Camping at Bishop's Cabin

Our Bishop is good friends with Brent, and he was nice enough to let us spend a few nights at their family cabin. Their family was able to come up and spend some time together and we had a great time.

Here's Brent working his salmon magic on the grill. (Believe it or not, he's actually been able to turn some fish haters into fish lovers with his mad cooking skills.)
Family home evening with the Ellis's

Faith with her best friend.

Gracie spent hours playing with the Ellis kids out on the little docks.

Hey Faith, you've got a little dirt on your nose...

TJ getting some one on one time with his Dad.

I think we named him Freddie the frog... the kids had fun playing with him.

...time to sleep...

It's hard not to love Grandpa!

Brent looking a little like a male model...(but don't tell him that)

A summertime midnight in Alaska...

A little after midnight.

Around 1:00 AM this is about as dark as it gets this time of year.

It was around 72 degrees. That's swimsuit weather in Alaska folks. (Mom & Dad didn't think so.)

Another obligatory self portrait... (actually my Dad might have taken this one.)

Who wouldn't want to be best friends with my mommy?

....................................................................It's not dark yet... but she's getting tired.

.......................................................................................................Some kids are adorable even when their filthy.

TJ LOVED playing pokemon with the Ellis boys.

It takes a brave Grandma to let the kids play the way we let them in these next pictures....

................................................................................(oops I wasn't actually talking about this one. :) I think she's cute no matter what her hair looks like!

We found some great critters to play with. Gracie and Faith played with them the whole trip....

Beware of toes and small bodies wading in the water...

Because here come the Leeches!... Oh lovely.

Eeewww! :)

Celebrating the 4th of July!

This is the 1st parade we've been to since we moved to Kenai. It was so fun to go with Mom & Dad!

Up here they're still allowed to throw candy at the parade. This was a new experience for the kids and they LOVED it!

The kids were handed these little flags, which they waved fertively. They thought that was pretty neat.

Don't they are looking so patriotic!

I didn't get a flag, but I managed to get hit in the head by a flying news paper, and some kind of plastic blow up toy. My head must look like a good target. ;O)

We wanted to meet Brent for lunch after the parade since he had to work,... but he was busy with some sort of foot pursuit, so we went to the beach instead.

We saw several seals out in the water... fishing for salmon I presume.

It's not a good picture, but you can tell what it is.

Isn't my mom pretty?

It didn't take her long to become Faith's new best friend.

My Dad is digging in the sand, to see if there are sand crabs. Just another one of the kids. :)

........................................................................................................................I didn't get a picture, but TJ kept hitting me in the head with rocks. He was trying to skip them, but he wasn't watching where they were going. A rock would hit me, and I'd look around to see where it came from. But he would already be looking for another rock to throw. It took me forever to finally figure out what was going on!

I told her not to get wet, but she's soaked as usual.

.......................................................................................................................................................................... Faith and Gracie love the water this year. TJ doesn't really want anything to do with it, he just likes to play in the sand. They're all their own little people.

If your beach was fed by Glacial rivers and streams you'd run away screaming too!

We've Been Waiting For a Year & They're Finally Here!

My parents arrived for their 3 week visit on July 3rd.
That's one day before our 1 year anniversary of moving Kenai.
A whole year is too long to go without seeing my Mommy and Daddy it was so nice to have them here.

My Angel Mother.

We stopped to check out Portage Glacier on the way home from the airport, in Anchorage.

Faith was a little bit shy around Grandma & Grandpa at first, it's been 1/3rd of her life since she's even seen them. But it didn't take her long to fall in love with them again.

Gracie didn't want to let go of Grandma's hand... I kind of felt the same way.

The water fall from the Glacier in Whittier, AK.

Making up for all of those missed kisses.

An obligatory picture of me, stepping out from behind the camera to prove I really do exist. :P

Camping in Alaska

Our good friends invited us to go camping with them. I have to say, I'm a nervous camper. (It's the whole bear thing.) We had a great time though, to my relief and Brent's dismay, there were no bears to be seen.

Doesn't Faith look cute in her little piglet ears? Don't tell her she's piglet though, she thinks she's a rabbit.

Gracie had a blast swimming and playing with her good friend Morgyn.

This is our little camping spot. Notice the clothes hanging everywhere.

We must really be Alaskans now, because we went swimming. Even I got in the water this time. I thought I would try to swim across the lake.... Yeah right! It was way too cold. I haven't been in Alaska for that long. I made it 1/2 way then turned around... (you know the whole hypothermia thing.)

Brent made it across and back though. He's such a manly man, it's like he was meant to live here.

Our Friends Becky and Sage.

They were awfully nice to share their camper with us. Bears aren't nearly as scary when you're inside!

TJ made the only catch of the trip. This monstrous trout... However did we eat it all? Of course he was extremely proud, it's his first fish this year.

Gracie and Morgyn with their mud soup.

Gracie LOVES the water, she swam and swam. Well more like dipped and dipped. Mostly just legs. :)

Apparently TJ doesn't love frigid water. He spent most of the time finding his own special places and games to play, with his buddy Gabe.

Faith is just happy and excited to be doing whatever it is that she's doing. She's pretty stinkin cute!
What kid doesn't love making mud soup?
Zip shoes make TJ run Super Fast!
Cleaning them is not as fun as catching them.

Flying Fish Preschool -A look back at the year...

This month we celebrated our last day of Preschool.

-In case you forgot, some friends and I did preschool for our 5 little pre-k kiddo's.
We had a lot of good times, it was fun as a Mom to teach them. And I really appreciated the other Mother's who worked so hard to make it happen.

TJ is excited to start Kindergarten in August. He learned a lot over the year, and made some great friends.

Gracie and Faith enjoy tagging along to the parties that always included the younger siblings.

Abraham and TJ were the only boys. They were good little buddies during the last year. Ab's getting ready to move next month, we're going to miss him.

Gracie & Faith loved playing with Ab's little sister Ziya. We'll miss getting to babysit her.


Emma and her sister Sarah. Emma is fun and outgoing. She'll be going to a different school than TJ, we're glad we got to spend so much time with her.

Syndey, Jason, and Katie.

TJ's excited to be going to the same school as Sydney next year. They're hoping they'll get to be in the same class.

Karah and Owen

Karah was the last to join our little group. She lives the farthest away, and we were really lucky to have her. She's smart and is reading early like TJ. She had the best writing in the class. She and Emma will be in the same school

The kids got to try out their hands at Valentines this year. They each made and envelope so the could collect their cards.

The kids were so excited to get to go to an extra Easter party. They got to try out their relay racing skills. They had a lot of fun.

It was great being in a preschool with like minded women. We started every day with prayer, and the national anthem. We also made sure to focus on the religious purpose for each of our Holidays.

Here are the kids dressed up for the Nativity scene.