Merry Christmas...Ha.

Sorry,

This Christmas post is a bit late. I predicted February, turns out....March was the magical month. Christmas this year was a lot of fun. We got to spend the holiday with my family this year. We got to spend time with my grandparent's  and our cousins. We had a special musical program on Christmas Eve, at my Grandma Melda's request. Graycie played a piano solo. Kenzie, Riley, Asher and Graycie sang a song and acted out the nativity scene. I sang a song as did my dad and his siblings. Lacey played the piano for us all. We also had Grandma and Grandpa share some of their favorite Christmas memories from when they were kids. It was a special night.

The holiday was spent with cousins, playing in the snow. We took all the kids snow skiing one day. Kenzie is still on the fence about whether or not she wants to be a skier. Graycie is amazing and seems to really like. We also got to go ice skating with Mamma D and her family. It is always so wonderful to see them. Kenzie was an ice skating whiz kid. She seriously picked it right up and was skating like a pro right away.

It was a wonderful holiday. Enjoy the pics.

10 Years Baby!!

Well,

Dustin and I have officially stayed married 10 years. We celebrated our 10 year anniversary on August 17th. I know we are a bit behind in the blogging world, and perhaps it is strange to be blogging about our anniversary in December. I promise, the Christmas post will come....probably by February. :)

We decided to go to an all inclusive resort in the Dominican Republic to celebrate the big 10. It was just what the doctor ordered. We had a great time relaxing on the beach, eating delicious food (Dustin enjoyed about a million virgin pina coladas). We went parasailing on the beach right outside of our hotel. We also spent some time kayaking.

 We went on a tour where we got to see a school, a coffee plantation and coconut plantation. It was fascinating to go out in the countryside and see how the local people really live. It was humbling and made us grateful for all the little things that we take for granted. We also got to go to a local beach and do some boogie boarding.

The best part was probably our zip lining tour. It was seriously so much fun. We zip lined over, through, and above the jungle. It was so beautiful and we finished just in time....after our final line a torrential rain storm hit. Dustin overheard (in Spanish) the guide's talking about how dangerous it was to zip line in the rain. Thankfully, we were done, but I know there were at least a few others from our group out on the lines still. The guide said the rain makes the lines really slippery and difficult to stop properly.

It was so fun and I forget how awesome my husband is sometimes. It was wonderful to spend some one on one time with just him. It made me remember why I fell in love with him some 10+ years ago. And heck, it is easy to fall in love again when you are in a tropical paradise....I highly recommend it.

Here are a few pics.

The rest of our summer...in a nutshell.

Hello,

  Well today it feels like FALL. So I guess that means I should write about the rest of our summer. :) Kenzie turned 5 this summer...sniff, sniff. I can't believe she is already five! She had a fun party complete with a "pinyasta" (she couldn't remember how to say piñata and kept calling it a pinyasta). She helped decorate her own birthday cake and absolutely LOVED being the center of attention all day long. She is already bugging me about when her next birthday party is!

 We also went to Lake Powell this summer. Graycie learned how to water ski this year and totally rocked at it! I think gymnastics has made her little legs so strong, which is definitely helpful when you are trying to learn to water ski. She would get a bit nervous once she was up and would bail anytime she got to close to the wake, but she did amazing! It was so fun to watch her. :) Kenzie loved riding the tube with her cousin Asher, and riding in the battery controlled bumper boats that Nanny and Ta-Ta bought for each of the grandkids. It was such a fun year!

Both girls started school in August. Things are going pretty well so far. Kenzie HATES waking up in the morning and is a total bear for the first 30 minutes of the morning. She likes school though and is enjoying feeling like a "big kid". Graycie is having a good year too...she has made some new friends who she really loves and is growing up all the time. :(

 Enjoy the pics.

Summer Happenings

This summer has been absolutely loaded with fun. It started out with a trip to Mesa Verde National Park....we pulled our trusty pop up trailer the 6 hrs. to the park and had a grand time looking at all the ruins.

The girls were really interested in the ruins and learning about the Anasazi Indians. Kenzie made us all sufficiently nervous climbing up the really tall ladders into and out of the ruins. She kept reassuring us that she could do it on her own....sheesh...I about had a heart attack.... multiple times.

In more recent news....Graycie had a birthday AND got baptized. We are so lucky to have such wonderful and supportive family. Grandma and Grandpa Sidwell came. Grandma and Grandpa Morrill along with Lacey and her boys came too. Graycie's baptism happened to be over the 4th of July weekend so the whole family got be here for the 4th of July festivities. The kids had a fun time lighting fireworks in the street in front of our house.....turns out it was totally illegal, which we didn't find out until afterwards. :) Much to Asher's delight we also made a trip to the top of Pikes Peak as well.

Graycie's baptism was so tender and perfect. My mother and Dustin's mom both spoke. Her daddy baptized her..... I couldn't hold back the tears and can hardly believe that our Graycie is already 8 years old. It was a wonderful day!

Lacey and her boys stayed for a week after the baptism and we spent it running all over Colorado Springs. We even made a trip to Denver to a little amusement park there called "RiverSide Amusement Park." It was seriously the most ghetto amusement park I have ever seen.....however, our kids didn't seem to notice at all. They had the time of their lives!

Most recently, we returned home from a trip to Oklahoma where we had a family reunion with my mom's side of the family. We went boating and visited Turner Falls. It was quite beautiful. It was so fun to see my aunts, uncles, and cousins.

The summer isn't over....I hope we have enough energy to finish it out!

What's been going on?

Well,

It has been many moons since I last posted anything. It almost makes it hard to remember all the awesome stuff that has been going on lately. :)

Since I haven't posted since January I will try and go back a bit. Kenzie had her first ballet recital in March. She was so excited...everyday she would ask when her ballet costume was going to get here (even though I had explained to her a million times that it was being shipped to her ballet teacher's house). When the big day finally got here she jumped on stage, no hesitations, and danced her heart out.

Graycie is taking piano lessons and is getting really, really, good. She is also still working away at gymnastics, it makes me hurt to watch her practice because she is SOOOOO flexible.

Easter was a lot of fun, we decorated Easter eggs, much to both girls delight. We also had an Easter egg hunt with a bunch of friends at the school playground. We had just come from one of Kenzie's soccer games (notice in the pictures she is wearing a ginormous jersey, because she is the tallest kid on the team they gave her the biggest one....it fit her like a dress.) The girls had a great time hunting for eggs with their friends.

Kenzie loved playing soccer and was pretty darn good. Falling was an issue...I swear the girl fell about 5 times every game. She never cried and would get right back up and take off...she is super aggressive (much to Dustin's delight). She scored a goal for her team and was so happy she had to run over and high five us right then.

Graycie continues to love to create art and is getting really good at it...she will be taking an art class this summer. Seriously, she comes with art from school that is better than anything that I could ever make. Her grade has been studying the different continents at school.....when they got to Europe they had an English tea party. They decorated their classroom and got all fancied up, they even got to have AMAZING treats and eat on real china. It was soooo cute and Graycie could hardly stop smiling. I was one of the servers and got to see her giddiness first hand. So adorable.

Life is good...enjoy the pics.