First Day of School 2012

It's hard to believe that summer break is done and the kiddos are back in school already. They were ready to head back. Me- well, I love having them around in the summer to go have adventures, or be homebodies and just relax. But, I do enjoy the change of pace that comes when school starts again- more structure, a cleaner house, and a little more solitude for myself. Here's to another school year!

John, Jared and Noah.  They weren't thrilled to hold the signs, but they love their mother and didn't grumble too much.

Cool kids.

After years of attending different schools for various reasons, we're glad our good friends the Clarks are back in the same schools as our kids. Now we can carpool again- woohoo! Evan and Jared have been besties since they were beating each other up in church nursery. Noah and Taylor were born 3 days apart, and we joke that if she and Noah were to get married her name would be Taylor Taylor:) And Courtney's just one of the nicest girl I know.

We're Still Alive, I Promise. ANNOTATED

Brooke here! The reason my mom hasn't posted in almost a year is because she's too awesome for her own good. (She's too kind. The reason I haven't posted in almost a year is because I'm good at making up excuses not to post, like I don't have good pictures of what I want to blog about, or just plain procrastination.) The family is in a perpetual state of motion--they start before dawn and work/school/practice/perform/host/teach/help/serve/etc until they drop well into the night.(This is pretty much true. But whose family isn't busy?)So here's a quick update of what everyone's up to. (As far as I can tell, anyway. They don't call me anymore. (We do too call, just not as often as she'd like.))

Dallin has most of his college applications in and is auditioning for North Texas University today.(He did great! Chris and I sneaked into the foyer where we could hear after he'd gone into the audition room and were soooo proud of our French horn playing son! Turns out his auditioner (is that a word?) knew one of Chris's music professors at BYU.)  He survived the craziest semester imaginable and otherwise laughs in the face of stress. He was brass captain of the Regiment this year and he and John both marched in the Rose Parade this year. (We went to see it live-my first time ever- and it was awesome!)

John is still obsessed with band and plays first alto in the Stage Band. (He's auditioning on Tuesday for Wind Symphony, so he plays classical, too. Although he really prefers jazz.) He has great teachers (I would know, I had half of them at his age) and is otherwise awesome.

Jared is a...blue(?) (nope. green) belt in karate now and returned to public school this year. He's a sixth grader and clearly the smartest kid in his class. (True. But he's humble about it. He made the million word club, and has a goal to read 3 million words by the end of the school year.)

Noah is also at the public school and is probably the most well-spoken third grader in the country. (Well, maybe not the entire country, but he's not shy to talk to anyone about pretty much anything.) His AYSO team made the playoffs (will this season ever end they win?) and he can talk soccer all day long (as long as you don't bring up famous teams or players).

My parents are still working hard at their callings (Dad's in the bishopric and Mom's YW President) and manage to get everyone where they need to be on time. They still look too young to be married for almost 21 years.(Has it only been 21 years? It seems like forever- and I mean that in a good way!)

That's all I can think of for now, and Mom can fill in the rest. (Thanks for updating, Brooke! Feel free to continue, and I'll edit where necessary:)

Trains

Jared and Noah had a blast with the train set the other day. Noah was especially persistent in figuring out how to do a track that had some elevation while getting creative with the pieces he had. Here are the results!

Disney Dinner

Recently our ward young women put on a fundraiser dinner featuring a Disney theme.

John's a pirate in this picture. He's after Sir Mitchell, who's Dallin's age.

Brooke loved playing the part of Snow White, and did a great job. Happy and Dopey were adorable, too, though I am a bit biased. Cinderella, Prince Charming, Pocahontas, and Mulan were there, as well, along with princesses in training, knights, and pirates.

Catch Up

Again, it's been too long since my last post.  Also decided it was time to dress up our site a little--this is a work in progress.  I've managed to leave some things out in between the last two posts, so here's what's been happening.

March 19 was Chris's birthday, and March 23 was Jared's birthday.  We celebrated both at once the week before Easter, which was also Jared's birthday.  Chris turned 41, and Jared is now 9.

We have a tradition of going to Grandma and Grandpa Taylor's house to celebrate birthdays, and we like Aunt Carin to make the cake because she's the Queen of Cake Baking. Thanks, Carin!!

So, both of them got more like a birthday week, instead of just one day, since we also did celebrate at home on the actual days of their birthdays.  For a "friend party" Jared chose to invite his friend Evan to go to Knott's Berry Farm with our family during the week of spring break. Jared also earned his Wolf badge in Cub Scouts.

Now that he's 9, he can start working on his Bear badge.

Chris took his band, orchestra, and choir to perform at Knott's Berry Farm.

The week after Easter was spring break for the kids, but Chris had spring break the week before, so we couldn't really go anywhere.  We did go to Knott's together, though, and that was a blast.  Silver Bullet is awesome!! I love a good, smooth, fast roller coaster!!

We also went bowling, which was a lot of fun.  I can still bowl almost as well as I did back in junior high when I was on a youth bowling league.  Some of my kids are impressed by the fact that at one time I could bowl around 135, while others aren't so dazzled by that number.  Anyway, enough about bowling. The rest of the week we just stayed home, played board games, played outside, and relaxed!  The weekend closing spring break was wonderful, too.  We watched Jared and Noah play soccer games (Jared's number 8 in the dark green, Noah's number 3. Spring soccer is coed, so they both have girls on their teams).

We also watched General Conference, which I always enjoy.  It's as if the speakers are directing their remarks just to me.  Before we went to soccer games, a solemn assembly was held in which we had the opportunity to participate in the sustaining of our new prophet, President Thomas S. Monson, as well as his counselors, President Henry B. Eyring, and President Dieter F. Uchdorf,

and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles with its newest member Elder D. Todd Christofferson.

This was a beautiful occasion that I hope all of our family will always remember.  We also sustained a new General Young Women Presidency:  Elaine S. Dalton, Mary N. Cook, and Ann M. Dibb.

Some other things we've been doing . . .

BEFORE

AFTER

A friend of ours offered to do some improvements in our front yard, so we jumped on the opportunity!   I can't wait for the roses to climb up the pillars and bloom gloriously red and yellow!!  Thanks, Mark!!  

Brooke went to what's known as Mormon Prom.  No dates, just fun with friends in fancy clothes. The theme for the evening was "Pure Imagination" from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

That about sums up the last three weeks or so.  Except there was one day where I lost my keys, and I was supposed to leave to take Brooke and Dallin and two other kids to early morning seminary at 6:25 am to get them there by 6:40 am.  And so we looked high and low, in my purse, under the couches, behind the hall tree, couldn't find them, called for backup, and kept looking even after the kids were taken care of.  A few hours later, I just decided to look in my purse again, and what do you know, there were my keys!  What lesson was I supposed to learn from this experience?  That my eyesight is going?  That sometimes we don't see what's right in front of us?  Both are true, I think.

Anyway, it's been a good and busy three weeks.  Won't wait so long to post again because this has taken me two days to finish!!!!!