Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

This post is late, but I don't care . . .

This past winter, Station Park opened up. I have taken my girls there often and taken many pictures of them there. I think when they are older and see the pictures of themselves little there, they will get a kick out of it. Anyway, this was the first winter there and they had a teeny tiny ice rink outside. My girls begged and begged me to take them ice skating. I am a terrible parent because I waver on what I will and won't pay for. For some unknown reason I would NOT fork over the $3 it cost to go ice skating. I made them earn it. They did extra chores and each earned their money to go skate. They also decided to each bring a friend.

They were so proud of themselves to bring their own purses and pay the man themselves. I could tell they were thinking they were just so cool. Then they begged to go to the new "teenage" store that opened and look at the clothes. They were giggling and silly and pretending to be soooo grown up! It was a good time. I love these preteen days when they are still my little darlings "pretending" to be teenagers . . . I don't know how I'll feel when real teenage years hit and they are shopping there for real!

Above: At the ice rink (left to right) Maura Gardner, Hailey, Maryn Stewart, Aubrey

The girls trying out poses and clothes! Yikes.

Aubrey and Maryn striking their model poses.

The Epic Journey to Kansas City

It has been 10 years since Ben and I have been out to Kansas City to visit my brother Jeff and his wife Angela and their kids. I put it on the top of our priority list and this Spring Break we took the epic journey (by minivan) to Kansas. Of course, I took about a billion pictures of this trip and then I came home and made an entire scrapbook of it, so here are just a few moments from our trip.

This is what the drive looked like most of the time. B-B-B-BORNING. I'm fairly certain that Wyoming must be the most miserable state in the union. Our girls were troupers though. Nothing a few million DVDs, and coloring books can't conquer! 

We stopped in North Platte Nebraska for an overnight pit stop. The girls were thrilled with our "fancy" hotel (The Holiday Inn Express) Fortunately we did get the kids suite and Ashley was particularly happy with the table and chairs that were just her size!

Ben has always dreamed of being on a Harley surrounded by a bunch of beautiful women . . . but I don't think this is what he had in mind. ;) There is a Harley Davidson Factory in Kansas City, so of course, Ben NEEDED to tour it. However the girls weren't old enough to go. So . . .

The girls and I happened upon this remote Doll Museum. It was up a strange road and we just follow homemade signs to get to it. It just might be the most bizarre place I've ever been. It was a little spooky. When we got there, no lights were on but everything was unlocked so we went in. Then, an old (really old) lady came out and welcomed us. I was fully prepared for a chainsaw man to come out of the back too! It was a little crazy. I tried not to show the girls my personal reservations on the place but about half way through Aubrey curled up in a ball on the floor and started crying. When I asked what was wrong she said she was just soooo freaked out there and hated it. I snapped a quick picture (for the memory, or evidence, if needed) and we booked it out of there!!!

Of course the best part of Kansas City is The Place family!!!! We stayed with Jeff and Angela at their house. Every night Angela read to the girls. It was a daily favorite for all of them!! 

 We also traveled to Liberty Jail, where Joseph Smith was imprisoned for a time while he wrote the Doctrine and Covenants. To the right is the jail (but it is too dark to see). Above is a replica of the gold plates.

 Jeff spent a lot of time playing with the kids all together. This picture warms my heart!

 The is "The Man" it is this statue in the middle of no where, in Angela's neighborhood. It is weird and interesting all at the same time. I told the Place children to always think of us when they pass "the man" because he is dreaming of his family in Utah!

 It was unusually HOT for April in Kansas City. It was 90 degrees! Luckily we broke out the slip and slide and let the kids play all day!

Kansas City has an awesome library! This is just the parking structure!!! I love that it is all books!

 On the way home, we stopped at the Omaha zoo. I'd never been to a zoo that fantastic before! It was amazing and made our Hoogle Zoo look pretty weak. It was great!

Hailey had just done a report on Jaguars and was thrilled to be so close to one!!

Aubrey's 7th Birthday

On March 10th, for Aubrey's 7th Birthday, we took her and a bunch of her friend to the new CineMark at Station Park to see the new movie The Lorax! We had a great time!

 The gangs all here. Left to right: Ava Barkdull, Myah Smith, Hailey Powell, Grace Barkdull, Aubrey Powell, Brynna Coles, Bella Anderson, Maryn Stewart

I guess you can't be Aubrey's friend unless you're willing to be a goofball. (birds of a feather . . .) Goofy, goofy girls.

Christmas 2011

Merry Christmas 2011

We had a good Christmas this year. It was a little quiet, nothing terribly exciting, but for this year, that is a good thing. Christmas Day was on a Sunday and our church is at 9am. I thought it would be more painful that it was. It was actually a really nice thing, we didn't let the girls open any gifts until we got back home from sacrament meeting (we only had sacrament meeting). It really drove home the true meaning of Christmas, a celebration of Christ's birth. The ward choir sang and it was a lovely morning. I actually sang my first duet. Karamie and I sang a beautiful version of "Away in a Manger." I haven't sang anything since high school and it was nice to enjoy music like that again. I was nervous but it went well enough. Here are a few pictures from our Christmas season.

The girls and I made home made ginger bread cookies. Messy, but fun!

We took Ashley to see Santa. She was not trilled with it! He was really good to her.

On Christmas Eve we always go to Powells. This is my girls on Christmas Eve day  ready to go to Grandma and Grandpas.

Christmas morning. We all got new Christmas footie pajamas,  Ben got Grinch ones and I got Pink Panther (sorry Ben and I are not pictured . . . but that's a good thing).

Gone with the WIND!

Well, we just had one heck of a wind storm. Here are the events from my perspective.

On Wednesday I noticed on the news that our area was going to have “strong winds”. It was also the evening of Wendy’s surprise 60^th birthday party. I wanted to be sure to get home before the wind started and I wanted to bring in some little trees that I had put on my front porch to decorate. I had added rocks to weigh down the trees, but thought I ought to bring them in just in case the rocks didn’t hold and they tipped over.

Around 2 a.m. I woke up to howling wind. It was the loudest wind I’d ever heard. At Wendy’s birthday party, Hilary had made a DVD of Wendy life and played the song “Everyone Knows it’s Wendy” at the party. Now that the wind outside was keeping me awake, that song played over and over in my mind only with an “I” instead of an “E” having it be “Everyone knows it’s windy.” The wind howled and howled. Around 4 a.m. our bed started to shake and I realized that our whole house was shaking in the wind. Our house is built three inches above street level and therefore stands very high. The entire second story was shaking and vibrating our walls, floors, windows and even our bed! By 5 a.m. I was wide awake. Ben and I started talking and trying to sleep but just couldn’t. By 7 a.m. our whole family was up and worried about the wind. I looked out the window and everything looked normal, it was just SO windy. My sister, Stephanie, called at 7:15. She said that she was worried about the wind where she lived in Bountiful. She said trees were falling. We wondered if we should send the kids to school or not. While I was on the phone with Steph I looked out my window just in time to see our big, fancy, metal, Lifetime swingset tumble through our yard!!! It is BIG and HEAVY and was expensive. The name brand Lifetime means it is suppose to last a LIFETIME. The wind just tossed it like a tumbleweed and it literally tumbled across our yard! I was shocked.

As the morning progressed the wind got stronger and louder. It was a beautiful sunny day, with this amazingly powerful wind. Our neighbor’s had just installed a vinyl fence. It blew into our yard in bits and pieces. Pretty soon shingles were flying everywhere! I sat and watched at the neighbor across the street lost most of their shingles off their entire roof. It was amazing. I clearly decided NOT to send Hailey and Aubrey to school. Hailey especially, because her classroom is a portable and I wasn’t going to risk it. We just hunkered down and watched the wind blow the neighborhood apart. At 9:30a.m. the power went out. By 10 a.m. the school called our cell phones to say it was closing for the day. Luckily I already had my children with me. Now, without power and with the wind so loud it was hard to do anything to keep our minds off the situation. The freeways were closed so Ben couldn’t go to work, but I didn’t want him to leave us anyway. We all just sat and stewed. Ashley wouldn’t even take a nap, the wind was so loud. I moved her crib to the middle of the room (incase a window broke) but she would not nap. With Ashley crying, the girls scared, me scared the power out and the wind howling, around noon, I decided I couldn’t take it any longer. We piled in the car to drive to Sandy to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. The freeway had opened going south. When we were on the freeway the two miles between Farmington and Centerville we witnessed 11 semi’s tipped over on the road. It was insane! I couldn’t believe it. Once in Salt Lake City it was a beautiful, calm afternoon. It was hard to believe the destruction that was in Davis County. We got to Powell’s and I was a bundle of nerves. I couldn’t even enjoy being there. We decided to take the girls to see “The Muppets” at the theatre. Then we went to Walmart to get flashlights and kerosene lamps. When we got back to Powell’s we saw on the news that the winds were still strong in Davis County and the power was still out. Schools had been canceled for Friday. We decided that Ben would go home to “protect” it and be there, while the girls and I stayed at Powell’s. I was still uptight about the whole thing and couldn’t relax. By 9p.m. Ben called and said that the power was on and the wind had stopped. He drove back to Sandy to get us.

The next morning the cities of Bountiful, Centerville and Farmington looked like war zones. Shingles and fence bits were EVERYWHERE!!! In Bountiful, most of the HUGE pine trees had blown down. It really was an amazing site. Saturday was spent cleaning the yard. It was also Bronson’s baptism. Stephanie had two huge pines blow down. All the men brought their chain saws to help cut up the trees after the baptism. Sunday morning we received word that another wind storm was coming that night. Bountiful and Centerville canceled their church services to clean the city. Everyone was out chopping trees and clearing them away before the next storm. We had church but then we went to work helping neighbors and cleaning up and bringing in everything that was outside. We took in garbage cans, lawn chairs and even put our BBQ in the basement.  Even though it was a Sunday, Ben went and bought a generator. The number one complaint of people we heard was that their homes got so cold. I didn’t dare risk it with Ashley. Stephanie had a neighbor that had their house get down to 36 degrees!!! When night time came we were ready for the next hit . . . we waited and waited, very nervous. Nothing ever happened.

Although it was a little anticlimactic, I’m glad that nothing happened, my nerves where shot after this weekend! Hailey had a rough time going to school this morning. She didn’t want to leave us and was afraid of going to school (we had heard it was damaged.) I’ll be happy to get back into our routine. I really firmly feel that this was the Lord’s way of saying, “I’m not joking about food storage and emergency preparedness.” I think this was the dress rehearsal for the real show. We’d better get ready . . .

This is a bad picture, but this used to be three lights and a ceiling fan.  

Some of our house hanging off.

I wish you could see where the playground used to be. Here is it bent in half. 

More damage.

Missing shingles

I duct taped this paper sign to the doorbell about a month ago. It stayed through the whole storm! I guess our whole house should be made of this stuff!!!

Ashley's First Birthday

November 22, 2011 we celebrated our sweet Ashley's first birthday. I can't believe that a year has already gone by. I also can't believe our family ever existed without her. 

I really wanted to get photo's of her at one year old. I used to take the other girls to JC Penny or Kiddie Kandids to get their photos, but now with all the digital stuff and fancy cameras I don't think it is worth the cost. My sister Stephanie has a really nice camera so we set up a little "photo shoot" in her house and took some pictures of Ash. I think they turned out really well. 

For Ashley's birthday party, we invited ALL the family over! My best friend Jen, Ben's two sister's Hilary (Quin, Jonas and Rex), Lindsey (Ky and Parker), my sister Heather (Mike, Spencer and Melia) we also had Kim's kids James, Rachael and Becca and Hannah and of course Grandma and Grandpa Place and Powell. 

Rex and Ashley. Rex is six months younger than Ash.

It is a family tradition that Grandpa Place brings the "Birthday Bear" at every grandchild's birthday. 

Ashley and her cupcake. She loved it!

Boil, boil, toil and trouble

Happy Halloween! The month of October we had a Halloween celebration!

First, I tried to take the girls to Lagoon's Frightmares. Uh, it didn't go over very well. We went in the day, but still . . . we made it into that park, but when we tried to leave the gouls came out and scared Hailey and Aubrey so bad, they ran out of the park, through the parking lot and to the highway!!!! We will NOT do that again.

I was bummed that I didn't get to experience Frightmares but my best bud Jen said she'd love to come with me. Jen and I braved Frightmares all on our own. It was a blast! It has been a 13 years since I've been to a haunted house, I felt like a young girl again with Jen there. We had a great time!

Then, Stephanie and Loren had two free Frightmare tickets and wanted Ben and I to take Mike, their 11 year old son. So, a few weeks later, I went to Frightmares AGAIN, this time with Ben and Mike. It was fun to be with Mike and Ben. Mike had NEVER been to a haunted house and it was a kick to take him through. He was really tough and looked the creeps in the face and stood his ground. It was fun!

A week or so later, a friend of mine called and offered me tickets to Ballet West's Dracula!!!! I was thrilled to go to Dracula! (Ben was less than excited, but he was a good sport). I cannot say how much I LOVED it!!! It was wonderful to be at the ballet again. I haven't been to a ballet in about 14 years. I was in heaven.

My high school friend, Mindy Lillyquist was in Thriller at Kingsburry so the next weekend Ben and I went to see her in that! It was fun.

Finally Halloween arrived!

Every year we go to Grandma Powell's ward party. Ashley was a  spider witch with Grandma Powell.

I volunteered for the Halloween party in Hailey's classroom. I dressed as Malificent. (I was the ONLY mom dressed up!) Hailey was a gypsy and Aubrey was a little devil.

Carving pumpkins on Halloween morning! (Look at Hailey holding the knife in the background . . . scary!)

Ready to go trick-or-treating! Ashley was a kitty cat this time.