Happy Birthday Kyle!

Well, Kyle is the big 29 today... he was kind enough to point out that we will be the same age for a few days. Of course he had to wake up early and be at work, so Kyle and I opened up most of his presents without the kids. He wanted luggage, so that was the bulk of his presents. Then he headed to work.

His surgery day is pretty weird today, so he got to come home for lunch, so we celebrated with the kids then and had his ice cream cake. They kept singing happy birthday to you.... except for Carly who sings "Happy to you" as loud as she can. Then it was off to work again, we don't know if we'll see him tonight... hopefully! (Thanks Spencer for being the photographer)

The candy poster that we made for his birthday.

Celebrating. We are sure blessed to have such an awesome dad and husband! We love you Kyle!

This Friday we had a big end-of-season soccer BBQ with the other players and their families. All of the kids got trophies. It was so fun- the coach would say something about each player as they were up on top of the slide and then they would slide down to get their trophy as everyone clapped. The coach said that Spencer was the most versatile player (he kicks with both feet, unlike the other kids) and the most sociable (this is a nice way to say that he likes to interupt the coaching to tell stories). We are sure proud of him.

Spencer took this picture of his trophy. He was sure excited to get it. He kept saying, "This is my first trophy ever!"

And a week ago I was able to attend a Time Out for Women conference and go with some good friends. It was so much fun and it was definitely a needed "Time Out" for me. THis picture is with Kenneth Cope who sang a bunch of songs there.

Me and my pregnant self with my good friends. It was nice to go and be uplifted! Thanks to Kyle for watching the kids Friday and Saturday so that I could go!

The latest happenings

It seems like we've been more busy the last week or two, but it's probably just the usual spring time stuff. We have had fun doing things that keep us busy though...

Yesterday I took the kids to the Isotopes Baseball game (without Kyle). It happens that since the game was at noon on a weekday, that there wasn't a lot of people that could attend the game, so Kyle was able to get me some tickets without a problem from work. Of course, me, being one not to make easy things stay that way, asked Kyle if he could possibly get me more tickets so that we could take the kids in Spencer's preschool group (joy school) and their moms. And of course Kyle being the wonderful husband that he is, worked it out... of course it took a little more finangling (is that a word?) and a little more stress, but it all worked out... much to our surprise.






I made the kids stay after the game and take some pictures, but Carly wasn't very cooperative. She was too interested in other things, but here she gave me a nice "Cheese" for the camera.

Spencer eating a hotdog during the game.

A quick snapshot of the preschool kids. I think they had fun ?

After the game attempt at a picture.

We've also been getting ready for our trip to Utah. Kyle's sis is getting married and then he's going on a big ol' fishing trip to Lake Powell. Here are the kids trying out the sleeping bag that Kyle is taking.

And Spencer had his last soccer game of the season. Here is Carly at the game.

All of us waiting for the game to start.

And here is one picture of him during the game. He's finally starting to focus on the ball a little more and not the butterflies or blades of grass... And he says he wants to play again next season, so we'll be signing him up on Saturday.

And I think with all of the fun we've been having :) the kids are pretty worn out because they are both taking a nap right now... Gasp! They both need it! Maybe I need one too...

The ZOO

My mom and sister, Katie, came down last week. It was a lot of fun. We went to the childrens museum, to the zoo, celebrated my mom's birthday and hung out.




The kids at the zoo
Again at the zoo, with the sun in their eyes.

This is what happens when you still my camera and take pictures of yourself... you get it blogged. That'll teach ya! :) HA HA

Playing around with my camera again.

Carly watering our lawn and having a little too much fun.

Happy Birthday Carly!

So Carly is numero dos today! Happy Birthday Carly! We had to wake her up early because we had our ultrasound today. Poor girl, there's nothiing like being woken up on your birthday. We had the house decorated and her presents on the table ready to be opened. She wasn't that excited about it (actually quite ornery), until she saw her new bike. All of a sudden she lit up and was happy. Yay!


Such a funny picture I had to post it... she had just woken up (post seeing the bike).

Opening some presents

Spencer, of course was a great help!

The cake I made for her. (She loves sunglasses, so I thought this was an appropriate cake for this year.)

After dinner, we had hamburgers (her favorite), we had the cake and some icecream. This is Carly wearing her sunglasses with her sunglasses cake. So cute!

Carly wasn't that excited about the candles on her cake. This is after she blew one of them out and smelled the smoke...

We are so glad that Carly is in our family! She is so much fun and we just love her to pieces!

And in other news: Yes we had the ultrasound today. The whole family came and got to see their new...

Brother! (Check out the arrow for the proof)

He kept putting his hand in front of his face, so we didn't get a ton of great pictures. But here's one that was snapped just as he moved it.

And this is one of the 4-d pictures. The lady only put this picture on our CD, but we got copies of a few other ones... oh well. You get the jist of how he looks.

So we are totally excited about having another boy. Kyle was really surprised because he thought it would be another girl. Now we just need to come up with a boy name - they're so much harder than girls! We're taking suggestions. :)

Great friends and fun times!

So you know those friends that come into your life and no matter how long it's been since you've seen them or talked to them, once you are back together, it's like only minutes have passed? Well, this weekend I was able to get together with SO many great friends like this! It was a GREAT weekend!





This is my great friend Cassie, whom I have not seen in two years. We served in the YW presidency together and she flew down to Albuquerque to attend the baptism of one of "our" Young Women. We picked her up from the airport and got to spend the day together. It was so much fun talking to her and hanging out.
While trying to get a decent picture of us both, we were laughing so hard that, well you know me, I cried.
Me and Nohemi, my Young Woman. She was finally able to get baptized and I wouldn't have missed it for the world. She is such an amazing girl and such a great example!

And this is a group of some of my favorite people in the world. We had a "girls night out" and all hung out. We were all (and still are) such good friends when we all went to the Manzano Ward. It was SO much fun hanging out and talking. We stayed up until almost midnight talking and giggling like little girls... someone made the comment that it is a good thing we don't drink...

It was so great to see everybody and hang out like the "good ol days". Of course there were a couple people missing, and we all talked about them and how much we missed them (you know who you are), but it was so fantastic to get together with the group again!

Our "goofy" shot... obviously some of us took it more seriously than others :)

I love these girls!

Petroglyphs and Easter Fun

Well, we're almost all recovered from the marathon sicknesses in our family... we finally took the kids to the doctor and they both had gotten double ear infections. So antibiotics were given and of course this Sunday Spencer broke out into a huge rash, having a reaction from the Amoxicillin... but we're hopefully all on the mend.



We went to Petroglyphs National Monument today. It is about five minutes away from our house... it's about time we went. So here's a picture of some of the first ones we saw on our 2.5 mile hike and as a bonus, you get to see my 5 month baby bump... exciting huh.



A picture of the almost 10 steps Carly took on the entire hike. It was monumental so we had to take a pic of it. Poor Kyle had to carry her almost the entire way.

The crew at some more petroglyphs (behind Spencer).

Spencer did really good and had a lot of fun looking for the pictures on the rocks.

Carly on the other hand.... well, this is a picture of her refusing to walk. She'd just plunk herself down on the dirt and sit there with a scowl. We'd pretend to walk away and say bye, and she didn't care at all, she wasn't budging. So of course we had to go back and pick her up and carry her, what could we do? Let her sit and rot in the desert? (We were tempted at times)

And this is Easter. Spencer got all of the eggs because Carly was more interested in playing in her car than finding eggs.

These are 2 of the 6 eggs she cared to grab.

The kids posing in front of the eggs.

My parents came down for the weekend. It was fun to see them and the kids loved having their grandparents here!
And this is Carly all tuckered out from a hard week. She actually fell asleep standing up... she's amazing.

Happy Birthday Spencer!

Spencer is the big number 5! He had a great day full of swashbuckling fun! ( I have yet to figure out how to get these pictures in order, so bear with me).




Spencer at his birthday party, dressed as a pirate, with his pirate ship cake. (The cake was a lot harder than it looks, you'll have to take my word on that.)

Right before the candles were blown out...

Okay, this has been one of the hardest weeks in a LONG time for our family. I had a major sickness (and of course since I'm preggo, I can't take anything that really works), Spencer got pink eye, then a cold, Carly then got the pink eye and a cold, and Kyle has had one of the busiest weeks at work ever. Poor guy, I hardly saw him at all. It's hard enough taking care of sick kids, when you are sick, but then I got a sinus infection... yep, I've never had one until now and I had no idea they were so painful and miserable. So anyway, taking care of sick kids, while you are sick, trying to plan a birthday party, keep the house sanitized, and support your husband is hard (I know a lot of you have done this and survived, and probably have been in better spirits about the whole thing- good for you, but I'm not one of those people as often as I should be :) ) So anyway, Kyle started getting sick at the end of the week, still working like crazy, on-call at the hospital, feeling guilty because he wants to be home helping me and the kids and can't... You know the story. But to make a long story even longer, Kyle bought me these roses and it is so nice to have a husband that knows what a hard week it has been and has been through it himself, but still thinks about things like this! I am so lucky!

Here's to a better week ahead!

Okay, back to the party.

This is Spencer's birthday morning, opening up all of the family presents.

Spencer on the day of his party, still not feeling quite up to par... poor kid.

Spencer and Carly giving an "AAARGH" for the camera

The party-goers all dressed up as cute pirates.

About ready to eat the cake.

It was a really fun party and luckily it all worked out. We had ordered one of those big jumpers for the kids, and of course Albuquerque had gusting winds and so we couldn't get it. Last minute games were thought up and it turned out great. We played a lot of pirate games, had a treasure hunt, ate pizza, cake, and ice cream, and just had fun.

Spencer loved it and that's all that matters!