Happy Birthday, Bridget!

Happy 4th Birthday to my sweet little girl! Bridget Bonnie has been such a blessing to our family. I always said when she was a baby that I am ending on a perfect note! {wink} Of course, Heavenly Father had a different plan, my motherhood challenges were not over yet...BUT that's a different story for another time!

A few things about our sweet little miss; she is ALL GIRL. She loves to have her hair done. She loves to dress up in pretty dresses and all kinds of cheer clothes. She is super funny and has the cutest personality! We giggle lots and lots at her cute little phrases and observances.


One day old...

"cheering" at Tanner's games this summer. She loves to tumble and cheer just like her big sis!

We love her beautiful blue eyes and very blonde hair!

All dressed up in her pretty birthday dress from her best friend, Lizzy.

The Princess cake and her new dress up clothes from Grandma Pam.

Make a wish, sweet girl! We love you so much and wish you the happiest birthday ever!
We are so grateful that you are a part of our family!

Happy Anniversary to my one and only...

For my husband:

Fourteen Years! Yikes! Where exactly does the time go? I remember sooo well the past fourteen years and even before that when we started this journey that will last throughout eternity. I am so grateful to you, my sweet husband for all your patience, love, and understanding of me and my many weaknesses. I have enjoyed this journey with you so far, and I know there are many more years to come. Today, I wanted to express my love for you through our memories...

In 1993, our friendship began when my dear friends persuaded me to transfer into journalism and take the awesome trip to Long Beach where we would meet and hang out for several days...when we got home, you asked me out on our first date to Sophomore Hop!

Later that same year, you accepted the call to serve a full-time mission to Philadelphia. I said good-bye to you at the airport and didn't know our relationship would blossom during those two years...

And when you arrived home, my smile could not have been any bigger! I was so excited to see you and even more excited about the feelings that were telling me you were someone very special!

Our engagement happened two months after you came home, on September 20th. You took me to the Manti temple and asked me to be your eternal companion! I wholeheartedly agreed and our date was set for November 22nd, 1996.

Our wedding day is full of memories! First, it rained and rained all day long. We had to RUN into the temple, and RUN to our cars after the ceremony, thus preventing us getting any temple pictures:( Grandpa's camera was dropped and our pictures are all few and far between, BUT, I would not change that day for anything. EVER. You and I were meant to be together, no matter what the weather! And, as you always say "one day we will have all the pictures we will ever need, they are all recorded in heaven"! It was our perfect day, and the start of sooo many more memories...

Ward Activity 1998.
Our very first Christmas, just a month after we were married.

Silly times together with friends...

Lots and lots of flowers and gifts from you to always let me know how much you love me!

Many fun trips, including our Carribbean cruise!

Trip to the beach...

Several trips to Las Vegas...

Many more, including Moab, BYU Games, St. George, California, Florida, just to name a few.

But even most important, aside from the day we gave our hearts to one another was the moments we shared becoming a family...

Our sweet Bayli, January, 20th 1998.

Our stud, Tanner October 12th, 1999

Our sweet little Tucker, August 17th, 2002

Our Princess, Bridget November 28th, 2006.
And our muffin, Brightyn, February 26th, 2010.

My life has been full of blessings since the day we made our vows and I am so grateful for you and for all the memories that we have made and will continue to make throughout our lives together. You are my everything, I am nothing without you and I wish you a very happy day today! All my love, Jeni

My son turns 11 this year...WHAT??? He is such a grown-up, kind, loving, helpful young man. I am so proud of who he is becoming. I find it really hard to beleive and really hard to swallow that he is on his way to becoming a Deacon and recieving the Priesthood. One day after church he approached me to tell me that his testimony had really grown that day. He said he felt the spirit so strongly it was making him sweat {smile}. When I asked further about what was different today he told me that he had decided not to sit by the same boys he always sat by and that he was going to really pay attention to the lesson. He looked up each scripture and then answered the questions from the teacher..(she reported this was true).

Did I mention how proud I am of this kid? I sure love him! Aside from being a great example, he is a great athlete. He can be found every day doing some kind of sporting activity after school (not to mention at school). He loves baseball, football, and basketball. He is really amazing at all three sports (not to be too braggy, but he really is). I can brag about him because he works sooo hard at all sports. He throws, runs, shoots, hits, and more to keep in shape and work so that he can do his best when it comes to playing in a game.

Tanner is a great student. He tries his best at school and really loves to learn.

A great friend to all, truly, to all. He played a football game against a team that had a kid with Turett's Syndrome. He was a great player, despite his physical disabilities, and of course he was the kid who Tanner was up against. He said he felt so bad for hitting him even though that was what he supposed to do. He brought it up several times after the game, how bad he felt. I assured him that if the kid was in any danger of getting hurt, he wouldn't be playing, so I am sure he was fine to get hit.

Okay, one more and then I will stop bragging about my boy...Matt put together a football video for our team this year to show at our end of the year party. I took the video, so of course, a lot of it was of Tanner (he played quarterback, so he is in most of the plays), and most of the pictures were of Tanner. When he previewed the vid. he made Matt take out some of the pics because he felt bad that not all the kids were in the pictures!

I am sure happy to be a mother to such an amazing guy. I love you bubs hope you have a very happy birthday!
Tanner jumps off a 30-foot cliff at Sand Hollow State Park in St. George...
He loves to play baseball, doesn't this smile show it?

A great little catcher, has learned so much and works really hard at the position...

Go Trojans! We had a really fun year in football, Tanner loved playing quarterback and getting to play with his best friends...

Happy 11th birthday!

Bridget's musings

"Mom, there's a scratch in the sky" Bridget exclaims one day. "A Scratch?" I ask with that confused tone in my voice. "Yeah, see, right there" as she points to the jet stream slowly making it's way across the sky! A scratch alright!

It was lunch time one day and I asked Bridget if she wanted a grilled cheese sandwich. Her reply? "What if I want a boy cheese instead?"

Bayli refers to cheerleading in most everything she does. She has taught Bridget that if she wants to be a cheerleader, she must do this or do that. Like for example, if Bridget is whining Bayli will tell her that "cheerleaders don't whine". Bridget immediately stops. So the other day as we were getting ready Bridget matter-of-factly tells me that "cheerleaders brush their teeth AND eat all their food, mom". Hmmmm, I think we are onto something here!

Bridget tells me one day that she wants "down underwear". "Hu? What the heck are down underwear" I ask while imagining in my mind some type of feathery bikini bottoms. "And WHERE did you learn about down underwear?" her reply; "like yours mommy!" AHEM, yeah, so like underwear that's LONG {wink}...O.KAYYYY!

She sits on her feet while up at the bar. After a particularly long time of watching tv she hops down and states "My feet are snoring!" A few minutes later..."they woke up!!!"

About Brightyn: "I don't think she likes me anymore" I ask "Why?" "Because she keeps spitting at me!"

Of course, like most three-year old girls, she is very curious about my nursing the baby. She asked one night if Brightyn was drinking juice, as she is pointing "there". I said "no, Brightyn drinks baby milk." "Well is that one juice?" she asks while pointing at the other side. "Nope, milk too" I say. "so two milks!" she exclaims, like she has just discovered something wonderful...

While watching Dora one day Bridget made the observation "Dora and Boots don't go potty like me!" True. Very true!

Out of the blue: "Maybe we should give our baby to Lizzy" (Bridget's friend). "Why?" I asked "so she can have a baby" matter-of factly.

Lizzy gives Bridget lots and lots of hand-me-downs. One day I was getting her dressed and pulled out some shorts from her. "Where did I get these?" "from Lizzy" I anwered, smiling so she would be excited (did I mention a very picky dresser?) "Well, these don't live here! I don't want them!" Sighhh, I can't win most days when it comes to dressing the three-year old!

Funny, funny little girl!

"TICO"

(Cori, this is for you!)



So Tucker has this certain smile that he gets on his face when he is concentrating. Think Dora...Tico the squirrel...yeah, this is what it looks like!



This is the best picture I could get...he never does it when asked, you have to catch him concentrating! In this case...rubbing dads feet!

Well sweet potatoes!

Need I explain?

Happy birth week, Tucker!

My Tucker is eight! This brings a smile to my face! It has been a very eventful eight years with this boy! We have experienced a lot since his birth and I am so grateful for this little guy. What he lacks in stature he makes up for in personality. Tucker is so loving, friendly, energetic, and outgoing. Our lives would be very boring without him! Happy birthday, kid! We love you!

We celebrated all week long...

Day one: Grandma Pam and Aunt Cori came for Sunday dinner and birthday dessert. Grandma has a tradition with the kids that she takes them out for lunch and shopping to pick out a birthday gift.
Tucker got a card from Grandma...
with his shopping money inside...

He is very good at giving loves...

There are only a few things that Tucker will actually eat, so we made an ice cream cake and he ate plain ice cream!

Day two: Tucker and Grandma went shopping. He picked out a remote control Yukon XL that lights up. He loves remote control cars!

Day three: We spent the day at the lake, just Tucker and his siblings. It was really nice and relaxing. Tucker loves water and could swim for hours, so that is just what we did!

please pardon the gal in the bikini with her "bagel" as Bayli calls it...hope this isn't anyone you know! Tucker enjoyed the slide.

Tanner talked Bridget into going down with him...she screamed the whole way! Hated it!

We got there early enough that the kids had the dock to themselves for awhile.

Here he is! The birthday boy enjoying his day in the sun!

Tanner and Bridget had a great time building sand castles. Bridget spent the entire day on the beach and loved every minute of it!

Brightyn even enjoyed the beach...from the grassy sideline!

Here he is, the fish! This kid has NO FEAR of water, he will swim and swim and not even worry about going too deep...kinda scary!

Bayli and Bright...

packing the sand to make a castle...

I just thought she looked cute here!


Day four: Tucker had to get two teeth extracted (poor kid). So mom and he went to Toys R Us and picked out some things. He got a new backpack and lunch box for school, a really large semi truck to hold all his hot wheels, and a smaller semi truck to push around. Later that night, dad took him to the store and got him a soccer ball.

Day five: Tucker invited his two favorite cousins, Courtney and Ali to the movie, Shrek. Ali gave him a bag full of his favorite treats (he only eats a few things) and Courtney gave him a gift card to Toys R Us. After the movie we went to the park for pizza and the kids played tag until it got so hot we had to leave!

All ready to go!

The perfect seats...

Bayli and Brightyn stay in the shade while the kids play on the playground.

A picnic to end the day! What a great time we had!

Day six: Tucker celebrated his birthday at Grandma Clayton's with all the cousins, aunts and uncles who have birthdays in the months of July and August. He got some money from grandma and grandpa, which he later spent on ice cream from the ice cream truck!

We must say, this was a great week for this birthday boy! He was truly spoiled!