Catching Up On This Blog

We all went to the dentist and the kids were pretty excited to get their new toothbrushes and balloons.

I'm not sure why Annette added this picture except to remind us all how fun it is to take a bath in the kitchen sink.  (This photo was added because when Henry sits next to Lizzy at the table he always runs his fingers through her hair and gets her absolutely disgusting.  So much that I have to wash her hair in the sink.  She was particularly dirty and had to get all of her washed in this particular photo.)

This is us with a few of my coworkers (not pictured because they showed up late and we didn't wait for them).  I'm trying to remember all of the wonderful things I learned at Front Sight.  Oh, how we long to go back!  Hopefully we'll go again soon.

She's showing me up...again.

We need to do this more often.

I hope this is Henry's last attempt in life at tattooing his body.  Apparently Mommy lost track of him for a few seconds.

"Behold, ladies and gentlemen! Despite the snot running into my mouth and my pj's falling off, I will perform my magnum opus." (This is how we often find Eliza in the morning.  Her snaps come undone sometimes and so the boys like to be so kind as to undo the rest of the snaps.  Sometimes they even get her jammies all of the way off.)

I guess the kids went to the park while I was at work.

There's Annette teaching Charlie how to be happy.

This is what happens when you don't ride a bike for a long while.  The bruising from the gears lasted a lot longer than I thought they would.

We went camping and Elizabeth loved the new environment.  I'm sure she didn't remember that we went camping back when she was a couple of months old.

Recently castigated for some infraction; hence the disgruntled look.

Annette wanted to capture the moment of her dirty white socks.

So icky, yet so cute.

King of the Rock

Sticks are a kid's best friend.

Selfie In The Woods

The kids hold the food too far from the fire to cook it and Annette gets impatient and holds it too close and burns it so I get to do the cooking :) 

Case in point.  That marshmallow never got cooked.

We think this background looks fake this year, too.

That's one dirty little face.

This is Lizzy being so helpful.  The tent fly is her cape.

What are pillows for if not to rest your head?  If I'd have known that they were not going use them, I would have used them myself for padding.


It rained that morning so it was nice and muddy for the day.

What could be better for breakfast than s'mores?

I'm guessing it was luck, but she really did go.  (She wants to be like her big brothers!)

Annette must work those poor little kids to death.  They can't even stay awake for mealtime.

I love the swimsuit.


And I love the swimming pool even more.

Ghaaaa!

I'm sure in Charlie's mind that's a shark.

There it is about to eat you!

We're teaching her not to suck on her fingers.  Apparently I'm losing this battle.

Some babies come out of the womb with this much hair, but we're proud of her for fighting tooth and nail and for a year for this hair.

Annette set one of our ceramic mixing bowls down in our largest one (we nest them to save space) and she was very careful.  But when ceramic decides to fast fracture, it's all over.  

Is this Henry or Elizabeth? When I texted this picture to Annette she thought it was Henry.  But alas, it's Elizabeth.  I really do see resemblance in this picture.

My beautiful, wonderful wife.

My cutie patootie and BYU Fan #5

BYU Fan #4

BYU Fan #3

This was at the Susquehanna Valley BYU Alumni party.

This only happens once a year...

...so it's imperative to capture the moment.

Hey!  The popcorn fell off of the apricot trees!

We played at the park while Annette practiced biking on her new (used) bike for the triathlon.

Right now she does the whole Jon Schmidt arm-to-the-keyboard move really well.

Annette wakes up looking like this.  I love it.

Each day there's a race to the hallway to get their teeth brushed.  Even if they come in second or third place, they still try to muscle their way in, in hopes that Daddy will forget who was first.

While Annette was out of town one weekend I decided it was high time to teach Lizzy about high heels.  She caught on fast.

On our way to the gym, our truck's drive belt decided to break and wrap itself around the fan.  Annette ran the two miles home (no gym needed for a workout that night) to get the Benz and My Lovely Assistant and I installed a new belt and idler pulley that evening.

Annette's New York City Trip with the Ladies

I went on a fun two day trip to New York City with three great ladies from church.

We took the train to NYC which was so fun.  No hassle with driving, directions, parking, and all of the costs associated with that.  The train was three hours and lots of fun to chit chat the whole way.

We stayed at the Marriott in Times Square and our view was directly of the ball that drops on New Years.  We were on the 34th floor.

This picture made sense when I took it, but I honestly can't remember what that building is now.

We ate at a fun French restaurant and I ordered the Crepe Suzette.  Unfortunately I didn't remember until too late that they pour alcohol over the top and then catch it on fire.  I wish I had skipped that part.  Parts of it tasted like the smell of rubbing alcohol.  I don't think all of the alcohol burned off :)  So, I guess I have had alcohol now and I would never have it again.

New York City may be fast paced, but eating out is slow paced at a nice restaurant.  Every single place we ate at had a few things that made it really darn annoying.  1) They looked at us like we were aliens when we asked to have the check split.  Some had no idea how to even do it.  2) The servers were incredibly slow at coming by the table.  3) The food was priced ridiculously high.  Most items on the menus were about $20-$40.  One restaurant had a dish in triple digits.  I always scoured the menu for the least expensive thing that would hopefully be enough food.  I guess when overhead costs are so high, the prices have to be high, too.  We spent so much time at restaurants it was awful.  I think next time I will just buy food from the street vendors and skip the restaurants.

We wanted to go to the Guggenheim Museum, but the workers were on strike and it was closed, so we went to the Met (Metropolitan Museum of Art).

At the Met I thoroughly loved the European art!  Here are the main staircases; they are super pretty.

We rode around Central Park on bikes.  We didn't see everything, but we sure saw a lot. 

This was one of the larger lakes.

We went and saw the Broadway play "Finding Neverland."  I enjoyed it.

We saw the 9/11 Memorial.  It was pretty interesting. 

We walked along the coast of the island and we gazed at the Statue of Liberty.

Musical Martins

Here we have Elizabeth learning to play the clarinet.  She is getting quite good at destroying the reed while playing :)

Charles is giving Charlie viola lessons on a 1/16 size violin.  We got the violin on eBay for super cheap and Charles refitted it with viola strings.  I am personally pretty excited for our kids to start having their own instruments and learning music.  Charles will be a great, easy, and relaxed teacher.

Happy Birthday Little Lizzy

Elizabeth is quite a cute little girl!  She is sure growing up and really has a personality of her own.  She loves being with her older brothers, especially when she can get at their toys.

Little Lizzy has definitely learned to smile when the camera comes out.

And Henry and Charlie can never leave her alone in a photo.

Eliza can be dramatic at times with her whaling, but her cute face and bright blue eyes help us over look it :)

What a cutie!

She has so many good skills.  Drinking from a cup, signing "all done", waving, folding arms and bowing head for prayer, dancing, conducting music, smiling on cue, stacking blocks, putting blankets on her head, and being calm.  Skills she is working at includes growing hair, putting on clothes (which she loves), and walking.  She took her first steps on Easter morning.

She got a little piano from Grandma Jan and Elizabeth loves it!  I love the half smile.

After she plays for a few seconds she looks up waiting for us to clap.  The boys love to clap for every piano piece she plays.

Eliza has decided that she wants to use the toilet like her brothers.  The greatest thing is that she actually pooped while on the toilet!  Charlie and Henry were so proud of her and clapped a ton.

She is such a joy in our family and we love her dearly.  We love our Lizzy so much and couldn't imagine our lives without her.  She radiates sunshine in our lives.  Happy first birthday Elizabeth.