Some Thanksgiving Fun!

Thanksgiving was loads of fun this year. It consisted of doing double time...at Kathryn's house, and at the Bryants. I don't know where my pictures are of Kathryn's house, so I'll focus on the Bryants.
The older kids sat around and played cards.


All of Grandma and Grandpaw Bryant's family came, so we took some family pictures.
And on Saturday, all of the kids made gingerbread houses! It's so fun that Grandma Bryant has this fun tradition!
Kate

Jocelynn

Dylan
Afton

Savannah and Parker

Meghan

Allyson

Fall Pics!

For U.E.A. and Daniel's Birthday, we decided to go down to Price, and then to Goblin Valley. It's been a tradition for me, to take the kids' school picture myself, I was thinking the Helper Parkway, and my mom told me about some cute pictures she had her SUN kids just had taken near a train. Lucky for us, it was a train right next to the Helper Parkway, and not on any tracks. Here are some of our favorite pics.


I've got the best kids, ever! I really do, so don't even be thinking other wise!

Dylan is a 6th grader! Last year in Elementary for him!

4th grader...Jocelynn!

Afton is in 8th grade, last year of Junior High for her.

And Kate...is a Sophomore!

Little Wild Horse Canyon

The day after our photo shoot in Helper, we went down to Goblin Valley, and decided to go hiking at Little Wild Horse Canyon! We did this hike 11 years ago, we had Dylan in a baby sling, Afton was 2, and Kate was 4! And Jocelynn was in Heaven, which she tells me, that it wasn't fair she wasn't with us. We went with Nana, and Nana's friend, Jim, and his daughter, Michelle, all those years ago, and thank goodness for them, because it was quite a hike!
Eleven years later, and that hike is still very beautiful, I am glad we got to go! We were so pooped that by the time we went to the goblins, we mostly just sat there. Next time, we want to camp at the goblins, and play hide-and-seek at night!
Forgot to mention it was pretty busy too! And the weather was just perfect!

Our Nana, she can do anything!

Told you it was beautiful!
Also told you it was ticky!
Some pooped out hikers!

School...once again!

Kate and Kelsie! Kate had to wear her soccer uniform top on the first day, since she had a game. I guess she's giving her grump face...

School started (in August) once again, for my cute kiddos. Kate is now a sophomore! Afton is a 8th grader, at her Junior High, Dylan is in 6th grade! Last year in Elementary for him! And my Jocelynn is in 4th grade! 4th grade! I can hardly believe it! In 4th grade, we moved from the dorms to our new house, and I had Mr. Westover, I think he is my favorite all-time teacher, probably because I was a good student, and he liked me, so I always got to run his errands! The funny things you remember! Here are some pics of the first day of school, and some pics of the night before, modeling new school clothes.
Afton and Maddi, Maddi, and Hannah

4th grader Jocelynn
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The Summer that never ended?

No, the summer did end, but we did more activities, so here are a few more that we did with Erina...

We went to Cedar City for Jacob's Baptism. On the way down, we stopped at Cove Fort, thinking it would be a nice little time to relax, and just learn more about the Pioneers, but it was "Cove Fort Days" and the place was packed! The best thing about it, was they served free lunch! So hotdogs and chips around. Erina really could join our family, because she did NOT like hotdogs!
We got to spend the night at the cabin...
The Cabin




Jacob and Grandma Murray at Jacob's Baptism

Make-overs at Kathryn's after the Baptism with Seval.
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Emma's Play! And Jacob's too. They both did a great job!Especially since it was a special dress rehearsal.

Jocelynn and Erina in her Ukata. Erina looked so pretty (and later, she was so sweet and sent all of the girls their very own!)


And of course playing at the park!

Erina summer continues...

I saw a groupon deal, and decided to buy it for a float down the Provo River. This was one of our most exciting/dangerous activities of the summer. It was only dangerous for the fact that we could not steer the boat, and we kept running into the side!
After rafting we visited Bridal Veil Falls.
After the falls, we drove to Salt Lake and had dinner at 5 Guys, Burgers and Fries. They had the biggest hamburgers we've ever seen, and we were surprised that Erina ate the whole thing! Plus fries!

Everyone emjoyed their dinner!

After dinner, we went to the Sandy City Hall to see the Hot Air Balloon Festival. I've always wanted to go to one, so I was excited that it was at a time we could attend. We got to watch them set their balloons up, and then blow them up, and at the end, see them lit up. It was really pretty. I don't know where my better pictures are!


It was a fun and memorable day!

Erina summer...continued

Erina was with us for about a month...here are some pictures of the various activities...
Pizza at Costco!
Ice cream at Dairy Queen (in Beaver)
Visiting Daniel at work and looking out at the city!
Tour of the candy factory!
and swimming!

An Erina kind of summer!

Well, contribute it to the fact, that growing up, in my house, we had many different people come and live at our house, that when the opportunity arose to have a Japanese foreign exchange student come stay at our house for a month, I talked my dear husband into letting her stay at our house,(this was especially great, since it meant that the downstairs bathroom now had a finished date). So we quickly signed up for a teenage girl...and picked her up with her traveling group at the end of July. Erina...so very cute, but she didn't speak any English! She smiled a lot, and we tried as hard as we could to help her feel welcomed, to feel like she was part of the family, and to communicate with her, but I'm still not sure how well we did. The best part was that we had to come up with activities to do, which was also the worst part, because I felt a lot of pressure to keep her entertained! But it helped to also provide my kids more activties, which was also difficult, because we were juggling everyone's schedules, especially Kate's, because she was just made the High School Soccer team, and she had to be to all of the practices, and then the games. Here are a few of the pics, of some of our various activities.

Went to downtown Salt Lake, to see Temple Square, then rode Trax to the Gateway
We went to the Bingham Copper Mine, to check that out... it had been raining, and they almost didn't let us go, but by the time we finished with the visitor center, it had stopped raining, so we got to see down into the open mining pit.
I must say, that our bowling alley is awesome! They did some program where "kids bowl free", you just had to pay for shoe rental, and you could bowl, so that was my life saver this summer! I thought I'd get to go bowling, but every time, something else came up, so I just dropped them off! I hope Erina liked to bowl!! (Never knew for sure, she never could tell us)