Downtown!

Yesterday was the kids' last day off track, so Mike took another day off work and we headed to downtown Salt Lake! We started out at The Gateway Mall and then rode Trax to Temple Square where we had lunch at one of our favorite restaurants, The Garden, at the top of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. I didn't get pictures, but we were seated right next to the windows and had a gorgeous view of the temple! The food was amazing too, and I am already trying to think of excuses to go there again!! Then, we walked around the visitor's center, which we had realized was the first time Mike had been there with me ever! I guess I've always gone with other people. I love how interested Brayden is in learning everything and taking it all in, but all Ashton cared about was seeing the big Christ statue, so we had to kind of rush through. When we finally made it up to it, Ashton begged for me to take a picture of him and Brayden with the statue, and I was kind of embarrassed that as I was taking the picture, instead of saying "cheese", Ashton says really loud, "I love Jesus!" I took two shots, and he said that both times, both loudly of course, in front of all of the people in there. Maybe I shouldn't be embarrassed of that, but it was mostly due to the fact that he said that instead of "cheese"! I should be used to it though, my son embarrasses me on a daily basis!! :)

After that, we got back on Trax and headed to the Clark Planetarium. We went there for the first time last summer, and I was really impressed with it. It is completely free to look at the exhibits, and the kids like it way more than some other museums we've been to that cost a ton of money! We had a great time there!

On Mars!

Pointing out a frog rock!

Aquarium Fun!

Our fun for yesterday was going to The Living Planet Aquarium! We hadn't gone in years, so it was so fun seeing the kids both so interested and excited to see everything! My mom came with us and we had a great time! When we were paying to get in, my outgoing Ashton asked the aquarium worker if there were any whales - he laughed and said no, but that there were some sharks. Luckily that was enough to get Ashton excited and he wasn't too disappointed about there being no whales! :) Another funny thing, as we were walking through looking at the exhibits, my mom was telling the kids what the names of everything was and Ashton eventually told her in total amazement, "I can't believe you know all of their names and what they are called, Grandma! I just can't believe that you know all that!" He thought Grandma was just SO SMART and had no idea she was reading the info above the tanks! Ha ha! That gave a good laugh to a few poeple who had heard around us as well!!

The kids were so excited to see the penguins! They didn't have them last time we were there.....

Ashton was fascinated with this electric eel! He always has to "act" in his pictures, so here he is "acting" scared of it.....oh, and by the way, Ashton insisted on doing his own hair that day, so I take no responsibilty for whatever funkiness is going on with it in these pictures.....

Piranha!!!!!!!

Our favorite thing to do was hang out with the stingrays! They were so friendly and would go up to the side and wait for you to pet them. The kids were a little leery at first, but they warmed up to them and loved feeling their "goobery" wings, as Ashton described it!

Ashton trying to look like a modeling stud on the frog.....

With Grandma.....

These were some of my favorites.....

jUmP oN iT

I always panic on the kids' last week of being off-track feeling guilty for not doing more fun things with them durng their previous 2 weeks off, so we made sure to plan some fun stuff to fill this last week! We started off this week with Mike taking the day off yesterday so we could go to Jump On It together. We had so much fun, and it was great to get out and get some exercise as a family!

We had so much fun bouncing off the walls! Literally!!!

They have all kinds of balls to play with and basketball hoops everywhere, so we had fun playing "keep away" and shooting hoops!

Ashton LOVED this place! He was actually less of a daredevil than we thought he'd be, but he warmed up by the end and started taking advantage of all he could do! Brayden, on the otherhand, wasn't actually loving the place - it was a little too rough for her, getting knocked over or hurting herself, but it made us realize we need to do stuff like that more often just to toughen her up!!

Of course when we are down in Happy Valley we have to go visit some of our favorite spots from when we lived there. The kids first wanted to see our condo that we owned when we first were married until Brayden was about 7 months old.....we lived on the top floor.....

Then we headed to University Mall for our favorite Chinese food, and then went to Movies 8 for a 75 cent movie! We wanted to see "Sherlock Holmes" but it was all sold out, so we saw "Jack and Jill" which the kids loved and was better than we had heard. Worth what we paid at least! :) After the movie we headed home and finished off the night playing Pictionary! It was a fun day and we can't wait for more fun to come this week!

Interview With KSL

This week my brother-in-law Steve was interviewed by KSL about his daughter Emmalee and the book he wrote about what they went through when she was suffering from liver cancer. Here's the link for anyone who has been following her story or is interested: http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=19269505 KSL had done a couple of stories about Emmalee when she was still alive, so some of the reporters had known her.

~OUR VALENTINE'S DAY~

Valentine's Day has been going on for actually this whole month in our house! Brayden and Ashton have been making non-stop Valentine's and Valentine crafts! This is one craft I did with them out of tissue paper.....

Mike and I celebrated together last weekend and went out to dinner. As we were driving in the car I noticed something glistening that was hanging from the rear view mirror.....it was this necklace!

I don't get jewelry often, but when I do it's special, especially knowing he picked it out for me, and he always seems to find the neatest stones or crystals that I wouldn't even think to look for but I love!

This is what our table looked like Valentine's Day morning. Our tradition is the kids get a present each and a new outfit that they get to wear for Valentine's Day! I also got Mike a giant Valentine's Day card and some chocolates!

I woke up extra early and surprised everyone with Valentine donuts that I made!

Here are the kids with their Valentine loot and their new clothes.....

I don't know what got into me, but I had these treat ideas and I just HAD to make them all in one day! I was in the kitchen all day long! I made these cake pops for the kids to hand out. I had never even eaten one before, but I thought they would be fun to make, and they were!

I saw something similar to these on Pinterest, so of course I had to make them too! They are strawberry Hugs cookies!

Needless to say, between everything I made and the incoming Valentines from friends, we were all on quite the sugar high yesterday! But, we had a great day of baking, dropping off treats, and visiting some family! We hope your Valentine's Day was a great one too!!!

Ashton Has Got Some Fans!

Recently Ashton has been obsessed with wanting to be famous and has been making videos to put on You Tube hoping tons of people will see him. We have a webcam and a special effects program that came with our computer that he will sit and play with and record himself while I'm busy doing other things. The other day I put a few of his videos up on You Tube after he begged me, not thinking anyone would really watch them, but one of his videos has gotten over 1,200 views in just 4 days! I don't really get why, but I thought I would post it here, just in case there is something I'm missing that others seem to see in it! To me it's funny because he's my son, but maybe you, or at least your kids, might be entertained by it! It's a little long and slow moving in some spots, but it's kind of funny to be inside the mind of my 5 year old Ashton!

Our New Nephew!!!

I just realized that I hadn't posted about our new little nephew! My sister and her family have waited 5 years for this adoption and that day finally came last week! They just recently got back home from The Philippines where they picked up their 14 month old son, Joshua! My sister says he is a very easy going, happy little boy. I can't wait to travel to Seattle to meet him hopefully soon! In the mean time, he's going to have to get to know us through web cam!

This is at Joshua's orphanage...doesn't it make you want to just go bring one of them home? Ashton calls it the baby shop and keeps saying he wants to go buy a baby. I've had to tell him it's not quite that simple!

Ashton The Entertainer!

We are big fans of Jason Hewlett The Entertainer in this house, having been to a couple of his shows, and OF COURSE Ashton is his biggest fan! Jason Hewlett posted a video at Christmastime that my kids watched over and over and OVER, and then just the other day, Ashton decided to make his own version on our web cam. Ashton still has to refine his talent a bit (ha ha!), but I thought it was pretty funny, especially since he did it on his own!!

Here is Jason Hewlett's video to have something to compare it to....


And here is Ashton's...