Our Garden.........

Those of us who know Connor, know that he LOVES vegetables. We decided to plant our own garden this year. It has been quite the project. We dug out a 2' by 54' section on the side of our house. Next, we made a garden box with some 9x12's. Then, my dear sweet husband hauled in some top soil from Beaver and some manure. We had some awesome neighbors that helped us shovel and wheelbarrow it in. When my parents came down for Easter we planted all the seeds and plants. Unfortunately within a couple of days most of the plants had been eaten! We are pretty sure it was the rabbits. We tried sprinkling cayenne pepper on the plants, but that did not stop them from eating everything. Since then, my amazing husband has built me a "cage"(with help from his dad and brother Wes, thanks guys!) and we have replanted the plants. Connor and Chloee have had a blast and they are so excited to see the sprouts coming out of the ground. Connor goes out with his notebook everyday and draws what he sees. It is so funny to see how serious he is about the whole thing. We planted corn, pumpkins, watermelon, cantaloupe, yellow squash, zucchini, lettuce, peas, cucumbers, strawberries, tomatoes, carrots, cherry tomatoes, grapes, and raspberries. I also got the kids some pots to plant their own flowers. We will see how long they can keep them alive. Here are the pictures.......

The Garden Box-

Connor working hard-

Chloee's cute little friend Ella who played while the guys shoveled-

Planting, Planting, Planting-

Building the Cage-

The Cage-

Eventually it will stand up and have a top......

Pea plants-

Cute little Pea plant-

Carrots-

Strawberries-

Lettuce-

Raspberry Plant-

Grape Plant-

Flower Pots-

Filling up their pots with soil....

Planting the flowers-

Connor's finished pot-

Chloee's finished pot -

Our Beautiful Princess Ballerina

I took Chloee to a new Photography studio. They did a great job. She looked so pretty. I scanned these, so they don't do the real photos justice, but you can get the idea. They turned out amazing. She had so much fun being a princess ballerina.

Chloee's 3rd Birthday!!

Our little princess is THREE! I can't believe it! We are so lucky to have such a beautiful, sweet, loud, crazy, smart, funny, energetic, loveable little angel in our family. She has grown up so much in the past year. She loves when we go to Connor's class to help. She thinks that she is a part of the class too. She does everything that they do. When it is time for her to go to Kindergarten, I think we will be able to say that she has had four years of preschool. Chloee had her first "play-date" at her friend Ella's house. Ella lives down the street and she went over one day and played for a couple of hours. She thought she was so big playing at her friend's house without mom tagging along. Chloee has been potty trained for a while now. We are so proud of her. She did so well with the transition has hardly ever had an accident. She can spell her name, recite the whole alphabet, and can count to twenty. She loves music like her brother. She loves to sing and dance. Some of her favorite songs are - "All the Single Ladies" (Beyonce), "All I Wanna Do" (Sugarland), "Save a Horse"(Big n Rich), and "Showdown Hoedown" (Miley Cyrus). Everytime we get in the car she says "Mom, do you have your ipod"? and then she proceeds to tell me the order in which she would like her songs played. She loves to go to "her class" at church (nursery). She always comes home singing. Her favorite song that they sing in class is "Five Little Speckled Frogs". She taught it to us :) She also loves to sing "Love is Spoken Here" and Familes can be Together Forever". We sing these almost every night before she goes to sleep. I still can't get her to eat a single vegetable. She loves milk, cheese, fruit, and bread. She weighs 30.5 pounds. I think that is partly to do with the fact that she can't hold still very long. She is a tad bit clumsy. A couple of weeks ago she fell off one of our barstools and cut her head open. We had our neighbor, who is a Life Flight Pararmedic come and look at her. He said that if we took her to the hospital, they would probably give her some stitches, but that she would probably be fine if we put a butterfly bandage on it. It has been about 4 weeks and she has a scar above her right eye. Despite all of that she still climbs around like a little monkey. She loves all of her family so much and we love her! Happy Birthday Chloee Bear!!!

Chloee was lucky enough to have two birthday parties this year. On her birthday we celebrated at Grandma and Grandpa Hyde's house. They got her a new princess bike, which she LOVES! Britney and I made her a Princess Tiana cake. (Thanks Brit!) Two days later we had a party with Luke's family. That afternoon Katy, Christina, and I took the kids to the dollar theater to see The Princess and The Frog. That night we had cake and opened presents. Grandma and Grandpa Robinson gave her a doll house. She loves it and has already spent hours playing with it. Luke and I gave her a interactive doll with a stoller, bed, and highchair. The baby has a sensor on her back and says things like "mommy I'm hungry", "mommy I'm tired", "I want to go for a walk", or "mommy change me". She will tell you what she wants a couple of times and if you don't do it fast enough she will start to cry. When we first put batteries in her Connor and Chloee thought it was so cute that she could talk. They gave her what she needed and took the responsibity very seriously. They decided to name her- Peaches?! Then she started to cry and they looked at each other like "oh no what have we done!" Chloee picked her up and patted her on the back. The baby stopped crying and said "I'm hungry". Connor looked at me with a disgusted look and said "Man........she sure is bossy!" Needless to say Chloee had a great birthday!

A Few Scrapbook Pages!!

Connor's 5th Birthday!!

I can't believe I have a five year old! Where does the time go?! We are so lucky to have Connor in our family! He has the most tender heart and is so loving and kind to everyone. He makes us laugh all the time. He has the greatest imagination. He can get so much use out of the simplest things. He has such a big heart. When the earthquake hit Haiti he saw some of the footage on TV and he wanted to help. He felt so bad for the kids that were hurt and didn't have food or water. I told him the best way that we could help is to give some money to the bishop to send to the people in Haiti. He went straight to his piggy bank, brought me twenty dollars, and said "I want to send this to the kids in Haiti so that they can have a drink of water." A few days later he asked me if the bishop sent the money and if the kids got their food and water. He talked about it for weeks and was very concerned. He loves to wrestle with his dad. He says he wants to be a Kung Fu master/teacher when he grows up. He loves his little sister so much. He looks out for her and takes care of her. Sometimes he will even go without so that she can have what she wants. The other day Luke told Chloee that she was beautiful and asked Connor, "Don't you think your sister is beautiful"? Connor said "Yes, she is beautiful ........I want to marry her when I grow up"! Of course Luke explained to him that he would find another beautiful girl to marry that isn't his sister. Connor loves preschool! He is so ready for Kindergarten. He knows all the letters in the alphabet and the sounds they make. He has been writing for quite a while now. He asks all the time how to spell words and he'll write them out as I spell them. He can read some small words. He can count by two's and ten's. He just started adding numbers. He came to me today and said "Mom two plus four equals six"! I asked him how he knew that and he said "I just knew it in my head.........Chloee has 2 chicken nuggets on her plate and I have four, that equals six." (I don't think that they are learning that in school, but he is always telling me about some kind of math equation.) I hope he keeps his love for learning throughout his life. He still says the most beautiful prayers. He asks Heavenly Father to "bless everyone that he loves". Even though Derek has been on his mission for 20 months, he still asks Heavenly Father to bless Derek to "speak Spanish very good". He loves music and is very good at learning the words to songs. He loves to play his Wii that he got for Christmas. He is very good at all the games. He loves to draw, color and paint. I am so lucky to have this little boy in my life! I don't know what I would do without him! Happy Birthday Connor!

This year Connor wanted a Spiderman birthday party. He also thought that he needed to invite all his friends from school and primary. There ended up being THIRTEEN kids. It was quite the party. All the kids had a blast. They played all sorts of games, hit the pinata, ate cake, and opened presents. I forgot to get a picture of all the kids together. My camera was on a weird setting so my pictures didn't turn out very good, but here are a few...........