newport vacay

We just got home from our vacation to Newport Coast. I took almost 500 photos this week! After some debate over what to do while in southern California, we decided to take it easy and relax on the beach as much as possible. We loaded up on Tuesday afternoon, picked the boys up from school and were on our way. We met Rob's folks there on Tuesday, and Aunt Alisa joined us on Thursday night.

Wednesday included: Exploring around the resort (Tosh tried to ride down a steep hill on his scooter and scraped up his chin and face pretty good as you will see in photos), going to Crystal Cove beach, and then Grandma and Grandpa Pete watched the kids so we could go to the Newport temple that evening (gorgeous!).
Tosh told us that in this last one he was yelling at the ocean, "To not make big waves!"

I love that we caught Tosh yawning in this family photo. The kids were exhausted by the end of the day!Some Frisbee action:A picnic and more beach play on Wednesday:A candid shot by BurkeSaw some dolphins swimming (looked like sharks at first!). I saw them jumping, but wasn't able to catch any photos of that...
At Laguna Beach on Friday:Aunt Alisa, Grandma Pete, Rob, and Grandpa Pete

Laguna has a great viewIt was a gorgeous day and there was a wedding taking place about 200-300 feet from us (busy wedding day, 11/11/11).

It rained most of Saturday, but it didn't stop us from going to Balboa Island to explore around. We took the scooters so the kids could ride along the waterfront and we could stare in awe at the amazing homes! Wow. We stopped for "famous" frozen bananas (yummy!). Burke shocked me by saying he preferred the chocolate dipped bananas to the ice cream bars! Late afternoon Saturday we were able to meet Rob's cousin Brian and his family and catch up with them over some hot chocolate.

It was such a nice break to relax, play lots of games, get in a few good workouts (got my 10k around the corner), catch a few naps, and hang out and visit with family. We love Newport and are already figuring out when we can get back!

sisters are fine, especially mine

Some friends joined us for Trick or Treating in our neighborhood last Monday. The kids totally scored on candy and we only did a couple of streets! Two of the houses were giving out full-sized candy bars and when I said something like, "Wow! You are generous," the woman said, "New Costco membership!" and she laughed.

Hewitt and Tosh came up with 'new' costumes the night of Halloween. I especially liked Hewitt's creation. He got A LOT of compliments as I'm sure you can imagine:
Liv loves candy. She asks for it many times a day and isn't happy when denied. I was surprised (well not really) to find that she was able to climb up onto the counter top in our laundry room (she didn't use a chair or anything to boost herself!) to get into a candy bag on her own. Look at that devilish smile:

Here is a photo I took of Liv at the park last week in a favorite hand-me-down shirt from her cousin:

Some good friends invited us to their cabin in Greer (in the White Mountains in AZ) last weekend. I didn't think we'd be able to swing it, but thought it was worth a shot to see if my sister would be able to watch our kids... My sister ROCKS! She agreed to do it and flew out on Friday morning. We left around 1pm on Friday and got home right in time for 1pm church on Sunday. This was the first time that Rob and I have been away from our kids overnight in three years! It has been about five years since we've been away for more than one night. We had a great time away (nice and relaxing) and our kids had a fun time with their aunt.

Thanks Aunt Mindy!!!

One funny thing: I was so busy last Friday that I didn't have time to make lunches for the boys. They were very excited to buy school lunch and I was asking them about their Friday lunch as we drove to school on Monday. They were discussing what they got (both had chocolate milk, of course) and then Hewitt asked Burke, "Did you get anything from the vegetable barn?"

So I am actually writing this from California. We drove to Newport Beach last night and I forgot the cord to download photos from my camera to my laptop, so I am resorting to taking a photo of the tiny display on my camera with my cell phone. Here is my sister and me with the kids on Sunday night:

Mindy went home early Monday and we got ready to leave for CA. We picked the kids up right after school on Tuesday and drove to the coast. We met Rob's folks here and his sister will be joining us tomorrow.

I took this photo of the ocean view on the way back from my run this morning:

We are excited to be here. Get ready for lots of beach photos next week!

c'est chic

This was a busy week. Our primary program was on Sunday and went fine. Everything feels like a blur at the moment. I either have horrible allergies or am getting a head cold, so I'm going to be brief. The boys got their soccer photos (and team photos) this week so I'm posting photos of the photos (the originals look a bit better of course):

And just so Liv isn't left out, here is a festive one of her:


The highlight of the week was a "Disco Skating" party that Rob and I planned (ok, it was really just me but I'm happy to share the credit). Rob has always talked fondly of dressing up to go disco skating while he was at BYU, and I'm sorry to say that we have never gone roller skating together. So after years of talking about going (for what, 15 years now?) we finally decided to get a group together and go. We invited a bunch of friends and left the invitation open for people to invite others. We were pleased with the turnout and are planning to make this an annual event around Halloween. Next year: 80's theme and music. You are welcome to join us!

So here are a few photo highlights from the night. Prior to hitting the rink, we grabbed some dinner with our friends Alecia and Rob (this is the doctor I referred to in my last post and Alecia and I run together).

Getting warmed up at the rink before the others arrived:

I'm glad that I'm married to someone that makes me laugh... Rob was the hit of the night. He really is great on skates and spent most of the night skating backwards, weaving in and out of other people and he even can do the thing where you squat down holding on to one bent leg with the other extended. Such a show-off! :)

My favorite photo of Rob is actually one where I happened to catch him in the background of this next one.... Hilarious!

'Elvis' was a big hit and highly entertaining:

And I about fell on the floor when this dude made his grand entrance (this is Alecia's little brother!):
Here is a group shot taken before we got skating so not everyone had shown up yet. It was a total blast and we can't wait until next year!Happy Halloween!

a visit from good friends (and an ER visit)

This was an eventful week. We unpacked and cleaned up some on Monday and met friends at the park on Tuesday. The kids started talking about what they wanted to be for Halloween and got into dress ups: We had a little excitement on Tuesday. Rob was at the church for a youth activity and I was upstairs vacuuming the kids' rooms right before bedtime. I had just finished with the vacuum, and we were all in Burke and Hewitt's room. While I was setting out clothes for the boys for the next morning (school started on Wednesday), Liv fell off of Burke's bed (maybe she was jumping? I didn't see) and I heard her scream/cry. When I turned around, she was between the bed and the window and I'm guessing that she hit her mouth on his bed frame/bit through her lip. Her mouth was full of blood and when I cleaned her up it was obvious that the hole would need stitches. I called Rob to tell him to come home and also called our friend Rob (a doctor) to come over while I waited for my Rob. (Dr.) Rob told me that we were probably best off going to the ER because they would need to make sure to line up the "vermilion border" of her lip just right (where the red part of the lip meets the skin).

Liv actually calmed down pretty quick and was pretty sleepy when we got to the ER (way past her bedtime at that point). She actually got super smiley and animated and posed for this photo when we got back to her hospital bed:

They put some sort of medication up her nose that made her "pleasantly stoned" as the ER doc put it and once she got very loopy and relaxed they wrapped her up, numbed her, and sewed it up. She fought and screamed, but calmed down fairly quickly after, although she was very irritable and couldn't sit still for the next couple of hours and didn't get to sleep until after midnight (she was still making up for lack of sleep on Thursday and took a five hour nap!). I was thrilled to get in and out of the ER in about two hours. Her stitches come out on Monday morning and I'm not looking forward to that. I hope that she will relax and that they won't need to wrap/restrain her to get them out (they had to do that to Hewitt to get stitches out once).

So the highlight of our week was a visit from some of our friends from Utah. Heather and I were roommates for two years in college (95-97) and then she married our friend Dar (Aaron) from our ward right after I left on my mission. When Rob and I moved to Riverton in 2005, we ended up building in Heather and Dar's ward! It was great to have such a great friend just one street over and a blessing to move into an area already having good friends. I didn't take one photo of Heather and me while she was here, so I had to pull out an oldie from 1996:

Pretty awesome hair, huh?

We had dinner and played some board games after the kids went to bed on Thursday and then hit the zoo on Friday morning (minus Hewitt and Burke). Here is one of Liv and Lindsey taken right before we saw a sweet giraffe gallop across the grass in the background to make sure that this ostrich didn't mess with his buddy. It was seriously cool. It was a warmer than average week, and the kids dared to swim both Friday and Saturday afternoon (although Hewitt didn't swim--too cold for him). The kids had a great time together.

It's become somewhat of a tradition to get a photo with guests jumping off of the wall:

After swimming we got ready for the annual Harvest Party at our church. We tend to have some last minute costume changes... Tosh decided to be a pirate:Liv did better wearing this cute bee costume than I thought she would--you never know what a two-year-old will do (I was losing my light in this photo):

Weeks ago Hewitt declared that he wanted to be a ghost, and Dar helped him design the face:

We moved all the kids outside for a group photo:

I couldn't resist posting this hilarious candid shot I caught of Tosh:

Thanks so much for the visit guys! Come back again!