One Year Pictures

We got Claire's one year old pictures taken, Janae again did a great job. We love them. Loved the location and the cute props.

Cheese Ball!!

Okay so Claire is a lounger, notice leg up hand out. She does this everywhere we go. Shopping cart legs up back to side of cart, stroller, high chair, you name it she lounges.

Don't you bother me!

Are you Stinkin' Kidding Me??

Mom, please don't make me get any more picture's taken!

Thanks Janae for taking her cute pictures. Love your work!!

Saturday Fun

So I kind of forgot to post about this, was looking through pictures and so here they are. I ran the American Heart Assocations Heart Walk/Run 5k on Saturday at Sugar House Park and took some time off my last 5k. Before the race

Claire looking like she is having fun waiting for Mom, "GO MOMMY"

Done, in 30:16 I took 2:46 off my last time. hopefully that will get better!

Then we headed home and Daddy headed up to school to get some much needed work done. We cleaned the house and Daddy mentioned he wanted some more popcorn. So we made some.

Claire is a great helper, she was holding my grocery list so I could get stuff written down.

Wanting the popping popcorn

Yum that looks good

Aren't Saturdays fun??

Faith Factor

As some of you may know I have one of the greatest callings, I am the Achievement Day leader in my ward for all the 8 to 11 year old girls. I love these girls, they are always willing and wanting to do what I come up with. This activity was, I thought, fun. We had faith factor
(sorry I can't take all the credit I got the idea from sugardoodle.net). We divide into two teams and had scriptures written on the board that I would uncover before each new activity. The team that found the scripture the fastest (all the team members in there own scriptures) was the winner. After finding the scriptures they had to tell me the Faith word(s) in the verse(s). Then if there team won they got to pick there activity.

(for the privacy of my girls I will be changing names)

Sour Lips-object to get as much juice from the lemons as possible in 30 secondsGertrude and Pamela are at there best Gertrude, getting the lemon juice out.

Pamela, spitting hers in, hoping she can get more then Gertrude

We had an Ice Melt-object is to have your whole team melt there ice cubes, in there hands, the fastest.

The Brady bunches hands were absolutely frozen by the time they were done

Apparently jumping up and down makes the ice cube melt faster


Next Shakira and Nancy were Breath Taking, object to get the cotton ball of the opposite side of the table

Nancy, blowing so hard her face turned a little red, but working so hard.

Shakira in action, wanting to win, blowing, blowing, blowing.


Shakira and Pamela were ready for bounce. Object to get as many tennis balls to BOUNCE into a garbage can.
Doing great ladies



We had a Drop Zone- Object to drop three goldfish into there teammates mouths before the other team
Megara, Winny, Apple, and Montana all were at there best, never giving up and being cheered on by the rest of the team.

We also had Slime Ball, where teams had to get down to the slime of a grape by taking the skin off. Creepy Crawly, they used a stick to get gummy worms from a bowl to cup to cup and see who had the most in the end cup in 2 minutes. and Black Hole two girls are blindfolded and throwing balls and there partners are holding the bowl to toss into, first to get there two in wins the point.

Thanks for a great activity girlies!!

our last day

So our last day in Sydney took us to the Powerhouse Museum. We saw lots of fun things. Like this bike that I tried out And this shoe that is made out of candy but is really a bike. My kind of shoe!

And I got to play the piano with my tootsies

We got to see coral beds crocheted. It was amazing, they were all different colors there hand to be a couple dozen different coral beds

And of course we played in the kids area. Well everyone but Claire she was snoozen
Lift this...

Pull or push this

Then dump it and start all over.


After we hit the museum we went and met the kiddos at home and Kevin worked at home that day so we could go SWIMMIN'. They took us the the Sydney Olympic Pool. Now I have taken Claire to a pool before and she sat there and cried most of the time. This time she made me nervous she had no fear and went under the water a few times and I had to grab her and she came up a spittin' . She loved floating on her back and get dumped on with the giant bucket of water, and playing with the other kids. There was a lazy river and a slide. And we all had a great time, thus the lack of pictures, sorry to much fun, not time to pose.

Then we had to say our goodbyes and packed up so we could leave for the airport before 6:00a.m.

Claire and Daddy waiting for our plane to leave.

FREEDOM after our long flight she was crazy and all she wanted to do was crawl, so we let her. then onto our flight home

THANK YOU so much Stacy, Kevin, Madi, Cooper and Rylee for letting us come and stay. We loved visiting and seeing you and all the places you love to go. Thanks for letting us use the Hutchinson Hotel for a few weeks.

A Day of Sightseeing

So after headed to the Blue Mountains and to see the famous Opera House and the Gardens, the next day we decided to go Whale watching. We kindly asked Stacy if she could watch Claire for us and we headed out.

We saw lots of this...and this...
and this....
but we saw no whales. We got a free trip back, and ended up giving to Stacy and Kevin. Mind you when Stacy found out we would get a free trip of we didn't see whales, she said I hope you don't see any whales. So I am giving credit to Stacy for no whale seeing. But the Ocean is beautiful and we got to see many things on our trip out and in.
Then since we had no Claire we planned to meet with Kevin and we went to the Sydney Tower. There is a simulation about Australia and an observation deck.
The view was beautiful. Kevin lookin' at the sights.
And of course to boys wanted to play outdoors. So me being the youngest child that I am tagged along. We took the Sky Walk tour. They take you outside (attached of course) and we walk along and the guide tells us about Sydney, the truth, the lies and the rumors. Of course there has to be at least on glass floor. (I tell you am an not afraid of heights so much as falling from those heights, is that the same thing??) anywho. So we get to the second much smaller glass floor and she tells us to hold onto the railing and look over, I was feeling good about that, and then all of a sudden movement, and it was getting bigger. Oh too much excitement makes your heart pound, and that is what it did. But we got some great pictures.

Hands up like we just don't care(well I do, but who wouldn't pose for a once in a lifetime picture)Look at the view, gorgeous
Lookin' scared just for me!
Look at us we don't care (again, I did a little)



Mean while back at the Hutchinson Hotel, we had all sorts of fun going on. Cute picture Stace!!

Back to our Adventures

We still have 5 days left in Sydney to tell about and having a birthday and weekend out of town cased a brake in the telling. So now is as good as any to tell, seeing as the hubby is at school and the girlie is sleeping soundly. We last saw ourselves in Toukley with a rented van and a great time with the Barrs. We kept the van an extra day so that we wouldn't have to make Stacy drive us up to the Blue Mountains. That means Brandon was driving and a few times I was afraid of hitting something, seeing as we drive on the opposite side of the road. We headed up to the mountains and I was warned to not think of Utah mountains when going to see them, they are not the same. Also The day we headed to the Blue Mountains was our 4 wedding anniversary.
The Blue Mountains, when it is not as windy and cold like it was when we got there, the Eucalyptus Trees give off the sense that the mountains are blue
The Three Sisters, the Legend is: The Aboriginal dream-time legend has it that three sisters, 'Meehni', 'Wimlah' and Gunnedoo' lived in the Jamison Valley as members of the Katoomba tribe.
These beautiful young ladies had fallen in love with three brothers from the Nepean tribe, yet tribal law forbade them to marry.
The brothers were not happy to accept this law and so decided to use force to capture the three sisters causing a major tribal battle.
As the lives of the three sisters were seriously in danger, a witchdoctor from the Katoomba tribe took it upon himself to turn the three sisters into stone to protect them from any harm. While he had intended to reverse the spell when the battle was over, the witchdoctor himself was killed. As only he could reverse the spell to return the ladies to their former beauty, the sisters remain in their magnificent rock formation as a reminder of this battle for generations to come. There is another Legend saying that they were changed to stone to protect them from danger.
After being in the cold and Claire shivering, we headed to get some yummy hot chocolate.
So we got this cup with a metal cup inside and candle in the bottom, we pour the milk in and put the chocolate pieces in and stir. When it is how we like it we drink from the straw. So good, we decided to come home with one.
Brandon enjoying his cocoa
I also tried this Tart, seeing as sweets are not as sweet, I was able to eat the whole thing without flinching. Sorry I was so excited to eat it, I forgot to take a picture until Brandon reminded me.

And Claire loved the tart as well, look at her eyes, she was so happy I shared. Then we headed to Wentworth Falls, and saw this beautiful waterfall.


The Next Day Stacy and Rylee joined us in going to the Opera House and the Botanical Gardens.
The Sydney BridgeDifferent sides of the Opera House

Then we headed into the Botanical Gardens to meet Kevin for lunch and then a look around. They have bats in there trees. It was amazing to see.

Then from the Gardens you can go to the Government Building

Stay tuned if you would like to hear more of our trip.