Chocolate Houses!

Our family has a fun tradition of decorating gingerbread houses every year with their cousins and grandparents. A few years ago my friend gave me the idea of doing chocolate houses instead. The kids loved it so much that we have changed to decorating chocolate houses. After decorating we love eating the candy and all of the chocolate! Here is this year's houses the kids decorated!

Baptism Day!

Kaitlyn's baptism was yesterday, Saturday, November 7th. She was baptized and confirmed by her dad. It was a good, spiritual day for our family. We enjoyed having family and friends there to share this special day with us! And the luncheon afterwards was yummy! It was fun to chat with everyone! What a great day for Kaitlyn!

Happy Birthday Kaitlyn!

Kaitlyn had a fun birthday yesterday! It's hard to believe she is 8 years old and getting baptized this week.

Last week Kaitlyn had a birthday party with some of her friends. Since she loves arts and crafts we had all of the girls paint some ceramic pumpkins, paint stain glass art, and make some cute necklaces. We also ate pizza for lunch and then decorated cupcakes and sugar cookies! It was a lot of fun! Kaitlyn was definitely spoiled with gifts this year! She can't wait to start working on all of the arts and crafts gifts she got from everyone!

Happy Halloween!

For Halloween this year Kaitlyn was a witch, Jackson was Tigger, Mckay was a pit crew person, and Caden was Luke Skywalker. The kids had fun trick or treating and brought home tons of candy! We hope everyone had a fun Halloween!

Pinewood Derby!

We had a fun time at Caden's Pinewood Derby tonight! He won first place! That means his car was the fastest out of 16 boys! He won each round and ended up with a total score for four races of 10.457 seconds. Way to go Caden and Scott! And thanks to both grandpas for giving us some great advice and help on the car. As you can see in the picture, Caden got a trophy to stick his car on. This Pinewood Derby involved five different wards in our stake. The other picture I posted shows only the boys in our ward. As you can see, our ward did quite well. We ended up with the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners! This is probably Caden's last Pinewood Derby before he turns 11 next year, so we were so happy that he won first place!

Happy Birthday Caden!

Caden turned 10 years old yesterday! He invited some of his friends to a bowling party at the local bowling alley. The kids had fun bowling, eating pizza, eating a bowling pin shaped cake with doughnut hole bowling balls, and playing the arcade games. Caden was excited to receive some Lego Star Wars toys from some of his friends. He has read the whole series and has really gotten into the whole Star Wars thing. We gave Caden a new bike since his old one is too small for him now. Scott and I can't believe we have a ten year old. It went by so fast! It's definitely been a fun and challenging experience!

Our Boston Trip!

Our family had a fun family vacation in Boston and other New England areas last week. We were able to visit my sister and her family who live in Boston and see some fun things in the area. Since I can't figure out how to put a caption for each picture, you'll just have to figure out what they are.

In Maine we saw the Portland Head Light lighthouse, went to the L.L. Bean stores in Freeport (recognize the giant shoe?), played in the ocean, and of course enjoyed some Ben and Jerry's Icecream that is famous in New England. Scott served his mission in New England so it was fun for him to drive through some of the towns he lived and served in. We got to see some of the apartments he used to live in and some other sites he remembered from his mission. We also enjoyed trying chocolate covered blueberries. Yummy!

In Vermont we went to the Joseph Smith Birthplace Memorial which was fun for Scott since he had his district meetings there while on his mission. The kids enjoyed riding in a golf cart to some sites around the area. The missionaries there were so kind to our family!

Here are some of the things we enjoyed in Boston!
- The New England Aquarium and touching all kinds of sea animals. The kids especially loved touching the star fish.
- The Duck Tours where we went on a tour of the city on land and then going into the water. Our tour guide was great and we learned a lot of fun facts about Boston!
- Touring the USS Constitution, walking the Freedom Trail, and seeing the Minuteman Visitors Center
- The JFK Presidential Library and Museum
- The kids especially enjoyed riding the subway and trains around the city.


Warning! There are lots of pictures! Enjoy!