason)...

Justin took one last bike ride on the playground before we left.

So long preschool, hello Kindergarten!
(but not for 3 more months, He's all mine until then. :) )

Walking

2009-05-28T19:35:00.000-07:00

Eden is walking! I just wanted to throw this video on here to show off some of her first steps. This video is from a few days ago and she has been getting better and better everyday. She is still pretty tipsy, but is doing great! It's kind of funny because all three of my kids started walking about this same time, within a week of their first birthday. I think it's pretty much perfect timing. So, yay for Eden!

St. George

2009-05-26T08:51:00.001-07:00

Warning: There are going to be A LOT of pictures in this post (even by my standards.)

Reason: Not only did Dave surprise the kids and I with an over-night trip to St. George last weekend, he also surprised me the night before we left with a sweet, new camera as an early birthday present. Needless to say I went a little nuts with picture taking...

So we left Saturday morning and came home Sunday morning, so it was a VERY short trip. But so fun and so wonderful.

The first thing we did when we made it to St. George was head to the Farmer's Market they hold every Saturday morning at Tuachan. It was very fun, and very beautiful there.

Most of the booths were jewelry stands.

We did pretty good and didn't buy anything, just looked around.

We did decide to splurge on hot dogs for the kids...

(I don't know why it was so fun taking pictures of my kids

eating hot dogs but it totally was!)

(I love the way Justin eats his...)

Eden as usual just kicked it in her stroller...

Just some cute pictures of the kids...

Emily and Justin enjoyed the bounce house there...

Some pretty flowers I had fun taking pictures of...

Next we drove up Snow Canyon and hiked to some sand dunes there. I had never been there before and it was beautiful.

We borrowed this awesome carrier from my friend Marjorie (thank you!) and Eden loved it. It made the hike so much easier (last time we went hiking a couple of months ago I carried Eden in my baby Bjorn and she was way too big for it...it was way uncomfortable for both of us, so this was awesome!)

The kids really enjoyed running around in the sand and exploring...

Justin on a stroll and checking out some ants...

Poor Emily couldn't stand the sand getting in her shoes, so she stopped to clean them out about every 5-minutes...

Knowing how Eden feels about grass we weren't sure what she would think of the sand...

To our surprise she loved it!

Here's some proof that I was there...

I didn't notice any flowers on our hike but somehow Emily

was able to surprise me with these...

After our hike we headed to our hotel for a swim...

Next we went out to dinner and then visited the beautiful St. George temple...

(Justin was kind of tired of pictures at this point)

So that's it! Well, we actually did go swimming one more time before going to bed. It starting pouring rain while we were all (except Eden) in the hot tub which was kind of a fun way to end our awesome day together. It was really just one of those perfect days that we'll always remember. I'm so thankful for my wonderful husband and family!

Justin's Party...(a little late)

2009-05-24T22:16:00.001-07:00

Justin turned 5 last monday, but we had his 5th birthday party the Saturday before that. We had a water/pizza party. Super fun and super easy...here's what we did:

(oops, this picture is out of order, I meant to put it last...

but here is Justin after the party is over...telling us how old he is)

(YAY!)

So, now here is what we did:

Decorated foam visors and sunglasses...

(I really wanted a great picture of all of the kids in their

new hats and glasses. But it was pretty much impossible

to get them all together for ANY of the photos, so here

are just a few of the kids in their cool sun gear...)

Next came the slip'n slide...

(it was a big hit)

Then some water balloon games...

and some fun in the kiddie pool...

Pizza time...

Froggie cupcakes to (kind of) go with the whole water theme...

Last of all...present time!

The party was a hit and Justin loved every second of it (which is the whole point of course!) Thank you to our wonderful family and friends for celebrating with us!

Conversations with Justin

2009-05-18T09:19:00.000-07:00

(Justin and I at his preschool's Mother's Day Tea Party)

Anyone who knows Justin knows he is a pretty funny little kid. Very quiet, but also very funny. Today is Justin's 5th birthday. I really cannot believe it. I think 5 is a very special birthday...it means kindergarten, and reading, and writing, and extra chores, and hopefully learning to swim without floaties, and maybe even ride a bike without training wheels...It's really a big age with a lot of possibilities. :) So I wanted to share a couple of conversations I've had with Justin recently that I think are funny and meaningful. Especially on his birthday.

Conversation #1:

Justin: Mom, I'm smarter than a 5th-year-old-grader, you know why?

Me: Why, hon?

Justin: Cause I know that anytime anybody gets hit by an asteroid they will be dead.

(I then burst out laughing)

Justin: (Looking deep into my eyes with a very serious look) It's true!

Me: Yes buddy, it is.

Justin: That is why we want no one of our family to go to outer space. O.k. mom?

Me: O.k. bud, I'll see what I can do.

(The above conversation may not sound as funny written down as it was in person, but I just loved it and thought it was hilarious. I wrote it down in my journal right after...so there it is, word for word. :) )

Conversation #2:

This short conversation took place a couple of weeks ago after Justin came running in the house from playing in the backyard. He just looked so happy and healthy and big and grown up and for some reason I was just hit by this feeling of time going by way too fast, so I said to him while giving him a huge hug...

Me: Justin, please stop growing!

Justin: (pulling back and again, looking deep into my eyes) But mommy, that is just the way how life is...growing!

I thought these were very wise words coming from a four-almost-five-year-old. And I thought it would be very fitting to share them right now on his birthday. I just have to say that I am a very lucky mom to have such a sweet and kind-hearted (and also crazy and fun) little boy in our family. I am so thankful for him and feel blessed beyond words.

Happy birthday Justin!!!

She did it!

2009-05-07T20:22:00.000-07:00

O.K., remember a few posts back when I wrote about Eden not liking the feel of grass on her legs so she would hold one leg up in the air to keep it from touching the ground? Then I said that I'm sure she would have put both legs up if it were possible? Well, I didn't think it was possible for a baby to pull off sitting with both legs up in the air...but she proved me wrong. Check this out...

She must have killer ab muscles because

she sat like this for quite awhile. :)
Pretty awesome, huh.

I just had to document Eden's cool accomplishment. But this is also going to double as her 11-month update. She's been 11-months-old since Saturday. Her first birthday is coming up on June 2nd! It is going to be a very bittersweet day, time just goes by way too fast (deep sigh.) So, here are a couple of Eden's favorite things to do right now...

I don't know any baby who doesn't love doing this...
or this...

A classic wiggling out of the arms maneuver...

so sweet...

Until next time...

Butterflies + Flowers = Spring

2009-05-04T12:38:00.000-07:00

We don't go to The Strip very often. Usually just when we have visitors who want to check it out and see some of the sights. I actually forget most of the time that I live 20 minutes away from a place that thousands of people travel to every year from all over the world to visit. It just obviously doesn't hold a lot of appeal for our family. :) But, there is one place on The Strip that we actually do love to visit...the Bellagio is hands down our favorite place to see there. The fountain shows outside are so, so cool...for reals, We are in awe every time we watch. But our very favorite part of the Bellagio is inside. There is this huge Atrium that is just filled with gorgeous flowers and trees and plants. They redo it every season...decorating it with flowers and colors and landscaping to go along with winter, fall, summer and spring. All the flowers and trees are real and fresh and beautiful. I don't know how they do it, but it's wonderful.

So Emily is studying Butterfly life cycles in school, and her teacher told the class that there were butterflies at the Bellagio atrium right now, so Emily begged us to go see them. Since it was a Saturday and we had tons of cleaning, yard work, and errands to run...we of course said yes. :) We had never seen the atrium in the Spring and it was so, so pretty. We loved it and I'm so glad we took the time to go, it was definitely worth it!

Emily and Justin are walking into the green house where the butterflies are...

It is so hard to see them in pictures but the green house
was filled with gorgeous butterflies of all colors. They were
flying around like crazy and it was so cool to see them.
Emily kept exclaiming... "Oh mommy, they are so gorgeous" or
"Oh mommy, they are just beautiful" and "Oh mommy, they are so graceful."
She was in heaven.

That blue, blurry thing in the middle is an
Azure butterfly...they had a lot of them and
they were huge and so pretty!
Eden loved the butterflies too...
Some of the Spring-y decorations...

And of course, the flowers...

Tulips were everywhere!

These were my favorite...and I don't even know

what they are called! Does anyone know?

Just one more pretty flower...

Happy May everyone!

Standing Up (10-months)

2009-04-24T09:02:00.001-07:00

This is all Eden does lately. Pretty soon after learning to crawl Eden figured out how to pull herself up to standing. It's pretty much her favorite thing to do. She pulls herself up on everything...tables, chairs, beds, couches, doors, the wall, her brother, her sister, my legs (I love that one :) ). She is not at all content to sit anywhere...she is always finding somewhere to stand...

(Justin left the fridge open when he was

getting himself a yogurt. Eden saw her chance

and was so excited and happy as she reached

for that bowl of strawberries. I got to her right

before she could dump them.)

With all of the standing up comes a lot of

falling down. Here is Eden in action...

She is so fun. She even smiles when

she's falling over...pretty great, huh.

Eden as godzilla...

So here is Eden at 10-months!

Time is going by way too fast!

And here is a video of Eden laughing for those who

don't get to hear it very often. It's a great sound.

(I don't know why my videos always come out so dark

when I post them on my blog. They are much lighter when

I watch them on my computer. Oh well...)

Easter Morning

2009-04-15T10:07:00.001-07:00

Happy (late) Easter!

Pretty Emily

Adorable (and awesome) Justin
Sweet Eden

Since it's Eden's first Easter and first

Easter dress...she gets a couple extra pictures. :)

I wanted to include this picture because it shows

off Eden's cool purple lip that she woke up with Sunday morning.

Every once in a while Eden will suck on her lower lip

so hard it actually turns purple. Crazy, huh.

Everyone at church wondered what happened to her!

(at least it matches her dress. just kidding.)

Sisters...

I am so incredibly grateful for these three children...

They are happy and healthy and good and I couldn't ask for more!

Spring Break and First Time Swimming!

2009-04-15T09:41:00.000-07:00

Like I said before, we had a great break. One of the big things we did was take the kids swimming (indoor) two different times. It's a big deal because this was Eden's first time ever swimming. It was so fun and she loved it. She went crazy splashing in the water and would've stayed in their for hours if she could have. It makes me excited for the summer!

The pool had these great baby

life vests. She loved just floating around.

My little sister came down from Utah

with her two boys. Her youngest is just

6 weeks younger than Eden!

(sorry this picture is so dark)

They were hilarious together...

it was so fun to watch them play.

My niece Abbie slept over two separate nights.

We loved having her!

Girl time...they painted each others nails and

put curlers in each others hair and ate brownies and watched movies.

It was pretty much the perfect girly sleepover.

At the park...

And finally...dying Easter eggs.

Spring Break is Over. :(

2009-04-13T10:41:00.000-07:00

I like to leave love notes in Emily's lunchbox every now and then. Just so she has a little surprise when she goes to eat her lunch and just so she knows I am always thinking of her when she's gone. It makes her happy. This morning was the first time Emily actually requested a note for her lunch. She said after being home with us everyday for Spring Break she is probably gonna be a little homesick at school and a note would really help. So Dave and I both slipped one in there before she left to school. I thought it was so sweet of her to ask, and it also made me a little sad because I realized I was going to be homesick for her all day today as well. I cannot even express how nice it was to just have my kids HOME over the break. I loved it so much. Not having anywhere we have to be is just so nice! We had a super fun break and it really flew by. We spent a lot of time playing with cousins and friends which was great. Mostly we just enjoyed doing things together. I am going to post more about Spring Break and Easter later. But for now I am trying to catch up...so here are a couple of posts with more to come soon...Enjoy! :)

Egg Hunts

2009-04-13T10:11:00.000-07:00

We had a couple of egg hunts this year. They are actually out of order...but here are pictures from our ward's Primary egg hunt last Friday...

I caught Emily doing this a few times actually...

Instead of putting eggs in her basket, she'd give

them to a little kid near by. She still took plenty

for herself as well :), but I thought this was so sweet...

This is very typical Emily...

Over conference weekend we had Dave's brother's family

over for dinner and an egg hunt. It was so fun!

Before the hunt...

We actually had an egg hunt with these same cousins at our house last year too (just last year Grandma was visiting and put it on for us and we had Dave's other brother and his cute family here as well). Anyways, we were short on Easter baskets and so the kids just used random things/bags we had around the house to put their eggs in. I just love what Justin came up with to gather his eggs. These pictures make me laugh...

:)
O.K. back to this years hunt...

The kids getting antsy while waiting to go out...

It's on...

Eden didn't quite get it...

(aren't Dave's socks and sandals awesome!)

Eden loved her egg...

What did we get?

This is funny...we let Eden down on the grass to play and

she just didn't like the feel of it I guess. She sat with this one leg

up in the air so it wouldn't touch (I'm sure she would have put

both up if it were possible!). It was pretty cute.

I'm sure it won't be as funny on video as it

was in person, but here's Eden trying to

keep her leg up to avoid it touching the grass...

March

2009-04-13T09:50:00.001-07:00

Wow, I am behind.
March was actually a really slow month for us. The weather was mostly cold and windy and we didn't get out a whole lot. We did participate in our cities annual fishing derby though, which the kids loved. So I thought it was worth going back and posting about. Every March a fishing derby is held at a park by our house and every year we go (I think this was our fourth year) and every year we don't catch a single fish. :( It's so crazy. I really thought this might be the year, but nada. Our nephew was staying with us for a few days while he was on track break and he actually caught a fish which was very exciting. It was so fun to have him stay with us...the kids had a great time. Here are the pics...

These boys are truly best friends

and seriously two of the sweetest boys ever :)...

We didn't do anything for St. Patricks day...but

here's a cute picture of Em doing her homework

with her clover headband on that she made at school.

It's all I have to document the holiday. :)

We also got hooked on American Idol this month.

I love this show. Seriously, I just love cuddling up

next to Dave on the couch...listening to him crack

up at absolutely everything Simon says. It makes me happy.

We really have fun watching it together.

Emily loves it too. I record them for her

so she can watch her favorites the next day...

(kris and matt are her faves by the way).

Here's a picture she drew of herself on Idol someday.

I love it...

That's it for March!

Oh baby

2009-03-26T15:35:00.000-07:00

I've noticed that this blog has kind of become the Eden show. I didn't mean for that to happen, but she is the literal "baby of the family" and her first year of life is going by so fast...I want to document every moment of it. Believe it or not, I am actually holding back when it comes to all the things I want to post and say about this baby. :)

She is about to be 10-months-old, but I haven't documented her 9th month yet. So here are some pictures and tidbits of and about Eden at 9-months.

She's as happy and sweet as ever...

One thing Eden loves is playing with and chewing

on Dave's ties. She just sits there during church

and chomps away on the smaller length of Dave's tie while he

holds her every Sunday (he's a very nice daddy).

It seriously makes her the happiest baby ever.

So we used her weakness for ties against her to try to get her
to crawl. I think it helped with her practicing because
she started crawling the day after this picture was taken... :)
Besides the crawling there are a few other fun things Eden has figured out this month. She actually says a few words (at least I think she says a few words.) I swear she says "ma ma" and "da da" and actually means it at least half of the time. :) She also says (and sometimes signs!) "all done." It actually sounds more like "ah da" but it sure is adorable. I am completely in love with her little voice and can't get enough of listening to her words and noises.

Eden had another first this month. She was really sick

for the very first time which was really heartbreaking for us.

She had an ear infection and was pretty miserable for a couple of days.
Check out her sad face...

This was also her first time ever playing with a balloon,
and it actually cheered her up for a little bit!

We had a Sunday morning photo shoot with the kids

before church a couple of weeks ago...

(Eden was way better at holding still than silly Justin!)

Eden happily playing...

I left a bowl of her oatmeal a little too close to
her high chair one day and she grabbed it from the counter
while I was gone for a minute and proceeded to make this mess...
(I was wondering why it was so quiet in there)

Eden is really enjoying crawling and is getting faster everyday.
She loves crawling under the table... She also loves crawling in the kitchen and the
bathrooms (yucky, I know). I think she likes the
slapping sound her hands make when she's on the
linoleum. She also loves to bee-line it to the fireplace
every chance she gets. Why are kids always
drawn to the most dangerous, weird places!?

One more thing...the seperation anxiety has really
started kicking in for Eden this month. I know that
it is very normal for this age, but it's still been kind of
a bummer. She gets so sad and nervous almost every time
someone besides our family tries to hold her. She smiles

like crazy at everyone around her as long as she is in my

arms, but if someone tries to take her...forget about it.

There are times where randomly she is just fine, but in

general she is almost guaranteed to get at least a little sad.

I guess Dave and I will have to say bye-bye to dating for

at least a little while. :(

She sure is worth it though!!!

Yay for Eden!

2009-03-17T09:38:00.000-07:00

After weeks of doing this...

And this...

And after a lot of this...

Eden is finally doing this...

Her crawling is still a little awkward and still a little slow...

but all of her hard work sure paid off! Way to go sweetie!

Why Can't we Live Here?

2009-03-05T09:45:00.000-08:00

Dave and I ask ourselves that question every time we visit Southern California. I know CA has it's problems...but I can't get over the beautiful weather, the gorgeous scenery, the beautiful and unique flowers and foliage, the amazing beaches and gorgeous ocean, and of course...the delicious Mexican food. We took a very short trip to San Diego last weekend and we were able to get a taste of all of these wonderful things while we were there. :)

We left last Friday, visited SeaWorld on Saturday and came home on Sunday...like I said, it was very short. But oh so fun!

The grounds at SeaWorld are so beautiful!

(let's see how many times I can use the words

beautiful, gorgeous, and amazing in this post ;))

Our first show of the day...the Dolphin Discovery!

Emily and Eden were so excited.

So where are Justin and David during the show, you ask?
They were actually IN the show!
Before it started a SeaWorld worker asked
Justin if he'd like to be in the show, and he said yes!
It was so cool, he and Dave got to meet and feed the
dolphins and were totally part of everything.
Justin did so awesome...the video of his performance
is at the bottom of the post. It's so funny.

Here are some actual pictures of Justin and Dave...

And here are the dolphins...

these animals are so amazing!

After the show, Eden took a little nap...

and we went to see the sharks!
(The exhibit was very dark, so none of the pictures I took
inside turned out...but the sharks were very scary and cool.)

We saw Flamingos, visited with the sea stars (the correct name for
star fish we found out) and fed the sting rays.

Emily is saying...

"Look Justin, this is where the mouth is."

Emily's favorite part of the trip was feeding the

sting rays. They were very cute and friendly.

Eden just kickin' it at SeaWorld...

The Sesame Street kid area was so much fun.

It had this huge fort with nets everywhere to climb,

the most amazing bounce house ever, and a few rides.

(I think this picture is so cool, they are both flying)

Fun rides...

Waiting for the Shamu show...

Justin said this was his favorite part of SeaWorld.

It was awesome.

Our camera battery died about 3/4 of the way through

the day which was a huge bummer. A few things we

did/saw that aren't pictured are: fed the dolphins, saw the

penguins, polar bears, and beluga whales. Went to the

sea lion/seal show, and Justin went on his first ever scary

roller coaster. Good job buddy!

We were at our hotel 2 nights and the kids went

swimming both of them. We really milked this

trip for everything and got so much out of it even though

it was so, super short! The kids loved swimming in the dark!

The morning we left we took a drive

across the Coronado Bridge and went to fly

kites at the beach. It was perfect kite weather...

Emily and Justin loved it.

They played in the sand for a bit and then we headed home.

We drove by my favorite temple on the way out.

Isn't the San Diego temple so beautiful?!

Here's the video of Justin in the Dolphin show.

Keep in mind I was holding a very wiggly baby

in one arm and trying to video with the other. It's

a little shaky but turned out o.k. overall.

I'm so proud of my little guy!