The Sawtooth National Forest: The White Cloud Mountains, Walker Lake trail, Walker Lake and Hook Lake.

Amelia's Baptism

Can you believe that she is 8?! I cannot. However she has really grown in maturity over the last 6 months and it has been awesome to experience her growth. She was baptized on August 6th at 3p.m.

Is this summer or what? I love it that she decided to wear panty covers from a dress as underwear and then tights over it all.

Vietnam

The last two weeks Chris was in Vietnam with an ngo called IGE http://www.globalengage.org/ . They were super awesome to invite and welcome Chris along for their trip. They even set up many very productive interviews for him to do as part of his research for his dissertation. This was an amazing opportunity. Here is a link to watch a video on vietnamese television about the conference he attended and the goals of the conference. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf72YVWzjWA&feature=related

Now here's some pics of Vitenam:

Vietnam is now Chris' favorite place.

The girls' TaVaci concert.

What is TaVaci you ask? Why singing and dancing of course.

In true Idaho fashion TaVaci is a combo name of the two women who started it. We have gotten to know the "CI"ndy, who is a wonderful woman and now that we've done one semester of the program I would have to say that it was super fun. The best was watching all the little performers bring their own brand of silliness.

Vampire anyone? What...it's not Halloween yet? Shh. Don't tell Lauren and Edie.

Amelia painted their faces and then she started on the feet....Well the tops went pretty good so why not the bottom of the feet? The carpet was washed the next day.

Very Special Denver Friends



Our trip to Brighton and Denver, CO.

Grandma & Grandpa Lee were tremendously great hosts. Our girls played with their dolls and tea sets for literally hours. I love that they have such a great imagination and can satisfy that need in such a pleasant way.

We were all glad to visit with both Uncle Andy and Uncle Rick. Rick wasn't feeling well and declined a photo, but we'll get him next time.



She's Super E and she's got super strength.

Ever have one of those off days?

Well Edie doesn't even seem to notice when some things are just off. Or in this case wearing a size 8 when she's lucky to fit into a size 2/3.



Our Trip to Provo

We went south to visit the Carl Bloch exhibit and visit my cousins at the end of April. While there we were treated to super yummy pizza at the SLAB. I had the Thai chicken with peanut sauce. Then we went to a dessert palace called The Chocolate. This place is run/owned by Chris' old mission companion and his wife. It was wonderful! I had the turtle brownie there, which was great. I wanted to get the cazookie, but Chris would have been really sad since he wasn't with us and his jealousy may have driven him mad if he didn't get to share that infamous dessert with me. By the way our cousins that were with us recently had a birthday party done at The Chocolate and they loved it too.

A great photo for the memories. Awesome cousins!

Spring Time

With a little help from the kids we started our garden planning and then some other peoples (unintentionally) about a month ago now. We started with a 70 Jiffy starter kit. It said that things would sprout in about 1-2 weeks. We had sprouts within 3 days. So many things had to be transplanted about 1 1/2 weeks later (the zucchini and cucumbers). The rest could easily wait the 2 weeks. Our bell peppers took 3 weeks to even amount to something.

These were the ones that weren't quite as big and will wait another week or so to be planted.

This morning it was a frigid 26, but the plants were safe inside--whew.

The happy planters.

 Amelia's beloved electronics kit by Elenco. Super duper awesome. She loves it!

Edie and I by the end of the day. She was a little wiped out.

The girls in their Christmas PJs and opening presents on Christmas Day.

Amelia loves Christmas.

Amelia had her violin recital last week, however I ran out of memory card space to do the video. I have another copy of it from Grandpa, but I won't be able to post that until tonight. This lovely picture will have to do for now.

Here are Tommy and Kara with the Willfords on the left and the Ipson's on the right.

 We visited family in Arizona over Thanksgiving for the wedding of Chris' bro, Tommy and new sister-n-law, Kara. We are super glad that Tommy married such a nice girl. Above is a pic of the Mesa Temple. And below is a rare moment of PDA. Forgive my sharing, but I thought it was fun.

These girls are so awesome. Probably the cutest Halloween costumes ever only because they are worn by the cutest kids.

Pumpkin decorating. We had the most amazing pumpkins grown by their Willford grandparents. They had their names engraved into them.