A New Calling

This weekend we had a life changing experience as Ricky was called to be the second counselor in our new Stake Presidency. It was a very sweet and humbling experience to meet with servants of the Lord. I am so proud of Ricky and know that he will serve with his whole heart and be the best counselor he can be. He will also be the bishop for a few weeks while they wait to call a new one. Crazy? Very!! My testimony was once again solidified of latter prophets and modern day revelation. I am excited to serve and support Ricky in this new endeavor!

Take me out to the Ball Game!!!

We have officially entered the world of sports! Braxton started little league last month, and it has been busy to say the least. Coming from a family of all girls and Brax being the oldest, I had no idea how busy little league is! We are the ball park all the time, but it is great. Braxton LOVES playing baseball and he is doing great and learning a lot. It has been a good experience and now I know what to expect from now on. Burke has also started t-ball so that has added to the craziness! I wouldn't have it any other way though!

California Dreamin!!

Ricky and I took an awesome trip to California last month an it was wonderful!!
He would be proud that this is the first picture for the trip. He LOVES Ronald Reagan and we went to the Reagan Library while we were there. It was very interesting and I learned a lot. I would recommend it to anyone. I have to say that I quite like Pres. Reagan as well.

Ricky is a born Dodger fan! The main reason we took this trip at this time is because it was the world baseball classic finals and they were being played at Dodger stadium. How could we pass that up?

We went to the games with our friends Caton and Michelle and we had so much fun!! We laughed and laughed! I love baseball fields!! They are beautiful and they smell heavenly.

Our trip fell over my birthday and our 9th wedding anniversary. We stayed at the Grand Californian and Disneyland to celebrate. When we checked in we found out that we were the family for the day and they gave us balloons and these papers and they upgraded our room to a suite We were surprised and so excited! What a way to celebrate!

This is the view from our balcony. Pretty awesome!

I think this is probably the best birthday I have ever had! Can it get better than being at Disneyland on your birthday? It was strange to be their with no kids, but so nice to do what we wanted. Ricky treated me like a queen and we had lots of fun!

After a few days in LA we went to San Diego for two days. We went to Sea World which we haven't done for a few years. I love watched Shamu. What amazing animals these are. I could sit and watch them all day! However, I had a major laugh attack at the dolphin show as I got a fin full of water right in the face!

I don't know what this place is called, but apparently it is a popular place to go and look at the seals. They were so cute!

After watching the seals, we hiked down to the beach and looked around in the tide pools. These are things we don't get to do very often, and I thoroughly enjoyed it! This is the part of the ocean that I like.

The biggest highlight of our trip is that we got to go to three temples. We rarely get to go to the temple together and this was a special experience that may never happen again. I have a firm testimony of the temple and the work that we do there. I am so thankful that we were able to go. This is the LA Temple. We went their the first night we were there with Caton and Michelle. It is HUGE! It has an awesome staircase that makes you feel like a princess when you walk down it.

This is the Newport Beach Temple, and it is my new favorite. It was so beautiful inside and the grounds we awesome. Plus, we went their on our anniversary.

This is the majestic San Diego Temple. I don't even know what to say about the beauty and grandness of this temple. I think this totally represents what heaven will look like. I LOVE THE TEMPLE!

Catching Up: Finally
January was a busy month with lots going on. I have been meaning to blog, but life has just got in the way. I was sick in bed with pneumonia for 2 weeks, so I am finally updating this blog after nearly 2 months of craziness!

This year we did one party for both of the boys. They have the same friends, so why have 2 parties 1 week apart. I think these are the biggest cupcakes I have ever seen! Costco special.
Aunt Lisa gave us this fun birthday stuff for Christmas this year and everyone was so excited to finally be able to use it.

Is this a happy boy or what?

Braxton turned 8 this year so he had a lot of special things happen in January. The first thing was that he got to start scouts. This is a huge deal and he has been thrilled and got his bobcat patch in two weeks. I realized that I am going to be a scout expert by the time my four boys are grown. Yeah for scouts!!

The second and more exciting thing for Braxton was that he finally got to be baptized. He has been looking forward to this for months! I am so proud of him for choosing the right. He has a solid litle testimony and is a great example for his brothers and sister.

We had an awesome weekend! We were blessed to have my whole family, and almost all of Ricky's family come for this special day; we were only missing one family from Ricky's side. Braxton felt so much love and support from everyone. It was a wonderful and very special day for our family.

We took Braxton to the temple and made some goals with him. There is truly no greater thing than to know that my children walk in truth. As we were walking into the temple I felt like yelling to everyone, that this is my little boy and he just got baptized; of course I refrained as we were on the temple grounds. What a day!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

As is true Able's fashion on the 30th we decided to take a trip to Disneyland to celebrate the Braxton and Burke's birthday's and the new year. Although it was crowded we had lots of fun,and the boys were so proud to wear their birthday buttons and have everyone tell them Happy Birthday!

Do you think Burke can pull the sword out by making this strained face??

The kids loved Tom Sawyer Island. We have never taken the younger 4 over there and they ran themsleves ragged. Their favorite thing was exlploring the caves.

Will the real Dale please stand up??

Christmas Day
Don't you love the mess Christmas brings! To me this means that there are a lot of happy kids running around the house. I love this day for many reasons, one of which is that you get to relax all day. I love staying in my jammies and enjoying my kids have fun!
I think this was the best day in Ashton's life thus far. He got all kinds of new vehicles and he was occupied all day long. That never happens.
There was a picture of Ash here with is line of cars but it got erased. BUMMER

I do have to admit that boy toys are a little more fun than girls. Ellie gets kind of jipped on Christmas because she has no sisters, so here she is playing legos with the boys. What's a girl to do??

Yeah For Christmas!!

It finally came! But, here is my issue with blogging things like Christmas. I have so many pictures from all the events that it is hard to choose which ones to post, so I picked a few of the best to show what a great time we had!!

Christmas Eve day was a blast! We went out on the four wheeler and pulled the kids around on sleds for a couple of hours. Our friends the Tholl's were out as well and the kids had so much fun!! We played till we the kids were frozen, and Holly and I had to go in to make food. What a way to start the day!

Ellie and London were so cute on the sleds. They laughed and laughed. Conli also came out which added to the fun.

We spent Christmas Eve with my family and one of the fun things we did was to go on a trailer ride and sing carols. It was lots of fun!

The kids were troopers, even though it was FREEZING!!!

My brother in law Brian had this idea to drive up and see this house that played music to go with the lights. We all thought it was a great idea until we realized it was like 2 miles up the road. He jumped in the truck with Ricky and us women folk toughed it out. We sang all the way there and home and had a grand time freezing our tails off; thanks Brian for the fun memory!!

This one is for you Nana!

After our ride, we came back and opened gifts. My parents gave all of the grandkids p.j.s. and a Disney Character. Needless to say it went over very well. Ashton got Heimlich from Bugs Life and we were all cracking up at how well that matches Ash's personality. They both "love tveets and sveets!'

Girls Only!!!!

Ellie and I went on a girl trip to Disneyland last week. She is our only girl and Ricky and I thought it would be good for the two of us to go somewhere alone; of course Disneyland is the perfect place!! We had a great time being girls.

I have only been to Disneyland at Christmas time one other time and it was so pretty! Everything was so Christmasy and festive!

These are the garlands hanging over Main Street.

They had all the tiny houses decorated on the Storybook Land ride. It was so cute. Even the lamp post's had tiny wreaths on them.

Ellie's favorite thing was getting her hair makeup done. They have 6 or 7 chairs shaped like crowns and they just pamper the little princesses. She loved it!!

This is the almost finished product.

This is the finished product. She really wanted the black eyelashes and glitter. It was very cute. It is hard to see in this picture but she has a little tiara in her hair that was so cute! People commented the whole rest of the day on her hair and makeup. What little girl wouldn't love that?

Despite her princess look, Ellie is somewhat of a tomboy at heart. The rockets were one of her favorite rides this trip and we had to ride them twice. What can you expect from a girl with 4 brothers?

One of my favorite things to do at Disneyland is go to the breakfast with Minnie and her friends. The food is great, but the best part is that all of the characters come to your table while you eat. Minnie was so, so cute in her Christmas outfit.

Tigger was so funny. He was bouncing around teasing everyone making us all laugh.

This is a character you rarely see. Ellie kept playing with his big pink nose.

Max was so funny! I asked if we could take a picture with just Minnie and he acted so offended, but gave us both a big hug in the end.

We walked up through the castle and this is the book at the end. Very cool!

This tree was beautiful!! I don't know how they decorate it, but I heard a worker tell someone that they put it up overnight. Crazy!!
I have to put in a big thank you to Ricky for making this trip possible. He stayed home with the four boys and the dog for two days and he did great!! He took great care of the kids and was so excited for Ellie and I to spend some time together. What an awesome hubby!