Payson Temple

We took a quick trip to Provo the first weekend of May so we could go to the Payson Temple open house.  We went the Pitt's family and my mom.  It was a breezy spring day and it was lovely.  The temple is absolutely beautiful inside and out.  There is so much detail and artistry all through out the building.  After the temple we went to Los Hermanos-my favorite Mexican place ever.  The Pitts family didn't go eat with us but they were going to come back to Grandma's and visit for a while until Ella bella got sick as soon as they got home.  She had been sick for a few days but they thought she was over it until they got back home and she barfed in the garage. We were very fortunate that none of us got it especially because Kyle and Ella were holding hands and Don and I carried her some.  I'm so glad that the church is building so many temples and we can take our children to the open houses.  Cayden has been to 4 now and Kyle has been to two.  Caleb and Connor did not go with us on the trip because they had to work.  The Provo temple should be done here in the next year and we will get to go to that open house.  The church announced it was breaking ground in Cedar City for that temple so we can go to that in a few years as well.  Kyle especially asks about the temple because I try to go as often as I can.  He asks if he can go all the time and so we were finally able to take him to the temple open house in Ogden last summer and then to St. George when Ashley and Brad Farmer had their twins sealed to them in February.  Kyle got to go then but only to the waiting room. And now he has gotten to go again.    Cayden has been able to do baptisms for the dead 2 or three times since he turned 12 in February of last year.  

Father and Sons Campout

The boys all went on the Father and Sons campout on Friday April 25-26.  This was Kyle's first campout and the sweet baby has been asking to go on a campout for a long long time.  I was a little nervous about him going because he is so so busy and just runs and runs.  The last several years the campout has been out above Mesquite at a place called Whitney Pocket.  It was a place with lots of rocks and other dangerous places that I was concerned about for Kyle.  Luckily this time the campout was held down past Overton at the Wildlife Refuge.  It took several hours of packing and loading to get ready for the one night campout but they boys had a great time.  The High Priests group provided and cooked up a bunch of fish and chips and the Elder's Quorum (Don) was in charge of breakfast and they had breakfast burritos.  The weather was windy but not too cold so that was good.  

Park Squirt Gun Party

On Saturday April 18, Kyle got invited to a birthday at the park. It was for a little boy in his primary class named Chuck. They had a great time with squirt guns and water balloons. 

He was quite a sad boy when it was time to go home. 

Piano Man

Cayden had his second piano recital on Monday, April 20. He has been taking piano from Sister Cooper for about 3 years. Last year at his first recital he was very very nervous and asked Sister Cooper to sit by him while he played his song. This year he had no problems at all. He didn't fuss or complain about going and he didn't ask for any help. When it was his turn he marched right up to the stage and played his song with out a hitch. His song was Puff the Magic Dragon. All the songs the kids played were from movies so that made it really fun. After his song he was all grins. He was sitting on the opposite side of the auditorium from us so we weren't able to see him after he came down until the end of the recital but we could see him trying to look for us. This was quite a big step for him and we are very proud of him. If I can figure out how to upload the video of him playing I will. 

Going Back To Cali

This year for Spring Break we went to California.  We have usually go to Disneyland in the Spring but we always check to see what rides are going to be closed and this year there were way too many that we love that were going to be closed so we decided to go to the beach.  Kyle has never been to the beach so he was very excited.  We decided to go down around San Diego but I have several requirements for the hotels we stay in and have to stay in Hilton hotels so that we can use Don's points from traveling.  We really like the Hampton Inn and Suites and there was only 2 that were suites and having a separate room for Kyle to go to sleep in is one of my requirements.  The other requirement is a free breakfast on site so that we can feed the kids easily.  The Hampton Inn and Suites that was available and not super expensive was in San Clemente.  San Clemente was about 15 minutes from Carlsbad but it had a lovely uncrowded beach and the town itself was not super crowded like Laguna or Calrsbad and had some great restaurants that we tried.  Caleb and Connor did not go with us on this trip because they were working at the fair getting it ready and they were working for Grandpa and Grandma.  It was an interesting trip without the majority of our kids with us but we are getting to that point now where it will just be Cayden and Kyle now.  

This is San Clemente beach.  As soon as we got to San Clemente and checked in to our hotel we had to hurry to the beach!

Kyle had to make sand angels.

We walked out on the pier and Kyle had to look over the edge.  

On Wednesday we headed down to Carlsbad to go to Legoland.  We had to drive through Camp Pendleton Naval Base and this huge ship was out in the water pretty close to the beach.  There were several helicopters hauling huge boxes out to the ship and then coming back and getting another load.  

This is the Legoland entrance.  I didn't take a ton of pictures because Legoland was not that great.  We can say we came, we saw and we won't be going back.  It was very expensive and not worth the money.  We really were only there for about 6 hours and even after 2 hours I was ready to leave.  Cayden had a good time and now we can say that all the kids have been there.  Cayden is our biggest Lego fan so we were happy to get to take him.

It was a little cool at the beach the first day we went which was Thursday but it warmed up nicely.  Cayden found his comfy spot.  

Kyle loved loved loved the sand.  

The beach was very rocky and we found lots of cool rocks and shells.  

The water was pretty cold but Don, Cayden and Kyle braved the waves.  

Our last day at the beach Cayden got everything all cleaned up for us.  

On Friday we went down to San Juan Capistrano to the movies.  We watched the movie Home and it was cute and funny and actually had a really good lesson.  There were also some sad parts that I didn't expect!

Man!  If  I could see this every day!  Unfortunately a 2 bedroom condo is as much as my house!

Kyle was so cute carrying the boogie board.  Little surfer dude!

Funny story-Caleb thought that he could get away with taking the truck out to go get his pay check from Grandma's house.  He forgot that his brother is every where and would feel the need to tell us what Caleb had done.  This is the note that we found when we got home.  Caleb was at a friend's house when we got home and this is what we found.  He really is quite clever and we had a good laugh before we instituted a few of the consequences he thought he deserved.  

This Ain't My First Rodeo