our weekend.

Ryan, Melissa, Tyson, Jaris, and Jimmy

We had a fun weekend in Marysvale. It started out with the wedding of Jaris in the Manti Temple. It was so fun to see her! She is really a neat person and it's so wonderful to see her so happy.
Grandma and Grandpa Blackwell's is the best place to see wildlife. Spencer went right out with the binoculars looking at the deer. They also have a hawks nest in their tree with some little baby hawks too.

Outside playing at the wedding reception.

At the reception there was chocolate cake and chocolate covered strawberries. I was really hoping the white shirts would make it through the wedding reception and be presentable the next day for church. My mom and dad had another reception to go to after this one and offered to take my boys and they were so excited to be with them and ride in the Mini Cooper. Needless to say after 2 wedding receptions and Taco Time for dinner Spencer's white shirt was in need of a good washing Saturday night. Parker's had a couple of spots, but nothing serious:-)

Spencer's graduation.

My cute, sweet little Spencer graduated preschool today. When the graduates walked in there was a whole lot of flash photography! My kid was the cutest, of course:-)

Receiving his diploma. Miss Angie on the left is the owner of the school. In the middle is Miss Christine (teacher assistant), and his main teacher on the right Miss Angela.

She read stuff about Spencer when he was standing there. She said Spencer wants to be an Indian when he grows up because they hunt dinosaurs. And what makes Spencer special is that he can run faster than a cheetah and a raptor!

We love you Spencer! What a fun and amazing little boy you are!

Father's and Son's Camp out

The annual Stake father's and son's camp out was last weekend. It was a success! They had chili dogs for dinner. Yummy!

The bishopric chowing down! These guys are so much fun and have a sense of humor and you can clearly tell.

Gage was Parker's shadow. He kept going up to him and saying "hi". He is a little cutie.

Where sticks, dirt and water are concerned little boys will always have something to keep them occupied.

Carter, Spencer, and Mason.....little buds! I love the dirty faces too.

They had a meeting at camp and all the little boys sang. Parker said, "Mom, it was like church, but we didn't have to wear church clothes!"

They made it home on Saturday by 10 a.m. with dirty clothes and fingernails. Smelling of a campfire with smiles on their faces.

Thanks, Cory, for taking the boys on an adventure!

spenc.

Spencer

This little boy of mine is an absolute joy! I got to go on a walking field trip with his preschool class on Wednesday. They walked across the street to an ice cream shop and got to see how they make ice cream and waffle cones. And they got to eat ice cream too. All the boys choose the blue cotton candy flavored ice cream. I wish I had my camera because it was hilarious sitting there with 6 boys, who were chomping away, showing each other their blue tongues. Spencer was so excited to have me there, it was a lot of fun. I don't know how those teachers do it. I was only with them for an hour and I was ready for a nap:-)

I've found it a little easier to blog now that Cory got me a laptop as a mother's day/anniversary/birthday gift and he's always gone and I tend to get bored...lol! So I'll just keep on blogging about food, kids, and ordinary life.

girls night out.

While the boys were off on the stake father and son's camp out eating chili dogs for dinner and doing "guy" stuff me and Mataya were doing girl stuff.

We hung out with some fun girls and went to the park, McDonald's and then painted fingernails. I have never painted Mataya's fingernails so it was good to be around other little girls so she could see what being a girl is all about. We are at the point where she loves Go Diego Go, wearing boots all the time and playing with Spencer's lions, tigers, and dinosaurs! A girls night out was in order!Mataya picking out her colors. She chose purple, sparkly nail polish. Good choice.And the little girls watched Tangled and Strawberry shortcake while the moms chatted. And I'll be honest adult conversations are few and far between for me these days. So it was SO nice!

Cory is a very busy guy these days so me and the kids don't see him too much. So I was so glad they got to go camping and spend time together. He took some great pictures so I'll be posting those soon.

Welcome to the Club!

My sweet little Mataya taking a nap wearing her favorite pink, polka dotted pants. She has such a spunky personality and has a strong opinion when it comes to her wardrobe. I wrestle her into a dress every Sunday while she is kicking and screaming and thrashing around. I have to often remind myself that I'm the mom and I'm in charge and she will wear what I tell her to wear....lol! She is not even two years old yet. I'm really in for it:) I told one of my friends that I'm embarrassed to take her places because of what she is wearing and she said, "Welcome to the club!"

yummy!

Chicken taquitos

Now that my life is settling down a bit I've been able to do some things that I love. One of those things is cooking. My fabulous mother-in-law got me the Our Best Bites cookbook as an early birthday gift. All last week I only made things from it for dinner. The recipes are awesome and easy to make. And Cory loved everything so I scored some points there:) One night I made an orange fruit dip that involved cream cheese, orange juice, and marshmallow cream. My Grammy would love it! Parker asked me if we were going to someone's house for dinner and I told him no we were just staying home. He said, "are you sure we aren't going to Melissa's because fruit dip is very 'Melissa style'?" Melissa does love her fruit dip, but apparently my poor kids think fruit dip these days is "fancy"!

dinosaur park field trip.

Spencer's preschool had a field trip to the Dinosaur Park in Ogden today. It was a rainy day and it looked like we were in for a wet, cold morning. But I knew we had to go because there was no way I would be able to talk Spencusaurus out of going:) So I wrestled Mataya into a long sleeve shirt and jacket and off we went. This is a picture of some of the kids from his preschool.

I managed to lose Spencer 5 minutes into being there. I was helping the teachers carry some food for lunch and I thought he was with our group walking to the picnic tables. I realized he wasn't there and started to walk back to find him. Then I heard on the intercom "Attention ladies and gentlemen, we have a lost child his name is Spencer and he is carrying a Spider man umbrella." I got there right after the announcement and the lady said she was impressed with how calm he was and he stayed right where he last saw me. Good job Spenc!After exploring the park for a while we got to make a craft and learn more about dinosaurs. Here is Spencer coloring his triceratops for his puppet.Mataya liked sitting in the chairs with the big kids. And she really enjoyed using the glue sticks. She is all about the messy stuff!Mataya managed to splash in every puddle she could find and by the end has soaking wet socks and boots. It didn't seem to bother her because she ran right along with the other kids and had a fun time.We got to have pizza, salad, bananas, juice, AND cookies at the park. It was really fun and as you can see Spencer was very excited about his big piece of pizza.Spencer only had 2 more weeks until school ends and then it's the big graduation day! I LOVE LOVE his preschool! The teachers are amazing and do so much with the kids and teach them a whole lot. I really love teachers especially on field trip days....bless their hearts!

birthday boy.

Cory's birthday was last week. We went the night before his birthday to the Capitol Theater and saw Young Frankenstein. It was very good, but had a few crude parts. It was nice to spend some time together in the middle of a stressful, crazy week. Friday we went to Cory's brother's house and had dinner with them and we brought a Farr's ice cream cake. It was very yummy. Here is Justin lighting the candles on Cory's cake. He rolled up a piece of paper and lit it on the barbeque and brought it in to light the candles. This is called lighting candles "South Dakota" style....LOL!
Those South Dakota boys know how to get things done!

cousins.

Mataya loved swinging Tyson!

We went and saw Tyson and Lexi this week. I got to hold this little guy for an hour and he was talking and smiling at me. He is such a good little baby. Melissa and I decided it would have been tragic for us to move away. So it's good things turned out the way they did:-)