Easter

Easter Sunday and General Conference fell on the same day this year. We enjoyed doing Easter activities and drawing while listening to the talks.

 Tie dye eggs

Below- Bethany's Dual Immersion Spanish class at the BYU Language Fair.

ROTC, Toe painting, Valentines

Carter looks sharp in his JR ROTC uniform. Carter is the flight commander of Echo Flight. He is learning some great leadership skills.

Bethany is always full of clever ideas.  Here she is trying out toe painting...

Her Kermit makes me smile!

Scott gave me these lovely flower on Valentines Day. I think these are probably the most beautiful flowers I've ever been given!

Mary Poppins, Beets and Pumpkins

Bethany with her friend Hunter Murdock after "Mary Poppins the Musical". Bethany was in park scene and a chimney sweep. She loved every minute!

Scott grew beets this summer.  He canned them this fall using his Aunt Mary's pickled beets recipe.  I was super impressed because I can't imagine canning for fun...  

 Aren't they pretty?  They taste really good too.

Carter, Ryan and Bethany enjoyed carving and decorating pumpkins in October.

Cup Cake Wars

Bethany helped organize an activity for the young women in our ward.  They had a cupcake decorating contest.  Each class drew a category out of a hat. The categories were all Disney movies.  Bethany came home with all the extra cupcakes (like 30) which did not make her mom happy.  Bethany gave us each one cupcake and then polished off the rest over the next week.

  Bethany and her pal from school, Lily.

Carter asked Alanna to Homecoming Dance.  It was his first date.

Most of the kids in his group are in Marching Band.  They are great kids, Carter has a lot of fun with them. 

Carter playing in the Homecoming parade which went down our street.  Carter is playing the euphonium.

We had a cousin weekend while Uncle Wayne and Uncle Aaron raced in the Lotoja.  We loved having Eva, Jacob and Audrey stay with us!   The cousins went to the pool, played in the backyard, played video games and watched a movie.

The girls made "jam" with the berries in our backyard.

Jacob has perfected the art of catching wasps!  He also spent  a lot of time searching for our cat, Merlin.  Merlin spent an equal amount of time hiding in the bushes.

Got one!

Farewell from Temple Square

Hello everyone! It has been a few years since I've helped with the blog, but I'm back! (you know who   I am right? I'm Bethany!)

Anyway, Camille was able to be released from her mission, and we had her farewell in the church office building. There were some talks and testimonies, and at the end we all got pie. I had one and a half pieces! (I couldn't finish the last one...) 

Camille with her bishop and boss thing-ma jig

We stopped to take pictures at the Christus 

(notice how it's spelled Christ-us)

MOAR PICTUREZZZ

Camille

Yay kids

OoOoooOh... who is THIS?

Ryan with his model poses

HUrm..... WhatS THis? It'S OvER? 

Yep. It's over.

Bye.

Capitol Reef National Park

We explored Capitol Reef National Park the first week in June.  It was stunning!  I never get tired of southern Utah's amazing red rocks.  We camped in the park at the Fruita Campground.  The campground is in the middle of the original pioneer orchards and has lots of shade.  The Fremont river runs next to camp but it's really just a large stream.  Everyone, especially Bethany, loved wading in the river in the hot afternoon hours.  Ryan, Bethany and Carter liked hanging around camp relaxing with a good book, building fires and eating treats.  They don't love hiking the way Mom and Dad do but they are good sports. 

The orchards in Fruita, Utah.

There is a herd of deer who were living in the orchard next to our campground.  As you can see they were not very scared of us.  The nights were bright while we were there, and when I would walk to the restroom during the night the deer were all through the campground grazing.

The first afternoon we were in Capitol Reef we hiked Grand Wash.  It's a mostly flat hike great for tired kids.  We enjoyed the beautiful canyon walls and pioneer names carved into the rock. At the far end of the hike we scrambled up the hill to some "tanks" and saw a hole full of tadpoles.

Carter caught one of the many kinds of lizards we saw in the park.

 

Early  in the morning while the kids were still sleeping, Scott and I hiked up Cohab canyon.  It was my favorite hike.  There are many hidden canyons like this one.  Some of the rocks were strangely pitted like swiss cheese.  The spring rains being recent, the greenery contracted beautifully with the red canyon walls.

 We explored the pioneer town of Fruita.  This is at the educational center for kids.  Bethany would make a great ranger!

 Ryan fell and sprained his wrist on the first day so our most enthusiastic hiker was in some pain the rest of the trip.  Being Ryan he was pretty stoic about it.

Senior Graduation All Night Party

Ryan- So at the end of this year I had the opportunity to go the the Wasatch High School all night grad party. I stayed all night which I think is a great accomplishment! The Graduation party ended around 5:30 in the morning. I then slept in and went to school later in the day. It was an Even Day so I had Seminary, Concert Choir and Adult Roles. I only went to the last two. One of my friends was very surprised that I was at the grad party. He thought I would be in my bed asleep. It actually took a while for my friends to convince me to go to the Grad party. I finally decided to go and went to the party. I then waited for my friends to come pick me up. While waiting I watched three movies. I was surprised I got in since I'm not graduating yet. I'll be graduating next year. Yay! I had a great time! The activities they had at the party were board games, bouncy obstacle courses, and then early in the morning they played a movie. My friends didn't watch the movie so we chatted. Which was very entertaining. Then around 4:00 am they had a hypnotist I thought he did a great job! It was very funny. My friend was sitting next to me and she was laughing her head off. I admit I was laughing pretty hard. For breakfast we had donut holes and chocolate milk. Not a great breakfast. But oh well ,it was fun!