Let The Games Begin!

Well the soccer craziness has begun.  We've had a few weeks of practices (M, W, 5:30-6:30) (for both Emmy and Jonas) and then games just started this past Saturday.  It makes for some busy times, but it's good.  We've got about 6 more weeks of practices and games and then it's done - short and sweet!  :)

Anyways here are a few pictures from Emmy's and Jonas' first games:

Emmy's team is the Purple Minions.

 If she looks cold, it's because she was.  We've had a cold weekend - it even snowed today!

Emmy is the best to watch!  She's always in the game, going after the ball, trying to kick it, etc.  She's very active and just too cute to watch.

Kick!

She didn't score a goal this game (unfortunately nobody on her team did!), but did score two goals in a scrimmage a few days earlier.  So we've got some high hopes she'll score in a game.  :)  She loved playing!

 Where the ball is, there you'll find Emmy.  :)

The fun post-game high-fives!

Jonas' team is the Black Ninjas.

 Jonas is a little bit different of a player than Emmy.  His stamina is not quite what his sister's is.  Nor is he too aggressive towards the ball.  Hopefully he'll get a little more in to it as the season progresses.

He did get the ball a few times in the game.  (P.S.  His tongue is out in typical Jonas-style!)

 It was still a fun game to watch.

 Jonas got to be goalie for the last quarter.  He was excited about it.  He didn't get too much action at the goal, which was fine with me.  :)

And here is Lucy the Ewok.

It was a fun Saturday morning full of soccer!

The Chicks

Well we got new chicks today.  Our old chicks had become ugly chickens.  They were good egg-layers and also very good at what chickens do best:  peck.  We lost one to a raccoon, gave 2 away last summer hoping with only 2 remaining there wouldn't be any pecking - but there still was.  The final 2 died last winter.  In fact, irony of irony, the last one to go was the one we thought we die the 2nd winter due to the huge wound she had from being pecked on all the time.

Anyways, I didn't really think we'd get chickens again . . . but we did.  For many reasons, but a couple reasons made me okay with it all.  First of all, our kids will have the bulk of the responsibility of caring for these chickens - each week a child will be assigned water and food duty, plus egg-collecting once they start laying.  The kids had to buy their chicks with their own money (okay, so we helped Emmy a little and Lucy and Ben "share" one since Lucy didn't have any money . . . ).  We will be adding a bigger chicken run area so hopefully we will have happy hens.  Also, after our vegetable garden is done (late October) we will let the chickens out in our garden (putting up some high chicken wire fencing or something) and let them have all that space to roam around and fertilize our garden.  :)

Anyways, on to the cute pictures:

Cute boys and their chicks.

Love this - Emmy's trepidation at Miles' chick and Lucy's excitement as Ben gets her chick out of the box!

I was actually surprised Emmy held her chick.  She's gotten a lot more . . . . well, more like me in the past couple of years in regards to birds.  :)  But she loved and doted on her chick.

Cute Lucy - she was only about 7 months old when we last got our baby chicks.  She was pretty in to her chick.  Too in to her at times.  :)

I can't remember all the kids' names for their chicks.  I'm not sure they know for sure at this point either.  Jonas' chick might be Anna.  Miles' is Shadow, Emmy's is Chirpy.  And Lucy's/Ben's might be Elsa (per Ben) or Caleesa (per Lucy).  We'll see what they end up being called.

Miles' chick Shadow.  Cute.  For now.  I still didn't hold or touch any of these chicks - because, even though they are cute, they are still birds.

 Lucy loving it all.

Emmy was pretty delighted, too.

It was a fun evening for the kids.

As I said on facebook:
I must really love my children (and Ben, too) because I really hate birds.

March Madness

March was like a lion and a lamb together and usually happening within an hour's worth of time.  Rainy, sunny, windy, snowing, sunny.  All within an hour.  What a crazy month.  A little late, but here was our calendar:

Spring Break - All in One

Well, sorry, but this is going to be an all-in-one post - no breaking it up in to days.  Which equals lots and lots of pictures.  

I was going to head out after church on Sunday to Midway with all the kids - but minus Ben (who had work of course).  However, my dad called that morning around 8 to tell me about the weather.  He was nervous about the predicted high winds on my travel - especially with all the semis that drive my route.  So I started checking the weather and saw that my highest point - Soldier Summit - could get 6-12 inches of snow on Sunday.  With high winds.  No thank you.  So I talked to my kids and told them we were going to have to leave on Monday instead.  Lots of whines and moans (some of which were from me . . .).  So I called my dad back to tell him that we would be heading out on Monday.  Then my dad brought up the possibility of going to St. George instead for a few days.  And that sounded perfect!  I checked the weather for my drive and it was just forecasted for high winds that were to be done by about 2pm.  Plus, the next few days were to be in the mid to upper 60s in St. Geroge.  Much better than Midway's 40 degree temps and more rain/snow.

So I left after the 2nd hour of church and we were off.  All was good through Grand Junction.  Then the winds picked up and were super crazy and wild.  Once Jonas even remarked, "Whoa, that moved our car!"  It had.  Then the winds weren't super crazy - but it started raining and snowing.  White-out snow conditions at times, too.  It was no fun at all.  I was stressed.  I hated it.  But we made it - even in better time than I had anticipated. (I keep thinking it's like around 8 hours to get there.  Really, I think it's more like 6 1/2.  I took me 7 hours - and that included most of the drive going under the speed limit, including a good stretch on I-15 were I was going 40, instead of the 80 limit.)

My parents, never one to shy away from driving in crappy weather, headed down to meet me.  They left around 6:30, I think, and got there by 10:30.

Monday morning I took the kids swimming at the pool.  And who did I run in to?!?!  My old childhood friend (as in a best-friend, really) from Virginia!!!!  Angela Fink (now something else).  Too crazy.  It was really fun chatting with her.  She has four kids and lives in Idaho Falls.  Just nuts.

After swimming we headed out to do some hiking in Snow Canyon.  It was cool, the weather warm, the kids happy.

They found a little cave spot.

These are pioneer names, supposedly, written with axle grease.  Miles had no fear nor hesitation in hiking up to the names.  Emmy joined him just about.  Jonas almost made it before he turned back down.

We did some little white-rock hike, too.  Miles was determined to climb up to this rocky point - the highest point at this trail.  The kid is quite impressive with his stamina and determination.

Not only did Miles climb up fast, he also ran down fast, too.  Perhaps a little too fast for me to feel completely comfortable with.  Miles is the tiny dot straight down from Emmy.  My mom, Lucy, and Jonas stayed at the bottom.  Emmy made it about 2/3 of the way up.  She could have done it, I'm pretty sure, but I was getting nervous about me helping her on the way down and so we decided she'd stay and wait.

Then we made it to the sand dunes.  The kids loved it!

Some nights included playing games, like Othello:

After the kids were down, my friend Angela came over (her grandparent's bought a condo like 2 houses down and over from my parent's place!) and we visited for quite a while.  It was fun for my parents, too.  My parents were really great friends with her parents.  Fun, fun.

Tuesday we went to this crazy park - full of all things that spin.  It's totally fun and different.  We've done it before (I think I saw it on my cousin's blog a couple years back and just had to go  :).

Last year Emmy got stuck in some bucket seats that just spin and spin and spin and never stop pretty much.  She was sick all day from it!  This year we all knew better.  :)  But everyone still enjoyed spinning - just not too much.

My dad had given the kids some money and Emmy had already been begging about going to a store.  So I had my mom take us to some second-hand stores to see if there was anything for them.  The first one she took us to was so awesome - I wanted to buy 1/2 the store!  But it's more of a cool antique store - not super cheap prices.  So we tried another store.  Emmy and Lucy bought some stuffed horses and Lucy also found a cute, little, fold-out doll house thingy.  She was so excited about.  Miles bought two items for 50 cents.  Jonas saved his money.

After lunch and such we went back to town and played in their little downtown "creek" area and splash pad.  It wasn't super warm (due to wind and clouds), but the kids got soaked.  Especially after Grandpa's bet - which earned the kids a tiny bit more money.  :)

Wednesday we headed to the Children's Museum.  It was pretty darn cute and I think the kids enjoyed themselves:

Playing in the bakery.

I have no words for this.

They all loved playing "Smiths" (ya know, the popular grocery store in Utah).  Shopping, ringing up kids, etc.

Lucy was fixing the car.

The girls performed - a little song and dance.

After lunch we drove up to Midway.  It's a "quick" 4-hour trip and wasn't too horrible.  The weather was great for us (although my dad, who headed up about a half-hour before us had rain and sleet and such.)

I was so glad we were able to go to St. George and enjoy the nice weather and fun things there!  (It had rained/snowed most of Tuesday in Midway and even snowed a bit there on Wednesday.)  But it was nice to be in Midway as it feels much more like my parents' home - cuz it is, I guess!  :)

On Thursday I took the kids to Classic Skating in Orem.  Loved it.  Maybe more so than the kids.  Though the kids sure loved it, too.  I used to go rollerskating at a Classic Skating rink, but in Sandy.  Fun memories!  We had disco balls, funky lighting, the works.  And there was hardly anyone else there.  It was loads of fun - I made sure to rent me a scooter, too (yes, you can ride scooters there!), so I wouldn't just have to sit and watch them.  We all had a blast.  There are other things at this place, too - like bouncy houses, a huge climbing thing, etc.  We did it all.

We got to play a game of "red light, green light" hosted by the young "DJ" there.  We played enough rounds so that every kid won some sunglasses.  That boy on the right?  A random boy that decided to join our picture.  :)  I had asked his name:  Aiden.  I love this picture, though - random boy and all.  :)

Afterwards I took the kids to the dollar theater ($1.50, actually) and we saw the only kid show showing:  The Nut Job.  It was okay.  I think the kids had fun.  Although Lucy did fall asleep on me towards the end.  :)

Ben arrived, by train, that night - 11:50pm.  Almost 2 1/2 hours late.  Like always.  Ugh.  My dad is always so kind and generous to pick him up.  I had planned to and wanted to for his 9:30pm arrival.  But not for his midnight arrival.  But only because I don't drive well in the dark down windy, canyon roads.

My good friend, and, frankly, Ben's too (Megan), from BYU was in town and so we got together and met up at the new Aquarium on Friday.  It was . . . a disappointment.  Like 1/2 of the tanks were empty.  Empty, nada, zilch.  We really should have been charged a half-price admission.  It was a little ridiculous.  It was also super busy.  There were some definite cool spots - like the penguins and the overhead shark tank.  We saw a cool sting-ray that would swim right up to us.  Also a fun sea-turtle.

Afterwards we just went to a park and visited with Megan and her family.  We hung out there for a few hours and it was a super nice time.  There was a little park the kids played at.  Then a bit of a ways off there was this huge tree with a rope on it for swinging.  The kids spent a lot of time on it.  It looked super fun!

Here we go - first row:  Jonas, Ellie.  Next row:  Jack, Emmy, baby Lindsay, Lucy, Miles.  Back row:  Greg, Megan, me, Christian, and Ben.  What a cute bunch!  :)

Then it was off to Cafe Rio for dinner.  YUM.  And, finally, our last stop of the day - a BYU baseball game.  It was just fun being there.  About the 5th or so inning we spotted Cosmo.  And Lucy couldn't keep her eyes off him.  She kept following him, asking where he was when she couldn't spot him, called out his name, etc.  It was super-duper cuteness to the extreme.  He, Cosmo, finally made his way over to us and oh what a treat:

Cosmo giving Lucy a high-five.

Giving "fists" or whatever you call that to Emmy, I think.

He was just one of the Maxwells for a bit.  Check out Jonas' cute expression.  :)

Lucy was mesmerized with him even more after that.  :)  She kept looking for him, starring at him, etc.  Adorable.

We left around the 7th inning.  It was getting a little late and little too cool.  But it was a great evening!

Saturday we watched conference, took the kids swimming, watched more conference, Ben took the kids on a drive on my dad's "thing" and they hiked up Memorial hill.  I went grocery shopping with my mom.  After dinner the two men left for Priesthood session and we just hung out at home.  I made a little post-conference treat.  We got the girls to bed and the men came home.  They then gave up a little synopsis of each talk during conference.  This is one of Ben and mine's tradition, that just started including the boys last conference.  It's nice and enjoyable and great to hear about the great talks given.

(Anyone still hear that has read every word . . .???)

Conference Sunday with the Maxwells = Scandinavian puffed pancake breakfast. It was delicious and fun to share it with my folks!

We watched more conference and the kids kept pretty busy with their conference bingo and some coloring pages my mom had gotten ready for them.  After the 1st session, Ben and I headed out with the boys to Salt Lake, where we got to go in the conference center and watch the 2nd session.  It was really great being there with the boys.  They were interested in the cameras and the such, but it was still a really nice experience for us all.

We had a yummy dinner by my mom (who has vowed to not cook anymore) and a fun evening - complete with playing some Pictionary.  We headed out pretty early on Monday and are now adjusting (some better than others, ahem Jonas - see a later post) to real life once again.

Here are a few random pictures:

Cute Lucy playing with some magnets.

Miles started making a bunch of origami cranes - and couldn't stop.  Kind of cool, yet kind of excessive, too.  :)  That's my Miles.

And last, but not least, some videos:

At the sand dunes.

At the crazy park in St. George.

The skating rink.