Disneyland

   Once again we have allowed the blog to fall behind, so we'll continue where we left off. Our first full day of activities in Anaheim we spent the day at Disneyland. This was after having enjoyed a peaceful Sabbath with Aunt Utahna and Renee. We enjoyed attending church with Utahna in the morning and an afternoon of visiting.

   Ashley picked out Disney appropriate outfits for the parks, and even did the girls hair to go along with the Mickey theme. The kids were so excited that it was hard to get them to sit still long enough to get them fed and ready.

  We didn't end up taking a ton of pictures in the park but here are a few of the highlights. The lines for most the rides weren't too bad, and the kids actually did an excellent job be patient to get on the rides, including Jerrick.

   The tea cups were fun for some, but not for all. Keisha really enjoyed them spinning and kept saying faster, faster and Charlie was the opposite and didn't want them to spin at all. Of course we only listened to Keisha and got them going as fast as we could. No one got sick on them so that's what's really important.

   Some of the lines were so long we avoided waiting at all. The girls did want to get a picture with Tinker Bell, but the line was probably an hour long. Instead, we too a picture in front of the fairy cove and if you zoom in you can see Tinker Bell in the background.

The Marvel exhibit was of course a huge hit with the kids and the all chose their favorite Iron Man suite and got a picture in from of it. They also really enjoyed the interactive part of the exhibit where they got to test out the virtual Iron Man armor.

After a full day of activities the kids were still going strong for the most part. We forgot to get a picture out in front of the park on the way in, and had split up on the way out, so the girls where the only ones to get a picture in front of the Mikey lawn.

Spring Break

     We have once again fallen behind on our blog, so going back to the end of February we finally were able to take our first big family vacation, which with all the fun we had I'll break into a couple posts. This year we decided to take the kids to Disneyland. We made it and early spring break trip for them since Adahleigh didn't actually have spring break until mid March. We went earlier to avoid some of the crowds and the pricing is better before the first of March.
     We first told the kids about the trip at Christmas, they were excited but didn't really know what to expect. Over the next month we planned out with them which rides they wanted to go on, so that helped them get more excited for the trip. We figured with four of them to chase around we needed a little extra help, so we invited Grandma Phillips and Aunt Karli along to help out.
     We left out Friday (Feb 21) after Adahleigh was done with school, since the school was already giving us a hard time for her missing too much. We broke the 13 hour trip down into two days, and met Grandma and Karli in Sacramento.
     We stopped and got everyone dinner at burger King in Klamath Falls, so their bellies would get be full and they could get to sleep for the next few hours till we made it Sacramento.

    The Next morning we had breakfast and took the kids to a local park so they could burn off some energy before getting back in the car for most of the day. The weather in Sacramento was great at 70 by 10 am, compared to our regular 40 high for the day. Keisha has become quite the acrobat and likes to show here skills off.

     Charles also wanted to show his hanging skills, but would do it from the monkey bars.

     She also has a grip of steel, which she can dangle for long periods of time. She made it across the rings several times, but once the camera came out she couldn't get all the way across.

Valentine's Day

     This year for Valentine's Day I was able to  leave work for an early lunch with Adahleigh at her school. This was definitely the highlight of my week if not hers.

     She's funny about getting dropped off at school, she doesn't want anyone getting out of the car to help her. She's even told Ashley a couple times to get back in the car when she's getting dropped off. I thought she might act a little put out with me being at school because of this, but she was excited to have me there and introduce me to her friends. Her friends were just as excited to see someone's parent there, but it also could've been because I brought cake and they all wanted me to share with them too.

      She liked having me there so much she asked me to stick around for recess. Due to the rain we've been getting it was indoors, but I was able to sit down and play memory with her and her classmates.

      This year for valentines she made superheros and butterflies out of suckers for her classmates. She was really trying Ashley's patience on getting them made, because she kept harassing her to do them when she was busy with other things. The other kids didn't help out much with the situation either since they keep getting into the suckers, or destroying the ones already made. Jerrick was the worst since he now has realized he can climb the chairs to get on the table.

Snow Games

    Last Week we were able to enjoy the winter wonderland. The snow this year has been pretty scarce, until just this week. Over a 2 day period we got roughly 18" of much needed snow. In the last 2.5 years that we've been here we usually get 3-6" occasionally and it doesn't accumulate, so the kids haven't had very many chances to play in since there isn't enough to do anything with. It also wasn't frigid temperatures, so  we could stand to be outside for an extended period.
    On Friday Ashley build a snow fort with the kids, and Adahleigh, Charles and Keisha tried to make a snowman but got the balls too big  (a good 2.5-3' around) for even Ashley to stack, so they just left them unstacked in the yard. Jerrick was sleeping during their adventure, so he didn't get to participate at all.
    On Saturday, I had the day off, so we spent half the day in the snow. Amazingly, everyone stayed and played in the snow, unlike the usual spending 15 minutes getting them dressed and then them deciding they're too cold after 2 min. I went out and dug a maze out in the snow so everyone could get around easier (I remember my dad doing this one winter in Salem and we played fox and geese in the maze). We ended up playing tag and having a snowball fight.  Once everyone but Adahleigh decided they'd had enough and had gotten cold, we went and built a couple snowmen on our street. Adahleigh bailed out just before finishing the second snowman, so we didn't get any photos of her with the finished product.

Update

     We haven't been very good at keeping our blog updated, in part due to being busy and not setting time apart and also because we ran out of space on our hard drive to be able to load pictures. We've resolved those issue and now will try to be a little more diligent in keeping everyone updated on our lives.
     Things have been going well for us, both temporally and spiritually. We have the opportunity to attend two baptisms yesterday. It was great to go and feel of the spirit that was there. The first baptism was the spouse of a member that moved into the ward a couple months ago. He has been prepared by the lord over the course of several years and now just happened to right time in his life. He will be a great asset to the ward along with his wife and son. The second baptism was girl in Adahleigh's primary class, it reminds us of how close she is to being baptized, even though it seems like just yesterday she was born.
     As far as calling go in the ward, I'm still the Elder's Quorum President and Ashley had the privilege of moving up from nursery to Sunbeams with Keisha, although if you ask her it might not be such a privilege. The one perk is she is team teaching which makes things a little easier, and her partner does show up regularly. Jerrick on the other hand hasn't handle nursery well since Mom left. He would get to go in occasionally while she was in there, now he wants to leave when we drop him off and usually cries for 10 minutes, according to the nursery leaders. He's funny about going to nursery, we well tell him lets go to nursery he gets all excited and actually runs straight to the class door and even goes in, but once he looks around he remembers that he doesn't want to be there and starts to fuss and try to leave. If we get toys out to try and distract him while we leave he picks them up and puts them back in the toy closet, all while crying (tears and all), he knows you have to clean up to leave.
Adahleigh
    Has been growing like a weed, we can barely keep her in clothes or shoes. She continues to love going to school. Currently we're trying to get her double promoted from kindergarten to 2nd grade by the end of this year. Her teachers are both on board (she's in a K-1 split), and have been bringing her up with the 1st graders in most of their activities. She has also taken to reading and picks up books just to read through them, and usually can make it through most of them with little or no help from us. It's been amazing reading the scriptures as a family and letting her read everything she can which she doesn't need a whole lot of help doing. While the others are repeating, she'll try to read for them and have them repeat her.
     For her tooth count she's down 2, which have come in and is now also getting at set of 6 yr old molars.

Charles
     Continues to be our instigator and problem starter. He definitely has a very independent personality, there is very we can do to get him to listen if he doesn't want to. He can stand and stare you down for hours if you tell him to do something he doesn't want to, no matter what consequences he's informed his decision will cause. He still tend to be pretty shy in public, but is slowly coming out of his shell. Now in primary he will sing, and sings loud too. He'll also participates.
      After a year of telling us he's not going to school he's finally onboard with going. On his 5th birthday he actually demanded to go to school and we had to explain that he now needs to wait till fall to go. He got the mindset that once he turned 5 it was time to go to school. It was probably from all the time we told Adahleigh that she had to be 5 to start kindergarten.

Keisha
     Lately she has stopped being her sweet self all the time and now likes to throw fits and not listen. Just today at church she decided it was acceptable to stand in the isles instead of staying in the benches. Up till now we've been lucky and the kids don't try to leave the bench unless they were too small to understand. She also doesn't like to listen in Sunbeams with Ashley, which is adding to the grief of Ashley being moved up with her.
      She still loves to dance and sing all day long, which all the kids do, but she puts an extra flare to it. Jerrick is right alongside her most of the time.

Jerrick
     Continues to grow like a weed also, he'll definitely be in competition with Adahleigh on who ends up being tallest. His personality is now in full bloom. He lets us know exactly what he wants even if he doesn't say anything. He has his favorite shows (Jake and the Neverland Pirates), he dances/sings along to their songs and participates in the activities. He also has favorite songs that he insists on being played several times so he can sing to them (even though its more mimicking sound and not words). He has started to talk quite a bit and likes to repeat everyone, although he isn't stringing words together yet.