Christmas is Fun!

What a fun season it is. Our football highlights of the season are:
BYU beats Utah November 24th and then a victory at the Las Vegas Bowl on December 22. Chad and I were at the Utah game, and cheering madly with the crowd. Of course, we rushed the field as they actually pulled out the victory after what seemed like a sure defeat. Chad also went to Vegas with a few friends for the Vegas Bowl. The rest of us cheered from home! Once again, a close victory found Chad on the field celebrating after the game.


We enjoyed the first big snow fall by making a snow man. Here the kids are hugging their new friend. We have received several snow falls, and the temperatures have just plummeted. But there seems to be magic in the air, because it even snowed on Christmas Eve. Santa sure has come through for us here in Utah.




Here is Audrey during an in-class Christmas recital for parents. She loves ballet and her teacher not only teaches ballet basics, but also lets them imagine they are fairies, butterflies and princesses as they dance around. Audrey has told us that she wants to be in a real ballet someday.






On Christmas Eve, we acted out the Nativity with our kids. They were very cute, of course! Here on the left are Joseph, Mary, and Jesus.

What about Kate? Don't forget the Angels that sang to the shepherds.



Opening presents was a blast. Kate screamed with delight at every present. She definitely stole the show. Audrey and Carson were very excited to play with their toys as well. We had a great time!





Today is Chad and I's 8th anniversary! We celebrated yesterday with a couple get-away. Part of our get away included a trip to the Salomon Center in Ogden, UT. Here is Chad body boarding at Flowrider. This was so fun. Two thumbs up for best get away in 17 degree weather.

Halloween Is Fun!!

It was very exciting this year waiting for Halloween. We made a paper chain to count the days to Halloween, in September!!! Audrey and Carson were Dragons and witches. They enjoyed the Halloween parties at their schools this year.

Kate was a beautiful princess. Princess for Halloween. She likes to get dressed up and looking pretty.

Carson and Audrey loved the spooky decorations on the houses around us. Here they are trick-or treating an especially spooky one. We had a terrific Halloween with the kids. Of course, as soon as trick-or-treating is over, we hear, I can't wait until next Halloween!

Audrey is losing teeth like crazy. Here she is sporting 4 teeth out at the same time!

Fall is going well. With the beautiful weather, we have enjoyed a lot of park time and outside time. Now, however, the kids can't wait until Christmas. Here come the winter holidays!

October Fun

Happy Spooky Halloween!

Chad, Audrey and Carson stir up some magic spells at the Scarecrow Festival. They enjoyed the games, bouncing, haunted house and European Bungee Jumping.

Here are Audrey and her friend Rylee at the Witch Festival. They had fun posing with scary witches. Audrey is going to be a witch this year for Halloween.

Carson visited the skeleton pirates and had more than he bargained for. The spooky music had him pretty spooked.

Kate learned to walk this month (15 1/2 months old). She is so excited to walk by herself.

Audrey continues to play soccer. She is our soccer star! We are so glad to have these cute kids!

September started out with Audrey's birthday. She had a fun princess party with her friends, including a treasure box craft, princess games, a treasure hunt, pizza, and a Belle cake. She has been looking forward to her birthday for a whole year and had a blast planning it. One of her first comments after the birthday party was "I can't wait until my next birthday!"

Audrey is right at home kicking a soccer ball. Especially during a soccer game. Her coach says he just loves how she grins the entire game. She has sure gotten fast. It is fun to watch her play. They named their team the "Princess Fire-Dragons". The sidelines usually shorten it to "Go PFD's" or "Go Fire-Dragons". They play girls 4 on 4 with no goalie, so of course, Audrey has been racking up the goals.

This month has been the first day of Kindergarten for Audrey. She was a little nervous about starting school. She would tell me, "let's not talk about it." Our first day of school, we almost missed the bus. It came 5 minutes earlier than we expected. Then, I drove to school to see how it went. On the way home, I once again shadowed her and got her to her bus. Now, she is pro with school and the bus. She loves to talk about bus stops and loves Kindergarten, especially recess.

Carson also started school this month. He is attending 3 yr old preschool at the same preschool Audrey went to. He is so excited to finally be in preschool. He asks everyday if it is a preschool day yet, and he wears his preschool shirt every time. He also is excited to talk about colors they are studying in preschool and tells me what colors will be next. Very exciting!

Oregon 2007

It was a great Iverson Family Reunion at the Ross Iverson Family Farm in Woodburn Oregon. We enjoyed the people, lake, cow train rides, sand, duck races, slide, food etc. The picture at the left is at the Iverson farm.

We enjoyed our first night in Oregon at a hotel in Woodburn after driving there in one day from Draper, UT. We played in the pool for a couple hours that night and the next morning. Then drove to the reunion in time for the fun.

Later, that Saturday, we drove to the Oregon coast to Dorothy Iverson's family beach house. We had a wonderful week there, exploring the coast and playing at the beaches. Here is the clan that stayed with us at the beach house. Andy and Nicole, Kate, Sherry, Chad, Kathy, Carson and Audrey (Gary not pictured).

On Monday, we spent the day at Oswald Beach. Chad and Audrey built a hole and the kids loved playing in it. Here they all are standing in the hole.

On Tuesday, we had a fun hike to the top of the cliffs around Oswald Beach. Audrey imagined that we were in a fantasy world on the hike with a castle and beautiful rooms for princesses. We had a great time. Carson also enjoyed the trip imagining things along the way. The trail was wonderful with thick green forest foliage the whole way.

On Wednesday, we did more beaching, then we drove to Cape Meare to see the lighthouse. Audrey especially was excited to see the lighthouse. We climbed to the top of it, then walked over to the octopus tree nearby.

We started for home around noon on Thursday, stopped in Ontario, OR for the evening, then finished the trip home on Friday. It was a fun adventure.

Here we are looking out at the beautiful Oregon Coastline.

July 2007 Fun

We had a great 4th of July!! Chad and I ran the Blacksmith Fork Canyon 15K Freedom Run in Cache Valley. Chad placed 3rd in his age division, for the third year in a row he has earned a ribbon.

Then, we picked up the kids from Grandma and went to Riverdale City to a carnival there. The kids got bracelet passes and rode rides continuously for hours. They loved it!! Here they are holding hands and getting ready to ride the train.

That night we did fireworks with the kids. It was a great day!

Kate is also learning to walk. She learned to use a baby walker this month to get around. She loves being a big girl and the independence she has gained. Here she is on the July 4th, happy as can be.

July was our swimming lessons month at Draper Swimming Pool. Kate and I did a mom and me class. Carson was in Pre-level 1 (with his class at the right) and Audrey was in Level 1. Our classes were all at the same time, which was very nice to all be in the pool together. Audrey has also learned to swim, thanks to her persistence in trying to. She learned a few skills in class, but figured out how to link it all together herself. Now she is a little fish.

Also in July, we went water skiing with the Iversons at Mona Lake. The kids had a lot of fun on the big tube, and Chad and I had a blast knee boarding and wake boarding for the first time in years.

Chad had a birthday in July. We celebrated his birthday in Fruit Heights with his parents the night before, then on his birthday, we went to Lagoon.

Lagoon was great! The kids had so much fun on the kiddie rides. Carson was a lot more brave this year and did some more adventurous kiddie rides. Last year when he was scared at Lagoon he coined the phrase "It's hard for me". This year, there wasn't as much that was hard.

We enjoyed Lagoona Beach as well, playing in the kiddie area. After dinner, Audrey and Chad started to do the more serious rides. They did the Colossus, Wild Mouse, White Roller coaster, and more. Audrey's favorite ride is still the Bat.

Team Strong Women, Strong Men

The Wasatch Back was the goal for these hearty folks. This is Van 2 just after our first van started the race. We are feeling pretty strong, here. In our van was Chad, Sherry, Nicole (Weezie), Brett, Wade, and Steve.





The heat was pretty intense and the sleeping worse. Our team was short a woman (airplanes are very unreliable!) and so we also had three of our team members run an additional leg. Our start time was 11:00 am and van 1 was off. Most of van 2 relaxed in the little shade we could find while Chad ran his extra leg in van 1. Then our van took over at 4:45 pm. Here are our runners on board waiting for their turn (Weezie, Wade and Brett). This set of legs covered 22.1 miles.

Our van finished our first legs after climbing the hill to Snow Basin at 7:53 pm, and we drove to Taggerts in search of some good dinner. Very satisfied, we then drove to our next major exchange, East Canyon State Park, and some of us caught about an hour of sleep before we were awoken suddenly to meet our runner, only 1 mile out. Here is Chad, our fearless driver.

At 12:11 am, Brett took over for our van. A full 33.4 miles to go, but it was dark, cool and there was lots of excitement along the race trail. We finished our second legs at 4:41 am , arriving at Rockport Lake State Park and we drove to Wade's parents' house for a little shut eye. Wade wasn't so lucky, he had to run his extra leg shortly after we all fell asleep. Five of us slept very soundly from about 5:30 until 7:30 am. We would need those two hours of sleep later!
After waking, we drove to the next exchange in Heber City and were in position to let Brett start his last leg at 8:49 am. Our last set of legs covered 25.9 miles. Brett turned in another amazing run - we knew he could pull it out! Following Brett's leg, Steve did his last one. Steve was amazingnly consistent even though it was already very hot and we were going through water fast.


Next in line, Wade continues to run without sleep. He had the first part of guardsman pass with 7.6% grade. He was amazing and ran almost the whole thing. Wow!







Next, Chad did Ragnar. By now the heat is punishing and the grade is 8% uphill. Chad worked hard with his brand of running and speed hiking. Here he is on the right, as he and a fellow runner encourage each other to just keep going. The 4 miles could be the longest of his life.






Now the women take over. Weeze continues the uphill run for about a mile, then coasts back down. The side aches start to hit and the heat takes all the water out of us. She is so strong and finishes her section in good time.



Finally the last leg. Sherry runs this and ends at the the finish line. The rest of van 2 and all of van 1 meet her and everyone crosses the finish line together. It was a hard fought race. We finished at 12:48 pm, doing it in 25 hrs and 48 min. We placed 57th out of 300 teams. We were surprisingly competitive, especially since we were short a person. Way to go team!

June 2007 Fun

The summer was off to a quick start when we went to the Dinosaur Park in Odgen, UT with Grandma and cousins Max, BJ, and Tait. Here are Max, Carson and Audrey playing in the Triceratops skull.

The next day, we went to the Tracy Aviary. In the picture at the right is Audrey, BJ, Max and Kate. We loved all of the large birds they had on exhibit there. It was pretty neat to see them so close. The Carnival rides outside the Aviary really stole the show, however. If we go back to Lincoln Park, the top of the list request will be to do the rides again, followed closely by playing in the water at the splash park, and maybe a quick trip to the aviary.

It was fun to go to Gpa King's 90th birthday celebration in Pocatello, ID this year. Here he is amongst some of his great-grandchildren. He is wearing a Toronto BlueJays hat, obviously proud of his grandson, Roy Halladay.

Kate had a big birthday this year! She is One Years Old!! We had her favorite dinner of macaroni and cheese, then cake and presents. Here she is enjoying her cake.

Can you say "BIG SPLASH". This was a fun Father's Day celebration. BBQ dinner, water slide, soccer and T-Ball all in our back yard. Chad says that playing with the kids is one of his favorite things to do. This was a full day of playing!

We did a double combo - The Red Butte Gardens and Wheeler Farms to end the month. We were joined by Julie and Caleb and Angell and her children.