Potato Planting

 Today we spent the day at the garden planting potatoes! The kids took a lot of rocks out of the tilled up garden. It wasn't their favorite part of the day, but they all did a great job.

The kids worked really well together and put all the potatoes in the ground. Poor Noah was on a scout camp out the night before and I picked him up around noon. He was pretty tired and I think he was looking forward to a hot shower and a relaxing afternoon and evening at home. But he worked hard and didn't complain to much.

This girl got soooo dirty! All the kids did, but I think she takes the prize for the dirtiest!

 I love when Jane just wants her daddy. Today she kept reaching for him when she woke up from her nap. But Kendall needed to work so she tagged along and was as happy as can be!

After a much needed bath I found Jacob on the couch sound asleep! He worked hard today. We started the day with a piece of land that hadn't been worked in many years.  By the end of the day we had tilled the potato garden plot up, tilled up another field for other veggies, and planted 184 potatoes! So glad those potatoes are in the ground and look forward to eating them all next year!

Daniel Turns 6!

Daniel turned 6 years old yesterday! My Brother, Joshua, volunteers at an equestrian center and was able to take Daniel out for a ride. We didn't tell Daniel about it so he was super surprised and excited!

 He got to lead Shaw out to the arena and lead her around all by himself!

 Joshua said that at first he held on really tight to the saddle, but soon was more comfortable and held onto the reins. He even got the horse to trot, and giggled the whole time!

 He requested a volcano cake with snakes on it. Since I have absolutely no talent when it comes to cakes I let my mom do the cake.

 I think he likes it!

 He got another model for his birthday, it's an apache helicopter. He's already started working on it.

He also got the movie Epic which we watched that night. 

 Noah is an awesome big brother to little miss Jane! He loves her when she's squirmy and crying

and when she's sleeping in his arms. And she just lights up when she sees him!

Silly Faces!

Seriously, my children love to make faces in front of the camera! It's so hard to get a "nice" smile from these guys! Once one starts with a silly face it's all down hill from there!

School Play

 This year we joined a homeschool co-op. The kids have really enjoyed taking classes and making new friends. They put on a class play In The Lap Of the God's. I wasn't so sure Emma would like to be in the play as she is really, really shy. But she totally surprised me and LOVED acting on stage!

 The play was great! All the kids did a great job and it was so fun to watch them up there on stage.

Both Noah and Emma did an awesome job! They remembered all their lines and we could all hear them very well. I'm so proud of them! I am so grateful that they had this chance to try something new and exciting!

New Floors!

I have to say I'm super SUPER excited to be writing this post! When we moved into our house years ago, the carpet was gross! We would clean it and it would look okay for a couple hours and then look awful again. I've been wanting to put in hard wood (pergo) floors for years but it just hasn't happened. Well we finally decided to do it!

 Kendall started ripping our carpet when he got home from work on Thursday night.

 Jacob was right in the thick of it helping out his dad. The plan was for me to take the kids to their co-op classes on Friday morning while Kendall and my brother Joshua worked on the floors without the kids around. Noah woke up Friday morning and was disappointed that he wouldn't be able to help. This kind of thing is right up his ally! I told him that he could miss one day of classes and stay and help if he really wanted to stay. The elders needed some service hours and said they would like to come help. They spent all day Friday helping! Friday night both Kendall and Joshua were pretty sore! Ha, they're not as young as they once were!

 We let the kids have a movie day in their room today so they wouldn't be in the way. They elders showed up again and spent a good 6 hours helping us finish up. Jane enjoyed getting right in the middle of the work!

 This is the living room floor all done. All we need to do is the trim! I LOVE this new floor! Now I just need to find an area rug to go in the front room!

Ha, Kendall just might kill me for posting this picture, but I just couldn't resist! Can you tell where the last plank of wood was laid? He was so tired after two days of laying floor! But he did an awesome job! I love that Kendall can do anything, the perfect handyman! Hmmm, I think I'll wait a few weeks before I let him know that I have plans for him to put this flooring in our bed room!

Noah Turns 12!

I wrote this post last month and some how it never got posted. So here it is a little late.

Noah turned 12 this week! We had my mom and brother, Joshua, over for dinner and cobbler.

He got a cool tie tack from my mom.

We got him a pair of shoes, and new shirt and tie.

The kids got him ductape! He loves making things with ductape! He made a pair of shoes this week out of the stuff!

 

He wanted peach cherry cobbler for his birthday treat. Emma is good at photo bombing!

He is such a wonderful boy and I can't believe how fast these 12 years have gone by. I'm having a hard time with him turning 12! He went on his 1st campout and hike with his new scout troop this weekend and had a great time. Today was special as he became a deacon and received the priesthood! He is really excited to join the young men's program at church.