cords

homemade ice cream, recycling bins, and other fun stuff

We emailed this to my little brother Trevon for his happy hump day

We made some yummy mint chip icecream!!

Jaxon was crazy with excitement and threw a fit if he didn't have stirrer in his hand

Reduce, Reuse, RECYCLE!!

probably dangerous, but this is how we know Jaxon is all done!

We are thinking of turning this hallway into a bowling alley :)

Maelie also gave another talk on Sunday and insisted we video it after church so she could watch it, but it's too big to upload. She loves giving talks, she went into primary and announced, I'm giving the talk today! She was also the spotlight on Sunday and was feeling pretty special! I love being in primary with her!

Let Us Be Men

Let Us Be Men

I just watched this and cried, it is amazing! I am grateful for all the men in my life!

Dancin' 4 Decades

This weekend was Maelie and Kyla's dance recital and the 40th Anniversary for Campbell's Dance Studio, where I danced for 16 years! Maelie and Kyla both did awesome! I was so happy for them, I seriously laughed and cried! It was so great to watch them up there, totally enjoyed it! And the girls had fun, too.

cousins Kailin and Anna with Maelie and Kyla after the show, good job girls!

Maelie, Kyla, and Anna before the show

curlers the night before

Maelie and Kyla right before the show


and after the show with their rose

the cute group shot

with their teach Emily

Maelie Lin Sweetie

I love this girl Maelie to pieces and I am so gonna miss her when she's at school all day next year!! She is such an awesome big sister, she is so kind and fun to play with! Last night Maelie took Kyla and Jaxon into their secret hideout and shut the door and were in there for a quite a while!

She loves doing the dishes! It's amazing and I probably better enjoy it all I can while it lasts. I say "chores" and she comes running all excited. I love having someone help me with the dishes. She usually unloads the whole thing and then loads the silverware.

She hasn't been excited about riding a bike at all and last night she finally did it! I was so happy for her! This morning she told Jonas she was going to ride her bike to his work so she could see him. haha :)

a birthday and other stuff

First off, Jonas came home with this last week and it has been giving me the change I needed to keep exercising! It is wayyy better than the wii fit! I am really liking it!
These shoes entertained Jaxon for about a half hour.. it was pretty cute to watch him walking around in them and just a diaper! Is this where I say he loves shoes and is ALL BOY??

Kyla hardly ever sleeps during the day. Maelie still falls asleep during the day but never Kyla. This can be a good thing because she is always ready for bed at 7:30 pm. Even if we delay bedtime a little, she asks us to put her to bed. The other night she was playing and this is how we found her when we got around to putting the kids to bed...

And here's an example of little Jaxon getting into everything. I seriously can't leave this kid alone for very long. The other day while I was on the elliptical, he took about 8 keys off the computer keyboard. And another time he got the dishwasher open, broke a glass and had 2 knives in his hand. After making oceans in a bottle at Kailin's birthday party, he opened the bottle and dumped the blue and oil mess all over the playroom carpet. I could go on and on...

Jonas and I have a calling together in our new ward as the ward reps for Helping Hands, Caring Hearts. It's a tri-stake service project to give school clothes to needy children in the school district. It's a pretty cool calling so far and only lasts a couple months. I am also the CTR 6 teacher which I am excited about but have never done by myself so it is actually challenging, but challenge is good, right? :)

And last but definitely not least! Jonas had his 28th birthday yesterday!!! Happy Birthday Jonas! We love you!!!

12 hour camping

Friday night we went camping up by Payson. There was a 40% chance of rain but we went anyway. We got there at 6 pm and realized we forgot flashlights and it was kinda chilly, so we ran to WalMart and got jackets for the kids and flashlights. We got back to the campsite at almost 7 pm and set up camp. The kids had fun running around and I was so happy we were able to have a campfire!

We roasted hot dogs, marshamallows, and made some delicious hot schmoes! Jaxon was kinda crazy! He would run towards the fire and then start climbing in the tent so we would take his shoes off. 2 minutes later he would climb out of the tent so we would put his shoes back on and then he would take off for the fire and start all over again!

After about 1/2 hour of enjoying our campfire, it started sprinkling... we stayed out for a while longer and then figured we better start making our way to the tent. We finished our dinner in the tent and not much longer the girls went right to sleep...

Jaxon on the other hand...

apparently needed some more time to wind down. He was climbing all over us and flopping over Jonas then flopping over me and trying to get to the girls. It was pretty funny and we couldn't stop laughing at him. The plan was to sneak out and enjoy the fire after the kids were all asleep but I guess we didn't make it! We're old like that. :)

I was surprised we actually got some sleep. Kyla had a mental breakdown sometime in the middle of the night and Jaxon crawled all over us everytime he woke up... In the morning it started pouring and we enjoyed it for quite a while and we stayed surprisingly dry for the most part. I love the sound of rain on the tent! It was awesome! But it was starting to get a little annoying because it wouldn't stop and we hadn't had time to get out and enjoy the outdoors yet. We waited it out for a while, hoping it would stop. But our tent was really starting to get wet so we decided it was time to go. Jonas made several quick trips running stuff out to the car and then we ran the kids out and jumped in the car and drove back home. It was 6:30 am!!! We musta been up early! Anyway, it was fun but next time we're going without the rain!

BLAST OFF

Jonas' first rocket launched on Tuesday night from Virgina. He has worked on several different rockets, but this is the first one that he worked on that launched since rockets take about 2 years to complete. It's pretty cool to see this rocket launch that Jonas helped to design. It's a few minutes long, the cool part is just the first 30 seconds of it. He might get mad at me for posting this, but I think it's pretty cool! This rocket carried a satellite into space. Way to go Jonas!

dance pix

Maelie and Kyla have been in a dance class since February and yesterday was picture day.

Their cousins Kailin and Anna are also in the class - this is the costume for their ballet dance - Minnie Mouse Birthday Party and their tap dance is You are a Pirate!

And here's the whole group!

Maelie

Kyla

cute sisters

Arizona Science Center

We finally tested out the culture pass and it really works! We got free tickets to the Arizona Science Center on Saturday, altho we still had to pay $12 for parking! The librarian said you can go to each place as many times as you want and they have an agreement thru 2010. I think we'll try out the Children's museum next and we'll definitely hit the zoo much later in the year! It's getting a little too hot these days. If you haven't already, go to your library and check out a culture pass!

doing the pully thingy, it's actually pretty hard...

the kids had fun with this but definitely liked the falling down part the best...

Kyla and Jaxon exploring the sun, earth, and moon

the kids having a picnic

Kiddy Kickers

Maelie has been taking a community soccer class every Tuesday morning since the end of February. This week was her last time and also a makeup week so the only kids there were Maelie, her cousin Kailin, and another little boy. So Coach Cook threw a bunch of balls out into the gym for a fun day! I tell ya, give kids a big room and a bunch of balls and they are HAPPY!!! It was great, because Jaxon, Kyla and Karsyn also got to play. The pictures didn't turn out that great because of the large room, but you get the idea. They sure had a ball!! =)

Jaxon and Karsyn had fun pushing the ball cart around! At one point Karsyn ran over Jaxon.

Jaxon had so much fun!

So did Kyla!

Maelie "stopping" the ball... I was impressed with how much she enjoyed that. Sometimes I think she tires easily, but she kept going and going that whole 45 minutes and finished with a red face but enough energy to play at the park afterwards.

going in for a kick and almost kicking Grandma (who came to watch that day)

cute soccer stars - Maelie and Kailin, they sure had fun taking this class together!

6th Anniversary and Mother's Day

This year our anniversary fell on Mother's Day. We celebrated on Saturday by hiking in the mountains that we see everyday that are near our house. Mother's day was great, the highlights were definitely breakfast in bed and Maelie singing to me in sarcrament meeting. I am blessed with an amazing mother, an amazing mother in law, and my cute family who made me feel special on mother's day.

the beginning of our hike in the hot desert :)

Jaxon helping me make mother's day dessert

The view of Phoenix from the top