New Year on the Beach

It's still unbelievable that we were on the beach New Year's Day.  It was a gorgeous day. The water was cold but the kids didn't mind. And when they weren't swimming they were making a sand sculpture.

KayLee spent the week with us!!!

It was a family effort.

And the creature is finished!!!

Burying EmmaLee was also fun.

Joe and I just read, watched and relaxed.

Yard Sale

I'm not so good at taking pictures so I don't have any of the big event...our yard sale.  We're trying to get ready to move so we spent a couple of days cleaning out the garage and going through things.  It was our most successful garage sale ever even though we still have a lot of things left.

After the long days work we went to Chipotle for dinner and then to the movie "How to Train your Dragon"  It was a fun movie.

If I was a good writer this would be far more detailed and interesting....to bad for no pictures.

The Scary ride home

Saturday Morning KayLee had her convocation where her name was actually read with the others in her college.  We attended that and then we needed to drive home.  We decided to go through Wyoming as opposed to driving through Denver as the weather report wasn't so good.  Well the trip started out O.K.  Then Nathan got hungry and was tired of sitting in the car and started to cry so we looked for a place to eat lunch.  We finally found a Golden Corral and had a nice buffet while Nathan stretched his legs.  We got back in the car and as we drove the weather started to get rainy and colder.

Then, traffic came to a complete standstill.  We don't know what was going on in front of us but we sat not moving on the freeway for 2 hours and it got darker and darker and snowier and snowier.  As we sat there it probably snowed 3 or 4 inches.  Finally at about 10:00 pm traffic started moving again but it was pitch black and the wind was blowing so hard that the big semi trucks were having a hard time staying on the road.  The wind was blowing the snow across the road so the road and the lines on the road were nearly invisible.  Not knowing whether to pull over and wait it out or to just keep moving, we just kept moving.  Thank goodness Joe was a calm and cautions driver because I was a mess.  He kept moving at between 10 - 25 mph.  It took us about 2 hours to go 20 miles and finally we had to leave the freeway at Laramie, Wyoming because the freeway was closed.  We had reservations for an room on and Airforce Base in Cheyenne so we called and cancelled those and then started calling motels to see if we could find one with openings.  We finally found a Howard Johnson's that would answer the phone so we slowly made our way there and because we were not dressed for snowy weather and we didn't want to spend the time unloading the car we just went in the motel room and went to sleep.

The next morning the freeway was still closed so after having not showered or even combed our hair we hung out at Wal-Mart with all of the other stranded travelers until the freeways opened up again at about 1:00 pm.  Then we had a 10 - 12 hour drive home.  We were very thankful to make it home.

I did take pictures of the snow and some other things...but they go lost.  Luckily one survived in an e-mail I sent to Ben.  This just shows how much it snowed in one night in April in Wyoming.

KayLee's Graduation

After having a nice visit with Grandma we drove to Provo for KayLee's graduation.  We also got to go to the tabernacle and see Joshua play the organ.  He had e-mailed Bro. Christiansen to see if he could and was told that he needed to memorize 12 hymns with pedals and then he would be allowed to.  He set it up so that we could be there.  That was fun.

KayLee's graduation was in the afternoon.  We sat in the Marriott center and even though we couldn't exactly see KayLee we were so proud of her.  What a great accomplishment.

Grandma's House

We had a lot of fun visiting Grandma.  Nathan and EmmaLee loved playing outside in the sand and with the animals.

Sadly my compter did something with all of the pictures I took so here are a few of the whole family when Sherece was also visiting.

We spent Sunday at Grandma's. Tom and Sherece's family came over and EmmaLee played with TaiLey so much and she cried and cried when they had to go home. Monday Joe, Melissa, DeeAnn, Darin and Jamie went to Cedar City. We walked around SUU a little so Melissa could see it then Darin surprised his girlfriend Melissa and they dropped Joe and Jamie off at Dutch and Christine Workman's then they went to Hurricane to go hiking. Then Melissa stayed in Hurricane and Darin came back and picked us up. Tuesday we just hung out at Grandma's.

Driving to Utah

On Friday we got up early and packed the car. It was raining.  And we drove to Colorado Springs.  We stayed on and Airforce Base.  The room we got was really a suite.  There were two bedrooms one with a queen bed and one with two twin beds.  A living room area with a pull out couch and a kitchenette. It was actually quite nice.  Since it  had a kitchenette we decided not to go out to eat.  We just went to the commissary and got Chicken for dinner and bacon and eggs for breakfast.  I think we got food for two meals for less than one at a restaurant.  Then Saturday we had a longer drive.  We drove through the bottom of Colorado through Page and then to Kanab.  It took about 12 hours with all the stopping we had to do for bathrooms and carsickness...yes Adam got car sick coming of a mountain.  It was a winding two lane road not a freeway.  At least he didn't barf in the car.

Swimming Lessons

Adam and EmmaLee are taking swimming lessons.  Adam needs to pass the BSA swimmers test and although he swims almost like a fish...he doesn't use correct strokes so he's learning them.

EmmaLee has always been almost terrified to be in the water.  She is starting at the beginning and doing great.

Although I didn't get any pictures of the actual lessons, here are some of us waiting outside the indoor pool for Adam to finish.

Nathan has to have a "leash" because he is a runner.  One day as I was helping EmmaLee change, (she was standing in the dressing room in a towel) Nathan ran out the door, down the hall, past the front desk and was almost out the front door before I caught up with him.