Happy Easter! Happy April Fool's Day! Happy Spring!

The tulips and daffodils are all blooming in my yard and it is so pretty!!  I'm still hoping to get another ski day or two but I'm also enjoying the nice spring weather.

Tori and Boston arrived 2 Sundays ago while Jared was on a business trip to Washington DC.  Boston got to get acquainted with his great grandma Hill.

We had a wonderful Easter last weekend and were so happy to have Jared, Tori and Boston with us as well as Josh on Easter Sunday.

We started off the weekend with a sledding trip.  We had to go all the way to the Olympic Bobsled park in Park City to even find snow and when we did, we only got to sled for a little while before we were told it wasn't allowed.  Oh well!  We had a fun time.... Boston was a little leery of the whole thing and just wanted to watch.

After our fun in the sun, we colored Easter Eggs.  Boston wasn't too sure about that either but we had fun!

Easter morning was fun for all.  Boston liked carrying around the baskets and eating the candy.  All the kids liked hunting for eggs, especially the "money" egg which is what they are all searching for in the 2nd picture down.  :-)

After our yummy Easter dinner, Josh and Adam went outside to have a chalk fest!  Joshua brought it back from the Color Festival that was on Saturday.

In the evening we enjoyed the nice spring weather and played Spike Ball and Basketball.  Even Tori (5 months pregnant) was doing a pretty good job with the basketball.

This next picture is what Boston did to all my stools in the kitchen.  Apparently this is what they do at home so he won't climb up on the table so he thought it should be the same way at Grandma's.  It was adorable.

The aunts and uncles all loved playing with Boston.  Rachel even taught him a little bit of chess.

When it was time to go back to California Boston gave everyone hugs!!

Once again... HAPPY EASTER and HAPPY SPRING!!!!

This weekend is General Conference!!  Woohoo!!

Our Last Cub Scout Graduation

Adam turned 11 in December and has been attending the 11-year-old scouts since then.  But last night was the official graduation from Cub Scouts.  He received his Arrow of Light and crossed over the bridge to Boy Scouts.  There were 6 boys crossing last night so it was a big group.

The Pack Leader makes these cool arrows and plaques when the boys get their Arrow of Light.  She wraps the arrow with different colors to represent all that they have achieved.  It is very cool.

Adam also received a special achievement award because he earned 28 activity pins in Webelos.  This is amazing because in the new program there are only 14 and in the old program there were 20.  The program changed in the middle of his Webelos year so he had a bunch from the old program and then earned a bunch in the new program.  GOOD JOB ADAM!!!

For those of you who are familiar with Boy Scouts, you may be wondering why Adam has already reached the Life Scout Rank and has a Camp Hi-Sierra Patch from 2005.  It's because he was born in Boy Scouts and grew up at Camp Hi-Sierra.   Hahahahaha.  Just Kidding.  It is Joshua's shirt since we don't have one for Adam yet.... and he loves it because it is all worn and soft and comfortable.  :-)

More Skiing

It's been a bit warm the past week or so and the snow is melting fast... even up in the mountains.  But, we managed to get in some more skiing and are hoping for a good snow storm so we can keep skiing for another month or so.

We went a week ago Saturday and David went with us.  We met some friends (the Grames) up there and skied with them for a while too.  On our very first run down, David's friend, Keith, kind of ran into David.  Rachel happened to be filming so we got some good video of it and a few pictures that capture it as well.  Luckily nobody was hurt and we had a great rest of the day skiing.

The kids had a short day on Tuesday so we headed up again and had a great day without many people.  David was the responsible adult and went to work.  We sure love him for making it all possible.

 David is the one on skis and Keith is just plowing into him

 Rebecca

 Gaylene

 Rebecca, Keith, David, Rachel, Gaylene, Adam

This is Rachel smiling.   She smiles like this the whole time she is skiing because she loves it so much.

Here is a picture that shows the difference in crowds between a Saturday and a Tuesday.  Now you understand why we cut school so much and go during the week.  Hahaha

Provo City Center Temple Open House

We had a nice visit to the Provo City Center Temple for the open house.  It is amazing what they've done and it is beautiful.   We were so glad to have my mom and Josh join us.

And dinner afterwards at Los Hermanos.  :-)

Presidents Day Weekend in St. George

It's an annual tradition to go to St. George for soccer over Presidents Day weekend (which also seems to include Valentine's Day).  This year Rachel's team went down for the IceBreakers Tournament and Adam's team went for the Rage Invitational Tournament.  Rebecca's team didn't go this year so she ended up reffing (which means she actually made some money - Yay!!!).  Mom and Dad spent a lot of time watching soccer and driving kids to different fields.  Here's the rundown of the weekend.....

Adam won his first game 10-2
Rachel lost her first game 0-1
Adam won his second game 2-1
Adam won his third game 5-2 - Qualified to go on to the Finals
Rachel won her second game 1-0 - Rachel scored THE GOAL
Rachel tied her third game 0-0 - Qualified to go on to the Finals

Adam lost his final game 2-0 - Heart breaking
Rachel lost her final game 5-4 - Ended in a tie and they had to go to PK's.  Heart breaking.

It was lots of fun though and we squeezed in a movie, a couple of team parties, and a trip to Zions National Park where Gaylene, Rachel and Rebecca hiked to the top of Angels Landing with Karen, Brynley and Quincy Rozsa (they were there with us for the tournaments).  Adam and David didn't go  because Adam was sick and David has done it before so he stayed with Adam.

The hike was awesome.  5 miles round trip.  It was pretty challenging, especially where you have to hold onto chains because the trail is so steep and narrow.  I was so glad to do it though and the views were spectacular.  It was also nice that it was only about 50 degrees instead of 104 degrees like it was the last time we tried.  David and Josh were the only ones who made it in that hot weather.  The rest of us ended up waiting IN the river.

All in all, it was a great weekend but we're glad to be home again.  Hope everyone had a HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!

Action Shots of Rachel and Adam

One of Adam's Goals (the next 3 pictures)

Rachel's Goal

Rachel after her successful PK 

Brynley and Rachel

Angels Landing in Zions (The top of that mountain)

We hiked along that ridge out to the peak at the top center of the picture.  In the middle of that sheer cliff are 2 rock climbers.  I decided that our way up was definitely less scary than their way up.

Karen R., Rebecca, Rachel, Gaylene

 Rachel

 Rachel and Rebecca

Brynley, Rachel, Rebecca and Gaylene

This is called Walter's Wiggles.... some very tight switch backs.  This is the view from the top as we were headed back down.

Adam and Rachel with their proud father  

January Wrap Up

I can't believe January is over already.  I never even posted Christmas or Adam's birthday so here are a couple of pictures from the last 2 weeks in December.

Christmas Morning

Adam's 11th Birthday on December 28th

One thing the kids did between Christmas and New Year's was build a giant snow cave in our backyard.  They even incorporated our fireplace into it so they could sit around the fire inside their snow cave.  It was really cool!!

Josh and Adam

 Rebecca and Rachel

 Rebecca and Josh inside the snow cave

 Rebecca, Josh and Adam inside the snow cave

January has been somewhat of a BLAH month.  But, the SKIING has been great.  Here are a few pictures from our adventures.

 Rachel, Gaylene and Rebecca is on the ground.

 Adam

Rachel on the new gondola at Park City 

Those 3 people prints in the snow are Gaylene, Rebecca and Adam.  We were having a good time in some fresh powder we found.

It's funny that some of our favorite pictures are of falls because they are so amusing but the kids are all excellent skiers and snow boarders.  They rarely fall and it's usually because they are goofing around and almost trying to fall.