School Activities etc.

 The day before Thanksgiving the kids school had a Turkey Trot.  Their new school does it a little different than their old school.  They have a time limit and they see who can run the most laps around the field before the time limit is up.  Every lap around their teacher puts a new mark on their hand then they count up the marks at the end.  The first place runner in each grade gets a pie.  Well, apparently my boys are runners.  They both won for their grades.  Apparently after Jared finished his race the cross country coach hunted him down to see what grade he was in because they can start cross country in third grade.  She told Jared that she needed him next year.  Nathan ran two or three laps more than the closest boy in his class, that boy happens to be on the cross country team.  It looks like next year we will have another activity on our list of things to do.

My runners

Jared and Gwen participated in a Readers' Theater for their classes.  Jared was Agent 006 and Gwen was Linda the Good Fairy.  They did a great job.

I graduated from dental assisting school at the end of December.  The did a whole graduation ceremony and I was the speaker for our class.  It seemed a bit much to me for a three-month course, but it was a good experience.  I really loved school and I made a lot of friends.

We had an orchestra concert, a band concert, and a piano recital all in December.

Jared is playing violin and he got to play a solo during the concert

Bonnie is playing the flute and the cello in school this year.

Nate is playing the trombone in the 6th grade band.  His teacher had a challenge for all the students that if they passed off several pieces of music they would be able to play a piece during the concert with the 7th and 8th grade band.  There were about 7 students that did the challenge and Nate was one of them.  

The kids have all been taking piano lessons this year and they are doing so good.  We love their teacher and she comes to our house every Tuesday to give them all lessons.  It is so nice to not have to go back and forth with four kids for lessons.

The kids with their piano teacher, Amanda Leach

Overall we had a busy, and tiring, December with school activities.

Jared and Gwen during the band concert.

Housework and Thanksgiving

In the middle of November we started a project on our house.  We decided to tear out the carpet and put in tile  We also decided to paint.

 For several days we had our table out on the back patio.  The oven was unplugged so we were cooking on a camp stove.  The kids thought it was awesome.  Jared especially loved to help with the cooking.

Now probably just before Thanksgiving was not the best time to start this project, but life goes on.  Ben's brother Jake and his family came up for Thanksgiving dinner

This is what our family room looked like on Thanksgiving morning.  It did not look like this by the time company came.

As you can see by the awesome knee pads and the stylin' outfit we were still working on the house Thanksgiving morning.

The turkey ended up taking a couple of hours longer than originally planned, but it was really good and our guests were very patient.

Some of the adults in the kitchen

The kids table

My sister-in-law Tiff and I

When the house is completely finished, it just needs a few finishing touches, we will post before and after pictures, but I love it so far!

Halloween with Friends

Ben and I, Tamina and Dastan from The Prince of Persia

Every year our friends, Brian and Cadi, host a Halloween party for couples.  There is a contest for the best couples' Halloween costume.  We had so many good costumes this year and we had so much fun.  I am so glad that we have so many good friends here in Arizona.

Our hosts, Brian and Cadi Davis

I was very proud of this awesome Halloween cake that I made

A bunch of us girls together.  Unfortunately I forgot to pull out the camera until some of the couples had left so we didn't get everyone in the picture.

 For our contest, in third place were Zac and Becky.  I forgot to get a picture of them, but they dressed up as a pinata and a little boy at a birthday party.  It was such a cool idea.  Becky is in the back of the group picture.

In second place were our geriatric couples, The Ashtons and the Pages.  The were so funny and egged each other on all night.  They  kept all of us laughing.

And in first place were the Piepers, Taylor Swift and Kanye West. 

Playing Catch Up

As you may have noticed, I have been a slacker and have not posted anything new for a while.  Over the next week I hope to get caught up to where we are and what we are doing right now.  I will try to post one to two posts a day until we are completely caught up.  If you want to read them all that is wonderful!  If you don't, well I completely understand.

For starters we are going to go back to a family trip to Lake Pleasant over Columbus Day weekend.   On the Saturday before Columbus Day we went with our friends, The Ashtons, our to Lake Pleasant.  We have lived in Arizona for 5 years and have never been out there with our family. 

We roasted hot dogs over a fire and talked and laughed.

Bella, Cindy, and Mom

Mark, Cindy, Bella, Dad, and Gwen

We fished in the lake.  Surprisingly we didn't catch anything, of course due to the kids wandering around in the water at the time others were fishing I guess its not too surprising.

Dad protecting his ears while Gwen casts her fishing pole

Dad and Mark fishing

The kids collected lots of shells.

Clearly I was not thinking quite correctly when I forgot to bring towels and swim suits to an activity at the lake, but that didn't seem to stop the kids .  I thought the water looked pretty gross, but that didn't seem to bother them at all.

We will have to take more trips to the lake.  It's about the only natural water we get to see in our little part of the world except for monsoon rain.

Jared

So it has been a while since I posted, but I needed to get on and post about Jared's month.  Jared has had a very busy month.  He had his birthday which we celebrated as a family with pizza for dinner and then cake, ice-cream, and presents after.  

Jared waiting for his presents

Totally awesome birthday cake

The next weekend he had a party with his friends.  Ben got a projector from work and they watched "How to Train Your Dragon" and then played some games in the backyard.  They are such a fun group of boys and it was fun to have them over.

Jared with his friends.  Never try to get boys to smile normal, it just doesn't work.

The following week he had a "Tea at the White House" activity at school where all of the kids got to dress up like famous people in history and then meet parents and tell them about their lives and why they were famous.  Jared was George Washington.

Jared "George Washington"

Ben had the idea to make the wig out of paper and it worked pretty well.  Although, Jared was quick to inform people that George Washington's hair was in fact red, and he did not wear a wig, he powdered his hair.

Finally, and definitely most importantly, on November 6th Jared got baptized. 

Jared all dressed up in his new suit, carrying his new scriptures.  Ready to be a missionary.

Jared and Dad

Mom, Dad, and Jared before his baptism

Jared and Grandpa Walker

It was such a wonderful day.  Ben's dad was able to come down from Utah, and our sister-in-law, Tiffany, came up from Mesa with her four children.  Ben's brother, Jake, was in China for work.  We also had some good friends that joined us.  We are so grateful that Jared chose to be baptized.

Ben's Business Trip to India and The Philippines

Sunrise from the companies new hotel suite in Bangalore

Some of those holy cows

View from the hotel of a mosque and some of the residential neighborhoods.

I'm not sure if this is really conveying the right message.

Standing in front of the statue of Jose Rizal a Philippine national hero, the statue and those you can see in the background portray his death by firing squad. Please note that plaids and stripes do work together as long as there are stripes the same color in the plaid and in the stripes. 

Stopped to get some pearls for Teri with Joemin and Angela who helped with the negotiations.

He kept trying to eat my buttons...

We went to a small zoo in Tagatay Highlands. These were some of the exhibits pulled out for a photo op.

Back to School for Me

This time I am the one going back to school.  I am going to Altrain Dental Assisting Academy.  I started on the 7th of September and so far I love it.