Stopped by Border Patrol

On the last day of school we pulled the girls out of class a little early, we jumped in the car and headed for San Diego. We got thru the first border patrol stop, no problem. At the second stop we were admiring the guard dog and as the guy on the left was waving us through, the guy with the dog was saying..."pull them over, pull them over"! They told us to all exit the vehicle to the right and "go stand under the awning"so we dragged the sleeping children out of the back. The seven of us watched as one of the officers circled our car with some kind of little scanning device...nothing. So he walks over to us and starts scanning us. Little beeper goes off, so he asks if anyone had had a recent medical procedure. I told him I'd had a P.E.T. scan that morning... he said, "you, step away from the rest of the group". He scanned everyone else then they scanned me. beep, beep beep beep bbeeep...beeeeeeep!!! I'd been injected with radioactive fluid for the PET scan. How creepy is that? To have a substance in your body that is considered a potential hazard that they were actually able to detect from outside the car! They copied my I.D. asked me a million questions, wanted to know if I had any brochure from the doctors office. I joked with them that they'd told me to keep away from pregnant women and small children to not expose them to the radiation, they hadn't mentioned anything about the border patrol. Kendon and Bly thought it was a highlight of the trip.

We spent several days enjoying the beautiful weather in San Diego, stayed with Bly's sister, Shanna and her girls. Enjoyed them so much! Had a wonderful time!!!

San Diego Zoo

We enjoyed our day at the zoo. It was especially fun to have our cousins, Kimbre, Bren and Eden with us!I think everyone's favorite was the hippo. What an interesting creature!
Tell me who looks cuter in a hat than this!?
Eden and Natilee enjoying a ride on the trolley.And this is Eden's Happy Face!!!

Mad Gab

We spent an evening playing games... just the big people. We played Mad Gab.








What a hoot!!! So much fun!

DelMar Beach in San Diego

So we went to DelMar Beach on our trip to SanDiego. It was a perfect day!!!
Everyone had a great time building sand castles, playing with the beach ball,
trying to jump into the air at the same time, which we never managed to capture on camera so here are the girls in a stairstep pattern. Alisyn looks like she will fly away!
We enjoyed body surfing and boogie boarding.
catching some rays!!! It was so fun to have Brenn with us!


Natilee played in the sand.

and although I hate pics of me, I want there to be proof that I was actually there and not just the one behind the camera. My son thinks he's funny to get hold of the camera and take a million pics of me trying to get the camera from him.
Lounging and swimming. We all got sunburned but it was a perfect day at the beach!

Don't let people drive you crazy

I love quotes! I don't have too much in the way of clever or profound thoughts but I like to reflect on the wisdom of others!!! So here's another quote... I saw it on a rubber stamp at the craft store. It struck me as really funny and I had to text it immediately to my sister, Amy. She wanted to know why I thought of her when I saw it. If you know Amy, there is no need for explanation. LOL!!

"Don't let people drive you crazy when you know it's within walking distance".

Mother's Day

My mothers day started with church at 8am where Claudia and Josh showed up to surprise me. They came and had lunch with us and spent part of the day. It was so nice to have them here!!! Kendon was also home for the weekend. And he will be home for the summer next week, all done at EA. Gonna start getting him ready for his mission!!! I'm so glad he is coming home.

Ramsay's drawing from art class and a card she made.

Alisyn's drawing with color pastels from her art class!

This one is Alisyn's drawing also! Aren't my kids amazingly talented!!!

Emily made this sweet little book with "10 things I love about you"!

Natilee was very busy making several things including a piece of wood with "MOM" painted on it... isn't it great! She made paper roses, coupon books, cards, lots of fun sweet notes.

Some of the cards I got! I feel so loved!

This is the whole spread! the backdrop is a wall that Bly did an excellent job of building to make me a craft room/office! He is also letting me order some Close To My Heart scrapbooking supplies for my mother's day gift from him. I am so blessed!!!

Recent Happenings in our lives

Our beautiful son, Kendon, has been attending college at Eastern Arizona College where he was a member of the accapella choir, which he had to audition for, he was one of only 12 new members of a 64 member choir. We attended his Spring Sing Concert which was awesome! I have to brag a little... he has an amazing bass voice, has taught himself to play the guitar, writes his own songs and has developed his piano playing... just kind of his own made up melody, but they are beautiful!

Doesn't he look great in a tux!

Emily just lookin' cute!!!

Claudia helped Alisyn with one of her school projects... a "float" for the state of Ohio. Claudia looks exhausted! How cute that they are wearing matching shirts.

Here is the "float". We thought it turned out kinda cool! I love their state motto, "with God all things are possible"! Wouldn't it be great if all states had a motto like that and they lived by it! We'd have a perfect world!!!

Our Garden

We have a tiny garden in 2 big planters on the back porch with 2 tomato plants and a few herbs, basil, cilantro, mint... and a couple of other things that don't seem to be doing well.
The tomatoes are growing like crazy though. When we had our very first tomato ready to harvest, we didn't quite know what to do with it...


1 tomato barely bigger than a golf ball. How is everyone going to get a taste of our very first tomato? I decided to create my own version of bruschetta. I used basil from our garden, cilantro from our garden, and fresh garlic from Safeway, chopped them all up, mixed together, and then put them on a toasted, lightly buttered piece of chibata bread.

This is how much it made...we were amazed how it seemed to stretch. Alisyn said it was like Jesus with the bread... I loved that she said that. Our own little miracle tomato! Plenty for everyone to have a couple of bites and it was soooo delicious! I think we were just so proud that it all came from our garden.

The best and most beautiful things

As I was unable to find myself sleeping at 2AM this morning, I came across this quote in my planner...

"things seen are temporal and things unseen are eternal" - Helen Keller

Helen Keller has always been a hero of mine. I think she was a remarkable person! This reminded me of another quote I had seen of hers so I looked it up. It goes like this...

"The best and most beautiful things cannot be seen or even touched, they must be felt with the heart" - Helen Keller

I will take time to share a little more of my thoughts on this later but I couldn't help but reflect upon the profound perspective and incredible insight this woman had.

Our Pets

And here is Hercules, Kendon's turtle for almost 5 years. He is recently deceased also along with the hamster, Memory. 3 pets down in about a 2 month period. Only Rachel is remaining. It's amazing how much he has mellowed since Cocoa is gone.

This is our cute little bunny named Cocoa. She was the sweetest, most cuddly little sweetheart on the face of the earth. Ramsay loved her so much. She died this weekend, below is her grave. The girls were all so sad... especially Ramsay. We will miss her.

But we still have our wild little Rachel rabbit. He is well loved also but he's just a little wild. (Yes, he is a boy rabbit named Rachel). Only Natilee can hold him without him being crazy.

And this is our cute little Christmas hamster, Memory. Alisyn got her for Christmas. She is sweet and so fun! Rodents are messy and smelly, (I swear there will be no more after these die off), but we love them anyway! They bring us joy!!!