Happy "Golden" Birthday Liv-a-love

Today is Olivia's 9th Birthday..... hence the "golden" birthday.... 9 on the 9th.... She has been talking about her golden birthday for years.... I guess it is your special birthday where you get lots of money etc.... I don't know where my kids heard of this but Liv is our first one to celebrate it..... She didn't get a lot of money but we tried to make it special..... She is such a poser..... It is hard to find a normal smiley picture of her.. but it is part of her fun personality which we love!!

She was born on a Monday October 9th... She was our tiniest baby weighing 6lbs 13 oz... and only 18 inches tall. We had been wanting a baby sister for a long time, Madz had talked about her sister Olivia since she was two.... so when she was born we knew we had to name her Olivia..

At around 9months she became the grumpiest little person, this is the face she would give everyone all the time! I was shopping one day and a lady said to me "excuse me ma am your baby is giving me crusties.." Ok..... We laughed she had this face all the time.

She has always been so fearless, and full of passion for life! She loves people like no body I know and is so intense about everything. I think she is much wiser then the rest of us, she loves people for who they are and I so admire that in her! She loved to wear these goggles when she swam etc... this is actually a make do picture I couldn't find the best picture ever of her... it is right before this one was taken, she is on the top of a water slide coming off the houseboat (Nat if you have a copy of it can I have one??) My dad (Grandad) calls her Pecos... for Pecos Bill if he gives you a nick name it sticks and that is all he calls you.... one day he was out at our house when she was only 1 and we were trying to put in our yard.... she would walk around in just her diaper, ride her little bike down the drive way falling into trenches etc... He decided she was just like Pecos someone raised by wolves!! It is so fitting.... she could totally take care of herself... we laugh at her at dance competitions because she comes in the morning and happens to somehow be where she needs to be when it is her time to perform and there when its time to go home.... I don't know what happens in the mean time but she is very self sufficient!! (We call her stinky Pete so she has lots of nick names)

Here she is on her 3rd birthday...

She is such a good big sister and Canyon just loves her~~

This is a typical smile of Olivia's...

She has very many "stupid human tricks" This is her Kiss tongue which she can stick inside her nose....She also can wiggle her ears without touching them and roll her belly just like on "South Pacific" She is amazing!

She loves her friends... this is her with her friend Megan.... she would rather be with her friends than anything... we have to fight her every time we go somewhere over bringing friends... we don't mind most the time but once in awhile we have to get mad and tell her whether she likes it or not we are her family and she will have to live with it!!

Like I said such a poser!! It so shows her personality though and I just love every bit of her!! I wish I could keep her this age forever!!

She loves her American Girl Dolls"

Another thing about Olivia is she always always gets lost everywhere we go.... We lost her right after this picture was taken in Disney World.... we were so scared me and Hayden especially we thought she was kidnapped and she was just out in the parking lot like what is the big deal, I knew where I was.... Another time at Disney World we were with our friends the Reiers, we stopped to take a picture in front of the castle... she kept going, we did not notice we had lost her until Matt was checking the picture on the camera and noticed she wasn't there.... Can you say great parents!! I know she probably needs one of those terrible leashes!!

This is her dance picture from last year... She did her first solo last year and she did a great job I was so proud of her... we don't have a picture in that costume because she wouldn't come up to the studio she wanted to "play".....

Anyway Happy Birthday stinky Pete!! I hope it was "Golden" enough for you!! We are so so lucky to have you in our family and love you!!!

Its a nice day for a....

White Wedding....... So my sister got married last week..... she had this ancestor type thing.... it was actually pretty cool. She had this frame that had a picture of her and Mitch in the middle and then it went down each side with pictures of their parents and grandparents on their wedding day. She also had some of their wedding dresses displayed. So with that theme she wanted all of her sisters to get in their wedding dresses and get some photos done with her.........

So she had told us this for quite awhile.... Amber was less then happy about the whole thing, not wanting to unseal her dress, worried about fitting in it etc... I was fine with the idea (before hand). When we actually did it Amber was fine and I was the grumpy one.... I show up and they all have nice updo's my hair is just down and I am wearing the only outdated dress... notice the 1993 puffy sleeves and the wreath veil??? I looked like I had snuck out of the Robin Hood Set... in this apple orchard. Needless to say we had a really good time. Hense the above picture (where I totally have an Olivia face). We laughed so hard the whole time mostly over the 4 boobs Audrey and Amber had.... my dress was a laughing point too. However I thought it turned out good at her wedding it matched her theme... The pictures are pretty funny (I post them for you Carlye) so its ok if you want to laugh a little!!
I had to remove the veil it just was not matching with everyone else!!

Like I said we were laughing pretty hard the whole time!

"White" Lake Powell 2009

Our Family at Rainbow Bridge

The whole crew and Rainbow Bridge...

This year we went to Lake Powell with most of my family.(it is pretty much a yearly tradition) ...sadly we were missing my 2 brothers and their wifes and some of their kids (Troy, Blanca, Josh, Natalie, Augustus, Lila & Emme) and my parents We missed you guys!!.. The rest of us had a great time though.... Audrey, Dan & Annie and my family along with Kendeyl stayed in a hotel and just met the rest of the camping crew each morning.... It was hard to leave at night but man did we love having an air conditioned bed to sleep in!! Autumn, Miotch, Corbin, Jaimie, Andrew, Shawna, Amber, Mike, Winter, Lexi, Zarley, Owen and X-man were the camping crew!!
To me Lake Powell is like Heaven on Earth!! It is my favorite place to go.....
some of my favorite things are......
1.Everyone waves to each other, as you drive by another boat you all wave like its an old friend... or like "hey good times right".....
2. You never really know what time or day it is for that fact... that is the greatest feeling to me also I can share my girls camp skills and make a sun dial to guess the time!
3. The scenery can't get any better, it really just is beautiful!
4. If your hot you just jump in the water to cool off. I love that refreshing feeling and it takes me a few days when I get home to get over the lets just jump in the water feeling when I'm hot.
5. Its time spent with people I love!! In the sun and water which I also love!!

A few of this years highlights were.... Our new molecule tube, we all had so much fun being pulled on it, playing king of the hill on it, seeing who could balance the longest on it etc.... I think they even ended up sleeping on it.
We went to Rainbow Bridge.... I hadn't been in probably 30 years.. It was fun and it really is amazing to see. Mitch got in trouble from the Ranger for walking on sacred ground... I believe their is a picture in the slide show of it.
We brought 2 friends Kendeyl (with Madz) and Lexi (with Winter) they made it all the more fun, and we were glad they came with us...
Olivia got bit by a duck... it jumped right up and took a taste of her cheek..... It left quite a mark and I think my kids will forever be changed (feeding ducks is not so fun anymore)
I got chased by some freaky man in a motorized wheel chair... he came out from behind a dumpster like a mad man and I had to run for my life... probably pretty funny to anyone watching...
They had a lot of wild life in their camp site we had not seen before at Lake Powell... Rattle Snakes, a fox? They debate on if that is what it was... and then the regular frogs and lizards...
The boys played a little Baci??
Livie learned to knee board, Madz learned to slalom, we all had a try at surfing and quite liked it!! Winter and Kendeyl tried and learned almost everything (skiing, wake boarding, knee boarding, surfing etc....
I love how serious Jaimie and Madz get on the tube too, they seem like they are in some kind of serious tubing competition they can scurry from one side of the tube to the other to keep it from tipping or them going off... we did have some great falls on the tubes though!!
Anyway it was one of our all time funnest trips to Lake Powell and I can't wait to go again next year!! Enjoy the slide show of pictures..... Good times I tell ya!!

Summer Review Part 2 Lake Powell...

Here are a few more pictures... Winter, Madz, Jaimie and Kendeyl just playing in the water... they liked to do synchronize swimming...(lexi and I joined it too) Shawna and Annie, is that not a cute picture and its perfect because Shawna is always helping with the kids, she is so great with them and we are lucky to have her!!

Tomass doing a little surfing...

Audrey's infamous tube ride, lets just say she didn't stay on!!

Canyon and Owen at Rainbow bridge they had so much fun together when they weren't fighting!! Best buddies.

Summer Review Part 1 June...

We started June out with our Annual Dance Recital at the Sandy Amphitheater....... We love having it there, it is big enough to fit everyone and a really nice facility... However this year we got rained out!!! I have taught dance for the past 8 years and have never had the recital rained out. It was so awful!! We had to reschedule everything for the next week, some girls had camp and stuff so we were not able to get everyone back.... Here is Madz she was one of the last performances before we had to stop... It was pretty cool, she just kept dancing even though the wind and rain were blowing onto the stage... It was like in Step up 2....

Here is Olivia in her costume..

Here we are getting everything ready to go...

My poor boys, this is the world they have to live in!! Doesn't he look like he is having a great time!!

Here are some of the dancers back stage... they were playing Hey let me see you bust a move.. they were great sports a lot of the dancers just took off, but these girl were waiting it out.. and their great parents were sitting out in a monsoon. For real it was the worst storm ever!! I was beyond stressed and was in tears as I looked up and saw a huge circle of girls holding hands praying together that everything would be ok... I still get teary eyed now thinking what strong great youth we have!! We rescheduled for the following week where it rained throughout the recital, we had a way smaller crowd but we had to just finish. Lets just say it is a recital none of us will ever forget!! I just don't know if I should chance it again!! We also had an end of the year swimming party scheduled that also got rained out!! June was not my month for anything outdoors!! We were able to reschedule our swim party for August though and had a blast!!

Here is Tom in Oregon, he took a work trip in June to Oregon, one night he drove down to visit our good friends the Reiers on their vacation... That is Matt in the background.... Tom loves to travel and always has a good time!! Anyone who is on Face book can see all the pictures he posts of himself when he is traveling..... its ok if you laugh at him we all do!!

Oh What do you do in the Summer time.....

When all the world is green..... Do you go to the Pool, looking ever so cool, Just happy your not in school? Is that what you do? So do I...

..... Do you skip the parade, and dance with no shade.....

Performing for thousands at night??? Is that what you do? So do I....

.Do you fish when its light with Great Grandpa White or have sleepovers with cousins at night??? Is that what you do? So do I...

Do you go to the Lake and watch yourself bake... in the sun while your having fun? Is that what you do..... so do I