Thanksgiving 2009 Cabin Fever!

We spent Thanksgiving up in the White Mountains with Trent's brother and family as well as Grandma and Grandpa. We stayed at a cabin, ate Thanksgiving Dinner and played lots of games. The kids spent hours outside. We got snow on the last night we were there. It was exciting. We hadn't seen the white stuff for a while! It was a wonderful trip! Savana spent hours outside building the fort! Even though it was cold.

Carver was "fixing" the fort. It took a long time.

Avery had a giant smile on her face the whole weekend and only came in for Hot Chocolate.

Gavin was "Master of all he surveyed!" He had a great time.

Halloween 2009!

As always, Halloween was filled with fun costumes, fun trick or treating and waaaaay to much candy!! Need I say more?

Avery was Joan of Arc. Gavin was MIB. Carver was a Jedi Knight. Savana was a Pirate!

Horse Camp

Savana and Avery went to horse camp during the Fall Break. It was Savana's second time so she was a pro this year! It was Avery's first time. She has always been a bit horse crazy, so this was a lot of fun for her. It was also a little bit intimidating, as the horses are large and there is one old horse named Sugar who walks around everywhere and tries to eat everyone's lunch! The girls were picked up by Miss Candace every morning at 7 AM at Safeway, and returned to us at 5PM. The days were long and packed full of learning to walk, care for and train horses. There were also many trailrides. Avery admits to a little homesickness, but still loved camp! Savana just loved camp and was never homesick!!

It was hot, dusty and a lot of flies, but still very fun!

It was a fun week and the girls look forward to doing it again next fall. Carver plans to go next year too!

Today Savana turned 10.

It is hard to believe that it has already been ten years since a beautiful baby girl joined our family! Trent and I were so happy to have you, and in a blink of an eye, you are already ten. I decided to make you a top ten list of things to remember about Savana.

#1.... "I do it!!". From the moment you could talk you were telling us that you could do it. You could put on your own socks, put on your own shoes, get your own clothes on, comb your own hair... even if it took you forever! You can do it!

#2.....You are the cutest lady bug ever!!! For three years in a row you wanted to be a lady bug for Halloween. Adorable!!!!!

#3.... You are famous for the following expressions used in our family: Oooo Pricey, Oooo you've been schooled, and yes, Whatever!!!

#4..... You hate socks:)

#5..... You love to sing Hoedown Throwdown and sing it often.

#6.....You play the piano beautifully.

#7......You play a mean game of both canasta and Wyatt Earp!

#8......Your feet are superfast at soccer.

#9.....You are busy: You play the piano, soccer,you're in the band, choir, advanced math, activity days and ELP!

#10....You are a wonderful daughter and sister. WE LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!

Happy Birthday Savana.

More Lake Havasu Pictures

Gavin driving the Boat.

Savana tubing!

Gavin tubing!

Gavin again

Carver ready to tube!

Pictures!

Avery flying on the tube. Lake Havasu

Trent, Gavin Savana and Avery walking on the sandbar at Lake Havasu

Savana and Avery making sure the boat stays "parked" at Lake Havasu

Carver turned 7!!

Carver's Birthday Present!

Well so much has happened over this last month that I haven't found time to write about it. So here we go. Sadly, Grandpa Mark passed away at the end of August. His funeral was on September 4th in Pocatello Idaho. We drove up in time for the viewing the night before the funeral. Although Mark has been ill for some time now and is in a better place, it was still emotional to say goodbye. He has been a good grandfather to my kids, and was certainly full of lots of advice for them and for Trent and I! Trent will miss playing cribbage with him. I will miss his love of birds, fishing and the great stories he liked to tell. He was buried with full military honors as he was a vet of WW II. He shared a story with us about when he had been called up to serve. He wanted to be a pilot but it turns out he was color blind and the military was picky about things like that. They wanted their pilots to be able to tell the difference between enemy uniforms. Well Mark waited in line to take his test and proceeded to memorize all the answers to the questions the soldiers ahead of him were asked. When it got to be his turn he answered all the questions the nurse asked. She laughed and told him that he got all the answers right, but it was for the wrong test. She had switched to a different test right as it was his turn. So he got to serve as an office clerk instead of a pilot during WWI.
We will miss him.

We had a lot of school activities leading up to the fall break. Savana had her 4th grade musical. It was all about being good to the earth. It was cute and fun. Gavin had a choir concert the same week and that was very enjoyable. He has a great low voice now, and unlike the rest of his family, he can carry a tune.

On September 25th Carver turned 7! It was a fun day and we love him so much! He had two birthday cakes because he couldn't decide vanilla or chocolate:). Here are 7 great things that happened to Carver this year!

1....Carver learned to swim this year! Like a Fish!

2....Carver gets to go to school full day and eat lunch in the Cafeteria!

3.. Famous Carver expression this year "That's weak dad".

4...Got the Family award for riding on the tube the longest at Lake Havasu.

5...Favorite meal is still Pasghetti!

6...Turned 7 and gets to go to bed at 8PM!

7...Is a great brother with a huge sense of humor!

We love you Carver.

We love year round school because it gives us a fabulous 3 week Fall break! We just got back from Lake Havasu last weekend. It was an enjoyable vacation just for our little family. We camped at the state park right at the beach on the lake. There was hardly anyone else there, and hardly any boats on the lake. The first day we hung out by the lake, swimming in the water ever time we got hot. It was so relaxing. We rented a boat for day two and three. The kids had a great time letting us pull them around the lake on a tube. Any time we got hot, we stopped the boat and jumped into the water. Lake Havasu has sand bars in the middle of it where you can pull your boat right on top of. We anchored on one of them and played in the ankle deep water. It difficult to describe the sensation of standing on a piece of sand, completely surrounded by deep water.

The only problem we had was when we tried to crash the boat by a lighthouse. Well we didn't exactly try. On day two of the boat, we backed it off the beach where we had "parked" it for the night. We got about a quarter mile from the beach and the boat cut out. No matter what we tried, it wouldn't start. We dropped the anchor, but soon noticed that the anchor was dragging along the bottom of the lake as we were dragged back toward the shore, yup toward the lighthouse and the rocks. Well, we decided to call the company we were renting the boat from to see what they would like us to do. The had us try a couple of different things, nothing worked. They then told us not to worry, they'd send someone over to help us.
It was hard not to panic as the boat kept being steadily swept to the shore and rocks. We drifted past some buoy's marking off a swim area, and I managed to grab a buoy and slip a rope around it. I held onto the rope for about 15 minutes, but the boat eventually just pulled away. It was probably a good thing as I don't know how much the state park was going to charge me for dragging off their swim area. Finally we saw someone pull up on the shore to help, right as the boat was minutes from the rock. A man got out of his truck and started running down to the light house. He was dropping car keys, wallet and whatever else was in his pocket as he ran. He climbed down the rocks and waited for us to get to the rocks. I'm not sure what his plan was, maybe to push us back of the rocks after we hit them? At this point, the boat takes one last swing sideways into the rocks and just stops. Apparently the anchor finally caught. Then the boat swings the other direction, away from the rocks, and away for the guy that's supposed to help us. He just wades into the water and swims out to the boat. At this point, relief is starting to set in. We were about 40 minutes into the ordeal and I am trying not to cry, when the guy gets on the boat, sits in the driver seat, and yup, starts the boat right up. Now, Trent and I had been frantically trying to start it every few minutes and it never worked for us, so we both felt a little upset when the boat started right up. The guy explained that since it had cooled down from the day before, the boat was cold and hard to start. Not for him apparently. He drove us around a bit and revved the engine a lot and then jumped back into the lake and swam back to shore. We then proceeded to drive right to the middle of the lake as far away from any light houses as possible! So there you have it. No crash, no sinking to the bottom of Lake Havasu, and we can't wait to try it all again next year.
Now we are just enjoying the last two weeks of our break. Pretty good stuff.

This is the debut of our family blog. I am not really technically inclined so bear with me as I figure out how to do this! A few months ago I signed up on Facebook and have found people that I haven't had contact with for years. It is so wonderful to be able to find somebody with a click of a button. Many of you have asked if I have a blog and now I can say yes! So here we go:

The kids have been in school for a month now and instead of feeling organized, I feel like we keep scrambling to adjust our schedules to accommodate whatever new activity somebody in the family takes on. I guess that's the way it works in a large family. I love that the kids have so many things that interest and excite them. Now we just have to find a way to get everybody where they need to be!

So how are we doing? Despite the busy schedule, we are doing well. Trent has made a good adjustment to his new job here in Tucson. He enjoys the people he works with and especially loves Raytheon Friday's! He gets every other Friday off.
I love Tucson! It reminds me of where I grew up in South Africa. The sun shines most of the time. Monsoons are awesome and the Desert Blooms!
Somebody once told me that it takes a year after you move to feel like you belong somewhere. I have found this to be true. This year, my children felt so much more confident about beginning the school year. They have friends, know the teachers and know their way around the school.
I am proud of them for moving outside of their comfort zones and making an effort to make this move a success.

Hopefully I will figure out how to get picture's up and do that next!