Painting the Sidewalk

The girls broke out their sidewalk chalk. Rob painted a beautiful picture and then the girls rolled in it. I would have been okay with it had they not just been bathed and jammied. Oh, well. Good thing they love showers!

Goblin Valley

Sleeping was an adventure. The rain and the wind finally stopped around 3:00 in the morning. The girls did surprisingly well. Sara crashed hard. I guess it helps that she didn't take a nap. Anna was a little scared of the wind shaking the tent. But she has learned that if she is afraid she needs to say a prayer and ask for help. She fell asleep after that. But she did wake up at 3:30 in the morning, turned to me and said "Mom, I slept in a tent. Let's go home now!". I had to convince her that it was too dark to try and go home.
After we took down camp we made our way to Goblin Valley. Here are all of the cousins that came, minus Sara and Aubrey. They had so much fun chasing each other and finding new places to climb.Sara loved that she was able to get down and run occasionally. She got really sick of that backpack.

Anna loved playing in all of the red dirt.
Our cute little family!Rob found a cave. Everyone had to check it out because it was so cool (literally!).

Going on a camping trip

Corry and Merf and their family invited us to go with them to Goblin Valley. It was the first time we have taken the girls camping. Anna has been camping before, but never slept in a tent, so this could be interesting. While we were packing we noticed that our air mattress had a hole, so we headed off to the camping store. Sara is a big wanderer and because she is, we have taught her "Marco, Polo". Well, true to form, she wandered off while we were at the store. Rob starting saying "Marco" and we could hear her cute little voice saying "Polo". We followed her voice and found her laying on a stack of dog beds. It was her hint to us that she was tired.
We made camp at a great little campground in Hanksville. Right after dinner the rain and the wind started. It is amazing how many people you can fit into an RV.
Sara made herself at home right in the middle of the floor.
And Merf taught everyone some great camping songs. Anna really got into it. Thumbs up, knees together, butt back:
Elbows together, head up:

Joy School Graduation

Anna had her joy school graduation on Tuesday. They sang a couple of the songs that they learned during the year; The Hokey Pokey, Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree, I Got Joy and Squishing a Baby Bumblebee. They then got their certificate for graduating. The girls did a really good job and they all looked so cute!

Anna's joy school group.
Singing one of their songs.

Anna was able to have her cousin Alli in her joy school class. I love that she is friends with her cousin!
Her diploma.
I told her to move it down so I could see her pretty face and this is what I got.

Memorial Day

Memorial Day is always so bittersweet for me. It is always sad going to take flowers to my sweet little ones. I don't think that it is fair that a parent is allowed to outlive their children. But on the other hand it is always nice to see how much Jason, Ellie and Grace are remembered and loved.We have started to teach Anna about her older brother and sisters. She seems to grasp it better than I thought she would. She will tell us that Jason, Ellie and Grace are her brother and sisters and that they live with Jesus and Heavenly Father. She was excited to see all of the "presents" that they got. My brother, Casey, is also teaching his daughter about them. She told me the other day that she sent a balloon to her cousins. I love the innocence of a child. Also, I don't think that my loved ones will ever realize how much it means to me to have their children "know" mine.
Anna snapped this picture of Rob. She's becoming quite the photographer.

Hansel and Gretel

Anna was in her first dance performance. They ballet school did a production of Hansel and Gretel. Anna was a bee. At first she was really miffed about this. She wanted to be a butterfly, so I told her that she was a black and yellow butterfly. That worked until she put on her costume and noticed that there was a stinger in the back. She was not happy. But after a couple of bribes from her mom, she decided to go out there and perform. She did great! She shook her stinger with the best of them. I wasn't able to get a picture of her in her costume, but it was so cute! I can't wait to get her pictures back from the studio so I can show how cute she is!
Her dad got her flowers and she was so excited! She was being quite cheesy with the camera.


Grandpa and Grandma Cloward were able to come and watch.
So were Grandpa and Grandma Hadfield. I'm so impressed that my dad was able to sit through the whole thing. He hates things like this, but when his grand kids are involved he will sit through anything!Aunt Kassi came to support her. I think she misses dancing when she comes to stuff like this!
Good job Anna! We're so proud of you for getting up there and not crying. You did a fantastic job!

Krista's Dance Recital

We had our dance recital tonight. It was a lot of fun. I have come to realize that I really love to dance! I am definitely going to be taking the class again next year. All of our families were invited to come and watch us perform. Sara was incredibly ornery probably because it was so hot inside the gym, so Rob wasn't able to get a lot of pictures. I will post more when I get them from my sister-in-law. These are the flowers that I got. We were told to tell our husbands that they were required to bring us flowers. Rob did a fabulous job and brought me these beautiful 2 dozen red roses. It is the first time I have ever had red roses. They smelled so good!

Party at Aunt Merfy's

My SIL decided to have all of the little kids come over and play at her house for a little bit. It was a nice day so she had them all wear their swimming suits. They had a great time jumping on the trampoline, playing with water guns and water balls and just hanging out together.

New Neighbors

We have new neighbors. We discovered this nest being built in our backyard a couple of weeks ago. Well, from the sounds of things, the eggs have hatched. We haven't been able to catch a glimpse of the new babies, but hopefully soon. The mother is very protective. I had to take a picture through the window because every time we go out the back door she flies away.

Joy School

It was the last time that I would host Joy School for Anna. This group of little girls have become such good friends. I hope that Anna will be able to see and play with them again soon.

Mother's Day

I had a fabulous Mother's Day. Rob and the girls spoiled me pretty good. Sara gave me noise canceling head phones for my upcoming plane trip to Washington DC. Anna gave me a pretty snow globe with a willow tree figurine in it that plays music. And Rob gave me a beautiful emerald pendant. Also at church Anna got to go up with the rest of the primary children to sing to the mothers. She did such a great job, trying her hardest to sing a song that she didn't even know. We had my parents and Kassi over for dinner and then Casey, Kristin and Jayde joined us for cake and ice cream. We incorporated my birthday into mother's day. Kassi gave me this fabulous cake (I love Costco cakes!). The girls were all excited to put the candles in. For some reason a plastic Cinderella got put on top as well. Needless to say, Sara really enjoyed the cake. She was an absolute mess, but she's awfully cute!
I love that the weather is finally nice enough to let the girls go out and play. They especially love to play with their cousins. I hope that they always have that fun bond with them.
Kassi was showing me something on the laptop. Sara wanted to know what was going on. She isn't all enough to quite reach, but every once in awhile we would see this little blond head pop over the keyboard.

Go Old Ladies!

As I have mentioned before, I started taking a jazz/lyrical dance class last year. It has been a lot of fun, and a lot more work than I thought it would be. For some reason, our dance instructor decided to sign us up in a dance competition. So yesterday a group of us "old ladies" drove up to Taylorsville high to compete against a bunch of high school and younger dance groups. When I walked into the high school the first thought I had was "Wow! I'm in the movie 'Bring It On'". No joke. I started to wonder what on earth I was doing there. For the first time in my life I really felt old. All of the moms were just staring at us, wondering what we were doing there. I think all of us were wondering the same thing. We ended up dancing two dances and let me tell you...We rocked! We got first place on both dances. Okay...It helps that nobody else was competing in that age group! It ended up being a lot of fun. Here we are with our group trophy. We were able to hang all of our ribbons on it.
Here I am with my SIL Merf showing off our trophies.
On the way home a Chicago song came on and everyone broke out singing. Of course we had to use our trophies for the microphones.
And here is my trophy being proudly displayed in our family room. I think it is the first trophy that this house has seen. Yay me!
And here is a picture of our two big trophies with our first place ribbons. We actually won the other trophy for being the judges favorite. I guess they were really impressed that we had the guts to get up there and do it!

Remembrance Walk

Today we were invited to attend a Remembrance Walk at Thanksgiving Point to remember all of the sweet angel babies that have passed on. It was a very nice program. They quietly read all of the babies names, followed by a minute of silence. We were then allowed to explore the gardens. It was so peaceful, even with the girls. I think that they could sense the reverence. We encountered some of our friends from the support group that we attended from when we first lost our babies. That group of friends saved us at that time. It was so nice to go someplace where everyone knew what you were going through. Where you could voice your thoughts and not be looked at as weird. Thank you, dear friends. You made such a difference in our lives.

Here are Anna and Sara looking at one of the waterfalls in the gardens.
I loved the purple tree that was in front of the waterfall. It wasn't a lilac. Rachel, do you have any idea what it is?They gave each of the mother's a Gerber daisy. Here is Anna enjoying mine.

Me with my sweet girls. They were not too happy with getting their picture taken.
Rob wasn't able to come with us, so my mom came. It's always nice to spend time with Grandma.

Happy Birthday to Me!

I have decided that birthdays are not that great once you reach a certain age. I think that age is 21. I did not want to turn a year older, but unfortunately I did. Rob and the girls did a great job in helping me celebrate it, even though Sara and Rob were sick. Rob brought me these beautiful flowers and gave me a digital picture frame, even though he said that he would never buy a picture frame in his life (we received several for our wedding). Anna gave me a ball with Sesame Street characters on it. When Rob took her shopping she said that I wanted a ball so I could play catch with her. Thanks for a great birthday everyone! Love you!

BTW...Rob just informed me that he gave me a picture frame with "flair". I guess the other frames lacked it!

Capital Reef

We decided to take the long route home, going through Capital Reef National Park in Wayne County (GO Rachel!) and stopping in Gunnison to see Rob's Grandma Jorgensen. We were told of a cool place where the locals go cliff jumping, so we decided to check it out. There were tons of red rocks, with a little waterfall right below us. It was a little scary trying to hold on to Anna, making sure she didn't fall down the cliffs. Anna, Merfy and Alli.
The stream looked so inviting that we had to soak our feet. Once I had my feet in the girls had to have theirs. Sara is a little scary, though, because she wanted to dive in head first. She is my crazy one!