New Tradition

New traditions are the best, and I am most excited about this one! In Tempe, down by ASU, they have a park called Tempe Town Lake. There are no motorized boats allowed on the lake, HOWEVER, they do a boat parade once a year. So you can dazzle your boat up, enter it in the contest, and float the parade. IT IS SO FUN! We entered ours this year, the theme: The North Pole. We had so much fun getting it ready. It was a gorgeous day and such a fun thing to do as a family. There were probably close to 10,000 people there, which makes it all the more exciting. Santa came and there were tonz of festivities throughout the day. We all agreed it was a blast and that we want to start it as a new tradition...My sweet little guy

Yes, Lilly is EATING the bulbs

Dale and Claire

Tatey is always laughing at his silly sissy

My favorite thing about the night was this guy. He screamed to the crowd the whole night "Merry Christmas" and got everyone to participate and show Christmas Cheer!

Lilly was honking the horn and my dad kept jumping like it was scaring him, she thought it was hilarious

It started to get cold for this little bear

These were a lot of the boats that were there:

This "UP" boat won first prize, it was pretty incredible

Not too bad for our first time eh? We are gonna win next year!

My sweet little girl and her Papa

My darling little boy and his Gamma

Love this time of year!

HO HO HO, Merry Christmas!

Gingerbread and Santa

We had a couple friends over to make gingerbread houses the other night... it was very fun and creative!!! I guess while I was at the other end of the table Lilly was fisting candy... and after she finally fell asleep she kept waking up all night screaming.. hmmmm must have had a belly ache! Shanda and our Pueblo Ginger House, complete with a pool in the back
Dale and Marie hiding her face

Josh constructing his gingerbread in that accounting mind of his!

fisting.

The finished products

Marie made the front yard, skipped the house

Our munchkins and Santa

Lilly was like "uh, don't touch me, but I'll sit here because your interesting, and I know you say, HO, HO, HO" .... which she says by the way, and it is very cute!

Salt Lake City!

The day after Thanksgiving we headed up to the bitterly cold temps of SLC for Josh's youngest brother Joel's wedding. We had a great time seeing the Salt Lake Temple lights and seeing lots of our close friends. But yet alas, we love living in Arizona because we came back to sunshine and 60's. I really don't know how I did it for 7 years...

Just relaxing one morning!
Cute little Tatey all bundled up!

The wee hours on the morning of the wedding.. doesn't Lilly's hair look so cute before the day got to her...

Aunt Jann and Taters

Aunt Jann, Tate, Lilly, Granny K

Granny K and Lilly

The Stunning Bride

All the brothers and their Dad

Jann and Kathi

Uncle Jar and Tate

Trying to sleep but my bright flash was disturbing him

Our cute little family

My gorgeous little girl...

* I have the cutest pic of Lilly and her Grandpa Hill, but I am saving it for Christmas, you'll get it soon!

**We just wanted to thank Sommer and Steve for letting us stay at their house.. it made it so comfortable and relaxing! You are the best!

sorry for the neglected blog! the internet isn't working on my pc, therefore no pics! but i have the hubby working on it, and hopefully there will be pics come the weekend! xoxo.

Josh is the big 2-9!

happy birthday babe!

you are my favorite pal, my sweets, and the best daddy and husband ever! i hope you have a wonderful day! and we can't wait to see you at lunch!

Halloween Events

Halloween definately felt different this year in AZ. We had to wait til this last Thursday night to carve pumpkins so they wouldn't die in the heat! They still did... However, I will take that any day over 2 feet of snow! I LOVE ARIZONA!

We had Dale and Claire, and Joel and Candice over for dinner in a pumpkin and pumpkin carving. It was fun!


I wish I could have captured Lilly's face when she stuck her hand in the pumpkins guts. It was hilarious!

Just carving away...

The Results

Joel's

Claire's

Josh's

Dale's

Spooky

Lilly is obsessed with all my dad's little fake critters in the front yard. We have been known to make fun of him in the past because it kinda felt like a trailor park with multiple fake rabbits, deer, racoons, and ducks. But man oh man, Lilly LOVES them. She finds new hiding places for the creatures all the time. They are her new best friends. We spend hours in the front yard.

"uh-oh", one of the bunny's ears fell off.

The start to her candy frenzy.. by 11:00 p.m. she was wired. Yes, she was still awake.

What is he dressed as?

It took her a little while to get into trick or treating, but man when she figured it out she was on a roll!

She was seriously hilarious walking up to the doors.

Sometimes she scored a lift

Tatey turned into a pumpkin.. skeleton costume wasn't warm enough.

Thanks Summer! Remember giving this to me before Lilly was born?

In the day we went over to the grocery stores trick or treat. It was too hot for Lilly to be a giraffe so we decided to have her be a little ballerina. When we were walking around this little kid came up to me and asked, "is she a diva?" ha ha are you kidding me? how funny is that? So yes, Lilly was a diva by day, giraffe by night.

The little "diva" and her grandpa who she now calls "pa pa" it is too die for.

Lilly Trick or Treating

The 3 sistas. One of them isn't too happy.

Josh and I seriously had a blast taking Lilly trick or treating. She had a entourage of people walking with her from door to door, as Uncle Dale, Aunt Steph, and Gamma and Pa Pa came with us to enjoy our first night of trick or treating.

Schnepf Farms 09

Its been quite an adjustment moving to Arizona and figuring out all the fun things to do here. We had so many fun traditions in Utah and have many fun memories going to different festivals, parks, and places to get yummy treats. So in my search to find those same wonderful things here, I came upon Schnepf farms in Queen Creek, just around the river bend from our house, ha ha, hopefully some of you chickies catch that. It was a great time to be together, away from our house chores, and having a blast being together outdoors, which is what we love most! Enjoy!


Is it just me, or is Josh and Tate making the exact same face??? WEIRD. They must both love taking pictures.

I told Lilly all about the "lily pads" and how she came to be.. just kidding

why, Why, WHY must this child love animals so much?

My two little punkins

Thanks Schnepf family for sharing your very expensive farm with us! ha ha

P.S. If any of you fellow Arizonians know of cute little things like this to do, LET ME KNOW!

Tate's Blessing, October 11, 2009

Tate's blessing day was wonderful. Our home was filled with family and friends to share his special little life with us. Josh did a wonderful job, and the little guy was so handsome. I just love special days that put life into perspective...

Went to the temple to take pics of the little guy in his blessing outfit one evening

Dayson and Lilly playing the piano at the luncheon afterward

Chet and Erika

Our sweet little family

Grandma Carson

Josh's side of the family and friends

My family left to go home to get stuff ready for the luncheon right afterward so unfortunately I didn't get a picture of them.. but we love them and thank them for their support.

It was a beautiful day!

A 97% completed yard! yipee!!

After a ton of hard work on Josh, Dale's, Joel's, Jarom's, and my dad's part, we have a yard with grass and we are so thankful!!!!!!
Uncle Jarom and the kiddos... we had a fun visit from him last weekend!

Our beautiful water feature!! ha ha

Auntie Claire The 3 boys who worked their cans off! Look at Joel's toughness in the background!

Having a "blast" trenching

The yard right before the sod was to be layed down

Prepping the ground

3 bro's, Joel, Josh, and Jar

Lilly was helping dig!

The front yard almost done by Dale and my dad...

A completed bea-utiful backyard!

love, Love, LOVE it!

We feel so blessed. Thank you so much to everyone who helped out so much. We are excited to take a break for a while!