MARCH

STATE SPORTS - The high school championships continued!  The first weekend of March was the boys basketball finals.  My parents came back over to watch Ririe play for the championship.  Unfortunately they lost and ended up 2nd in the state which is still a huge accomplishment.  Kasen, my dad, & Jed went to a few of the games that weekend.  Kasen was really cheering for Centential in the 5A bracket.  His friend Caleb (in the picture) had a cousin playing for that team.  Like I said about the superbowl, Kasen gets really invested in the teams he decides to cheer for.  In the final game, Centenial lost and Kasen was so upset he started crying.  :)  Abby and her family came over too, but because Jordan is an assistant coach for Ririe, they stayed at the hotel with the team and we didn't see them much.  We did meet at a parking lot for a few minutes to say hi to cute little Jaxon.

It was fun to have my parents stay with us again.  Saturday we went to breakfast and then decided to all go to the Ririe championship game.  Ava & Kasen were great little fans cheering for Ririe.  Kinsley mostly just liked the free chocolate milk and playing with Jaxon.  Dallin couldn't keep his eyes off the cheerleaders and the student section.  

GIRLS NIGHT OUT PARTY - That first Friday night in March Ava and I were invited to a mom/daughter girls night out party.  It was hosted by one of her friends at school.  We were supposed to wear our pjs but we forgot!  When we first got there we started with a game.  The mom/daughter team had to dress one of us up with tableclothes and create a modest dress for a fashion show.  It was fun except Ava said she felt like a tropical bird!  Then we had goodies and watched the live-action Cinderella.  It was really fun to spend time together.  It was also fun to see Ava having fun with lots of girls from school.

DALLIN 10 MONTHS - Another month down for this boy!  Dallin has really gotten fast at crawling.  He can zip across the floor pretty quick.  He still goes straight for shoes and cords and has added in another thing he isn't supposed to like - blinds.  Ugh. The kid never sit stills.  He hates his jumper and screams and screams if he gets put in it, so I decided to sell it on craigslist.  He still loves Baby Einstein movies, but I can't leave him alone to watch them anymore.  The other day he was strapped in to his bouncer seat watching and I ran upstairs to pay some bills online.  I heard him screaming after a bit so I went downstairs and he had flipped over on his hands and knees and had crawled over to the stairs - with the bouncer still attached to his back!  Crazy kid.  This month Dallin's hair has started curling up in the back and around his ears.

Dallin loves to go outside.  His eyes get big and it's like he can't hear & see everything fast enough.  He took his first trip to the playground earlier in the month.  He loved the swings.

This month Dallin got another tooth - that big top one!  It was a miserable few days leading up to that thing popping through.  Lots of waking up through the night and fussy days.  The other top front one looks like it is coming soon too.  Dallin is still a happy boy though most of the time.  He started holding his own bottle a little bit and is really good at drinking out of his sippy cup.  He gulps and gulps water and then puts it down and breathes really hard like he just ran a race.  It is funny.  Dallin really loves teasing and when he starts crawling he loves it when someone gets down behind him and pretends to chase him.  He just giggles and giggles.  He loves the yellow duck toy in the bathtub so much.  He still makes lots of yelps and noise.  He tries to mimic noises - he really likes Tyler and listening to his sounds.  He usually starts smiling and laughing when Tyler is talking and then Dallin will try to make the same sounds. I bought him a new toy to try and help him learn to walk, but so far he gets nervous.  In two days he learned how to go up the stairs all on his own.  He does not understand he has to go down backwards too yet though! A few of Dallin's bad habits right now are trying to roll away every time I change his diaper (so annoying!!!!) and he has gotten really good at throwing tantrums already. Especially when you take something away from him. Heaven help us.

He is still the cutest little sleeping baby around.  He just looks so precious and sweet.  I could kiss those cheeks all day long.

Busted with Kinsley's pink unicorn.  He loves pushing the button on the neck and hearing the horse sounds on it and the other stick horses we have.  He also loves the William Tell overture.  If we start humming it he gets the biggest grin on his face and starts rocking back and forth like he is riding a horse.

Dallin's new favorite thing this month was discovering the cats in Kinsley's room.  My Grandma Melba made these cats and I remember playing with them when I was little.  She had them in her dining room.  Then after she passed away, my mom ended up with them.  Kinsley loved them so much and would run straight for them whenever we came to my parents house to visit.  When we moved to Boise, my mom gave them to Kinsley.  But now it looks like Kinsley has some competition for them!  Dallin just heads straight for them and pats them and kisses them and rides them.  :)  He was trying to hug both of them so hard that he knocked the tall one down and chipped it's ear.  Of course Kinsley bawled and bawled so we had to move them apart and put the two cats in different parts of the room.  Dallin also learned how to climb the stairs this month.  He can go all the way up, but doesn't understand how to go down!  It is pretty scary because we have such a long staircase. 

When I need to get some stuff done on the computer I'll put Dallin in his chair to watch Baby Einsteins.  One day I could hear him just blabbering and I wondered which movie he was watching and liking so much.  When I looked over he was just staring my way trying to get my attention the whole time. :)

YW'S - It was a pretty busy month for YW's for me.  We had ward conference which led to a bunch of meetings.  I also had some other stake meetings this month for family history and planning with other YW presidents.  I think the biggest thing I didn't realize about being a president vs being in a presidency is how many more meetings I have to go to.  One of our laurels was in the Distinguished Young Women program (known as Junior Miss in my day.)  Here there aren't a lot of girls who participate so they combine all the high schools in the valley for one program.  I think there were 12 girls.  Michaela did a great job and I was happy some of our other laurels and leaders went to support her too.  Two Wednesdays I had mutual at our house.  Jed was a good sport about it.  One night we had a movie night and the other week we did a cooking competition with the priests.  It was a full house for sure. 

On March 22nd we had our YW New Beginning program.  This is held every year to welcome in the new girls who will turn 12 during that year and introduce them to the YW program.  I can't even believe it, but Ava is one of those girls this year!  We had originally planned this for January, but that was the night the church flooded.  It was a good program and I think that all the soon to be Beehives liked it.  We started off with them being introduced by a "Beehive Buddy" (a member of the beehive/mia maid classes), then the next big part was them going around to different tables where they were taught about the YW values by our laurels.  I was really proud of all the YW's efforts - especially the laurels who did all the teaching.  They had planned the whole night and it turned out great.  Each new Beehive also got a white rose and a bracelet with different colored beads that match the YW values.  Ava hasn't taken hers off.  I can't wait to have Ava in YW's with me.  She is such an amazing girl and I love her so much!

SPEED JUMP COMPETITION - Ava made the Willow Creek Speed Jump team again this year.    She has really improved this year and was the top girls backward jumper in the whole school!  The district tournament was on a Friday night from 6-9pm.  I was surprised again this year how many people attended and how long it takes - an entire 3 hrs!  The stands are as full for jump rope as they were when we had basketball games in high school. 

Ava was really nervous this year and didn't want us to tell anyone about it.  Jed gave her a blessing so she wouldn't be so nervous.  She did awesome!  She got her three highest jumps of the whole year in the three rounds of competition.  180 jumps in one minute - round 1.  184 jumps - round 2.  182 jumps - round 3.  They brought back 10 jumpers for the final round and gave the top 5 ribbons and the winner also got a trophy.  Ava didn't get a ribbon and she was pretty disappointed.  She found out the next week at school she got 8th.  It is always sad to watch your child be disappointed.  She did so awesome though and we had to remind her that last year she didn't even make it to the finals and that she was the top jumper in her whole school!  One of her teachers in primary came to watch her which was really special.  This lady isn't even a member she just helps the teacher who is.  Ava had mentioned that she was going to be in the competition so this lady called the PE teacher at school to find out when/where.  I thought that was really kind of her.  She said Ava is a really sweet girl and she was happy to support her.  Dallin was strapped to his stroller the entire time - all 3 hrs of jump time - but he was Ava's biggest fan! He adores Ava.

SCHOOL - A few months ago Kasen's teacher approached me about having him tested for the Gifted & Talented program.  Last month they started his testing.  He had to take two tests and pass both with a score higher than 96% on each one.  We received notification this month that he passed both of his tests and was able to be in the GT program.  Once a student is in the GT program they are in all the way through 8th grade.  Kasen was so excited!  He looks up to Ava so much and has wanted to be in GT too.  We were glad he made it in and know it will be a great for his education like it has been for Ava!  Kasen also got hit another 50 miles for Creek Cruisers!  He and Ava both entered a district wide art competition but neither of their submissions got chosen.  However they got ribbons - Kasen was excited about it, Ava was not.

Kinsley is doing so awesome at homeschool.  I can't believe she only has 10 weeks left!  I can't believe this is my third time teaching this curriculum.  It has been an amazing program and all three of my kids have turned into fantastic readers and thinkers.  I have also enjoyed the time I got to spend with each of them.  Looking back now, I know it was a gift from my Heavenly Father that Ava couldn't go to kindergarten that first year in KY and we had no money to enroll her anywhere else so I had to homeschool her.  So many blessings have come from that one event.  Kinsley earned her 2nd reading reward for reading another 25 books.  She choose to pick out a stuffed animal and got a little purple sea turtle.  We also discovered how much Dallin loves the racecar shopping cart!

FUN STUFF - Ava has been studying in the Old Testament during her personal scripture study.  She gave us a home evening lesson all about the children of Israel in the wilderness and prepared manna for us to gather.  Kasen and Kinsley made dragon lair forts one day and then slept in them overnight.

Ava wanted to learn a song by Joseph Haydn.  She had to do a report on a composer for music class and drew his name.  The teacher told them if they played a song for the class by their composer she would give them extra credit.  She came home and went through my music books until she found one by Haydn titled Gypsy Dance.  It was a pretty difficult song, one I thought would be too hard for her to learn.  But I taught her the first line and then after a couple of days the second line and then within two weeks she was playing it perfectly and had the whole thing memorized.  She practices all the time and it has given Dallin a greater desire to get started on his piano skills as well!

Kasen is a great boy.  He has some fun friends in his class.  They play football at recess and decided to make a team playbook.  They each got to take it home overnight and add some plays to it.  These were Kasen's three plays.  He was so proud of it!  Kasen had a pretty good crash on his bike one weekend when my parents were here.  He took the corner too sharp and laid his bike to the ground.  Well he actually kinda' did it on purpose so he wouldn't hit the tree.  He was upset about it, but my dad told him about when he had his bad motorbike wreck.  He showed Kasen his scar and gave Kasen the advise to wear some gloves to protect his hands (bc Kasen had scraped his hands up pretty bad).  Kasen has been riding with his gardening gloves ever since.

One weekend Jake, Jace, Madeline, & Jagger came to Boise for Jace to try-out for a competition basketball team.  They were only here for 24 hours, but it was fun while it lasted.  Madeline surprised us - we didn't know she was coming and Kinsley was soooo excited.  They are good little buddies and have so much fun together.  Everyone had fun with Jagger too.  Jagger was really nice to Dallin and played with Kasen.  We stopped by Tresa's house on their way home to see the new brown baby lamb!  It was so cute.  Another weekend Johnny and Trena were here for a wedding so we got to see them for a few hours too.  It happened to be Johnny's birthday so it even turned into a party! Tresa pointed out that she got to take a picture with her oldest and youngest brothers. :) Always nice to be around family.

On March 14th, our neighbors invited us over to celebrate Pi.  They had about 6 different pies to eat and we had fun visiting with them and other neighbors that came too.  I thought it was a really cute idea. Pi (3.14) on 3/14. There was a really nice warm week right in the middle of the month.  The kids would go play outside as soon as they got home from school.  Poor Dally had to watch from the window.  I'm not a fan of babies crawling outside.  I'm sensing a theme with this little guy until he gets sturdy on his legs... just watching the older ones dreaming of keeping up!

SLC TRIP -The last weekend of March we went to SLC to spend the weekend with my family (well at least part of them.)  My sister Katie, who is now living in NYC, was able to come out and translate for the Women's Conference on March 25th.  Jed & I were able to see Katie in January when we went to San Francisco, but my kids haven't seen her for over a year so we thought it would be a fun little trip to take.  Our kids had spring break the following week so Jed took a couple of days off of work and we planned to make a little vacation out of it and do some fun stuff.  We stayed downtown SLC about a block from Temple Square.  We had a great view of the temple from our hotel window.

When we got to SLC we met up with my mom, Katie, Abby/Jaxon, & Mal/her family at City Creek for some lunch.  We walked in to the food court and were looking around and all of a sudden this blur came screaming out of nowhere!  It was of course Katie.  The kids were very excited to see her!  Ava is getting really close to being Katie's height.

After lunch we walked through City Creek back to our hotel.  It was a cold, rainy day, but luckily the mall is mostly indoors.  The kids thought it was a pretty cool place, especially with the fish.  Kinsley was so hyper this day.  She would run ahead of us down and hurry and stop in front of every store front with a new pose until we caught up to her, then she would run down to the next store. 

Aunt Sharol gave my mom some tickets for all of us to go to Women's Conference at the conference center.  It was still raining and pretty colorful to see all the women with their umbrellas waiting to go in.  Ava has been going to Women's Conference for a few years now, but it was her first time going to the Conference Center.  She was pretty excited.  She is such a good girl.  She packed up her journal to take notes without me even mentioning it to her.

We had "special people" seats.  They were only 18 rows from the pulpit.  We were really really close and had to go through a special door to get down to our seats.  It was pretty cool because I've never been down that close.  On the other hand, it was a little distracting too because you were really close to all the cameras and so I found myself watching those move around a lot.  Personally, I like watching conference on tv.  I have better focus.

When we got out of the conference it had stopped raining and there was this beautiful mist everywhere.  The temple looked especially pretty.

That night before bed we went swimming again.  (Kids had gone earlier too.)  The pool was a little chilly so the babies didn't last long.  Good thing we had Jed to snuggle with them and keep them warm!  Our kids swam for about 1.5 hrs.  They are all good little swimmers.  Kasen and Ava wanted to sit in the sauna for awhile, so I went in there with them.  I thought we would all sleep really good that night, but I was wrong!  Dallin slept awful and was awake 3 or 4 times during the night.  He would just start screaming.  His upper gum was pretty swollen so I'm sure his tooth was hurting, but it was not fun at all.  He also started getting a horrible runny nose once we got there and having diarrhea.  We should have sensed the ominous nature of all of this, but we had no idea how much more craziness we were in for...

The next day was Sunday and rather than try to figure out a church schedule we decided we would spend the day at Temple Square.  Across the street from our hotel was this really cool art thing.  There were tons of signs of opposites and my kids (especially Ava) really liked it.  So on our way to breakfast we had to take some pictures by their favorite signs.

Salt Lake does have a very beautiful downtown area.  The fun thing about city centers are their statues, art, etc that make them unique.  The extra bonus SLC has is that they have Temple Square.

Sunday was projected to be our only sunny, dry day so it was a good day for walking.  We started in the visitor's center and enjoyed all the exhibits.  I could stay in there reading everything and watching everything all day I think.  I saw this quote hanging on the wall by Pres. Hinckley.  It really touched me, because I feel so unimportant most days. Well maybe not unimportant, but rather underutilized. 

One of my favorite places on Temple Square is the Christus Statue in the visitor's center.  The paintings of space on the walls leading up to it are so beautiful. 

Flowers were in bloom all around.  It was beautiful.  There were these cool boxes along the stone walls that had flowers growing out of them we were pretty fascinated with.  I love the early spring flowers - daffodils/tulips - I just wished they lasted longer.

We always love the reflection pond.  The kids wanted to make wishes so I went across with them.  While we were on the other side Jed said he was going to take our picture.  My sister Katie took a picture of Jed taking our picture which was cool.  I wonder how many, if any, people have fallen into that pond...

I am always in awe of the beauty of temples in general, but the SL temple just takes it to a whole other level.  It is so amazing and then to think of the story behind it and how long it took to build is hard to comprehend.  I think this last picture is pretty enough for an Ensign cover!

We decided to drive up to This Is The Place park.  I had heard it was a really neat place all about the pioneers.  They have recreated a little pioneer village with shops/homes and inside give demonstrations (like Nauvoo but smaller).  They also had an Indian village.  There was a train that you can ride all around the property as well.  Unfortunately we found out on Sunday those things aren't open!  So we just looked at the statues for a bit.  I love the history of the pioneers and am so thankful for all their sacrifices.  I can't even comprehend all that they went through and now for me looking out over the SL valley from this place was pretty humbling.  From one side of the valley clear to the other side it is completely full.  One thing I didn't know that I learned from reading the inscription on one of the statues was that Joseph Smith had drawn up 3 maps of the route and development of the Salt Lake valley as he had seen in a vision.  Brigham Young carried one of those maps with him across the plains.  We stayed up at the park until it was too cold and then we went back to our hotel.  Mal & Trevor & their kids joined us for dinner.  James' eye was really red and somebody mentioned he might have pink eye.  Mal thought it was just irritation from the pool from the day before, but the next day she took him to the doctor and sure enough it was pink eye.  Luckily no one else ended up getting it.  I was worried because my kids gave lots of hugs to Liam on Sunday, but he never did get it either. 

Sunday night Dallin slept much better, however Kinsley got sick and started projectile vomiting around 11 pm.  It was intense!  Then she was ok for a little bit and then she would move or something and vomit again.  It happened probably 5 times during the night.  Housekeeping had to come up 3 different times with new bedding.  Finally they brought a trundel bed for her.  After that we didn't move her again.  It was a really long night!  The next morning Katie had already arranged for us to go to the translating department for a tour with one of her directors.  We weren't sure if Kinsley was up to it or not, so Jed went and bought another stroller so she could just be pushed around.  The other exciting thing about the day was that it was pouring rain!  Not raining, but torrential downpour!  The hotel gave us complimentary umbrellas which was a lifesaver.  We had to walk in the rain to the church office building and by the time we got there, Kinsley was singing, "I'm singing in the rain, singing in the rain, I'm happy again just singing in the rain."  So she was feeling much better.  The translating department was on the 18th floor or so.  We had to get checked in with our drivers licenses and then they gave us badges (which they took away before we left.)  It was very secure.  The director had to come down to get us and then bring us back to the registration dept before we could leave.  Once upstairs though we got to see all the little booths where translating magic happens.  I found the Russian booth and had to pose for a picture.  Jed found Cebuano and Ava's favorite was Apache.  There were quite a few I hadn't even heard of before.  The kids went into the booth Katie translates Papiamento in.  It was really awesome. I felt a little bad that I haven't stayed fluent in Russian.  I really should start working on it again.  We all were so proud of Katie - it is so awesome that she gets to do serve the Lord in this way.

This was the view from the translating department floor on the east side.  Not too shabby!  If you look really closely you can see that the roof of the temple as Ava's hat...

Afterward we stopped at the new Church History museum.  It was awesome also.  They had a new 360 degree movie of Joseph Smith in the Sacred Grove and a million exhibits to see.  The kids learned all about the printing of the Book of Mormon and how long it would have taken to print.  We saw a life-sized version of Angel Moroni.  They actually said the one on the SL temple is a few feet taller.  That's probably one person who Ava won't be taller than!

After we got back we decided it would be best for us to load up and go home rather than stay another night and day.  Everyone else was leaving to go home also.  So we packed everything up and brought it down to the cars to load.  Jed had parked under a lower pipe and when Katie opened the back of the van she didn't notice and it hit the corner and made a good sized dent in the back hatch door.  I forgot to mention that as we were driving down to Utah a semi-truck flipped a rock at our windshield and we could just see two lines spreading from the bottom to the top of the windshield.  So two battle wounds for the van from this trip.  Below are a couple of other pictures of our rain-filled adventures. Right as we were finishing lunch and getting ready to leave Kasen said he wasn't feeling good.  We made it to Ogden and then we had to stop and he started throwing up.  It was a long drive home!  Jed swore that we were never leaving the house again because of all the bad things that had happened on this trip!  It was quite the trip.  I don't think I'll get him to do it again anytime soon.

SPRING BREAK - The rest of the week was Spring break which actually turned out to be a good thing.  Jed had taken Tuesday off because we had planned to be in Utah.  So when we decided to come home early he had all day Tuesday to be at home.  Since neither of us had slept for the previous 3 days it was nice he could catch up on sleep.  Kinsley was still sick for a few days.  Kasen bounced back after about 24 hrs.  But then Ava got sick and was throwing up everywhere.  I was actually glad Jed was home so he could help clean up all the throw up!  No one should have to clean up throw up as much as we did this weekend and week!!!!  I was so worried about when Dallin would get it, but he never did and neither did Jed or I.  So most of the week was spent watching tv/movies with throw-up bowls on their laps and lots of gatorade to drink!  By the end of the week everyone was back to normal so we met Jed and went to the movies after work on Friday.  Because of all the flooding here the hospital parking lot was about halfway under water.  The kids thought it was pretty cool and even cooler when Jed drove his truck through it really fast with them!  It wasn't exactly the way we planned to end March, but we were just glad everyone was back to their normal healthy selves by the time April arrived.