Oregon..

Last week we flew to Oregon. We saw family that u hadn't seen in 8 years. Kerry and my kids finally met all if my dads family. While we were there we went to a drive thru safari that was the coolest thing. I've never seen animal so contained, yet free if that makes sense? I've never been so close to them either...without a cage in between us. It was a fun quick trip. We can't wait to go back and do more fun things when the twins are s little bigger. Here are a few pics to show what we did. All of the cool pics are in my camera and I am posting this through my phone for now. I'll have cooler pics to show later.

Thatcher Trip...

This morning we had the opportunity to go to my cousin Nathan's sealing in the Gila Valley Temple. It was a beautiful ceremony and my cousin Dawn (his mom) said that she was doing just fine during it, until she saw the tears in my eyes. Then she couldn't hold it back. Sorry, I'm a cry baby. I can't help it. I sat there thinking that almost 7 years ago Jerry and I were in the Snowflake Temple being sealed. It was a great reminder of the things we have been promised and that things we have promised to do.

We drove down the day before so that it wouldn't be such a long trip for the boys. (They were watched by older cousins while we were in the sealing.)


Here they are relaxing, watching cartoon after a long day in the car and playing in the pool. Kaysen asked Gage if he wanted to sit by him so Gage crawled right up and laid in between his legs. Then Kaysen started rubbing/tickling Gages arms. I love watching them in the sweet moments when they arent fighting.



Here is Gage pretending to be Rapunzel. I have numerous photos like this one. Ones which Jerry tells me to burn (he's kidding...kinda). This boy just loves the movie Tangled. If he ever finds a blanket, or our arm chair cover, he sticks it on his head, twirls around and sings. He even moves the blanket with his feet like Rapunzel moves her hair when she is twisting. He will get a brush and say, "I'll brush and brush and brush and brush mine hair" just like she does in the movie. Luckily he still calls himself a boy though...he just like to dress up.


Immediately when we drove into the hotel Kaysen and Gage saw the swimming pool. I made the mistake of bringing it up to them about 3 days before the trip was made and they'd constantly ask when they were going to get to go swimming. So we headed into our room, changed our clothes and jumped into the pool. It felt great seeing as how it was 104 degrees outside. That water sure cooled us off quick. We have never used life vests when we've gone swimming, so we have always been constantly holding them. This time I borrowed some from my sis-in-law and man they were a hit with the boys. They loved being able to roam all over.

Here is Jerry giving Kaysen a flip. He'd sit him on one of his shoulders then throw him in the air. Kaysen was having a blast.




Here Jerry is trying to teach Gage how to keep his face up, out of the water. It took Gage a little bit to get used to the life vest. It kept making him dip forward and his face would go in the water, but once he go the hang of it he was hooked.

My mom came along for the trip and got a family picture for us. Good thing we are all in the water. I'm wearing my prepregancy swimsuit that barely fits. Luckily it is a tankini and covered my expanding belly, but occasionally it would slide on up and my belly would be poking out.

Due to wildfires and my pregnancy and building our addition this summer has been lacking in the family vacation area. This was a great little getaway.

6 years...

On January 8th Jerry and I celebrated our 6th Anniversary! My Mom was awesome enough to watch our boys overnight so that we could celebrate. We headed down to the Suns vs. Nicks game. We had a ton of fun, even though the Suns played horrible. It was my first game so I enjoyed it and basketball is Jerry's favorite sport so of course he liked it.

The next morning we did sealings at the Mesa Temple. We haven't ever done them there and decided we'd like to since we were in town and didn't have kids to worry about. We always do sealings on our anniversary. It's a great way to remember our special day.

It sounds cliche but I can't believe it has already been 6 years. Okay, Okay. Sometimes it feels like we have been married much longer than that (in a good way) but most of the time I think of what else was happening 6 years ago and it's so crazy.

The past 6 years have been great. We've had our fair share of trials but in the end we get through them TOGETHER and that's what it's all about.

Where Dreams Come True...

That is the slogan to the place we just got back from....well okay. We've been back a week and a half now but are just now getting back to the daily grind.


Did Grandma's dream come true?? I hope so. She was able to come to Disneyland with us. And man are we grateful. She was so much help and even stayed at the hotel with the boys while they napped and Jerry and I went on the TOWER OF TERROR and other grown up rides. THANKS MOM!


Kaysen's dream of getting a driver's license came true when he was allowed to drive on AUTOTOPIA. Jer's dream of driving in California with little traffic came true too...on this ride at least.



My dream of going to Disneyland with my family came true. I think I was more excited than they were.

Gage's dream of meeting Mickey Mouse came true as soon as we walked in the gates of Disneyland. He jumped out of the stroller and it took all the strength we had to hold him back until it was his turn to meet him. Then we got some Mickey ears for the boys...notice he wouldn't take them off??

Kaysen's dream of meeting Buzz Lightyear came true too. This was by far his favorite ride. We had to go on it a couple of times.


We have at least 200 more pictures and at least 50 video clips but I didn't want to bore you with them...some of them were dang cute and fun too. (and of course my favorites wouldn't upload on here)

We had so much fun. We left at 4:00 am on Gage's 2nd birthday and spent 2 days at the park and 2 days just hanging out and driving. It was definitely the best time to go...our longest wait time was 20 minutes and that only happended once. Most rides we just walked right up. It was the greatest. This will definitely always be the time our family goes, even if we do have to pull kids out of school. We were able to ride 90% of the Disneyland rides just on the first day. Kaysen is already saying that now we are going for is birthday on October 6. But that isn't likely...hopefully next year though.

Hart Canyon...

Last week we went camping at Hart Canyon for 3 days and 2 nights.

Just while Jerry and I were setting up camp our boys looked like this....

Like Gage's Elvis impression??? He always does a cheesy smile so I had the brilliant idea to try and wait a couple seconds until the cheesy smile goes away then hurry and snap the pic...this is what I got. Still cute huh?

Kaysen thinks he is a stud....he is.

We spent most of our days riding the quads. We saw so many elk, deer and coyote. They boys loved it. Almost every time we hopped on Gage would fall asleep though. I guess he just felt it so relaxing....and everytime he fell asleep I handed him over to Jerry. I trust him driving one handed much more than I trust myself.

Showing us their muslces...and Gage almost falling off the stump because he got a bit too excited when showing those muscles off.

The crazy couple that decides to take two boys camping for 3 days.

Helping gather fire wood.

Waiting for his marshmallow.

Blowing the fire out.

Making sure he gets every last bit of marshmallow.


Brushing our teeth in the morning.

Then we went crawdad fishing in this beautiful creek.

There were some monster crawdad's in there. Kaysen and Gage loved it. Jerry tried to get me to eat the ones we caught....heck no. I made hime through them back.

My boys. Kaysen loves to point out that, "I'm drinking a BIG FAT coke." Camping is one of the only times he gets to enjoy his very own.

Camping was really fun this year. My boys were covered in BLACK dirt from head to toe within five minutes. Luckily they could jump in the creek to wash a bit of it off...but it didn't really matter because within 5 more minutes the dirt was back. They had so much fun, riding quads, playing catch, shooting water guns, shooting Kaysen's bow, swinging in the hammock, roasting marshmallows and just being outside roaming the woods.

Father and Son

Jerry and I have been trying to set aside days for each of us to spend time alone with one of the boys.

A few weeks ago Jerry took Kaysen to Father and Sons camping. It was onlyl one night but they both had a lot of fun. Jerry's brother and his son went and so did Jerry's dad. Acording to Kaysen, they all went on a hike to a cave, they ate squeeze cheese and crackers and of course some hot chocolate. Now he thinks we have to have hot chocolate everytime we go camping.

I asked Jerry to please take the camera for me. He knows that I love to get pictures of everything but I can honestly say that I didn't think he would remember to take any. He didn't just surprise me by taking pictures, he actually took pictures like I would. See th picture of those dirty hands??? I would take a picture like that. I found out that this picture was taken just 5 minutes after pulling up to camp.

Doesn't this kid look like he was just having a blast?? I'm excited thaty they will have this memory and many others to share.

Today, Jerry has taken Kaysen to a Diamondbacks game with a few other boy cousins and uncles. It sure is strange just having Gage home. The poor kid is pretty bored without Kaysen around. I guess I'm just not as fun as his brother. I sure am enjoying the little cuddles he continually gives em though.

Two Weeks...

The past two weeks have been great.

Jerry has been off the whole time. He took his nights off then had long change. Its been heaven. It's been the first time in a LONG time that he has taken time off and used it for a family vacation instead of working on a house.

It feels strange.

It feels great!

So what did we do with all this time off??

We planned on going to the Phoenix Zoo, a spring training game, Freestone Park, Jeepers and the Arizona Museum for Youth.



However, the day we planned to go to the zoo was the day it poured in the valley. Luckily we were there for 3 days and were able to be flexible with our scheduling. So on the rainy day we went shopping and also enjoyed In-N-Out Burger and Texas Roadhouse! Our favs. Mmm.mmm.mmm



So since it poured Tuesday, we went to the Zoo on Wednesday. We usually go right when it opens in the morning but this day we decided not to be in such a hurry. I'm so glad we chose that. It was the best day we've ever had at the zoo. Usually the animals are just laying around doing nothing and are so far away the kids can't even see them. This time the baboons were right next to the window picking bugs out of each other's hair and Kaysen was right next to them. The rhinos were close to the fence eating and we got to throw a carrot at the elephant and watch him walk over to us for more. Kaysen's favorite animals were the Orangutans. The baby one was playing peek a boo with a sheet, making Kaysen laugh like crazy.


Jerry and the boys in front of the elephants.
Cheesy boy. Gage always has to smile like this if we tell him to smile for a picture. He rarely does his real smile anymore. He's still cute and funny though. Kaysen was much too interested in the elephants to stop and take a picture with me though.

Here Kaysen is pretending to be a flamingo. He thought they were "silly" because they only stand on one leg.

The next day we went to the Arizona Museum for Youth. They had soooo many fun activities for kids. Plus, I didn't really have to worry all that much about my kids breaking something. It was all for kids. They boys were able to draw all over, make numerous puzzles, go in a tree fort, play in a kitchen, garden and bedroom area and much more. It really was a neat place for kids to go. They loved being able to run around from one thing to the next without Mom and Dad nagging at them to be careful. We will definitely be making another stop by this place again.
Finally! A REAL smile. Isn't he cute?


After the Museum we headed to the Mesa Temple so that Kaysen could see Jesus. One of the recent Friend issues had the Christus on the cover and ever since Kaysen saw it he wanted to see it in person. So we took him here. Kaysen and Gage loved it. Gage would just point and smile. We asked one of the Sister missionaries to take a pic and I love it....even though it took a few tries to get us all looking at the camera, without Kaysen's finger in his nose.


I may be bias but aren't these the cutest boys in the world??

It was a very good, much needed trip but I think ALL of us were so glad to finally be home. Although I can't wait to do it all again!!!

Once we got home we hit it hard. Well the boys did at least. We are still digging away on our trench for our retaining wall. Kaysen and Gage have so much fun digging with Dad. They think they are as big as he is.

Now Jerry is back at work. Kaysen woke up this morning and asked where Dad went. When I told him he was at work he said, "Why? He doesn't need to work anymore. He needs to be with us." I wish that he didn't HAVE to work sometimes but I'm sure glad that he has the job he does and that we live where we are now. We see each other so much more and it's making life better then I thought it could be.