Spring Break

Fun but busy spring break, we left after church on Sunday and headed to Wyoming

 Monday we stopped at Martins Cove, its a 5 mile to hike into the cove where the pioneers were stranded for 5 days in the bitter weather where they suffered terribly, my girls weren't the most cheerful hikers although Kate enjoyed seeing some of the dead carcasses left by coyotes.  During some of the complaints I tried to impress on the girls what it was like for the pioneers as they were in the snow and wind and freezing temps and for us it was a beautiful day, we even got a little sun on our faces.  Kate said her ankle hurt and was limping by the time we finished, when she got to the car and Eric took off her shoe she had a good size rock in it!  poor girl but she made it through and I have to say that once the girls realized we were going to go all the way around they quit complaining.  The visitors center there was great, I did want to do the short hike to Devils gate but after the big hike into the cove the girls and Eric were done.

  The next day we headed up to South Dakota and first stopped at Crazy Horse, this is the world largest sculpture, so far only the head is complete and it was a project started in 1948, the picture below is what its supposed to look like when its complete, which I have to say will probably be never...

 After Crazy Horse we headed over to Mount Rushmore, amazing!

 There are several fun things to do in South Dakota but unfortunately most things don't open until May or June so for our last day we headed to Reptile Gardens, pretty fun, they have a lot of stuff to do there but again most of it doesn't really get going until June.

 One of the girls favorite things was the giant tortoises.

 For the rest of our last day we spent it at our hotel which had an indoor waterpark, didn't take the camera in there but te girls had a blast.  Thursday we headed home and drove straight through, we did take a slight detour on the way home to glimpse at Devils Tower, you can actually drive right up to the tower and hike around (for a small fee) but we had a 12 hour drive ahead of us so we got as close as we could, snapped a few pics and headed home.  

 All in all a fun trip.

Busy weekend wrap-up

Busy weekend but lots and lots of fun spent with Eric and the girls. Apologies for the terrible pics, I dropped my phone on the floor at Costco a week ago and now its not taking such good pictures anymore.  Friday Sara had her dance recital, here she is backstage with the other girls from her class. 

Saturday morning we took the girls to the animal shelter to look at the cats, they really want one but I'm not quite ready yet to have another indoor pet.

Then we went to Classic Fun Center where the girls skated and played on the inflatables.

 Sunday Sara lost her 1st tooth!  In sacrament of all places:)

 

Kate turns 9!

I can't believe that we have had this girl for 9 years today!  Love her, she is so awesome.  Here she is on Friday testing for her purple belt in karate.

 With her new purple belt on at the end of the test.

This morning she opened presents before church, she was super hard to buy for this year because she said she had gotten everything she wanted for Christmas.  She ended up with a few hit presents, perplexus,  brainstring and some Harry Potter games and a Harry Potter quiz book.  She was surprised and loved her new stuff.

 We had a family dinner, Grandma, aunts, uncles and cousins all came over for dinner bringing her a few more presents, a soccer ball, blockbuster gift card, cash, puzzles and a state quarter collection book.  We had Kate's pick of Orange Chicken for dinner and as it was from Costco it was super easy and yummy.

 Followed by cake, I made a chocolate cake and a green velvet cake roll.

 We ended with a little Just Dance 4.  Fun day for a fun girl.

First Feis

Since we moved to Utah Sara began taking Irish Dance, a few weeks ago she took part in her first dance competition, for Irish Dancers its called a Feis.  She did very well and placed 5th in both her dances, she danced a light jig and a reel, as it was her 1st competition she got medals for both but will have to work on just a few things to get one next time.

before she danced

with her medals

 with her friend Rachel in the practice area.

Archery outing for 4

Eric and I love groupon, on Saturday we used one of our groupons and went to Full Draw Archery for an hour of 'bow and arrowing' as Sara put it.  Super fun and we all loved it.

Days 22-24

I was doing so well with my posts but my cold got the better of me.  We finished up the advent, day 22 we took a carriage ride around the lights at Thanksgiving Point, I doped myself up on dayquil and glad I made it because it was fun, best pictures I could get from my phone.

 Day 23 was making some edible Christmas trees that are all over pintrest, Sara loved it, Kate had recently made them at activity days so was a little over it.

No pictures for day 24, we went to a friends for Christmas Eve dinner and all the kids acted out the nativity, it was cute, then we came home and watched this mormon message, opened our secret santa gifts to each other and went to bed.  Before I hit the hay though I put this breakfast casserole in the fridge for the morning, highly recommend it for a special occasion breakfast.

Day 21 - Make a pom pom ornament

I offered to watch my friends kids today so she could get out and do some Christmas shopping so I thought this craft would be fun, it worked out OK, only my Sara and her friend Rachel wanted to cover their whole balls, the others opted to make designs with the pom poms and then stop which worked out because I didn't have nearly enough pom poms for 8 kids.  Inspiration from here.  Maybe I'll post a picture of the finished ornament but right now I'm in bed at 6pm because my body is not co-operating with me and the 3,000 things I have to while I am finally of  work and exhibiting signs of a bad cold or the flu.