2009

The New Year is upon us! I hope you all have your wishes granted and that you are surrounded by the people who love you the most! We are looking forward to spending even more time with all of our friends and family in the new year. We are sending you happy thoughts and tons of love.

Scott, Amanda, Lanais, Hunter and Nicolas

The boards dont hit back...

Watch this video of Hunter, very cool.

May I introduce you to Lanais...

Lanais has been working very hard at school. She is a good friend, a good student and all and all a really good girl. Being as candid as I can be and usually am, we really have no idea where this girl came from. She is the ultimate overachiever. I feel bad for her,she really works so hard for everything to be perfect. She has been so busy between soccer, dance and school. She really did a great job of keeping her grades up and (only one B)and staying committed to all her after school activities. I kinda kept hoping something would slip so that I had an excuse to pull her out of something. But nothing ever did so I just wanted to take some time to introduce you to Lanais. Here are pictures of her doing her favorite things.

If we are home, we are often outside doing whatever we want. Lanais prefers her rollerblades over her bike.

Lanais being surprised by the science experiment at the Discovery Center. She went there with her ECL program at school. I truly have no idea what ECL stands for, I was told it is pre-gate program for lower graders. Told ya she was smart.

Sparthenian of the Month (the big award at school)

Did I forget to mention that Lanais takes horse riding lessons too? My mom bought her lessons for her birthday and she is not ready to give them up yet. She is very confident on the horse and when Scott and I went out to watch she got the horse to a nice run all by herself for the first time. It was scary for me to watch... she was thrilled with herself.

Lanais and her brothers at her favorite place on earth...Disneyland. Notice Nic, he hates those giant characters...we think it is funny, we are mean parents.

Soccer...

She has a recital tomorrow night so I will hopefully post some of those pictures soon. I have a feeling she will be something quite spectacular when and as she grows up. It will be a sight to see.

Happy Birthday Nic!!!!!

Finally we are finished with birthday season around here. It gets crazier and crazier every year.

My baby is 3!!!!!!!!!!!

It is the most horrible news. Normally I would be having another baby by now.

He is a very funny guy and 3 is proving to be a challenging age for him (all the others as well). We celebrated by having the family over and it worked out to do it over the Thanksgiving holiday and so the WHOLE family was in town. It was great. We don't get to see everyone enough, but my kids single handily take care of that this time of year.
The following week we invited friends to join us at Chuck E. Cheese for some fun and that is the best place to have 10 three year olds and their siblings. It was tons of fun and thanks to everyone who came. It is truly special for us.

Snake cake...

Evelyn Rose

My brother Jason and his wife Sarah had their 2nd baby on the 2nd of December. She is a beautiful baby. I am thrilled to be an auntie again and the kids are wondering why we are not already in Arkansas to see their new cousin. Congratulations you guys, welcome to the madness.


We love and miss all of you.

Fresno State Football

As most everyone knows, Scott is a HUGE Fresno State fan. He goes to every home game, most away games and just really likes it. We have been to the UCLA game as a family, the San Jose State game, as a family and maybe even to the bowl game (wherever that may be). Those of you with small kids understand what that means. We go with Scott because he loves it and sometimes can tolerate us being there too. At both games Nic had fallen asleep, but only at the San Jose game was I happy about that. It was freezing and he kept me warm. At UCLA it had to have been 100+ degrees in the stadium and he fell asleep on me and I thought I was going to die. We have had a good season (too bad we cant say that for FSU) it was fun hanging out with Daddy and although I think he forgets it sometimes, he is making good memories for the kids, OK maybe just the boys, Lanais is over it already.
Here are some pictures from UCLA


Just to prove we made it to the last quarter, it was soooo miserable I was not sure anyone would believe me.

Lanais' face pretty much sums it up.

Now San Jose...

See the difference

Nic's new way of smiling, very strange

The whole family

Happy Birthday Hunter!!!

My little Hunter is 6. Time goes too quickly. We had the family and friends gather at the park near our house. It started out to be a beautiful day, then it started to rain. Every year I plan a party at the park it rains, it is too funny. We were lucky enough to have good friends in town that weekend as well as my brother was here from Arkansas. We did a backwards party, had cupcakes at the park and then headed to dinner at Hunter's fav pizza place. Everyone came with us and we basically filled the entire parlor. It is good to be surrounded by so many loved ones. So happy birthday Hunter and we love you!

Here are a few pictures...