Recap!

Wow, I can't believe how fast time flies. I am so far behind in things that I wanted to be able to remember, so I am going to have to do a little recap of things. We have been going and going everyday it seems like I run from one thing to the next these days. In November Brock and Brett both started wrestling and that has taken out a huge chunk of time and with school and work we are all hopping.

The day after Thanksgiving Colby and I snuck away to Park City for the weekend. It was so nice to be able to have some time to relax and be together. We had the best hotel, we had our own private hot tub right out on the balcony. It was so fun to sit out there and watch the snow fall and be warm. I am thinking that we will have to make it a tradition! While we where gone we got a text from McKaid (he was tending the boys) and the caption said BROCK'S first DUCKS!

They had all gone up to Scofield to hunt, Brock shot these two ducks as they where flying. I am not sure who was more excited McKaid or Brock. Brock has been going out with Colby, and Brett to do clay pigeon shooting. Colby had told me that Brock was doing really well and that just a few days before this, he told Brett he could say "pull" and that Brock would back Brett up. Brett said "pull" and before he could even get his shots off Brock had taken the shot and got the clay. It is so fun for me to see how much bonding the boys all do over hunting. It keeps them out of trouble and it keeps them all active.

Thankful

I wanted to do an entire month of things that I am grateful or thankful for, but it's not going to happen. But I think that I can do it all this week. (Hopefully) So today I am so thankful for Kaid and Brock's relationship. This past week Colby was working late and Brock had a wrestling match, his first guy he won and did really well, his next match was a kid who had been wrestling 7 year and this match was brutal. Brock was crying and the kid was choking him, and the other mother was screaming at her son to take him down and pound him. I know its not all about winning but I was really upset that a mother would be shouting that kind of stuff when the other person was crying. Any ways Brock lost that match and he was crying saying that he was never going to wrestle again how bad he sucked, basically just having a pity party. Kaid took him outside and next thing I know Brock walks back in and goes to the 100 lb. class and asks this kid if he wanted to wrestle....I said Kaid he is only in the 60 lb. class he cant wrestle him Kaid says it will be OK don't worry. So they get in line to get to the mats and the ref looks at them and asks Brock if he is really sure that he wants to take on the other kid, Brock says YES! So they go out and have 3 rounds and each round Brock PINNED the kid. I was totally shocked, his self confidence was restored and he decided that he did like wrestling and that he would continue with it.

I was so glad to have Kaid there, and for him to take the lead and help Brock out. I know nothing about wrestling and am not a ton of help. I am glad that I can rely on him to help me out when I am out of my element.

Vikings Football

This year Brock was on the Viking's team, they were AWESOME! Brock loves football and everything about it so he was in heaven each game. His hair is wild because it was crazy hair day at school yesterday so we divided his hair into two sections one spiky and the other straight, and then we took purple hair color in it and made stripes. It was fun he was excited to have it that way for the game because it was Viking's colors. We had to laugh he plays so hard and at half time he can down his drink and then go right back out and play. If it was me I would be puking my guts out from drinking and exercising. :)

Brock has a great year they ended the season taking 3rd! He scored points in every game! And last night he scored 8 points he ran for a touchdown and then caught the pass for the extra points. He played quarterback a lot of the time so he also threw for a lot of the touchdowns. It was fun to watch him and see his excitement and enthusiasm. Keep it up Brock!

BYU Game

This past weekend we went to the BYU football game, Brett was working the booth so Brock got to invite a friend. He chose Jared, and Jared has never been to a college football game. These two where so excited!!! They talked the entire way there about how cool it was going to be and that BYU was going to win. This was right before the game, they think they are gangsters :) I wasn't sure if they where going to sit down or not. This is them during the game just entertaining themselves during a TV timeout. I love this picture of them--- they are too cute.

This next one was just as the game ended and BYU pulled out a victory- I don't know who was more excited Brock, Jared or BYU! These two started screaming and jumping up and down. It was so fun to watch them in their excitement. It was a fun game and nice to take Jared.

You can just see the excitement in their faces. I love these kids.

He has a brain!

So the past few weeks have been a little crazy at our house, Brock has been having"issues" for the past 7 or 8 weeks. He would kind of pass out. To say the least it was really scary, when we took him to his pediatrician he was extremely worried about what we where dealing with and sent us right to Primary Children's hospital to meet with a pediatric neurologist. They told us that they would be doing several tests to see if they could figure out what was going on. Brock was pretty nervous about if they would hurt or what they would do- the doctor told him that they were going to be looking at his brain and heart. Brock instantly perked up and said so you will see my brain, the doctor said yes we will be able to see all of your brain. Brock then said can we take pictures of it so I can show everyone how cool my brain looks. This is one of the first tests they did it is an EGG, they hook up all of these wires to your head to measure your brain waves. They glued them into his hair, he was not to happy when they went to pull them out. They then wrap your head with gauze so that you can move around and not loose any of the leads. Once he was ready to go they monitored him "normally" then had him exercise, and then go to sleep. Which they said OK Brock you need to go to sleep now- Colby and I looked at him a few minutes later and he was OUT! The last thing they do is to put a strobe light in front of his eyes and have it go off.

We got back his results and his "issues" are seizures, which they think are caused by stress....We are thrilled that this was the outcome for him. It was a true answer to many prayers. We are tyring to keep him from stress to prevent more of the seizures. :)

BYU Football

I had to post this, we have tickets to the games and if you know Colby BYU football is serious business. So at the season home opener we went to the game and it started at 5:00 and actually ran long so we did not get to dinner until rather late, and well if you know my kids then this photo should not surprise any one.

Here is Brock sound asleep at dinner, we tried and tried to wake him up to get him to eat but he was just not having it. I had to laugh because the next day he asked why we didn't let him have dinner. I told him that it was in the fridge and he could eat it when ever he wanted.

Another School Year 2010 Edition

Wow, summer has come and gone. What a sad day, this year was really different with McKaid not being in school it just made things weird. We went school shopping and got the kids what they needed, I thought with not having to buy clothes for McKaid it would be cheaper--- I thought WRONG! But oh well, I could not get pictures of the boys together because Brett has to catch the bus before Brock even gets up. I really don't understand why Brett's bus takes all of the Jr. High kids all the way over to Salem and then brings them back to Payson to the Jr. High-- doesn't make sense too me but I am not the district. Brock was so excited to start school he woke up around 2:30am and came in my room and said that he could not sleep any longer and could he get ready. I told him that he could go in the front room and watch TV while I slept but that he needed to go back to sleep because it would make for a LONG day if he didn't. With all reports in Brock enjoyed his first day of school and is ready to go back tomorrow-- thank heavens! I was not wanting another year like last year.

Here is Brett right before he left for the bus--- he has to be at his bus stop by 7:00am. I have offered to drive him to school so that he can sleep longer or not sit on the bus all morning- BUT he said he would rather ride the bus! Go figure, I guess I am not "cool" enough. I guess this way he gets lots more time to socialize.

Hope both of them have a great year and enjoy their school experience.

Family Renuion

This year we had a family reunion in Delores Colorado. We have not been able to make them for the past few years, this year Colby's mom was in charge of meals. She needed help so we where able to get away for a few days and take Brett and Brock. We decided to make a mini vacation out of it. On the first day we drove to Moab and stayed the night there. We decided to go to Arches since none of us had been there. It was a lot of fun. We hiked around on a few of them, I have decided that the boys are way too adventurous for me! I was panicked at they places they were jumping from and things they would climb on. The next day we got up and they played in the pool before heading out to the reunion. It was a couple hour drive to Delores, but it reminded me of Montana, it was bitter sweet. Once in Colorado we checked into our hotel (if you could call it that! It was more like the BATES MOTEL) got Colby and I settled and then drove out to the property where the reunion was being held. The property was so beautiful! I loved it and could just pack up my house and move there. They had a river running right threw the property and a beautiful house and barn. Brock and Brett (and everyone else) decided to stay there in their tent. We helped them set it up and they chose a spot right up from the river, so they could hear it all night.
They have tons of things to do most of the time the kids where in the water, weather it was floating the river, swimming, or wake boarding. This is Brock on the wake board they had tied to a tree, he could get all the way across the river to the other side. He did take a couple of spills and Brett had to save him once, but he had a blast! Brett even did it and he had to have Brock save him once. It was really sweet, Brett fell in and Brock was the first one running down the river to "save" him.

On Saturday most of us decided to float the river in tubes.........WOW it was an experience! Chelsey and myself ended up being in charge of Ethan. We only scared him once, he flipped over in a part where it was very deep and swift. He couldn't get his footing so I had to dive in and get him when we got him back in his tube he told me "your trying to kill me" I had to laugh, I told him that I was not and I would make sure that he didn't fall in again. We ended up going down again and the second time we had Brett and Brock in tubes with us rather than the canoe they went down in the first trip. We had tons of fun and got some great sunburns! But it was defiantly worth the drive and all of the bruises.

Here Kitty, Kitty!

I love living where we live, don't get me wrong! But lately we have had way too many cats, kittens, and more cats in the neighborhood. And for some unknown reason they all love to come into our yard. Normal that would be fine as long as they where just passing through. But these cats have decided not to pass through but to take up residency in our yard. Not only that, but a couple of them have had babies in our wood shed. Not only am I allergic to them, but they drive my dogs crazy! It seems that they (the cats) would only come out just as I was falling asleep and my dogs would then go CRAZY!!!!!! Not only causing me to get up and out of bed to go quite them, but I am sure it woke up the entire neighborhood! So after talking to some of the neighbors who were also frustrated with the ever exploding population of cats, Colby decided it was time to trap them and give them a new home. So he and Brock set a few traps and wouldn't you guess every morning we would find this Brock was so excited thinking that we where going to keep the kitten and have a new pet! I was so sad to have to tell him that there was NO way that we would be keeping the kitten. He named them all and found good homes for each one of them, this was one of the last kittens that he caught. I have never been more happy to have them gone. But we are hoping that soon Brock will forgive us and start talking to us again. :)
P.S. If you need traps let us know, I would be more than happy to help someone else out!

Baseball Season

This year Brock decided that he wanted to play in Salem, so we signed him up. He was on the Yankee's this year. He had a ton of fun. He was always the last batter in the line up which was a bit frustrating for him but he always did his best and would try to motivate his team. I would always forget my camera so I snapped a few pictures with my phone as he was in line to bat, we have the warm up and the swing. This year Brett decided that he did not want to play so we thought we would only have Brock playing because Kaid was going to be working at the scout camp at Scofield for the summer. Little did we know that he would not take that job and be playing baseball. McKaid played in Payson for the Red's again. He had a great year and got to pitch quite a few games, he did really well. It was bitter sweet to watch him play knowing that this would be his last year to play city league. His team starts tournaments this week and it will be fun to see what they can do.
Even with just having the two of them playing ball we still seemed to be at the ball park every night of the week and would typically close it down. (Which is fine by me :))

Get comfy...

The other night I was folding laundry and had done what seemed like 15 loads. I had piles all over in my room and I called all of the boys to come in and get their clothes to put them away. I then got side tracked and when I came back in my room this is what i found.....Brock was sound asleep with all of his clothes still in the piles that needed to be put away. I had to laugh because when I was a little girl my parents said that I would sleep in funny positions that did not look comfortable and they had a Garfield cartoon on the fridge. Here is my own little Garfield, he didn't even have a pillow under his head, they were all under his feet.

2010

Wow, it has been awhile since I updated this. I will try to be better, we had a great Christmas and New Years and have been busy just trying to get everything done that needs to be done. We started our New Year's out with a BANG! Colby, Brock and I decided that late New Year's day we would head up the canyon and go snowmobiling. We headed out around 5:30 and had not gotten too far up the canyon and I had decided that I dressed way to warm so I stopped and Brock and Colby decided while I took off a few layers that they would go off of some jumps......the first jump I watched them and thought wow Colby is getting ALOT of air. Once they landed I knew that Brock was hurt I ran over to him and took off his face mask and there was blood everywhere, I told Colby that we needed to head back down and get stitches, he said Oh it is fine. I had to put my foot down in order for both of them to decide that I was right :) so we headed back down the canyon and got the snowmobiles loaded up and headed home. Once we got there and got Brock cleaned up Colby told me that we could just use super glue- SO with a little bit of convincing between myself and a neighbor Colby told me that he needed to go to the hospital...... This is Brock while they were putting a topical solution that would help to numb the skin before they did the "shots" to numb the skin. I had to laugh, when Brock knew that we were going to the hospital he said "you need to call the family" I asked him for what his reply "that is what you do when you take someone to the hospital, you need to have the family for support" It was so cute that he wanted the grandparents there, I told him that he would be fine and that we could call them when we where done and he could tell them how many stitches he got. So about an hour in the ER and 16 stitches later he was all right and decided that stitches were not bad at all BUT he NEVER wants the shot to numb it again.
Hopefully medical bills are not the forecast for this year, we have had our share. Hope everyone had great holidays and is enjoying a New Year!
Erika

Flag Football ~ Redskins!

I know this is late but this is something that I want in my book so it is on here. Football was played during the end of September and October..

Brock got to play flag football this year ~ I think he would have rather it been tackle but hey it's okay with me. He was on the Redskins and played in Salem, Colby was his coach and they had a lot of fun and learned a lot! Brock was thrilled to get to play he LOVES football ( actually he loves sports) it was so fun to go and watch these kids come together as a team and win the games. Because of Colby's work schedule all of the games were either at 6:30 or 7:30 so the last few games have been FREEZING but that has not stopped the kids from doing great.

It was fun to watch the kids, some of them did not get the "flag" part of it and really tackled some of the other players hard- but still it was exciting.

Last night was the championships and they ended up taking 3rd place. Way to go Brock, he had 9 catches and scored 1 of the 2 point conversions for the win.

The Dove Hunt

Brock has always wanted to hunt, from the time he could walk and talk he would ask Colby when he could go hunting....Colby has always said once you can read and understand the hunters safety book you can take hunters safety and then you will be able to hunt. So this year Colby felt that Brock was ready, so Colby signed him up for his Hunter's Ed class and Brock did awesome! He passed both the written test and the shooting test. So the other day the older boys took him out dove hunting. They had not been out for too long and we got this picture text on our phones! Yep! Brock's first time and he gets a dove. He was so excited and so proud! I guess there is no turning back now, he has the hunting bug!

Good job Brock!

Erika

Corn Maze

Wow time sure flies by, I can't believe that it is October already. There has been so much that I have wanted to put on the blog but have not had the time. So I will have to back track in the next few posts. But I wanted to get up our fun night that we had. We go to the Corn Maze each year and this year Brock & Brett both brought friends. We had a lot of fun! This was the first thing we saw when we got to Hee Haw Farms..... One of the "friends" said that it looked a lot like his sister! (which was really mean.) This is Brett, Riley, and Brock on the hayride. I had to laugh because I told Brett and Riley that I was going to take a picture of them and Brock decided that he needed to get into the action.

After the hayride we walked around seeing all of the different things that they had to do, this was a duck race that you had to pump the water to see which duck would win. Riley was the only one that could actually make the water pump out so he obviously won!

After the duck races we walked over to the corn cannon and the kids loved this, all of them spent a lot of time at this, they could hit an old barn or other things that they had for the kids to hit. Brett seemed to get all of his over the barn. So who knows what he was hitting on the other side. On the way to the corn maze the kids found these big bikes that they could race, so needless to say they all took turns racing each other. Here Brett is "helping" Brock to the win.

I loved this next picture because you could see the determination on both the boys faces to WIN! I don't think Riley was wanting to be beat by a "little kid"!

This last picture was in the actual corn maze, it was a tricky one this year. Kaid "somehow" got separated from us and was done with the maze in record time. We found him out talking to a girl. Before we went in they gave us a list of rules and one of which was no picking corn, or cutting thru to find your way out. If we broke any of the rules the "corn cops" would ask us to leave. I told all of the boys that they needed to listen and make sure that we did not have the "cops" become an issue, sure enough we had been in the maze for about 5 minutes and here comes a "corn cop" just as Brock says we can cut thru right here.....The cop said no you can't and Brock just looked at me and turned and ran the other way. So we were following Brock and for a few minutes the "corn cop" was following us! All in all it was a fun time and I think that everyone enjoyed it!

Until Next Year!

Erika

School Time Fun!

So with having all boys I did not think I would have the problem of them sneaking out clothes in their backpacks or having another outfit on under what they are wearing to school....But apparently I thought wrong! These ugly shorts are what I have found in Brock's backpack on two different occasions....And then yesterday as we were leaving for school I noticed that Brock's

pants were falling down I told him that he needed to get his belt or have me adjust the waist on them. He started to say I can't find my belt and he stopped mid sentence, I told him to just come over and I would adjust his waistband......Guess what I found when I grabbed his pants! Yep these ugly shorts were on UNDER his clothes and he has this ugly old "football" shirt that he had on under his other shirt. I told him to march himself back in the house and to change his clothes and that he was NOT allowed to wear that outfit to school EVER! He proceeds to tell me that football was starting and that he needed to practice while he was a recess and that he needed to dress the part...Are you serious you can't run around in your shorts or jeans you have to wear the ugliest shorts and an old shirt because that it what you think a football player would wear?!?! He cracks me up, but seriously I would have NEVER thought that I would have to deal with this. I guess that is what paybacks are all about :)!

Erika

Another School Year.

It is really hard for me to write this.... I had a first and a last all in one moment! This is the first day of school for all of my kids and also the LAST first day of school for Kaid! He is a senior! It breaks my heart to think that in a few short months he will be graduating high school! Wow, time flies. As you can tell Brett and Brock were really the only ones that were OK with having their picture taken. I had to do both of these pictures- because we have always done two photos with the kids- up close and a little farther off. As you can see Kaid did get his cast off his nose, he only has to wear it at night for the next 3 weeks.

Brett is now in 8th grade and he could not wait to get back to school and see some of his friends. He has played hard all summer, but Brett really loves school.

Brock is in 3rd grade and has Mrs. Snow. We had to go in and find his class this morning and he was pretty excited. They are getting pretty smart they have split him up from all of his friends :) so he will have to make new ones again this year.

Hopefully they all have a good year, have fun, make new friends, and learn.

Erika

A Sad Goodbye

The past few weeks have been pretty emotional around our house. We have had to say goodbye to two of our horses. We have been keeping our horses on some property in Elk Ridge for years now, and there were some issues that came up with the land and so we needed to move the horses. We have been looking to buy a house with land but have not really found the right place. So we decided that the best thing to do was to sell the horses until we get a place of our own. So about 1 ago we sold Sierra- I will get a photo of her on here. We have had Sierra since she was old enough to leave her mom. It was heartbreaking- But Colby did it while we were at ball games and so she was just gone one day. But on Saturday it was Smokey's turn to go- we loaded her in the trailer and meet the guy at Cabela's it was the hardest thing I have ever had to do. We got Smokey right after Brett got burned, she was his therapy. He LOVED riding her and would spend hour upon hour with her. It was good for both of them. Brett did 4H with her and did very well. She helped build his confidence back up and he was more of the old Brett.

I was doing alright on the ride up, but when we got her out of the trailer it hit me like a ton of bricks. I started to cry, Brock said that he did not want to sell her and he was crying. The new owner came and they had two boys about the same ages as Brett and Brock, they were so excited to have a new horse, hopefully they will love her and take good care of her.

We are now down to one horse "Joe" that we need to sell and then we will sell the horse trailer.... It is hard to loose a pet - especially when your not ready to say goodbye.

Erika

Summertime Chores.

OK, so I am sure that none of you have this issue....Summertime chores. It seems like I can leave a list of chores for the kids to do and by 9:15 am I am getting calls asking if they can go and do this or this! So I will ask are your chores done and of course the answer is "YES" so I will let them go. Well once I get home I usually tend to get upset because not only is the work not done but the house is usually a disaster. So after one day where things just seemed like I might have to run away and not come back, Colby told the kids that the next day he wanted a DETAILED report of what each kid did throughout the day.......Minute by minute! I was cleaning out my purse and found this and just wanted to remember just how cute it was.

If you notice Brock wrote his name next to each thing because he was wanting to make sure that he got the credit for each thing he did. He wrote the start and finish time and the chore and then the total time of each task. I think one of my favorites is the one near the bottom of this list * Clean kitchen it took him 1 minute. He actually had 2 1/2 pages of things that he had done throughout the day. All the boys actually did a list like this and I do have to say that since Colby had them do this, they seem to make sure that they do better. The joys of summer.
Erika

Cousins

Wow, life has been BUSY! We have been finishing up baseball seasons and trying to finish up the remodel on the kitchen....

This past weekend we got to tend Payton and Cameron Bryce while Bryce and Michelle ran to St. George for the night. It was a lot of fun having the cousins over and letting them get to know each other.

On Saturday Brett got home from a week of scout camp, he was greeted by Cam, Brock and Payton. We decided that we would go down to the farm so that Payton and Cam could ride the horses. Brett decided that he was going to ride Smokey bareback, he was riding around the arena and having a fun time and all of the sudden there be came a problem, I was laughing so hard I asked him if he needed help I thought that he said no so I decided that I would grab a picture of him.

Once I grabbed the photo I again asked him he if needed help- this time he yelled "YES, I told you that the first time you asked" Oops! Sorry, he did a really good job of hopping with the horse as she was walking around the arena.

Once he got off the horse he put the saddle back on her and let Payton and Cameron Bryce have a turn. Payton got on the horse and sat there- then said that she was done. Cameron Bryce on the other hand loved it. He wanted to ride all by himself and not have anyone lead Smokey. I told him next time he could do that.

Once we were done riding the horses Brett brought over a new puppy and asked if he could keep it, being the good mother that I am, I told him of course we could keep it as long as it stayed at Merrill's place - he did not think I was funny! We had a great weekend, and hope Bryce and Michelle had a good anniversary.

Erika