DuttonLabs

Zander's first words

2012-01-25T14:59:00.002-07:00

So Zander just recently said his first word. No it was not mom or dad or anything cute like that but his first word is Dog. He loves our Cleo dog and I can always get him to stop crying or being a pill by asking him, "where is Cleo?". So shock of shocks when in the last few days he started saying his second word. Any guesses? Of all the words out there he can now say Cleo.

update

2011-11-01T13:20:00.001-07:00

So anyways here is a little update on what has been going on in the last few months. We just celebrated Halloween last night. Liz was Cleopatra (actually she was the monster high Cleo denial). Kayla was a monster high werewolf. Blake was Batman and Zander was Batman's sidekick Robin.

After trick or treating down our street Blake and Kayla decided they were done. So I ended up taking them home and took Liz and her friends out for another hour.

Jared just got back from his deer hunt. He and Liz were drawn this year. Jared got his buck opening morning.

Zander turned 1 last week. Jared just started taking a metal working class and his first class was on Zander's birthday. So Jared hurried home from work and we woke up Zander and had a little party. You can tell from the photos Zander is just waking up.

A few weeks ago we headed to Greer Arizona. We stayed in a really nice cabin and were able to go fishing. We caught 7 fish total. Blake caught the most with 3. We ate them for dinner and Blake made sure he ate the biggest fish.

On our way home we stopped and launched Jared's rocket. It went really well until the last launch when the rocket flew away and was never found. I just thought this picture of Liz was funny. Check out those glasses.

And here is our new puppy Shotzy (German for sweetheart). Jared and I picked her up on the way home from our romantic 13 year anniversary getaway. The kids were really surprised. We need to take more pictures apparently since this is the only one we have.
She is doing well on her potty training and has lots and lots of energy. Hopefully when the baby gets here in May she will be more calm like our Cleo dog.

2011-05-16T09:36:00.002-07:00

Alright here is my recap of the last few months.

Zander was blessed with his cousin Kent.

Blake had his 4th birthday, which included a super hero themed party with all his friends. We played super hero basket (fruit basket tip over), we made spiders and spider webs, we tied up bad guys, and we had super hero cake and homemade root beer.

We had an Easter weekend with both sides of the family which included a trip to the mall for new Sunday dresses, playing in the splash pad, egg dying, 2 Easter Egg hunts, a BBQ of crumbled Belk burgers (lets just say we all ate a lot of chips and pie), and Sunday dinner with the Great Grandparents.

The girls have been taking music lessons this year. Elizabeth plays the violin and Kayla plays the piano. They had a recital which only lasted 10 minutes. Best recital ever! Oh and they played great.

Zander is getting bigger. He is 6 months old now. He can sit up, roll across the room, and get on his knees and rock back and forth. He has a jumping horse he loves to sit in and bounce. I wanted to upload a movie of him in it but it was taking to long to upload and I don't feel like waiting around all day. He started teething a few weeks ago and loves his rice cereal! I have never had a kid eat rice cereal. The first time I tried feeding him he did so well I asked Jared how many bites he thought Zander had taken. He figured around 6 (that would have been good for any of our other kids) he really ate around 30 bites! At his 6 month check up the Dr asked if he was sleeping through the night. Yeah right. He said he was old enough to do it, no need to say that again. That very night he was moved upstairs into Blake's room. I have no idea if he sleeps through the night but I can't hear him downstairs so I am sleeping good. :)

Blake and Jared went on their first Father's in Sons Camp out. When they got home Jared set up the tent in the backyard. We had a fire and roasted marshmallows and told "scary" stories like how dad went to the store and spent all the money. I like to tell that scary story alot. :) The kids then slept in the backyard. Well not the baby.

2011-02-15T12:16:00.002-07:00

This weekend was my grandmothers birthday and she had recently told me she wanted some pictures of the kids. Saturday morning Jared and I thought it would be fun to hold a "photo shoot" in the backyard. It was actually really fun and after promising Blake he would get a star for his chore chart if he participated everything went smoothly. We even got a few smiles from Zander, of course those were usually in the same pictures Blake had his eyes closed! We were able to get a few pictures made for my grandma and were able to have a nice visit with her. It was also a nice surprise when we got to her house only to have the door be opened by my brother Richard! It was great to be able to see his family and see how big Kenton and Wesley are getting.

I think my favorite is the one with all four of them laying on the grass. What do you think? Anyways we had a great time as a family this weekend. After our mock photo shoot we went to the music store to get new strings for my/Elizabeth's violin and a new piano book for Kayla. Jared was inspired while we were there and has been getting out his old trumpet the last few days (even at 9pm when all the kids were asleep!) and yes he did wake up Zander and no he did not go right back to sleep!

2011-01-31T11:51:00.006-07:00

So after not posting awhile I was asked to put up some pictures of my little ones. Sometimes I find blogging is like a chore for me,( if you have ever been to my house before you would see how much I hate doing chores.:)) probably why I don't blog very often. So anywho here are a few pictures of the family over the last month. The first few are of Zander who is still not sleeping well in the middle of the night and who at this very moment is screaming at the top of his lungs. I still think he is pretty cute though. :)

Here is a few random pictures of Jared getting a pressure washer for Christmas. I accidentally added these pictures to the blog and thought oh well might as well keep them up. As I am sure most of you already know Jared was really sick this month. Within a few days of the new year Jared ended up getting the flu 10 days later he still was not better and having a fever of 104 we thought hey maybe we should go to the ER. Well a few hours later and and x-ray revealed the problem. Pneumonia in 2/3 of his right lung. He was admitted to the hospital and was released 5 days later! Luckily he is doing much better and is looking forward to his strength coming back.

This past weekend with Jared feeling a lot better he took our three oldest children to the Monster Truck Rally. The kids had a great time! They got to go down in to the pit before the show and meet a few of the drivers and Jared even won T-shirts and hats for the kids by winning a contest of taking out spark plugs the fastest. ( He even did it with his eyes closed! No joke)

Jared is a little obsessed with having us take pictures with duck faces. Here is Blake and Elizabeth satisfying his love of water fowl. :)

Blake is in his super hero phase and is obsessed with all things super hero. His absolute favorite is Batman. Everyday I am instructed to be Robin while he is Batman and we fight bad guys together. I knew there was going to be a Batman truck so I had Blake wear his Batman shirt, he was really excited to go and me the driver until he got there and realized the driver was real, he is really shy.

It sounded like they had a ton of fun and I can't wait to go another time when Zander is a bit older.

2010-11-09T15:12:00.000-07:00

So we decided to get a new camera a month ago (thanks Blake for breaking our last two cameras). These pictures were taken the day we got it. It is hard to believe we were still swimming only a few weeks ago. I just really liked how these pictures turned out and thought I would post them. I also realized that I need to take some pictures of my new baby! He has gone over a week without a new picture.
A little update on Zander and his two week appointment. He weighed 9.2lbs and was 22" long, he is doing good. Now he just needs to learn how to sleep longer than an hour during the night! He knows how to sleep for long periods in the day you would think he would know how to do it at night time! :)

pumpkin carving

2010-11-03T15:09:00.000-07:00

This year we bought 6 pumpkins to carve for Halloween! Jared's family was down visiting to see Zander and were able to hang out with us as we carved pumpkins. Grandma was a ton of help carving the pumpkins with me having to take care of the new baby.

Blake was pretty sure he could carve all by himself. He drew the design on his pumpkin but ended up in the end needing some help from his dad.

This is Jared's pumpkin, he saw a bunch of different designs online and thought he might give it a shot. I think it turned out really cool, so did some of the trick or treaters that came to the house, there were lots of comments on it.

Weird to see another person in our family pictures. :) Glad Zander is finally here! You must check out Jareds blog on the side. He turned one of our pumpkins into a "scary" pumpkin that honked at you after you pushed a button on its nose. It was hillarious hearing the trick or treaters scream from being caught off guard. I even had adults tell me it really scared them. :)

Introducing

2010-10-28T15:50:00.000-07:00

Zander Kenneth Dutton was born on Monday October 25th 2010 at 4:53pm. He weighed a healthy 8lbs.15oz. and was 21.5" long. The kids were super excited to come and see their new brother. When they arrived Jared asked them to guess how long it took me to push out Zander, the closest to the correct number got to hold him first. Kayla guessed 13 minutes which was the closest to the real 8 minute time. I like Elizabeths 2 minute guess though, wish she would have been right. :)

2010-08-27T11:07:00.002-07:00

Elizabeth has been taking violin lessons this year and her teacher told her she need to start using a full size violin. So lucky girl has started to use my old violin. Well last night Jared was digging through boxes in the garage and found a bunch of my old violin books so I thought this morning I might go through them and play a few songs. I think I was on my third song or so when I heard the garage door close. Hrm, wonder what Blake is doing? Well when I finish up with the third song I turn around to find Blake on the recliner with a pair of Jared's shooting ear muffs on. Come on Blake I wasn't that bad!

Kayla turns 7

2010-07-19T13:42:00.002-07:00

Last Saturday was Kayla's birthday. Since her birthday was on a Saturday we decided she could open her presents in the morning instead of waiting until dad got home from work. We put out her presents in the family room so that she would see them when she came downstairs in the morning. She was super excited, but she still had to wait a little while to open her presents because we had to go and borrow the Owensby's camera because ours broke again. Jared took Kayla to pick up the camera and get doughnuts for breakfast. Once they were back Kayla with a little help from Blake opened her presents.

Thank goodness Target had Barbie baby newborns. I had been hearing for a month about this toy! Kayla was really excited that I got them for her. After presents we decided to take the kids to Despicable Me. Blake actually sat through the whole movie, a first for him. The kids liked it but Jared and I thought it could have been better. When we got home we went swimming and then later in the day we went to Ponchos for dinner. I swear Kayla only likes that place because of the desert bar. The kids had ice cream, churros, jello, and sopapillas. Obviously when we got home no one was in the mood for birthday cake. No big deal we just did the birthday cake the next day.

Here are a few pictures of Blake in his homemade robot suit. He had me cut out holes in a paper sack for his body, but we couldn't figure out what to do for his helmet. I told him to go ask his dad and this is what they came up with.

It's a....

2010-06-23T08:29:00.000-07:00

Here we are getting ready for the sonogram to start. It is a really small room but we made it work. When the sonogram tech moved to that "area" it was very obvious we were having a little boy. We were all very excited, I think everyone wanted to have a boy especially the girls so they wouldn't have to share a room again. We have already had 2 boy cousins born this year and with another boy cousin on his way this little guy is sure to have some playmates. Yay.

Broken Car

2010-05-25T14:07:00.002-07:00

We just can't seem to get catch a break with our old cars, they always seem to need work, even the toy car can not escape the occasional break down. Not to worry though, Jared has taught Blake all he needs to know to fix his own car.

I just found Blake underneath his toy car "fixing" it and I had to take a picture. How cute is that? Just like his dad.

Oh Liz

2010-05-17T16:20:00.001-07:00

Oh Liz I am catching up with you. I had my doctors appointment today and he changed my due date to October 30th. :)

Bible Stories

2010-04-29T08:39:00.002-07:00

Kayla wanted to teach family home evening this week and decided she wanted to talk about Moses. Perfect I thought that is what we are learning about right now in Gospel Doctrine, it is fresh on my mind. So of course I end up helping Kayla tell the story of Moses to the kids and when I get to the part when they are in the wilderness and do not have any water to drink Blake seems to get interested in what I am saying. Blake, "No water mom?" Me, "no Blake they had no water." Blake, "Drink juice then." We all started to laugh, well of course they should just drink juice if they have no water.

Blake turned 3 earlier this month and is really starting to talk more and more. He loves to build things and help Jared in the garage. He just went into the garage and brought in a hammer, screw driver, and pliers to fix "something". I had to take them away and told him to go get his tools, he was pretty mad at me.
He loves his sisters and is always excited when the "girls" get home from school.
We have been swimming a few times this year and he is not as confident as he was last year, he wants to be in his inflatable boat and not out by himself with his floaties. He has a hard time pronouncing "swimming" instead he says, "pooing". Jared has so much fun teasing him when he says, "pooing dad". It is pretty funny.
He is fully potty trained now (except for at night, that kid can pee all night long!), he has even graduated from his little potty to being able to stand up and go in the big toilet.

#4

2010-04-20T10:50:00.005-07:00

We had our first appointment yesterday and everything looks good. Normally you don't get to have a sonogram on your first visit, however I have 9 pound babies at 38 weeks (induced) and since we were not sure if my due date was accurate my Dr. wanted an ultrasound to find out how far along the baby is. So during my next appointment we will see if my Dr. will change my due date from Nov. 5th to Oct. 30th which is what the ultrasound was estimating.

2010-03-01T16:08:00.003-07:00

Alright I guess it is time for me to post again. We have had a lot of things going on in the last month or so since I posted.
We have been down with the Swine flu for the past two months! Kayla always seems to be the first to get it and then it successfully never fails to find its way to Blake and then to Elizabeth and then to Jared and then to ME! It was nice having a few weeks off and back to our normal selves and the thought of actually getting sick again does not even enter into my mind but all of the sudden I am called from the school nurse to let me know Kayla has a fever and to come pick her up. Seriously? Not again, hopefully she will be the only one to get sick this time, yeah right. So anyways another two weeks of sickness and we are all starting to feel better again. If we get it for a third time next month I might just have to think about home schooling. J/K

Jared built us a square foot garden in our backyard this month (if you could call it that). He built two huge raised beds on the side of our house plus he made four mounds for Watermelon, Zucchini, and Yellow Squash and 3 rows for Corn. So it isn't really a square foot garden but a nice sized garden that has raised beds. We bought starts for tomatoes, herbs, and bell peppers. From seeds we are growing peas, beans, radishes, lettuce, carrots, cucumbers, zucchini, corn, squash, jalapeno, and watermelon. The peas, lettuce, and radishes have already started to sprout, which is just super exciting. Our only advice, don't buy your seeds online! The place we ordered from took their own dandy time sending us our seeds, over a month! Plus we still haven't received everything we ordered! We wont be doing that ever again.

The Dutton Grandparents come down once a month to have family home evening with us which the kids always look forward to. In February it snowed a ton in Flagstaff so being the thoughtful Grandma she is Grandma Dutton had Laurie and Grandpa pack as much snow as they could into 3 water coolers. What a treat for our little ones. The kids had a great time having a snowball fight in our front yard. After the snowball fight they made a snowman. We had neighbors driving by and getting out of their cars to take a pictures of our snowman. It is not everyday you see a snowman in Mesa.

I slowed down on couponing over the Holidays but I am back baby. I didn't miss it for those few months but I am loving it now. It is probably good to take a break from things every once in awhile. I am back to getting great deals and am even going to be teaching a Relief Society enrichment night next month about how to get started. I also just signed up for Goodreads online after so many people have been telling me to get on. I am a little nervous about sharing some of the books I like to read, they can be a little violent (I really like war books) but am excited to find out what other people read to expand my horizons. I also have been going on walks in the morning with one of my neighbors, which is so nice right now with the weather.

This past weekend my brother got married. Yeah the one I blogged about a few post down that just got home from his mission in December. He didn't waste any time. :) We are all very excited for him though, Danica is pretty awesome and will make a fun aunt. It was nice having the whole family in town. It was kind of funny though on the day of the wedding my mom, sister, and I went shopping for wedding dresses. A little birdie says there is going to be another wedding in the future like June 5th future.

Oh one finally thing that I think is funny that happened the other day. Jared and I borrowed the CD, Your Baby Can Read. Anyways you are supposed to have you baby watch it twice a day for a month. So we have tried for about 5 days or so and sit down and watch it with Blake, he doesn't really like it but will sit through most of it. Well anyways the other night we are watching it and he decides he is done and goes and turns off the TV, so I just turn it right back on. Blake in turn goes back to the TV not only turns it off but opens up the DVD player, takes out the DVD and throws it on the floor. OK Blake I get it we are done. That's my boy. Oh and he is doing great on his potty training, except for diapers at night he is fully trained. He hasn't had an accident in a few days. Yay!

Hope all is well and I probably wont post for another month, because lets face it I am a little lazy when it comes to blogging.

Elk hunt

2010-01-13T11:30:00.000-07:00

If you want to read about Jared's elk hunt, he wrote up a great post on his blog. Just go to Jaredsgarage.blogspot.com

What?

2009-12-17T07:44:00.002-07:00

So the last few weeks we have been rushing out the door to get to school on time. I know we should just wake up earlier but I just don't want to! This morning was no different, I rushed to the car with Blake in my arms and buckled him in. I heard Kayla get in and shut the door so off we went. I got to the first stop sign and checked right and left and right, wait a minute something is not right. Where is Elizabeth? I was in such a hurry I forgot Elizabeth. Ha ha I laughed all the way home and when I opened the garage there she was looking at me stunned that I would forget her. I think I am losing my mind.

Welcome Home Claaaaaark

2009-12-10T14:45:00.003-07:00

UPDATED ON THE BOTTOM OF POST!!!!!

My youngest brother Clark returned home from serving a mission in South Korea yesterday and we were all very excited to see him! My mom couldn't even wait twenty seconds for him to pass the TSA check point and rushed to him. She got yelled at by the TSA agent but luckily she was not arrested or body searched for any terrorism weapons.

We met Jared at Bass Pro and drove together to the airport. The arrival board kept on posting the plane was going to be 15 minutes early and I was nervous we might miss his arrival but luckily we got there a few minutes before he did. Apparently when Blake saw Grandma run to Clark he thought he should also. Clark being gone for two years had no idea who that little kid was, took him a minute to figure it out.

I should do a blog post on everything Blake has broken this year, his most recent was are beloved camera! So of course we had to hurry and rush our next camera purchase since Jared was due to leave on his hunt the next day(next blog post to come if Jared ever gets to it). Well anyways long story short our new camera stinks! All of the pictures I took of Clark in the airport were blurry and unrecognizable so I made him take a few snap shots for me in front of my Grandma Harris's house. That's her in the background I guess she wanted to be in the picture too?.?

Well we are glad you are home and are all anxious to see what happens with your girlfriend/fiance? Danica. You know we have flower girl dresses already right? :) Update!!!! Clark popped the question the night I wrote this blog, they are now officially engaged and planning on a wedding in February. Congratulations guys. :)

Blake

2009-11-08T21:07:00.002-07:00

Looking at these pictures I took today of Blake I can't believe at how old he looks. He is growing up so fast. Grandma Harris bought him this cute new outfit for church and I thought I would take his picture and post it up for her to see . He loves taking pictures, he always wants to see every picture I take right after the flash goes off. He was even saying "cheese" for me. :)

Jared has been in an electronic phase and has been programming a microchip to read the temperatures of the meats he is smoking in his smoker. Anyways long story short he has been looking into different robots for fun and has made Blake obsessed with robots. Jared bought him the yellow robot in the picture, so he would stop playing with the more expensive one he bought the other day.
Blake loves to play with it and will say in a robot voice, " I am a robot". The robot runs out of batteries fairly quickly since Blake never turns it off. Anyways to get Blake to try to use the toilet yesterday we kept bribing him with candy and he wouldn't even try, well Jared said, " I will put batteries in your robot if you go poo on the toilet." Blake quickly ran to his toilet and a few minutes later squeezed out a tiny poo. I know kinda gross but super exciting, I guess we know his weakness now. He even sat through all of Sacrament meeting today because he had his robot and when he was getting a little loud making his robot noises Jared helped him put Robot to "sleep" and they covered him with a book. My boys are just too cute. :)

Target trip

2009-11-05T12:38:00.002-07:00

I just got home from a very successful Target shopping trip with just a few little hiccups. Target is pain to use coupons at but after a few calls to the managers the cashier was able to punch through ten of my coupons that weren't registering!
Anyways I got
10 glade candle tins
10 glade candle refills (Christmas presents for church people and teachers)
6 Wii games (Christmas presents for hubby and kids)
6 bags of Halloween candy ( I am putting it up high in my closet, hopefully it will last until next year).

Total was $53! I saved $134.77, plus for buying the Glade candles I got back $20 in Target Gift Cards!

I love coupons!

Pics for the Grandmas

2009-11-03T14:27:00.002-07:00

This Halloween we kept it low key. Since I feel like I am always trying to save money with all of my coupon shopping I decided we weren't going to be buying costumes this year. Elizabeth went as hunter using things we already had.

Blake went as Bob the Builder. I had got the hat and tool belt online earlier this year when it was on clearance. I thought it was cuter than anything I saw at the store anyways. I don't know what is up with Blake and this funny smile but he does it a lot.

Kayla wanted to be a vampire nurse this year. Luckily Angie had this nurse outfit already and I never ended up getting the vampire teeth :( So she had to go just as a nurse.

On Halloween we always visit My Grandma Harris (Mimi) and My Grandpa Booth. This is a picture of my Grandma and my nephew Wesley (Rich and Liz new little man). Isn't he such a cute froggy?
After visiting my grandparents and my aunt Gail we headed home and sat outside and passed out candy with my Uncle Mike. We didn't do much trick or treating this year. We had the ward Trunk or Treat Friday night and all the non chocolate candy we got from there I handed out to the kids that came to our house. :) Yay no half eaten suckers on my carpet this year!

Happy Halloween!

Halloween is coming

2009-10-23T10:06:00.002-07:00

Halloween is coming!

A man is walking home alone late one foggy night...

When behind him he hears:

Bump...
BUMP....
BUMP...

Walking faster, he looks back and through the fog he makes out the image of an upright casket banging its way down the middle of the street toward him.
BUMP...
BUMP...
BUMP...

Terrified, the man begins to run toward his home, the casket bouncing quickly behind him

FASTER...
FASTER...
FASTER...

BUMP...
BUMP...
BUMP...

He runs up to his door, fumbles with his keys, opens the door, rushes in, slams and locks the door behind him..
However, the casket crashes through his door, with the lid of the casket clapping
Clappity-BUMP...
Clappity-BUMP....
Clappity-BUMP ...

On his heels, the terrified man runs.
Rushing upstairs to the bathroom, the man locks himself in.
His heart is pounding; his head is reeling; his breath is coming in sobbing gasps.

With a loud CRASH the casket breaks down the door.
Bumping and clapping toward him.
The man screams and reaches for something, anything, but all he can find is a bottle of cough syrup!
Desperate, he throws the cough syrup at the casket...

And,

The coffin stops

Let me know if you want it

2009-10-22T17:40:00.002-07:00

Well this week the Old Navy site did not do a $75 off $100. I did win a $25 off $100 coupon, not that great but if you would like it just leave a comment and I will email it to you. First to leave the comment gets it. I totally understand if no one wants it though. :)

My shopping trip 10/17

2009-10-17T17:21:00.002-07:00

Alright ladies just got home from all of my shopping today. The kids have been off of school this week and I DID NOT want to take them shopping with me. I hit up 4 stores, Target, Walgreens, Safeway, and CVS.
Target
6 Ortega Taco Shells- .63 a piece
2 M&M- 1.50 a piece
4 Chef Michael Dog food bags- .26 a piece
= $8.84

Walgreens
1 Vitamin Lotion
1 Chapstick
2 cream chicken soup
= $1.37
spent $10RR and got back $10RR :)

Safeway
15 Macaroni cheese- .33 a piece
2 milk- 1.37 a piece
6 Dial Hand Soap- free
Febreze Noticable- free
2 Bacon-1.63 each
1 Deli Meat- 1.50
=$13.46

CVS
2 Kashi Cereal- free
2 Neosporin Lip Care- free
=.47 in tax

So I spent a total of $24.14. So awesome! Kayla is so excited that I bought Macaroni and Cheese that she is making it right now all by herself.

Old Navy, Anniversary, Birthday

2009-10-16T12:42:00.003-07:00

Look what I WON! Every Thursday Old Navy updates their site and hides coupons ranging from 15% off an item to the mack daddy of them all $75 off your purchase of $100 or more! The $75 coupon is incredibly hard to get, once the site resets sometime on Thursday the $75 coupon is gone within 30 seconds so you have to be super fast and find it right away! I just got really really lucky. I probably screamed at the top of my lungs for 10 minutes because I was so excited. Jared came home right after I had won and thought I had won something better than $75 bucks by the way I was jumping up and down and screaming "I won"! Dang, if I ever won the lottery I would probably pass out. I tried yesterday and was too slow, I had a chance for the $50 off the $100 coupon but didn't find it in time. :(

So here is what we ended up buying at Old Navy this week.... Kayla got a dress, a pink shirt, and a pair of brown pants. Elizabeth got the plaid skirt and two undershirts. Blake got two shirts, two pairs of pants, and not pictured a tractor trailer toy. I only paid $26!!!

Last week was also our 11th Anniversary and Jared's 30th birthday. Jared and I left the kids with Grandma and Grandpa Dutton and drove to North Scottsdale to stay at the 5 star Fairmont Princess. Wow! It was truly beautiful and romantic, we have never stayed anywhere remotely as nice as this place. After our dinner fiasco last year for our anniversary and paying over $100 for 1 steak! we decided to go to Outback for dinner and get a good dinner for under $50 bucks, it was really yummy.
Jared's birthday was on Sunday and we celebrated with his family at his sister Angie's house. They made homemade chili and cornbread which was really good. We also played poor little black cat and fruit basket tip over. It was a really nice weekend and are so blessed to have family around that we can share our many experiences with.

Ferris Wheel!

2009-09-28T10:56:00.003-07:00

This weekend the kids school had a carnival.... Since this is our first year at this school we were pretty excited about it, it sounded really awesome. The school was advertising how there was even going to be a Ferris Wheel! Wow, that is so cool..... So here is a video of Blake riding the Ferris Wheel all by himself! Wow, what a big boy!

A little bit of South

2009-09-17T12:01:00.004-07:00

This picture is for my two sister in-laws who have brought a little "south" into our lives. He he he. :) j/k Liz.

Alright I really am not going to blog about every shopping trip but I had to tell about this one, it even surprised me! Now the trick to this deal was e-coupons (cellfire and shortcuts). These sites let you upload coupons to your shopping card. Apparently I had more e-coupons on my card than I remembered.

This deal was at Safeway and if you bought 4 of the participating products it would subtract $4 from your total (making everything before coupons $1.50). Plus when you bought 4 products you receive a free box a capri sun.

1 Cocoa Puffs - ecoupon cellfire .75, ecpn shortcuts .75 = free
1 Cin Toast Crunch- .55 cpn doubled to $1= .50
2 Trix- ecpn .55, 2 .55cpn doubled to $1= .45 for 2 boxes
4 Nut Clusters- ecpn $1, $1, .40, .40. then I had 3 $1 off cpns= .20 for 4 bags
2 Capri Suns= free with deal

Total= $1.15

I actually had a $1.60 printable coupon for the 4th bag of nut clusters but it wouldn't scan so I technically could have been owed .45 but they probably would have freaked out over that so maybe it was a good thing that coupon wasn't scanning and I can use it later. Or if I would have brought one more $1 off cpn for the nut clusters I would have only paid .15. I didn't think to bring an extra cpn because I had the $1.60 cpn. Oh well I am happy only paying $1.15.

My shopping trip 9/14

2009-09-14T13:15:00.003-07:00

Since I started couponing a few months ago I have had a few people ask me to blog about all the great deals I am getting. So I thought I would start with my shopping trip today.

Today I headed out to Bashas and had 10, .50 off coupons for Barilla pasta, plus 2 coupons for .55 off Hillshire farm lunch meat. Since Bashas doubles coupons I was able to get all of the pasta for free (on sale for $1) and the lunch meat for $1.88 a piece.

5- whole wheat spaghetti
5- mini rigatoni
2- Hilshire Farm lunch meat

paid $ 3.74

This photo is for my trip to Walgreens. Walgreens has been my new Walmart lately... It is weird never to go there anymore. Walgreens has deals called Register Rewards (RR) that print out after you purchase an item that is on sale that week. You can use your RR on your next purchase, but not on what you just bought or a new RR will not print out! The goal is to buy things that "roll" (use your RR on items that offer RR) making alot of the things you buy really cheap. Today I did 6 transactions.

1. Bought bag Northern Crisps on sale for $3. Used a $2 RR from a previous day paid $1 oop (out of pocket) got back $3RR for next purchase.

2. Northern Crisps $3. Used $1 RR from a previous day paid $2 oop. got back 3 RR

3. Northern Crisps $3. Used $1.50 RR from a previous day paid $1.50 oop. got back 3 RR

4. 2 Triaminc cold strips 2/$10. Used $2 off coupon in Walgreens Healthy Savings book next to Register (since it is a Wags coupon it takes off $2 per item and you can keep the coupon). Then I used 2 of my $3 RR from the Northern Crisps. So $4 off from Wags cpn and $6 off from RR. Paid .81 oop (I technically got these for free but had to pay .81 in tax). Got back $5 RR

5. Northern Crisps $3 and Pringles 2.29 (thanks Blake, extra buys when you bring along kids :).
Used $5 RR from Triaminic. Paid .29 oop got back 3RR

6. Decided to do the Triaminic deal again. Used two $3 RR from the Northern Crisps and the $4 Walgreens coupon. Paid oop .81 got back $5 RR.

Few that was a long explanation. So I calculated all of my purchases from Walgreens and paid a total of $6.41 for
4- Norther Crisps (hope they are good)
4- Triaminic cold strips
1- Pringles can

Timber

2009-09-14T09:27:00.004-07:00

I have the pictures in the wrong order so a few pics down is the picture of our hideous bottle tree that we had cut down this weekend. This tree makes a mess all year round and was not providing any shade for our home so we decided to get rid of it and plant something else. We do feel a little bad for cutting down such a mature tree but it is too late now.

These guys did a pretty good job and had the tree down within an hour, the clean up took a little longer though seemed like they were here for at least four hours. It was quite the show, I think every neighbor that was home came out to watch the tree fall.

So here is the before picture of our overgrown tree and here is a video of tree falling. Enjoy.

New AC Units

2009-09-14T09:12:00.003-07:00

When we bought this house we knew one of the first things we would need to replace would be our 22 year old ac units. I got a few quotes and decided I would call one more place to compare prices, glad I did they quoted us 3k less than the other places. We had them installed the next week. Here are a few pics of the replacement.

I thought this picture was fun with our old "large" ac unit in between the two new units.

These are the two old units looking pretty sad getting ready to be hauled away.

Wahoo our new units in place. Thank goodness it was starting to get really hot in the house with out the AC on all day! We spent most of the afternoon in the pool. :) Now bring on lower utility bills.

strep throat

2009-08-16T20:11:00.002-07:00

Last night after I posted about Kayla being sick she told me her throat hurt. I took a look and she had tons of white spots in the back of her throat. Poor kid. I took her to the Urgent Care this morning and the Doctor didn't even swab her throat, she took one look inside Kayla's mouth and said I will go write you a prescription. She is doing much better this evening after two doses of antibiotics. She will have to stay home from school tomorrow since she will not have been on antibiotics for more than 24 hours. I hope she is feeling well enough to go to K-Mart tomorrow they are doubling coupons up to 4 bucks! It is hard enough not being able to go on Sunday I will be upset if I can't go tomorrow too. I know I am way obsessed with my new hobby, Elizabeth was glad to go back to school so she didn't have to go to the store all the time. :)

Backyard campout

2009-08-15T21:09:00.004-07:00

We had told Elizabeth she could sleep out in the backyard this summer and we never got around to it. So with the first week of school behind us she convinced Jared to set up the tent in the backyard. Jared even made them a campfire out of some scrap wood he had laying around. It was quite the fire, maybe a little too big for a backyard fire :) but oh well it didn't catch the house on fire. I don't know if you can see Blake's arms in the picture it is a little dark, but he has his arms up around his head just relaxing like his dad does, he is so cute. :)
We weren't going to let Blake sleep outside with the girls but he went into the tent and got in the sleeping bag and was very content, so we thought why not.... Jared and I went inside and watched a movie, about an hour into it we decided to just go check on the kids. When we peered into the tent with the flashlight Blake's face was right there. He had been up the whole time playing with Cleo and running all over the tent. That was the end of Blake's camping adventure his mean old parents made him come inside and sleep in his room. :(

About 5 in the morning Kayla came in crying that she was scared and that her stomach really hurt. Well we knew what that meant... Blake had the stomach flu a few days ago and when we felt her forehead she had a fever. I got her a bowl because I knew the vomiting would begin soon and got her to take some medicine before it started. She has been pretty sick today, slept through most of the day and couldn't keep anything down until this evening. Hopefully she will be doing better tomorrow and then ready for school on Monday. :) I know I am a mean mom.

Winter Cabin

2009-08-15T20:52:00.003-07:00

Jared got drawn for 6B bull this year which is in Sycamore Canyon. Since we were headed up to Flag to see Jared's brother Mac come home from his mission he thought we should hike down to Winter Cabin in Sycamore Canyon. It is about an hour drive out of Flagstaff on a dirt road.
The hike wasn't too bad getting to the cabin it is hiking out that sucks. :) Oh and we forgot to bring Blake's hiking backpack so Jared and I (mostly Jared especially on the way up) got to hold him for most of the hike.
There is a little Spring just a little ways from the cabin so we hiked down to it so Cleo could get a drink. When we got to the Spring there were a ton of Wasps flying around getting a drink so the girls are telling Jared to hurry and take the picture so they could leave.
Like I said before the hike going up the canyon is pretty tough and with the altitude change it was hard to breath at times but we made it and we were all so happy to sit in the air conditioned truck when we were done. Sitting I think we take for granted, while I am sitting I don't usually think, oh wow this feels so good.... But that day just a little rest of sitting on the ground in the woods for a few minutes was like a gift from heaven. :)

The toothfairy is going broke

2009-08-15T20:32:00.002-07:00

So in the past month Elizabeth has lost 2 teeth and Kayla has lost 3! Kayla who previously swallowed her first two teeth actually pulled out her dangling teeth with the help of Elizabeth. The first tooth she lost this month was around the time Nick got married, so with grandparents, great grandparents, and the tooth fairy in town she made 16 bucks on one tooth! Unfortunately her other two teeth she only made a buck a piece. :(

What we have been up to

2009-06-24T08:26:00.002-07:00

Well it seems like we have been really busy and boring this month. We moved into our new home the end of last month and have been slowly unpacking. Once I unpacked all the essentials unpacking started to find a backseat to other things. We also have been cleaning up our rental to get it ready for our "final" inspection which we had yesterday, YAY we are all done with the rental!

My sister Bridgit came to stay with us for a few days before my brother Nick got married. We watched Pride and Prejudice and Lost in Austen. Before we started the movies we went to the store and bought a lot of junk food, my kids thought it was awesome! They each got to choose there own candy, very fun. One night while Bridgit was here we went out to dinner with my mom and cousin Caisa. We went to Macaroni Grill and had to each write a poem about girls night out on the table, they were pretty good but I don't remember them. We then went to dress barn to find something pink for me to wear to Nicks wedding. After that we headed to Superstition mall and listed to some sellslady try to sell us some REALLY SPARKLY makeup, she even put purple eyeshadow on me..... Apparently if you want a good deal you should keep telling them no thanks, I think the price of the makeup started at 25 bucks a piece all the way down to 10.... but we still said NO, it was really sparkly. So on the way home for girls night a sonic commercial popped into my head about two women hanging out on girls night and one of the women say at the end that they should go get some eggs and...... boil them. Well it was pretty funny because at dinner we had discussed at length how to boil eggs. :) We are so lame.

Well on the 20th of June my brother Nick and his lovely wife Katherine were marrried. They had the temple ceremony around 9 and then we all headed to the Wright House for pictures and a luncheon. It was all very nice and I am so excited for Nick to start this new chapter in his life, here are a few pictures of our kids in their flower girl outfits the Angie was so nice to make for them. Oops I must have deleted the one of Elizabeth oh well, here is a picture of Kayla in her flower girl outfit. :)

We Closed!!!!!

2009-05-22T23:12:00.003-07:00

Well it finally happened after almost 6 years we are homeowners again. It was a long and grueling process but in the end the house we got was worth the wait. :) We found out we had closed at 4 pm today (Friday), when we got the call we were so excited, we thought we were going to have to wait until after the Memorial Day to close. So being true to our promise we all put on our swimming suits and headed over for our first swim. Here are a few pictures of us this evening....

Blake loves his new swing set and jumps on the swings every time we go over to just hang out in our backyard. Hey now we have the key! We can actually get inside.

Elizabeth and Kayla waiting for us to get ready for the big jump...

Fake pose before we have the count down. 3-2-1 JUMP!!!!

I was a little nervous to jump in, it has been raining all week and I thought it would be really cold but it wasn't the water felt great.

Jared trying out the diving board, we had thought at one point we would get rid of the diving board for safety reasons, I doubt that's going to happen though... Diving boards are too much fun. :) Well tomorrow is going to be a fun day, yay we get to pack and haul stuff over to the new house all day long, bleh.... Can't wait for the work to be over with. Goodnight everyone.

Hawaiian Luau

2009-05-13T10:31:00.003-07:00

Even though Elizabeth's birthday is not until the end of July we usually have a "fake" birthday party for her at the end of the school year so it is easier to get all of her friends together. This year Elizabeth fell in love with some Hawaiian invitations, so a Hawaiian Luau we had! The night before the party Elizabeth and I went to the 99cent store and found hula hoops, grass skirts, beach balls and other great Luau decorations. When the girls arrived they each received a lei and began making flowers out of tissue paper. While the girls made their flowers I began whipping up Mango/Pineapple/OJ/Strawberry/Guava fruit smoothies. They were a big hit. We had a hula hoop contest (we thought the hula hoops were not going to work because we bought them at the 99cent store and none of us in our family could get them to work but apparently it is just us lame Dutton's that can't hula hoop :)) They had a limbo contest and Kayla won. We had a relay race where the girls had to put on grass skirts, flip flops, sun glasses, straw hats, leis, and carry a beach ball. They dressed and then ran around the "island" and quickly took everything off for the next girl to put on. It was a big hit and really fun. I also made coconut cupcakes that the girls are eating in this picture. Elizabeth sure is pretty silly when you get her around all of her friends. We are pretty sad to be leaving this great group of girls but with Elizabeths fun personality I'm sure she wont have much trouble finding new friends.

Jared took Blake to an urban lake to go fishing while we had our Luau. Not thinking he took the camera with him in case he caught a fish! About thirty minutes into the party I went to get the camera and could not find it! After calling Jared to learn he had taken it (which he felt bad about) I had to call our next door neighbor and borrow their camera. Oh well it worked out. Elizabeth got mostly jewlery from her friends, which she has been wearing all week. Her friend Jenny made her a rag time High School musical quilt, I was very impressed that she took so much time to make Elizabeth such a thoughtful present. Jenny's mom told me that on their way over to the party Jenny had put a kitten into her bag to also give to Elizabeth for her birthday.... Good thing her mom found out before it got here!
Well this saturday we will be again having another Hawaiian Luau. Apparently Kayla is old enough now to realize that she too needs a "fake" birthday party before school is out and we move away from all of her friends.

Angels

2009-05-10T16:19:00.002-07:00

Last night (the Saturday before Mother's Day) Kayla gave the prayer and asked that when the primary was singing for the moms during church that the angels would touch my heart. How sweet is that. So this morning when she came to sit back down after the primary had sung I told her how the Angels had touched my heart while she was singing. :) I love my Kayla what a sweety.

Buying a house!

2009-04-25T08:41:00.001-07:00

Jenny and I are in escrow on a new 1988 vintage house! As mentioned in my super fun Home AC Service post, we're in the inspection period. Neither of us can wait to close on it and get moved in! Here are some pics:

Here she is. The grass isn't looking quite as nice as it was the day these pictures were taken, but still pretty good. Can't wait to take the sign down.

Yeah, that's a 3 car garage and a RV gate!

Not a huge fan of the flooring, the wood is a little light and the carpet is a little dark, but it'll work. The paint on the other hand, has to go.

Should be fun painting the walls with the vaulted ceilings. We're debating scraping the popcorn from the ceilings while we're at it.

My TV room! Perfect shape and nice size. Can't wait to fill it up.

Appliances still in place, and look, nice ceiling fans! Corian counter tops, nice looking layout, and my favorite, maple cabinets. Hooray, not ugly!

We were hoping the house we bought would have gas, so it'll take some getting used to the electric stove, at least it looks good.

Ahh, the wonderful crap collection counter, where everything without a place goes.

Hidden buttons on the dishwasher. Now Blake won't start it when it's empty, stop it when it's full and change all the settings every day (or at least until he figures out how to open it)

Looking from the master bedroom, across the entryway and into the TV room. That closet on the right is under the stairs and unfinished inside, super cool.

That's the same cool closet with a view into the master bath.

This is where I will be brushing my teeth. Maybe I'll even get my own sink so I can have one free from toothpaste :-D.

Looking down the stairs, not a bad view, hopefully the bars for the banister will keep the kids on the stairs when they tumble down!

Another shot of the kitchen looking into the TV room. Not sure what to do with the niche, the girls think our hamster Spotty should reside there.

Hrm, a little tuscany in my house? I've never been a big fan of those types of sinks, but the faucet got me hooked, watching water fall over the spillway on the faucet and imagining wier calculations in my head.

The upstairs bathroom. Sure to be the subject of time sharing issues when the girls get older.

The back porch and view of grassy area. Wow, the grass is still alive, I'm sure to fix that problem with my greenish thumb!

The piece de resistance, the saltwater diving pool, diving board and all. I've been hoping for *a* pool, and a few houses we bid on actually had diving pools, but saltwater? Am I dreaming?

Funny rocky area. That's the 3rd bay of the garage sticking out (or, in it's present state, studio apartment). Not sure what to do with this area, more grass, garden, ash tree. We're going to have to do something to shade that wall from the afternoon sun.

That's the play area in the back. Nice slide and swing set. I think it is about a year and a half old but looks like the sprinklers are taking their toll.

Overall the house is excellent. The upgrades are very nice (hello ceiling fans) and for the most part in line with what I would have liked to do myself. I think the most disconcerting thing about the house is that the previous homeowners were unable to keep it. They did a lot of very nice things to the house, and must have been good people because unlike many of the foreclosures we have seen they kept the interior of the house in excellent condition. A few homes we have looked at were completely trashed and/or stripped by the previous owners. Hopefully they will be able to find an equally nice house when they are ready to purchase again, I know the pain of moving from a nice house into less than ideal conditions. I'm happy to finally be moving back into a nice house, it's been ages! :-D

House

2009-04-24T10:50:00.002-07:00

Well I wanted to wait until after our inspection to announce that we are in escrow on a house. The inspection went really well and there are only a few minor things that came up. It still isn't a done deal, we still have to get the appraisal done and all of the loan worked out but it seems like it will probably work out. So after 7 offers over the last year we are finally almost done! We are getting pretty excited.
We took the kids to see it yesterday during the inspection and they are in love, especially because they are all going to get their own rooms. Kayla called the pink room no surprise there. Blake will get the room next to Kayla and Elizabeth gets the biggest room that is bright orange. They are anxiously planning how they will decorate. :)
The house is only a half a mile from Jared's sister Angie so we will be close to our new cousin Zad. The house is also fairly close to my Aunt Gail, Mimi, and Papa which will be really nice. It has a salt water diving pool and a three car garage that Jared is really excited about and I get a new kitchen equipped with stainless steel appliances. We are set to close at the end of May but have our loan agent trying to get it done sooner. We decided that right after we sign the papers we are going to all jump in the pool, even if it is cold.
So I will keep everyone updated, cross your fingers.

Easter pics

2009-04-16T10:13:00.003-07:00

I just thought I would post these pictures of our Easter/Blake's birthday weekend. I have already posted about all the festivities a little earlier this week.

Old cars, what a pain

2009-04-16T09:54:00.003-07:00

Earlier this week I took my 95 Avalon to Big O tires to get it aligned, what a big can of worms that brought about. They informed me that they would not be able to do the alignment because my inner tie rod was really loose so that needed to be fixed first, quoting me at 200 bucks for the fix. Well being married to the handiest man alive Jared and I decided that he would do the fix and it would only end up costing us around 40 bucks. Hrm, well once Jared started getting everything off he found more and more things that needed to be replaced , great. Once he had it all taken apart Blake got into the front seat and began playing with the steering wheel, apparently when it is all taken apart if you turn the wheel really hard you can ruin your rack and pinion. So now we get to replace that too, thanks Blake. I think we have already spent over $400 bucks and still have a more to spend for the alignment and new tires. Stupid old cars, what a pain...

Blake turns 2

2009-04-13T17:27:00.003-07:00

Blake was my Easter baby this year and had his second birthday on Easter. What a day we had or weekend to be exact! Both grandparents came down this weekend to spend time with us. We woke up Saturday morning to Krispy Kreme Doughnuts brought to us by Grandpa and Grandma Harris. They then ended up taking the kids to Walmart and went shopping. When they returned we took the kids over to the Owensby's house to hang out with Grandma Dutton while Jared and I went to look at a house. They had a great time making pipe cleaners and pom poms into bunnies, deer, and squirells. We had a little birthday party for Blake with mini cupcakes and Grandma and Grandpa Dutton got Blake a wagon which he has been having a lot of fun with. The girls then headed with the Harris grandparents to see Monsters and Aliens in 3D, followed by a trip to Target for new outfits for Sundays party. Saturday night we ended up having The Owensbys and the Dutton grandparents over for games and lots and lots of popcorn( I think I popped 6 bags).
Sunday morning Grandma and Grandpa Harris came to church with us and brought newly made church activity packets for the kids. Blake has never, I repeat never sat through sacrament all the way through, well he just had a dandy time playing with Grandpa trying to match colors on the board game that he stayed all through sacrament meeting. After church we headed to Mimis (Great grandma Harris) and died Easter eggs. We then had a contest Harris vs. Duttons to see who decorated the best bunny house. The Harris bunny house was much better than the Duttons but for some reason the judges chose the Dutton house as the winner. We think it had something to do with the grand kids being on our team. :) After the competition the kids were then able to take turns at the pinata. Elizabeth was the one to break it open and Blake had the chocolate candy open before it reached the ground. Once we were done with the games at Mimis house we went across the sidewalk to Papas house (great grandpa Booth) where we hunted for Easter eggs. Blake only found one egg, apparently the egg he found was just too much fun to put down to find more. We then went up stairs for birthday presents, Blake got an aqua doodle, a car set, and disk shooting guns. The night ended with dinner of Honey Baked Ham, salad, grilled pineapple, asparagus, marshmallow rolls, and a Baskin Robbins ice cream cake. Thanks mom and dad for all the time and fun you put into making such a wonderful day for the kids. Jared and I were saying when we got home what a fun birthday Blake was able to have and how lucky we are to have a close family that we can share such great times with.

Spring Break

2009-03-27T23:08:00.003-07:00

I guess I should post a little bit about our Spring Break, it was nothing spectacular but we had fun. The kids took the cushions off of our chairs and made beds and forts in the family room all week. They even had a "sleep over" in the front room.

We tried going to the Botanical Gardens but were turned away because there wasn't any room for non-members. Instead we drove over to Jared's work and went out to lunch at a brick oven pizza place called, Grimalldis. We ordered 2 large pizzas and ate it all! I think Elizabeth had 4 huge pieces all by herself.

One night we met Jared after work at our favorite fishing spot and got a lot of bites but didn't hook anything. Blake is in this weird stage where he will not let me change him out of his pajama shirt. He does it almost every day it is getting kind of annoying, I think if I didn't have to change his diaper all the time I wouldn't be able to get off his pajama pants either.

We also went to the Southwest Museum with Aunt Angie and Zad. The kids love this place. They had an exhibit about 1001 ways to use poop. Blake had fun grabbing all the different rubber replicas of animal poo. They also had a story about a monkey that eats coffee beans and after it poos people gather the coffee beans out of the poo and make coffee out of it. Gross, now Kayla thinks all coffee is made out of poo. :)

On friday we went to Cheescake factory with Uncle Mike. Kayla woke up on friday morning with a little cold and was upset she was going to miss her special day but luckily she felt better by lunch time. About a month ago we went to Cheesecake factory with uncle Mike and all Kayla wanted was chocolate cake but when she had a bite of the key lime cheesecake that is all she talked about for a long time. So this time we ended up ordering 2 to share and 2 to take home to share with dad later. It was a great day to end our spring break.

2009-03-27T22:39:00.002-07:00

Jared decided this week it was time to teach Blake how to go pee in the toilet so we headed off to Target to get him his very own potty. When we got home we set up his potty in the kitchen Blake was very excited and stripped off his clothes and just sat and sat so we all started going about our business and left him alone. Apparently boys are made a little bit differently than girls and when a boy sits on the potty they need to do one more extra step or else pee goes flying strait forward, which of course we figured out a few minutes later. So now when he gets on his potty we get to tell him to hold down his winkie. After he went pee we rewarded him with a cupcake which is what he has in his hands in the photo.
The next day Blake was still pretty into going pee so he kept stripping off his clothes to use the "potty". I guess he just figured any chair would do and ended up taking off his diaper and peeing on the recliner. Oh well it needed a good cleaning anyways. :)
So now a few days later he is not that interested in it any more and neither am I, he is not even 2 yet so I figure I might wait a few more months to try again but we will see.

Fishing

2009-03-11T09:10:00.003-07:00

When Jared was in school we used to go fishing all the time, but ever since he graduated we never seem to go. The weather was so nice this weekend so we decided to get out of the house and go fishing. Elizabeth always loves to play with the worms! I think it is totally nasty! These worms were great though they wiggled and danced like crazy.
Before we headed to the lake we stopped at Subway and grabbed some sandwiches. It is always yummy to eat while you are fishing, worm guts and sandwiches, yumo.
We had a pretty good time, we didn't catch any fish but I did catch a duck! I was feeding the ducks some of our left over sandwiches and one duck decided to grab the worm that was lying next to me that was still on my fishing pole. I held on tight to the pole so he wouldn't drag it off while Jared came running to un-hook the duck. He wasn't quick enough, the duck broke the line and took off with the hook still in his mouth.
Jared likes to fish but thinks it is too much work to have to rig everyone up, so if we ever go again I get to learn how to help tie knots. I don't mind that, but I am not putting a worm on the line, that is just too gross.

Car Ride part II

2009-03-07T18:54:00.002-07:00

On the way home from the store......

Elizabeth: Ewwwwwww
Me: What is going on back there?
Kayla: Blake's digging for gold.

February updates

2009-02-28T21:09:00.003-07:00

Blake is loving the camera this month, he is taking the best pictures. On this day he had on Jared's backpack, a belt for a necklace, and a backwards hat. He just loves to get dressed up and zoom all over the house on his bike.
Did someone say wrestle? Blake loves to wrestle, if you are on the floor watch out, he will jump and stomp all over you.
Kayla is a goof ball and loves to act crazy when the camera is out.
Elizabeth hurt her wrist this month. She fell on it a few times throughout the week. So on valentines day night she was in so much pain Jared took her to the E.R. The doctors there thought she might have damaged her growth plate but weren't sure so they wrapped her up and told us to go see a specialist. Luckily no fractures or damage just a sprained wrist. I think she liked all of the attention she got at school though. :)

Dressing like dad

2009-02-28T21:08:00.000-07:00

The kids like to get Jared's motorcycle gear and dress up. Blake zooms around on his trike making the cutest motorcycle noises.

Car Ride

2009-02-28T20:57:00.003-07:00

When we were out and about today this was one of the conversations in the car.....

Elizabeth: Boys go to Jupiter to get more stupider.

Kayla: Wow! That is great! Ha Ha boys go to Jupiter to get more stupider! (she said this over and over for a few minutes) So boys go to Jupiter to get more stupider because girls are already stupid and boys need to go to get more stupid, right mom?

I have a new nephew!

2009-02-03T20:50:00.005-07:00

After many years of searching Angie and Steve have finally tracked down the elusive baby boy. His name is Zadok Paul Owensby and he is sure to be full of trouble like all his cousins. His birth mom is a wonderful woman and has made a difficult sacrifice in her life so that Zadok will able to be sealed to a mother and a father. He is such a beautiful baby. Much of my family thinks he is such a quiet little baby, but if memory serves me, all my kids were quiet for the first few weeks recovering from childbirth, then it's on with the lung excercises! Only time will tell! You can read all about it at Angie and Steve's blog:
http://angiedandsteveo.blogspot.com/
I think my mom ghost-wrote this entry about him:
http://angiedandsteveo.blogspot.com/2009/02/and-he-shall-be-called-zadok.html

2004 10 East Early Elk Hunt

2009-02-03T19:59:00.008-07:00

So I figure I should add in a successful hunting story to go along with my recent unsuccessful one. This was back in September 2004 and I wrote an email on it, so I'm feeling lazy and will just copy and paste from it. (Yes, I used a lot of exclamation points, it was all very exciting ;-)) I don't think I mentioned it, but this hunt was right in the middle of mid-terms. Lots of fun, I failed one for it (still pulled out a B in the class). Steve and I had put in for Unit 10 early hoping to not get drawn, as that year they were charging full price for the bonus point only option and we *knew* we wouldn't get drawn for this hunt with only a few bonus points.

After my last hunt I laugh about this one. For the 2008 hunt I had put together a Thompson Encore rifle in 300wm, spent some time getting fancy loads worked up with Barnes Triple X bullets and sub MOA grouping. I could hit a gong on every shot at 385 yards without much effort. This 10 east hunt was another story entirely. I had probably shot my rifle 3 times that year, used some bullets I had loaded 10 years earlier. Didn't zero in, probably shooting 3MOA (the throat is worn out on the barrel). Guess that's the way it goes :-D.

Anyway, I'll go ahead and paste the email now:

The hunt went great. Got up into unit 10 Thursday. My Dad had flown the area earlier this year so we had a general idea of where to go. We got up around 5 after camping out and drove the couple miles to where we were looking to hunt. As soon as we got out of the truck we could hear them bugling, but had to walk a couple miles to get to our desired spot (no roads went there). We spotted them around 800 yards away and were able to easily get about 400 yards from them. When we got closer we watched them fight a whole bunch, pushing eachother around, keeping the cows in their herums, and bugling like crazy! I hadn't done a lot of shooting this year so I didn't want to make that kind of a shot, so we spent the next two and a half hours trying for a closer shot. We'd move (my Dad (AKA Buahna Guide), then they'd move. Back and forth. Then we'd lose sight of them behind a hill only to somehow end up behind them again. We finally got up to where we figured they might come and were just kind of dinking along and all of the sudden there they were! Right in front of us around 150 yards were a bunch of them. We didn't have a clear shot at the herd bull so we stood absolutely motionless for half an hour! That was the longest half hour of my life! The biggest movements made was shifting weight from one foot to another.

Anyway, after waiting and watching and lots and lots of painful waiting, the herd bull finally came up on top of this little hill that we were standing on, but either had a cow in front of him, another bull behind him or a tree in front of him whenever I tried to get him in the clear. I blew a few elk calls (with a young bull type bugle) which got a quick "I'm the boss, stay away" response and look from him. I figured he would probably do some moving after the call, so I slowly placed my rifle on my Dad's shoulder as the grass was too tall for any sitting shots and nothing around us except grass in each direction for 50 yards. No chance we could make it that far to get a good rest without spooking them. The herd bull then proceeded to chase a couple cows around and finally started to follow one across an opening. Problem was, there was still another bull behind him about 50 yards. He didn't follow the cow across the opening. The elk behind him walked out of the way. He then followed another cow across the opening. Just as he was in the middle of the opening, BANG! I got a great shot right up through the ribs, caught both lungs and lodged in his left shoulder. (He was facing to our right). He ran about 20 yards and dropped dead. Man, what a sight it was seeing those monster antlers flop onto the ground! I was so excited! This is only my second elk, and a heck of a lot bigger than the first!

Then came the real work, getting him cleaned out and back to the truck. We had walked a lot further than I had thought, and the afternoon sun was really wearing on us. It was about 6 miles back to the truck. On the way my Dad almost stepped on a rattle snake! That'll get your attention when you're half awake walking.

After talking to some professional guides (the ones my Dad was flying when he found this area), they called this elk Scrappy and Topsy Tervy. Scrappy because he was always up fighting off other bulls, and Topsy Tervy because he has such a huge top end (5 and 6), but small in comparison bottom end. He has 7 points on the left side and 6 on the right. The guides figured him around 350" through a spotting scope. I measured him at 330" with my amaturish methods using the Boon and Crocket online measurement calculator. One of the guides watching him the day prior to my killing him (I got him opening morning, Friday at 9:30 AM) said that he had the number 4 on the left side which was broken off when I shot him. Guestimating the number 4 antler on the left side based on the right side gives him a score of around 347" :-D. Anyway, with that antler being there the day before, it could have broken off as I watched them fight.

It was an absolutely amazing hunt, can't beat a two and a half hour stalk! Definately something I will never forget. It still gets my blood going thinking about the excitement of it all!

Chaz got this nice shot of a bull doing some scouting with my dad and Steve:

A coyote that should have been schooled that day (another by Chaz):

Here we are, excited and tired. You can kind of see the #4 on his left side broken off:

My camera had old film in it and gave some odd coloring...I didn't want to lug the SLR around.
Another shot where he dropped:

This is back at my grandparent's house. Steve and my dad stayed out hunting so I was alone getting this one skinned and cleaned up for the butcher, having a tractor made it pretty easy :-D:

Back at my parents, I think this is my favorite shot of the antlers:

Another shot in my parent's back yard:

Last elk hunt of 7 East

2009-02-03T19:23:00.007-07:00

Yes, that's right, I'm sick of 7 east. I've never killed an elk in that unit, and lately I haven't had more than a few seconds chance of any elk in the unit. Beautiful country, and we sure can find them before the hunt, but when hunting day is upon us and mountains of people pour into the woods I just can't seem to find them.

First day was nice and overcast, raining with flurries of snow occassionally. We were way to low in elevation up on Babbit Ranch out in the cedars looking for elk. Not cold enough to push them out this far. We ended up on the powerline between 7East and 9, with a handful of tracks going into 9 and none coming out. The road was a mess and a few times I thought we might get stuck, miles from the road and nothing close enough to winch from.

Second day should have been the money maker. We hiked up a huge crater (yeah, I have no idea what the name is, just how to get there. Guess that is what I get for hunting there a lot and never having maps.) and saw some decent sign. After hiking for a few hours the shooting started down around the crater while we were up on top. We were pushing North spread out a mile or so, or at least I was a mile or so from Steve and my dad, who were probably only a quarter mile apart. My dad spotted a nice little 4 point and took him with a few shots from his new Browning semi-auto in 300wm. Nice kill except it was on top of the crater with no roads in sight. In the meantime I'm still hunting around the crater and pushing more elk off of the North side of the crater where several were taken, but it was a nice crisp morning so I shouldn't complain too much, yet.

After meeting back up with Steve and my dad we go around to load his elk. The hike was treacherous to get in and worse dragging the elk out. It was nice for a little bit until getting down some steep embankments as long as we could stay away from the antlers. Then we hit a ravine and couldn't reasonably get the elk back out of it, so we slogged along, step after tedious step dragging this huge elk over rocks and trees, occassionally under trees. Somewhere at this point my dad took off to go find his knife that fell out of his sheath so I get to do it myself :-D. Note, we have mules and horses back at my Grandpa's house. We're still trying to figure out what posessed us to drag this animal off of the crater instead of just loading it on the mule and riding a horse out.

Sunday we rested. Well, and talked hunting with the other people that got drawn. We needed it and were completely exhausted. This is also the day I started missing my family as I wasn't hunting and too tired to do anything but sit around. We did some church-house scouting by talking with Kevin Call and Lorin Peterson about places they had seen them. They suggested going up high on the Mountain so we figured we'd give that a shot the next day.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday are kind of a blur. Wake up before dawn, be sitting in a decent looking clearing as the sun comes up. One morning way up on the mountain, one down in the flats, and I think one was in between. We spotted some elk on the in-between day, but just 3 cows and 2 calfs. Would have been an easy shot. I started to get pretty burned out these days, as we worked thickets all day then found another nice looking spot to watch for sun down. No bulls. Just lots of hunters. I was beginning to think I should be doing more road hunting, as that's what most successful people we talked to were doing, but with my big noisy diesel and desire to get out and stalk it wasn't successful.

Thursday I started feeling better. I had called off working thickets and decided to screw around instead. We picked up firewood and pulled trees out of the road (we had been doing that mid-day throughout the hunt). I shot a crow in the head at 140 yards, I'd like to think I was aiming for the head, but just forgot I had signed in at 300 when I squeezed it off. We went up high that evening and got a bit more firewood for my parents, I always like getting firewood. We left my chainsaw back at my grandparents so we just chopped and smashed with the maul and axe.

We did have a great time together, got in some great wheeling in the truck, but I think I'm done with 7 East. It was our third choice! I've never been drawn for a third choice. We were hoping for 6B or 7 West (which we had seen several bulls cross into while driving in in the morning, and talked with some hikers in my parents ward that saw some huge herds in the area). Hopefully next year!

Traveling from the cedars to the high country:

Me and my dad's elk, shouldn't it be mine?:

My dad and his elk, beautiful morning:

Nice shot of my and my beast:

Steve and I in front of my truck:

Hieroglyphics Trail

2009-02-03T18:16:00.008-07:00

A few days after returning from the Wind Cave Trail and the family recovered a bit I was able to convince them that we should go hiking again the following week (on the 24th of January). During the week we went and got the kids some Camelbacks (camouflage of course) and tried to get some hiking boots for the girls, but couldn't find any in Kayla's size.

Angie had mentioned the Hieroglyphics trail as another trail that the kids could probably do and wouldn't be too painful for us adults either. Unfortunately on the morning of the hike Jenny wasn't feeling well and had to stay behind. I was contemplating leaving Blake with her, but knew he would love it so I dragged him along. I also figured I could use more exercise to get rid of my gut.

So off we went, relatively early Saturday morning (8:30 is early, isn't it?) out to the trailhead. We were using my bosses book (60 Hikes within 60 miles of Phoenix: http://www.amazon.com/Hikes-within-Miles-Including-Scottsdale/dp/0897325931) but you can also find some good information here:
http://hikearizona.com/decoder.php?ZTN=61

Blake was excited to get back in the backpack, he was pretty excited to be getting outside. It had rained the night before and was still pretty overcast for the whole hike.

Here are the Owensby's with Kayla and Elizabeth at the trailhead.

Taking a break. Kayla can only take so much before needing a rest and Blake was getting restless in the backpack.

Nice glamor shot of Elizabeth in front of the Superstitions :-).

Here we are up near the petroglyphs. Yes, that's right, no hieroglyphics on Hieroglyphic trail, what a shame. It would be a long way for the Egyptians to come just to make some wall art though.

Blake and I near a snake, we thought he was pretty cool.

Nice shot of the Owensby's and my girls near a pool of water.

Elizabeth and some holes used to grind grains I think. Not sure what they are called and I'm too lazy to look right now.

Ahh, the Dutton clan, or most of us anyway. It was a beautiful morning but a little muggy.

I had to get a shot of my cutie Kayla on the way out. Elizabeth ran off with Angie for a much needed bathroom break.

A hiking we will go

2009-01-18T17:04:00.002-07:00

This weekend the Owensby's invited us to hike up to the wind caves at Usery pass. This is a picture of the mountain right as we started our hike.
Blake got to ride on Jared's back during the hike. He even fell asleep! All the hikers passing by us thought he was so cute sleeping during the hike.
Elizabeth and Kayla did a great job. Kayla kept telling everyone she was a mountain climber and was doing well because her dad always takes her hunting.
Angie and Steve posing on top. The picture we have of us didn't turn out so well with the light so I didn't post it.
We had a great time and Jared thinks we should make the most of our nice weather and go on another hike very soon.

Congratulations!

2009-01-14T21:38:00.000-07:00

I am so excited that you are going to be a dad! Here is you with Kayla not Tank! Maybe I should think of a good name for your kid when he comes out!

This picture is of you with Blake.

And I know that there are way better pictures of you with Elizabeth that mom has, but this is the only one I have of you with Elizabeth. Nice. I know you will be a great dad. Kayla is so excited, when I told her the baby was due in July she told me all she wanted for her birthday was a cousin. So thanks now I don't have to buy her anything. :) I love you guys and hope all goes well.

More Pictures

2009-01-08T22:36:00.003-07:00

Well I don't know if my mom just read my recent post but she just sent me a picture of Nick and Blake at Christmas. I was just saying an hour ago how I wished I had one. So I thought I would post these pictures she just sent me.

Christmas pictures finally

2009-01-08T20:35:00.004-07:00

We headed up to Flag for Christmas this year. This is our year to spend with the Dutton family, but since both families were in town this year we got to spend it with both. We actually stayed with my family this year since Jared's brothers are currently living with his parents until they can sell their Tucson home. The pictures are a little out of order. We woke up early and opened presents at Grandpa and Grandma Harris's house then headed over to the Duttons.

Joey, Jared's brother wrapped some silly string for the nieces to open and in the middle of opening presents a big silly string attack was launched. It made quite a mess, but fun and unexpected.
Elizabeth made this tin soldier in school this year out of a Pringles can. It turned out great. She also made me a stiching of an apple.
The girls of course got a ton of high school musical dolls this year. I only got them one set of each doll, which was really hard for me to do. Everytime I would go to the store there would be another one on clearance but I would have to tell myslef, "How many of these dolls do these kids really need?" So I would put them down and not buy them. Yay go me.
Blake got some actual boy toys cars, trains, and blocks. Now he wont have to play with dolls and tea sets anymore.
This is Kayla with her two cousins, Ella and Galey. They played great together. Kayla is still excited for July though when she will get a new baby cousin for her birthday. :)
Here are the pictures at my parents house. My parents went to Disney World a few weeks before Christmas and were able to load up on some great High School Musical merchandise! Towels, journals, games, dolls, and puzzles. We are well stocked.
Here is the cute BYU coed.
Blake loves his Grandpa. He always wants to be held by grandpa. I wish I would have gotten some pictures of Blake and my brother Nick. Nick was the supreme play mate, he would throw Blake all over the place. Im sure when we left Nick took a huge nap because Blake played him hard.
I told you the pictures were out of order. Here are the kids on the stairs waiting to come down Christmas morning. I think this picture is funny because the kids are really happy and ready to go and Jared looks like he needs to go back to sleep. We had a great time. Blake acutally slept all night long this trip, at least I think he did, if he didn't I didn't hear him. :) Now we are back home and school has already been going on for a whole week. It has been tough to get back in to our rhythm of waking up early and doing homework. We are still trying to find a house after a year of searching and hope to actually have one by the time Christmas rolls around next year. We will see. Happy 2009 everyone.

kitchen helper

2009-01-08T20:27:00.003-07:00

I thought I would make the girls chocolate chip cookies today for when they got home from school. Blake wasn't being very cooperative so I put him up on the island to help me. I had creamed the sugar and butter together and was starting to add the dry ingredients, when Blake decided he would help me. He grabbed the teaspoon and started to add some sugar. So I told him "no", but of course my children do not listen to me so he continues to add more sugar. I promptly removed the sugar from the island, while I was doing so he dumped half a box of baking soda to the dough! I was not very happy! So I scooped out a quarter or so of dough and threw it in the trash. But now I am not sure how much more flour to add since I have thrown out some of the dough, great. I add about a cup more and call it good. Well as you can see from the picture not much about these cookies turned out right. They got nice a crispy brown on the outside and gooey and undone in the middle. Oh well Jared and the kids still thought they tasted fine.

Sledding

2008-12-30T16:21:00.003-07:00

This isn't that great of a picture but I thought this outfit of Blake is so cute I thought I would post it. Jared looks pretty good too in his ski hat.

Since I am being lazy and don't feel like getting the Christmas pictures off the camera right now I thought I would post up some pictures of us sledding the day after Christmas. It was a white Christmas for us this year. I don't think Flagstaff has seen that much snow in years. On our way to the sledding hill Blake fell asleep so I stayed in the truck with him while everyone else went and had a pretty good time well that is until the girls crashed and got hurt. Grandma brought hot chocolate to keep everyone warm, it was incredibly cold out. But I think all in all it was a success. We usually like to go out into the woods for sledding and a big fire but with all of the snow this year there was no way we would have been able to get into the woods with all the roads covered in snow.

Kayla's new do

2008-12-08T09:10:00.005-07:00

Kayla has been begging me to cut her hair for probably a year now. Here are the before pictures.

And here are the after shots. I didn't intend to cut it so much but her hair is just so curly it curls up and you are left with really short hair! She absolutely loves it though. She was so excited to go to school today and show everyone. We even put it half up with a pink ribbon.

Spooky

2008-12-03T20:26:00.002-07:00

Tonight as we were getting ready for bed Blake turned off the lights and said "spooky". He doesn't say very much so it was really cute to hear him talk. He also learned a new word this week, no. You would think it would have been one of his first words but instead he would usually say uh uh or shake his head no. But all of the sudden the other day he said, "no" and now wont stop saying it.

Thanksgiving

2008-12-02T09:16:00.003-07:00

This year for Thanksgiving we were in charge of making the Turkeys. While we knew we were going to smoke a turkey the opportunity for us to throw a turkey into a pit came up and we jumped at the chance. Jared went over and helped rig up all of the turkeys with hooks. When the fire was ready they threw in around thirty turkeys. They then covered the pit with a metal plate and piled on a ton of dirt until no more smoke came out. I think the turkeys were in the pit for around 12 hours. Though the cooking method was pretty cool the pit turkey was not nearly up to par with Jared's smoked turkey. He is getting so good at smoking meats. We had a little problem while smoking the turkey though, it blew out our electricity. Jared had to run to Walmart and get a new plug. He also had to cut down the wires since they became brittle and broke from the blow out. It was really stressful since Jared was leaving as soon as we were done eating to go up to Flagstaff for his Elk hunt. He couldn't just leave us here without the electricity working.

We ate dinner at Papa's house. Mimi, Uncle Mike, Grandma and Grandpa Harris, Rich and Liz, and Bridgit were there. We went to the park and Blake showed no fear climbing up a really tall slide.

Friday night Grandma and Grandpa took the kids to Amazing Jake's. They played video games, lazer tag, goofy golf, rode on rides ect... Apparently Blake loved a little train ride and wouldn't get off. So he just went around and around. Bridgit and I went to go see Twilight and got some dinner afterwards. It was fun to have a girls night out. Apparently she already has a boyfriend up at BYU! I guess I was the last to know no one tells me anything. Well we had a great weekend. Jared is still away right now on his hunt and I am wishing he was home. I'm not used to being apart from him for so long. But, only two more days and he will be back. Well Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Jared's Birthday

2008-11-06T12:53:00.005-07:00

Jared turned 29 on Oct. 11th. While we were at a wedding Grandma Dutton and the kids decided to throw Jared a surprise party. Elizabeth had a great idea to have balloons drop on his head when we walked in the door. It didn't go off quite as they planned, for one I came in first and then we lifted the handle upwards instead of downwards making the balloons not fall very well.

They decorated the house in camo and green balloons. It was really cute.

Angie and Steve came over for the surprise party. This is Uncle Steve goofing off with the girls.
Elizabeth even learned how to play Happy Birthday on her violin while we were gone. She did an awesome job.
We had pazookies, I think is what you call them. It seems like almost everyone in our family wants them for their birthday. :) Doesn't Jared look really cute in this picture? :)

more halloween pics

2008-11-06T12:44:00.002-07:00

Kayla and I worked together this year and cut out a spooky spider and web on our pumpkin. Blake got on the table the next day and ripped out our spider. That kids gets into everything!

I just got called to be in activity days with Elizabeth's age group. So we had the girls dress up in their Halloween costumes and we frosted cupcakes. I did these before they came as their examples. I think it went really well. When we were done we wrapped the girls like mummies and had an eyeball relay race.

Halloween

2008-11-04T21:41:00.002-07:00

This year for Halloween Elizabeth was Gabriella from High School Musical, Kayla was Ariel, and Blake was a lion.

High School Musical

2008-11-03T11:16:00.002-07:00

Coming out of the movie here is the conversation I had with Kayla.

Kayla: "What part did you not like the most mom?"

me: "I don't know Kayla I liked the movie. Why what part did you not like the most?"

Kayla : "The part where Troy doesn't kiss Sharpay!"

pictures of disneyland vacation

2008-10-23T07:10:00.000-07:00

Disneyland

2008-10-21T10:57:00.002-07:00

Jared and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary with a trip to Disneyland. We used a software called ridemax. You put in the rides you want to go on and it figures out from last years wait time which rides you should go on at what time and when to get fast passes. It was really helpful. We got on so many rides. Usually when we go to Disneyland we do the little kids rides, but since it was just Jared and me we got to do a lot of rides I have never done before like splash mountain. I love that ride I think we went on it 5 times, every time with a fast pass! The very last time we went on it I got stuck in the front! Not a good place to sit. I was drenched from head to toe when we got off. Jared liked Tower of Terror it really surprised us at the first drop, we weren't expecting it. I think I liked California Screamin the best it is the least jerky ride we went on.
We ate dinner at the Blue Bayou which is the restaurant on the water at Pirates of the Caribbean. The atmosphere was fun but the food wasn't that great and was really pricey. The next night we had dinner at Cafe Orleans and had their montey cristo sandwiches. They were pretty good. Saturday we went to Ripley s Believe it of not and saw some crazy stuff. They have one section where they show you a video of people moving their tongues real crazy. There is a mirror there for you to try to replicate what they are doing in the movie. Well as you move in further you see that it is a mirror you can see through in the back! We got to laugh at all the people trying to make funny tongue moves. I wonder if anyone laughed at me while I tried. :) Jared is too smart though, he didn't try, he thought something was up at the beginning.
We had such a fun time but were ready to be home. When we got back Blake woke up from his nap and gave me the best hugs and kisses. He would hug me then look to see if it was me, give me a good kiss on the mouth then do it all over again. But then he saw Jared and went strait to him and wouldn't let Jared go for a whole hour! What is up with that! I'm the mommy!
Grandma Harris stayed with the kids while we went away and they had a great time. They got to eat out every night and go see Papa and Mimi. Grandpa came down Friday and apparently Blake didn't want anything to do with Grandma anymore. I think my mom said today that my dad went and got his back adjusted today.... To much baby holding I guess. Friday night they went to Schnepf Farms and went on a roller coaster! Kayla was so proud of herself. She keeps calling the farm the market for some reason. She keeps asking me if we will take her to the market. Saturday they went to the Science museum and wouldn't you know while eating lunch Kayla lost her second tooth. She didn't realize it until later that day when she felt with her tongue it was missing. What is that you say? Kayla ate her second tooth too?!?! I guess so everyone Kayla must like the way teeth taste. She told us on the phone while we were away and thought she was so crazy. They had such a great time with my parents. Though I think they wore grandma and grandpa out, they said Saturday night they went to bed at 8:30. And when we got home Sunday afternoon they left a few minutes later. :) Thanks again Grandma and Grandpa. We love you.

Blake Sleeping

2008-09-25T21:17:00.003-07:00

Here is a video of Blake falling asleep while he was finishing his lunch. The end is really funny.

Labor Day at Lake Powell 2

2008-09-17T12:47:00.009-07:00

Elizabeth getting up for the first time on skis! It was incredibly exciting.

We had a great time this year at Lake Powell. We swam a ton, skied, tubed, played on the beach, fished, and had smores every night. Kayla also lost her very first tooth on the first night we were there. She was eating corn on the cob complaining about her loose tooth when Aunt Angie discovered it wasn't in her mouth anymore. We think she swallowed it but she didn't care she lost her tooth! Yay!

Labor Day at Lake Powell 1

2008-09-17T12:47:00.003-07:00

Blake did not like to go in the water after the first day. But being the mean parents we are we made him.
Elizabeth caught a few fish, this one is a carp. I think she caught this one with a dough ball. She also caught a few cat fish. Kayla "caught" a fish too because Elizabeth caught it on her pole.
We have an island at Lake Powell we named Dutton Island. Most of it was under water this year. Jared and I had fun jumping off this rock. Elizabeth and Kayla did Ariel shots on the rock. I didn't include Kayla's photo because she way crying because we took E's picture first.
Jared always tries to Slalom but never seems to be able to stay on the one ski. It is really funny watching him face plant into the water. I shouldn't laugh though I can't get up at all.

So I've taken up smoking lately

2008-09-09T08:28:00.013-07:00

I recently took up smoking, and after reading mountains of opinions online (analysis paralysis), I've had some success. The smoker I'm using I picked up used (well, not from a store but not ever used to smoke anything) for $10 or so, but have had some issues with getting it up to heat. To deal with this, after many smokings with cardboard boxes over the smoker, I finally added to hotplate to the bottom of the smoker. The ribs and pork shoulder are the first attempt at smoking after adding the additional heat and came out pretty good...better than most bbq from a restaurants.

These ribs were also my first time using mesquite, I usually use hickory. I'll probably switch back to hickory after I use up the rest of the mesquite, I like the sweeter aromatics in the hickory that I don't get with the mesquite. The food was excellent, tender and juicy, but still not perfect. To help with improvements, I added a more accurate temperature gauge to the smoker so I know the actual temp of the smoker, not just whether it is "warm", "ideal", or "hot". Worthless. I'll be sticking it at 220 for the most part now.

I can usually only smoke once every couple months, being covered in smoke all day while out camping is one thing, but around the house it makes me nuts and I crave a shower almost as much as eating. Hopefully with some work on the smoker I won't have to stand out in the smoke messing with the temperature as much.

So here are some pics of the recent smoking:

Here it is from the store, all wrapped in plastic and unrubbed. Speaking of rub, I just cover them with mustard and put a cheap rub on from the store...obviously I'm far from hard core on this.

Getting the smoker ready, filled the bottom with wood chips (for fast smoke) and wood chunks (so I don't have to put more chips in every hour). Note the two power cords coming from the unit :-).

Ribs just getting started on the smoker, there are more ribs and the pork shoulder on the rack below them.

And here they are coming out, they look like they're worth eating now:

The lower rack. We're all addicted to pulled pork, so it's hard to smoke without doing at least a small shoulder.

And the money shot, yum. I was so stuffed when I got done with these I could hardly finish the pork shoulder.

so...some other smokings...turkey is always good. I put some olive oil on this one per some site's recommendation, but wouldn't do it again. The last turkey I smoked had a real nice crispy skin and more smoke penetrated the meat.

Alright...picture of the previous turkey...note the skin texture, delicious.

You did what!

2008-08-26T12:37:00.000-07:00

What Elizabeth does Kayla must follow. As I recently posted, Elizabeth got her ears pierced for her birthday. Kayla has been quite upset that she hasn't been able to get her ears pierced too. Well as all of you know that have had your ears pierced you need to "clean" them several times a day. After seeing Elizabeth do this many times Kayla thought she would "clean" her ears also. Her choice for cleaner, super glue. Luckily we have a can of acetone out in the garage and a few nasty smelling minutes later she was all "clean".

The Most wonderful time of the year

2008-08-12T10:41:00.000-07:00

Yay! It finally came, the first day of school. I can't believe my little Kayla is going to be gone all day long. Kayla picked out a different outfit the night before so I was surprised when she came out with her green shirt on. It had pink sleeves so we cut them off to make this shirt summer compatible. Elizabeth was excited to go back and see her friends again, she got the teacher she wanted, Mrs. Eurkee. Almost all of her friends are in her class this year, she is growing up so fast already in the fourth grade. Kayla also has two girls from church in her class which is wonderful. This summer she did a phonogram class with both of them so she really has gotten to know them better. When Jared got out the camera to take their pictures Blake had just taken off his diaper. He realized we were taking pictures and went and stood with the girls, butt naked. It was really funny. Though every time Jared tried to get his picture he would wander out of range. Picking the girls up from school was a nightmare. It took me a half hour to get out of the parking lot! I don't know why everyone thinks they need to pick their kid up on the first day of school. Kayla seemed liked she had a good day, she said she had P.E. and three recesses. " I'm so sweaty mom." We stopped by Wendy's on the way home and they both got M&M Frosty's. Kayla is so funny, she isn't used to wearing pants all day long that as soon as we walked in the door she was out of her clothes and into her big pajama t-shirt which she wore for the rest of the day. Blake did pretty well yesterday with just me at home. He even gave us a good scare when we put him in his crib. Wouldn't you know when we went to check on him he was waiting for us at the door! NO!!!! We are hoping it is just a fluke and that he really doesn't know how to get out of his bed! He isn't even 18 months yet! Elizabeth and Kayla never got out of their cribs. Blake has been such a different experience, everyone was right boys are way more work than little girls. :) The first day of school seemed to go really well, hopefully it will be a great year.

Elizabeth's 9th Birthday

2008-07-24T21:51:00.000-07:00

A few years ago Elizabeth asked me if she could get a hamster. I told her that when she was in the 4th grade she could get one. Well guess what that day came sooner than I thought. She turned 9 yesterday and for her birthday we went down to petco and got a baby hamster. He is really cute. He is a dwarf hamster and she has named him Spotty, even though he has no spots. :) He has even bit her already! But Spotty was quickly forgiven. She also was able to convince Jared to let her get her ears pierced 3 years early. We had told her not till she was 12, oh well. She chose flower earings that look like diamonds. She was increadibly nervous that it was going to hurt and while we were waiting for the girl to get the guns ready she almost broke my hand from squeazing me so tightly. She did really well though, didn't cry at all. I asked her after we left if it felt like a small pinch, "more like a big pinch mom". Kayla was pretty upset she couldn't get her ears pierced and asks me all the time if she can get them when she turns six next year. After much asking I finally told Kayla that she would have to convince her dad. No luck yet.

Ride to Tortilla Flat

2008-07-23T20:06:00.005-07:00

I went on a somewhat spur of the moment ride with my friend Narasimhan to Tortilla Flat on the 4th of July, great way to spend the morning! It was kind spontaneous, at least the destination. It was either Canyon or Saguaro lake, Narasimhan figured we could save Saguaro Lake for the cars and take the bikes to Canyon Lake. When we got there it was only a couple more miles to Tortilla Flat, so we figured we might as well head down and snap some pictures :-). It was a great way to start the weekend celebrations :-D.