Fieldtripping with Ryker

Last week Ryker was FINALLY able to go on his Kindergarten field trip to the Zoo. He has been anxiously anticipating this trip for weeks! I signed up to go with the kids on the bus and be one of the chaperone's. It was kind of fun for me to share this experience with Ryker. I love how excited he was about everything..like a cute little puppy! :)
I had to get a picture of him climbing on the bus for his first bus ride. One of the big bummers for my kids is that they don't ride the bus to school seeing as how we live only a few blocks from it. So the first bus ride is always a big treat!

Thank you to Rykers teacher for giving me the group of "rowdys" to hang out with and keep track of. :) They were basically good kids I just had to keep reminding them not to run ahead and please stay with me so that I can see you!

Ryker liked this fun replica of a giant Komodo Dragon. We were looking at the real one and all the kids were calling it a lizard. When I told them it was actually a dragon they thought that was SO cool and couldn't stop talking about it..until we moved on to the next thing :).

Our little Zoo Boise now has Camels, Lions, Giraffes and Hyenas living in residence. It is fun to see the growth and the new African exhibit is so fun and looks more like a large scale zoo instead of the tiny one it has been. I love all the new things but I hope the prices stay the same! :)

Yee-Haw! You ride that Camel!

We had a good time and I really enjoyed spending time with Ryker. He is so cute and I love to watch his excitement over things. He sure does keep life fun!

Our Memorial Day Weekend

This past weekend we made a last minute decision to go up to McCall. I am so glad we did, it was a fun and relaxing weekend with lots of fun things to do. We invited our friends the Woodward's to come up with us, which they did but for just one night. It was a bummer to see them go so soon but hopefully next time they will be able to stay longer.

We went on some four-wheeler rides.

Kenedy taking a ride.
Avynlea and I going down the little hill.
Rylee fell and got a little scrape but her big brother was quick to take care of her.

Cute little Rylee and Dawson.

Wouldn't this be such a cute wedding announcement picture?

Kefford took the little ones for a turn on the small 4-wheeler. Here he is with Rylee. She knows how to work the gas and one has to be careful when riding with her because she will really take off!
Now Avynlea gets her turn. Going for rides on the paddle boat. All the kids thought this was great. Kefford, Dawson, Justin, Davis, Ryker and Brooklyn

Then it was our turn. Brooke and I got quite the workout paddling ourselves around! Brooke, Avynlea, Elizabeth, Lexus and Kenedy Rylee with a dirty hand!
Kefford took our kids out for a ride. Kenedy tried to be helpful and paddle with Kefford but he was too fast and her legs were not able to catch up!
The kids really loved the Hot Tub and spent a lot of time in there. Kenedy and Lexus gave Avynlea "swimming lessons". I am not sure how much better she can swim but they sure did have fun!
Our four cuties enjoying nature on our nature hike.
Ryker had one walkie talkie and Kefford had the other one. On our hike Ryker would constantly run ahead and then say random things into the walkie talkie. He thought he was pretty cool!I caught Avynlea being a mommy to Rylee, she was rocking her in this chair and singing lullabies to her. Rylee really enjoyed being babied!One of the last things to do before we pack up an dleave was clean off our 4-wheeler. Rylee really liked helping Kefford with this job. Such a cute little helper!

We had loads of fun this trip up to McCall and hope that we can do it again soon!

A good time was had by all!

Crazy, crazy... and slightly bored :)

A good way for me to ease my bored mind is to start playing with my camera. It is usually pretty accessible in my bored state of mind and so that is when all the fun begins..

"What? Did I do what? Blowfish!

"You talking to me? You better not be talking to me! You are talking to me! Oh it is on now!"

"You love me! You really love me!"

"Uh-huh"

We need to get those boys around next time I am bored!

ALOOOOO-HA

Last week all of the Moms were invited to achievement days for a mother daughter Hawaiian luau! Kenedy had been sooo excited since she found out about this and has been anxiously counting down the days. Finally the day had arrived!

We got cute little leis to wear and ate a yummy dinner of pulled pork sandwiches, chips and lots of fruit! There were cookies and a delicious pudding on a fantastic cookie crust that was all the rave. You had to have gotten to it quick because it was gone really fast and yes some people missed out. Ha but not me! I was one of the quick ones. It was sooo good but unfortunately halfway through eating it I found a hair in it. If you know anything about me you would know that finding hair in my food is a deal breaker. Even if it is mine my gag reflexes kick in really quick. So I could not finish it. Booo! Later I told Kenedy and she said that she found one in hers also but she just pulled it out and finished it. I was really impressed with that because there is no way I could do what she did! You go girl!!
After we ate we painted each others toenails. That was fun. I found a cute pink but then when I saw the cool blue my neighbor had I had Kenedy borrow it and redo my toes with that color. Kenedy had me do her toes and her fingers and she really enjoyed it!

Pretty toes! I thought the blue was going to turn out darker then it did. Oh well maybe next time!

We had a lot of fun and it was cool to be with Kenedy and have another fun bonding moment!

Vintage!

I have this dress from when I was little that my Mom made. It is so pretty and I love that my girls have been able to wear it also. **After giving the dress to me and after I showed her the picture of Avynlea in it my Mom then changed her mind and thought that maybe it was Emilys dress. Oh well it is still a dress from the past.

Rylee loves it because it is a good twirling dress and just look how cute she is. There are two ponytails in her hair but one of the ponys got a little tweaked! I thought her hair looked so cute with the one funky pony so I left it!
Here is Avynlea when she was two also wearing this little dress. She is actually the first one to wear it and unfortunately not Kenedy. When Kenedy was at the right age to wear it I do believe I put it on her but Kefford made fun of her and said she looked like Laura Ingalls. So I took it off of her because I did not want other people to make fun of her. When Avy came along I did not care anymore what people thought, I thought she looked cute and that is all that matters. Kefford still trys to call Rylee Laura Ingalls when I put the dress on her but I just smile and ignore it!

Blackhawks are cool!

Every year on career day a Blackhawk pilot and his Helicopter come to show the kids his cool machine. After he was done speaking Kefford took the little ones over for a couple of minutes to look at the beast!

Pretty cool!

Career Day

Since she started Kindergarten Kenedy has been begging Kefford to come to career day. Finally, this year, Kefford agreed to do it. It was extra fun because he also got to talk about his career in Rykers class.

Of course I wanted to come and watch with Rylee and Avynlea and since Mom, Emily, Isabelle and Ben were in town, they got to come also.
Here Kefford is trying to talk a little bit about glasses and how they are made to Rykers Kindergarten class. This class already had 3 or 4 previous demonstrations on different careers and had just about had it. It was a little frustrating because they were Kindergartners and thus acted like Kindergartners but Kefford kept his cool and didn't let it phase him a bit.

After a short break we headed over to Kenedys class where the little ones helped Kefford set up his stuff.

The third grade class were really good listeners and it was a nice way to end the time. Kenedy was really excited to have her Dad there and that was a lot of fun to see.

Kefford brought a hammer so that the kids could try breaking the "unbreakable" lens but there wasn't enough time to try it out. Avy was able to get a crack at it and the little kids thought it was funny that all it did was bounce away. No breakage here!

Color Me Mine!

Heather gave us all some more bath bombs and the kids were excited because this time they were for THEM!

Avy and Rylee got to have a yellow bath.
While Ryker really enjoyed his Blue bath.
Kenedy also got an orange bath but she is too old to have pictures taken of her in the bath tub. Ryker is really pushing it and I have since decided no more bath pictures of Ryker. It was almost comical having me and Kefford directing him in twisting and turning his body to make this a clean shot. I think we succeeded but no more!

Rylee girl

Isn't she a cutie? I love going to get her in the mornings cause she is usually so happy to see me and always so generous with her cuddles.

Then it is time to comb her hair
or as we like to call it...the taming of the beast!

Some fun randomness

OK these two pictures are not so fun but a couple weeks ago Rylee woke up with a really high fever. She was throwing up a little, would not eat, or drink and absolutely would not let me leave her sight all day long. So after making sure the other kids could take care of themselves I sat on my bed and held Rylee all day long. I did manage to sneak away a couple times when she fell asleep so I could check on things downstairs and do some laundry. But for the most part I sat on my bed with Rylee.
This weird flu thing only lasted one day and of course by the time Kefford came home Rylee had been able to keep down her medicine so she was feeling great and was happy and alert. Seriously Kefford, she was sick and I couldn't do anything all day! Thanks Rylee couldn't you have pretended to still feel sick so I wouldn't look like a slacker Mom?

Oh the poor Baby!

While in Utah my niece and nephew entertained us by putting pots on their heads after they cooked us some yummy food!

Here I am with my slice of cake, while Ashleigh got the entire cake...minus my slice of course! :)

Funny thing, I asked Isabelle (my niece) if she would cut me some of the cake we got for Ashleigh's graduation and much to my amazement this little 5 year old jumped up and did exactly that. The piece she brought me was so huge there was no way I could have ever finished it. She served everyone else normal sizes so I guess mine was the experimental slice but it was fun to see her being a helper and a good hostess!

Cute little Rylee riding the tractor.

Kefford told her he would let her ride the tractor but she had been in only her diaper so I threw on her the first thing i found which happened to be Kenedy's sweater. She loved it!

Temple Trip

While we were in Provo those of us who could took a little trip to the Temple to do a session. It was really neat because it has been a loooong time since I have done a session with anyone in my family. I really love what the temple represents and being in the celestial room with my Mom, sisters and brother was an incredible feeling!

Erin, Mom, Joshua, Emily and Elizabeth
I have never been inside the Provo Temple so of course I had to document this trip with a modeling shoot!

So happy to have been at the Temple this day!

No I did not jump off the fountain, I really can jump that high! :)

Erin says "Yippee for the Temple!"

I had a good time and could really feel the spirit inside the Temple, I hope to be able to do this again soon with my family!