Happy birthday Tyler the big 12

Time flies by way to fast when your oldest is no longer that cute 7 lbs 4 oz infant you just brought home from the hospital but a handsome young man who will be getting the priesthood and going to jr high next year! Tyler's birthday was a very busy day for him since he had the Hersey track meet and two baseball practices. He did well at the Hersey track meet running the 200 and winning his heat and the ran the 800.the best part was his friends telling the announcer that it was his birthday and watching his buddies pull him over to the announcer and then listening to his buddies sing happy birthday to him with 4 other schools joining in! That made Tyler's day! Tyler had me bring doughnuts to share with his class and then he got to come home early and hang out with carter until practices started.

It is weird to think my baby is 12 but I am excited for him to start going to young men's, getting the priesthood, moving in to jr high and all the other fun stuff he gets to do this year, the only thing that I could wait another year or two is the "girl" part. Lucky for this mom his head is more wrapped around sports and friends.

Tyler's decons teacher asked me something we do to strengthen out mother son relationship together and all I could say is he is my right hand man. Not only do we get to do the fun stuff together like playing catch or any kind of board game but he is right there to help me out and make life at home better by being a wonderful big brother, he got Treven to finally stop being afraid of the ball and just catch it in his mitt, and a resonsuble son who I can trust and get help from. Poor kid has even helped me by changing emery's diaper.

We love you bud!

Spring Break in St. George

Mom worked Easter weekend into the first part of Spring Break, so the family left for our vacation on Weds with Janette while Ryan drove down that night to join us for the rest of the week! This kids have fun Monday and Tuesday getting to just play with friends and not having mom telling them what to do all the time. Tuesday we meet up with Julie, Marthea and kids to play at the park and skate park along with the boys getting some baseball in! That night Tyler was busy with two baseball practices while mom and the rest of the kids enjoyed the good weather and worked out in the yard Tues night. Weds came and after we were all ready the kids and I along with Janette piled in the van off we went to St. George. After getting everything in the condo, since I swear I over pack every trip, we took the kids out to dinner at the Golden Corral and met up with Brad and Lezlee. We Don't take our kids out to eat very often so the kids were in heaven! Tyler was pounding the popcorn shrimp away while Treven was in seventh heaven since the dessert bar included cotton candy. I still can't believe Treven didn't get a sick stomach since he kept going back to the dessert bar for cotton candy and ice cream. I do believe he had one bite of his real dinner! Halle and Luke loved the cotton candy too, while Cole and Emery had fun running around and waving at all the other diners! Ryan made it down around 9 so we let the kids go down and watch a movie while the adults watch Warrior.

Thursday the kids were up early and begging to go hiking. So we took all the Strong family while Janette kept Elsie and went up to the Red Rock Canyon for a fun little hike. After hiking we took off to Brad and Lezlee's condo to swim at their pool. The wind was the only problem so the hot tub was busy with adults while the kids didn't care and kept on swimming. The kids kept asking to go back to our condo's pool since it is in the nearly dead community and most the time we are the only one's swimming so the kids love having a pool and hot tub to themselves. We swam another two hours and finally got the kids to go in so we could have dinner! After dinner we settled down again to watch a movie Extremely loud Incredibely close. I couldn't tell you anything about the movie since I fell asleep in the first 10 minutes! It has been a long time since we have had nights were we can all just sit down as a family or even Ryan and I and watch movies. It was sooo nice to be lazy at night!

Friday the weather was still good so we took the kids out to breakfast and Ryan and I's favorite place the Egg and I. The service was so slow that Emery got hungry and bored and started eating jelly packets! Tyler loved the place and even ate most of his "adult" meal! I guess since he is turning 12 this week he will finally be off the kids menu! After breakfast we were off to the narrows and rock climbing by what Treven kept tellings us was the D-I-X-I-E hike. Since the dixie is written on the side of the rock we climb. Since it was only midday we did a little shopping and then met up with the Strong's to go to Feista Fun for some go cart racing, golfing, arcade games, and bumper boats! We did a little bit more shopping and then got an ice cream and headed back to the condo for dinner and more movies. We watched the Princess Bride and Halle now tells me that this is her favorite movie!

Saturday was a wet and rainy day so we tried to sleep in, I went to the temple and then we met up again with the Strong family to go to the indoor pool at the Washington Rec Center. It was awesome! The kids swam for over three hours having a blast going down the slides, playing tag, Luke and Halle were mermaids/mermens, and a lot of swimming, swimming, swimming! Afte swimming we went back to get to change to go out to dinner at the Pizza Factory with the Strong family and then back to the condo so we could get the kids all settled so Ryan and I could go out to see The Hunger Games. Thank you Tyler and Janette for babysitting.

Sunday came to fast and so while Ryan took the kids to breakfast and to visit a bunch of parks, mom got the condo all cleaned up and then it was back to Springville we went and back to real life! It was a great family trip and we all had a blast getting to just be together as a family.