A "Cool Rider" in training!

Now that Ryker has mastered riding a four-wheeler it is time to move on to bigger and better things. A dirt bike!

Here he is all prepared for his dirt bike riding training course.

Kefford showed him brakes and clutch and gas.

then father and son took a test drive.

now it was time for the maiden voyage solo ride.

the kid got a little bit tipsy but not once did he fall or let the bike fall.

Kefford and I were both a little shocked and amazed with how amazing he did. He really took to it like a pro!

After we loaded the bike up Kefford let Ryker ride on it back down to his Grandpas house.. about a hundred yards away.

He was making me laugh because he was pretending the entire ride back that he was for real riding it and would make pretend turns and everything.
What a cutie kid and I love seeing his excitement for yet another new hobby of his!

Fashion Show

The other day I sent Kenedy and Avynlea up into their room to clean it up. I didn't know until a day later when I downloaded the pictures from the camera onto the computer that the reason they took so long cleaning was because they were playing fashion show. Apparently Kenedy was the designer and Avynlea and Rylee were the models!

Aloha-ha-ha

Ghetto Glam

Island Princess

Street Chic
I think they all have fashion careers ahead of them for sure!
Which look is your favorite?

It's a girl!

My sister in law had her first baby last week and because of the swine flu going around we couldn't go see her in the hospital. So we went out to Emmett after they went home to see her. I only had Rylee and Avynlea with me because the other two kids were in school.

Rylee absolutely loved holding baby Brooke. She was a little shy about it at first but then quickly warmed up and we had a hard time getting her to let go.

She is such a pretty baby and slept the entire time we were there.

Avynlea also enjoyed holding her but not as much as Rylee.
Such a cute baby we are very excited to have her join the family!

Hair!

While I was curling my hair this morning getting ready for church Avynlea asked if she could do her own hair. Actually it wasn't so much asking as it was telling me that she was doing her own hair. I wanted to finish mine before I moved onto hers so I let her do it. All the while thinking "how am I going to break it to her that I will be the one who does her hair for church?"

Look at her work her hair like a pro!

Can you see how much concentration she is putting into this?

She had to redo the second pony a couple of times until it was perfection in her mind.

Smiley girl all done with her hair!

And this is how the back of it looked.

She even went the extra mile and added bows.
I know you all are wondering if I really let her go to church like this..well to tell you the truth..HECK YES I DID! Can you tell how proud she is of doing her hair all by herself? I just smiled and let it go all the while telling her how amazing she is to have done it all by herself and to please let people know that you did it all by yourself. What a cutie. Of course at church somehow her pony's got pulled out and so I had to do a quick finger comb and pull it into one pony because we lost the second rubber band. But no worries it still looked like she did it all by herself!

Snow Baby

This little one is ready for the winter snow!

She pulled this coat out and put it on so she could go play outside the other day. It was pretty cold out but I don't think it was cold enough for this coat.

Isn't she adorable?!

Letterboxing?

This past week the kids had Thursday and Friday off from school. Now normally I really dread these days off from school because it is just alot of bored kids sitting around at home bugging me. But I had a friend from California move up here recently and she suggested we get together and do Letterboxing. Letterboxing is this crazy nationwide thing where people leave clues on the Internet and you follow the clues to find a hidden box that has a stamp and notebook in it. You are supposed to bring your own stamp and you leave your mark in the book and then stamp your own book with the stamp you find. Once you are done you put it all back where you found it so that someone else can find it. They have these boxes hidden all over the country and anybody can do it. Go to Letterboxing.org for more info.

So we went with the Grogans and found it surprisingly fun!

We found our first box at the Joplin cemetery hidden under this tree.

The second box was also found at the cemetery behind this tombstone also under a tree.

The box was missing from its place at this park but the kids really got into throwing big rocks into the pond that was out there. We spent a little over an hour with them throwing rocks.

Good throw Rylee!

Avynlea took a break to rest her throwing arm!

The third box was found by the Meridian Water Tower under one of the big logs.


The last one we hunted for and found was at another cemetery, the Meridian cemetery. It was hidden in a hole inside the tree!
This was a really fun activity and I would recommend it to anyone who has bored kids looking for something to do. We hunted for seven boxes and out of the seven only found four, but it was something we will definitely do again!

Spoooky Cupcakes

Last night for Young Womens the Beehive class did cake decorating. We asked Sister Marlene Terry, the ward wedding cake maker :0), if she would come and show the girls how to decorate cakes. She agreed and came really prepared with fun projects to do. We learned how to do a shell border using a star tip and we made this cute halloween spider and fun graveyard out of the cupcakes. We had the best time, Marlene is one of my most favorite people and she made learning how to pipe frosting so much fun. She sent us all home with some great ideas, a star tip, a grass making tip, plus a couple of bags of frosting.

We actually molded our own pumpkins out of modeling chocolate and then used a leaf tip to give it leaves. Mine turned out so cute but I ate them before I thought to take a picture. So for the sake of the picture I used some candy pumpkins. Just imagine how cute my own pumpkins were on top of the cake!

I think I found my new winter time pastime!