Veteran's Day

Since Savannah didn't have school on Veteran's Day, we thought that we'd try to have a little fun. We took a little trip to the dairy farm that's just around the corner. We had a lot of fun, but man did it get hot pretty quickly! And I thought that it was November. I guess that that doesn't really mean too much here in the valley. We invited both sides of the family to tag along with us and got a small turn out from each. Here's a shot of all of the kids up in one of the tractors. Melanie liked climbing around on some of the tires that they had set up. Of course, Spencer loved that too, mostly because we let him out of the stroller. Here is all of us waiting to go on a little hayride, which is also a tour of the dairy. We were lucky to get both Grandmas to come with us! Here is my mom and the girls, once we finally got on the hayride. We enjoyed seeing all of the cows and learning lots about them. They have about 1000 cows at the dairy. Did you know that each cow gets 4 showers a day? They are given 2 showers before each milking, and they are milked twice a day. The thought may have crossed my mind that those cows were usually cleaner than my kids, but then again, we get a good whiff of them every once in a while over at our house, and they don't smell too clean then. We even got to see 2 little calves that had been born that day. Pretty amazing. The kids all loved feeding and petting some of the other animals. The girls really wanted to pet one of the sheep, but it was much more shy and so we had to settle for the goats. Melanie's favorite was petting the bunny. It just sat so still and let everyone touch it. That's definitely Melanie's kind of animal. To finish up Savannah got her face painted, a unicorn. And of course, we all got free milk. We had fun, despite the heat and the crowd. And hopefully we can go back to the farm some time when Daddy can come too.

Snowflake

I have an aunt and uncle that live in Snowflake and I haven't been up to visit them since Savannah was a baby. So I decided that we would stop there on our way home from New Mexico to try and break up our trip. The weather was wonderful and we had such a great time. Savannah got to ride my cousin's horse, Spliff. She totally loved it! Melanie was forced to also ride and cried the entire time. She later claimed it was fun, but wouldn't do it again. I was surprised that Melanie really wanted to hold their baby goose though. Savannah liked the goose too and it kept following her around, to which she said, "I'm not a mommy goose!" The kids also loved jumping on the trampoline. I just loved the how green everything was and the cool weather. I also took the kids over to see the Snowflake Temple. It was so beautiful outside and we all loved it. Melanie loved the waterfall and all of the pretty flowers. Spencer just wanted to get into everything...the dirt, the water, anything he could. Luckily, Grandpa followed him around and kept him out of trouble.Savannah was a little disappointed that she didn't get to go inside, but she still really enjoyed walking around the outside. As a quick side story, Savannah stopped to look at a bug and so I stopped with her. My Dad and sister took the other kids ahead and when we turned to go and catch up with them a snake had come out of the shrubs onto the sidewalk! It totally scared me and so I grabbed Savannah's arm and pulled her up onto the planter. The snake took a look around and decided to go back into the bushes. It was yellow with black stripes. Needless to say I was a little paranoid about the pretty flowers after that. Here's Melanie touching the temple, like President Monson told all of the children to do! And I need to tell Sarah thank you for riding with me all the way to New Mexico and back! She made this trip possible, since I did it without Jon. The girls loved spending so much time with you! And here's me and my Meli! Other highlights of the trip included playing dress-up with cousins. And of course, roller skating in the house. Who could ask for more fun than that? We all loved it and only wished that Jon had been with us.

Spring Break Fun

The first part of Spring Break we stayed home and potty trained Melanie. But she did so good that I didn't mind taking her out the last few days for some fun. On Thursday we went with my mom and two youngest sisters to the Arizona Museum of Natural History (or the Dinosaur Museum as we like to call it). The girls had fun panning for gold and hanging out in the jail cells. I even let Spencer play with poop in the poop exhibit. Savannah and Spencer loved all of it. Melanie was afraid of the dinosaurs. But we all had a good time. Then on Friday we all went to the zoo. We really had a great time there. The first stop was Melanie's favorite animal, the giraffe. (I'd also like to point out just how fabulous Sarah's hair looks.)We also let everyone ride the camel. Here's Savannah, Natalie, and Sarah.Melanie was too young last year and so she was really excited to ride on it this time. Let me just say that riding a camel is very uncomfortable. We also got to see the tiger, lion, and here's the rhino! We stopped for an early lunch, which worked out really well. Here are all of the monkeys in our group. We got to see Savannah's favorite, the elephants, and then my favorite, the orangutans. We also made a special stop to see Sarah's favorite, the zebras. And of course we had to get a picture of Savannah with her namesake sign. It's always fun to see how much she's grown since we've been there last. We even stopped right at the end and took a few picts with some of the statues. Natalie really didn't want to be in this picture, which I think made it even funnier. Notice that she's not even in the next one. Melanie scraped her knee right after this and we had to stop at the ranger's station to get her cleaned up. Other than that, we had a wonderful time!

Civil Rights Day

Savannah didn't have school last Monday, so we decided to have a little fun. The girls were lucky enough to have my youngest sister, Natalie, spend the night on Sunday. So they got to play with her in the morning. We all got ready and then went to the park. It was fun; I got to visit with some friends from our old old ward. Spencer loved the swings. Melanie is always fond of anything bouncy; this day it was the teeter-totter. Afterwards, we went and visited my grandmother for a little while and then went over to my parents' house. The girls all had fun jumping in the pile of leaves out front. While we were there, Savannah found a nickel on the ground. She tried to give it back to my mom, but my mom told her that she could keep it. So on the way home, Savannah wanted to stop at the store and buy something. I told her that she would have to have some more money to be able to buy anything. I also told her that she could do a few chores at home and that I'd give her some money for working. (Bribery is always a great tool, right?) When we got home, Savannah cleaned her room, helped rearrange the dresser drawers (now Melanie can reach her clothes!), put some laundry away, and folded the kitchen towels and bibs. She was awfully busy and I paid her for her various jobs. She ended up earning 25 cents. She thought it was great and I loved the cheap labor! Here's how great their room looked when she got done. Later that night, Spencer was being so cute and was sitting in the toy cupboard looking at a book and playing with some toys. Of course the moment that I moved to get the camera, he thought that he had to follow me. But he sure was cute!

A Glimpse of December

Life has been crazy! Here are a few pictures from December!

The day after Thanksgiving we put up Jon's Nutcracker collection. The girls love it and have their favorite nutcrackers. I really wanted to get them up right away, so it would feel like Christmas (especially since we decided to move the weekend after Christmas and had to pack up all of our decorations the day after). We had lots of fun decorating and getting into the holiday spirit!The girls also helped put up our window stickers. They each enjoyed decorating their own window. And Savannah helped Jon put up our tree. I think that next year we'll have a real tree! Yay! Jon and the girls made a Gingerbread House a few days later. The girls love their "Ginger Man House!" Spencer has been getting dressed up for church in his white shirt and tie. Got to start that habit young right? I just think he looks totally cute. Savannah got to go to a Primary Activity Day. We did a Drive-In movie; where we showed a slide show of the pictures of the kids through-out the year. Savannah made her little car that she got to sit in during the "movie." We also went caroling with some friends. We made little goody bags for the people that we sang to. The girls loved it! Savannah loved going to sing to her primary teachers and giving them a treat! The girls also had fun eating their "Ginger Man" peeps. They (or maybe just Savannah) loved them, but they both enjoyed biting their heads off first! Savannah's preschool had their annual Christmas concert. I dressed all the kiddos in red just for the occasion and managed to get one good shot of them. I thought that Savannah looked beautiful in her red "Santa" dress that she picked out herself. We were so proud of her too for sitting on Santa's lap. Too bad she couldn't remember what to tell him. I guess that it's a good thing that she wrote him a letter. The weekend before Christmas was hectic. Jon and I (and Spencer) started out by going to Wickenburg for his company Christmas party (and staff meeting). We also celebrated our 6th anniversary here. We stayed at Ranchos de los Caballeros again (just like last year). We had a great time!Our girls went with Jon's family to Pine to stay in a cabin and play in the snow. We stopped back in Mesa on a few errands before joining them and found this on our doorstep! Yes, thank you Justin & Robin for the beautiful Peeps tree! Our girls honestly loved it! Jon and I got a kick out of it. And Jon has now declared war on you! We did manage to make it to Pine to join in the cabin fun. The girls got to play in the snow before we got there, so I only got a few shots of Spencer and Uncle Rob! But we had a good time there too. Here's my dad with Spencer. My dad loves to get the kids to stand up in his hands and Spencer was doing it so well! On Christmas Eve we went over to Jon's parents' home. We enjoyed a great dinner, even Spencer, who was styling his "Who needs Santa when I have Grandma" bib. Totally true! The kids got to open a present from Grandma and Grandpa - New Jammies! They all looked so great in their nice new jammies. Christmas morning was wonderful! I just loved the look of surprise on the girls' faces as they opened their presents! Here's Savannah opening a new "My Little Pony." She was so excited. Melanie is in love with her "Peter Man" movie. (I love it that she calls it that...too cute!) The girls made out like bandits! One of their favorite gifts was the Barbie & The Diamond Castle movie, along with the matching Barbie dolls. (Laurie- I figured that since your girls loved the movie so much, then mine would too!) Spencer just loved eating all of the bows and paper! He did get a few toys that he really likes to play with though. Savannah made a little present for Jon and I at school. I just love the little gifts that they make at school and I love that this one has her picture on it! Both Melanie and Savannah got new babies and they also got this baby bed that Melanie just loves! We then went over to my parent's house for breakfast and to talk to my sister, Andrea, who is serving in the Washington Tacoma mission. It really was so nice to get to talk to her on the phone. Savannah asked if Andrea gets to come home now. I told her that she wouldn't be back until after next Christmas! We also opened a few gifts from my family. Jon got 2 more nutcrackers...surprise, surprise. I really liked the baseball one that my sister, Sarah, gave him. I just wish it said Diamondbacks on it! Savannah loved getting this poodle that Uncle Tyler let her pick out for herself. The hard part was waiting that 1 day to open it before he'd let her play with it. We also made our way over to Jon's parents again for a few more gifts. All in all, we had a great Christmas. Spencer loved all of the hustle and bustle and especially the bows and ribbons! Congratulations if you made it to the end of this extremely long post! There you have all of our Holiday festivities! The day after Christmas we packed up and moved that weekend. The camera got packed away and I didn't dig it out until last week. We've had a lot go on since we moved and hopefully I'll get around to posting that soon!