HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

I love being a mom! I am so very grateful for my wonderful children and amazing husband. It's so much fun every Mother's Day to get all of the fun little things that the kids have made you at school and church.

I can't believe just how quickly the girls are growing up. Kennedy will be 13 in July, Morgan 10 in August, Emree will be 7 May 26th, and our little baby birdie is 1. She just started walking this week! Pretty soon she will be cruising around the house. How I love my little girls and wouldn't trade them for anything in the world!!!


Brackon is so sweet to always let me buy my own presents, even though it drives him crazy. He wants to be able to surprise me, but I'm always finding things that I want and letting him know that it's for my birthday, or Mother's Day, or Anniversary, when they roll around. I need to be better about letting him surprise me. I love you handsome!! Thanks to my sweet family for always making me feel so special and loved. Mommy loves you!



I'm also so very grateful for my own mom and what an amazing person she is. I learned all I know from her and want her to know how special she is to me. She's an angel in my book. Any women who can have 7 kids in 9 years and still be as sweet and loving and wonderful and strong as her she is (and also be an absolutely amazing grandma to 23 grandchildren) deserves to be crowned the world's most amazing mom! Thanks for everything you do for all of us mom! We love you!!!

Now, we also have another amazing mom in our life, mom Curtis. What an awesome mom and grandma you are. You are such a rock in the family and we are so grateful for all that you do and stand for. Thank you for raising such an amazing man and teaching him in the way you did so that he grew up to be the person he is today. We would be lost without him and are so appreciative to you for instilling the qualities that he has within him. We will forever be grateful!

To both of our mother's, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, "All that I am and hope to be I owe to my Mother."

4th Grade Pioneer Trek

Every Year the fourth graders at Cherry Hill Elementary have a 2 mile pioneer trek to go along with their Utah history class. They get real handcarts and have them dress up like pioneers were dressed back in the day when they were on the trek from Nauvoo to the Salt Lake Valley. Even the chaperons have to dress up! It's a good thing my mom had pioneer clothes that I could borrow. My younger sisters had a trek that they went on once upon a time (I think when they lived in Michigan) so she made clothes for them then.

They gave us groups of 7-8 kids. I had a group of 7 kids, 3 girls and 4 boys. We were lucky and had 5 adults in our group.

Morgan (right), Elle (left), and Maria (center) are best friends and were in a group together.

Morgan and I getting ready to go! I was worried when I posted these that people who weren't Mormon would think that we're FLDS - WERE NOT!!! Fabulous look isn't it?! For as many layers as they wore it's surprisingly cool and comfortable, though towards the end I was dying to take the 'wig' and bonnet off, but we all know that that was not about to happen. I would've terrified everyone! I roasted my rear end off at the end!

We started at the front of the school and as we got towards the back of the school they had all of the other grades out on the lawn waving goodbye to us. It was so cute!

There were 3 check stops that we came to along the trek. There were 10 handcarts altogether and the first 6 or 7 'families' lost their boys to the Mormon Battalion.

The boys in the Mormon Battalion had to go a different route that was a lot longer than the original trek. They even had wooden guns to carry. By losing their boys, the girls were left to pull the hand carts by themselves. We were handcart #9 so we didn't lose any of our boys, but 2 of our boys broke their legs and the other 2 were shot, so they had to ride in the cart. Our poor girls are so little and we had some big boys so parents had to help pull, especially through the field.

At the second check stop they told us that Morgan had fallen ill and needed to ride in the handcart. She was so excited!

Our third check stop was at Strong Hollow. Mr. Strong is one of the 6th grade teachers at the school whose property we used. His family owns all of the surrounding homes and they share the beautiful backyard known as Strong Hollow. Mr. Strong set our 'entry' up and once we got to the back we set up leantoo's (sp?) that our 'family' would eat in.

We all parked our handcarts.

A gentlemen that specialized in pioneer history from St. George came to talk to us and brought a ton of fun things for the kids to do. They made butter.

They had old tools for the kids to see how they did carpentry work back then. These particular ones were tongue and groove tools.

They had a really fun rope swing. The kids had to climb up on a huge rock to be able to get on it.

They made rag dolls that were adorable!

The gentlemen who came told the kids about the first capitol building that was built in Filmore. The building was made out of sandstone so he brought some so that the kids could see how hard it would've been for them to build.

They dipped candles.

All together there were about 10 different centers that the kids could go to. Every time they completed a center they would get a special colored bead that they would put in their little leather bags they made and have hanging around their necks.

Finally they learned a little dance before we headed back to the school. It was really a fun activity, one the kids will never forget.

A Trip to the Zoo....Or NOT!!!

On May 2nd all of the 1st graders were going to the zoo. Emree was so excited! All week long their class was making different animals with moving heads and tails and talking about it. I was one of the chaperon's and they had us at the school at 8 am. We were waiting for the buses to get there and one little boys dad who worked at the zoo was talking to the kids about all of the new babies and what to look for. Finally at 9:30 am Emree's teacher, Mrs. Poai, went out to the office to find out why the buses weren't there yet. After about 10 min. she came back in and told us that the district transportation office never scheduled the buses for us and there weren't any bus drivers so they had to cancel the trip. WHAT - CANCEL A ZOO TRIP FOR FIRST GRADERS!!! We could not believe it! The kids were so sad.

To try and make it up the teachers had us walk to a near by park to play and eat our lunches. The kids had a great time. These are two of Emree's good friends , Elizabeth and Jessica.

The park had a big pond and the kids were thrilled to find that the ducks had laid their eggs all around in the rocks!

The girls spent most of the time exploring around the rocks. Just before we left the park we took a picture of Emree's class. When we got back to the school they had set up the gym like a theater and we watched the animated Robin Hood and eat Krispy Kreme Donuts! YUMMY!!! Maybe we should cancel trips more often. They rescheduled the zoo trip for May 9th and had a great time seeing all of the little baby animals. The albino alligator was Emree's favorite!

Visiting St. George!

It has been so nice to live close to family again. Every time we have a chance we head on down to St. George to visit the Curtis family. We had such a great time at mom & dad Curtis' house. On Saturday we had a BBQ and took in some rays while the kids all swam in the pool and played in the hot tub.

The kids LOVE the hot tub! They think it's a special little pool made just for them!

Emree and Demie

Brackon and Dad Curtis were taking care of Berkley.

Coby and Tiffany have a HUGE dog named Abby! She is the sweetest thing and the kids love it when they get to see her. Berkley loved giving her snuggles! Abby makes Berkley look like a dinner mint!!

Happy Birthday to Berkley !!!

I can't believe that our little baby Berkley is one years old! It seems like only yesterday that I was at the hospital getting ready to have her. What a fun little addition she is to our family. She has such a sweet disposition. Whenever Berkley gets excited she will clench her fists together and straighten out her arms and shake them. It is so funny to watch.

With the size of Birdies cheeks you would think that she has a healthy, hardy appetite, but she is far from that! She eats like a bird, if at all. I was looking forward to moving her from formula to milk, but I'm worried about taking her off of it. As long as she's on formula, if she doesn't eat, I know that she's getting all the vitamins and nutrients that she needs.

When it came time to eat her cake, Berkley wasn't very interested in eating it. She licked her fingers a little and then was more interested in playing with it.




Berkley takes after her father with a love of music. She just recently discovered grandma & grandpa's piano and loves it. Any music that she hears sends her into a wiggle. Not only does she bob up and down like most babies do, but she also shakes her hips back and forth, moves her shoulders up and down, and will wave her hands in the air and clap her hands. The other day she found Emree's I Pod sitting on the coffee table and was trying to figure out how to use the headphones. She kept putting them close to her ears and then letting them go. It was so cute. I put one in her ear and she started to dance.

We love our little birdie and are so glad that she is in our family. What would we do without those chubby cheeks to smooch!

Easter Egg Hunt!

Grandma and Grandpa Livingstone have an Easter egg hunt for the kids every year. We are so excited to be back in Utah so that we can be here for it this year. Grandma uses caution tape to block off the backyard into three sections . She puts the kids into age groups so that the hunt is fair for everyone. The kids love it! Cassy and Kennedy in search.

Emree had so much fun gathering up her eggs!

Morgan and Sydney just beginning!

In each of the three groups grandma hides a special egg that has money in it. When Maggie started she was not at all interested in anything else, but the special egg. She was so excited to find it, especially since grandma put more money in it this year.

Thank you mom & dad for such a fun egg hunt for the kids and adults. We love you!

Our little baby Birdie!

Kennedy gave Berkley the nickname Birdie while we still lived in Georgia and it has stuck with her. We'll see how long she gets called that, but our family hardly ever calls her Berkley anymore. She can thank Kennedy when she's older!

I've had a request for more pictures of Berkley so here they are. I can't figure out how to turn my flash off so most of the pictures I get of Birdie are with her eyes closed. This is one of the few where she had her eyes open. On our way to St. George Berkley was crying and wanted to get out of her seat. She got herself so mad that she threw up all over herself and her car seat. That is definitely one way to get out of your car seat!!! We pulled over and had to clean her up. While I was cleaning her seat she was up front with daddy. She was so proud of herself and loved to be at the wheel. She was not happy when we put her back!

Berkley LOVES to play with cell phones and computers. If you have a computer in your lap she's all over you. Whenever I have the computer she wants to play with the keys, but when the girls have the computer she will sit quietly and watch them play Webkinz. She loves it!

There are quite a few of you that don't know what a Webkinz is. It's a virtual pet. You buy the Webkinz (stuffed animal) at the store and it comes with a password on the tag that you enter in and you get to name your pet and then play with them. You have to feed them, cloth them and take them to the doctor if they get sick. You work jobs to make money to buy them things for their homes. The jobs and games are educational. The kids love them. It's a fun gift to give someone. This is Kennedy's Littlekinz room.

Happy Birthday Dad Curtis!

Mom & Dad Curtis

It was dad Curtis' birthday so we headed down to St. George for a little visit and to celebrate his special day with the family. It's so nice to be living closer now so that we can see family on a more regular basis. Fun was had by all as we made pizza's, eat cake and ice cream, and enjoyed each others company! We love you dad!!!

Brackon and his baby sister Kacie!

A Little Taste of Georgia

Since our move to Utah we have missed our friends in Georgia!! Last week we were able to feel somewhat at home when we got together with our good friends the Shelley's . Rachel and her kids are here in Utah while Steve is in Iraq. Steve gets home on March 11th so they'll be heading home soon, but we are so excited that we were able to spend time with them while they were here and have just a little taste of Georgia in Utah!

Cheerios Has a Birthday!

Those of you who are familiar with Webkinz will understand the excitement that surrounds these cute little stuffed animals. Well, grandma Livingstone is just as excited about them as the children are and I'm sure that there are more adults out there that are just as excited as well! Here are grandma's webkinz Cheerio the pug and Penny the penguin! On Cheerio's birthday Penny threw a birthday party and invited all of the grandkids webkinz.

As you can see our families have a TON of webkinz! All of these Webkinz belong to only 16 grandchildren and a lot of them came from grandma & grandpa themselves! Grandma made all of the party hats with help from some of the mom's. It took us 2 1/2 hours to make them all. That's love!

Of course we had to have some great goodies for Cheerios party so grandma whipped up some delicious cupcakes. What a fun FHE we had celebrating Cheerios birthday! Thanks grandma & grandpa!

Here are Kennedy's!

Berkley has one too!

Emree got all three of here's from grandma & grandpa!

And finally are Morgan's. She has four!