Daddy/Daughter Date

Tonight Natty and Derek headed off for a Daddy/Daughter date for a Young Womens activity. I thought they looked so cute!! It was an "oldies night" and they were invited to come

dressed in 50's, 60's, 70's, or 80's attire.

Wait a minute....80's and oldies, can this be true?

Great Picture

I love Danny's hands. I think they are so cute.

Well, while I was browsing through the zoo pictures I came across this photo that he took. It's a cool picture, but I love the view of his hands on the camera in the reflection. What a nice boy!!

People To People Financial Update

Wow!!! The response to our family and friends mailers has been overwhelming. What a wonderful experience for Laurel to feel the love and support of her family and friends. We still have yet to go business to business and we are over 1/3 of the way to our goal. Thank you to everyone who has so generously donated to Laurel's DC experience. She has had a wonderful time getting return envelopes everyday with donations inside. This experience has already taught her money management, correspondence, and people skills. To our local friends and family: Please watch your mail this summer for our car wash fundraiser (we'll have two) and our bake sale flyers. If your car is dirty or you have a sweet tooth this may be just right for you!!!

Afternoon at the Zoo

We had a great afternoon at the zoo yesterday. Alyssa and her two boys joined Danny and I.

We arrived around 1:30 and stayed until 4:30. It was a great way to spend a warm spring afternoon.

Danny and Bracken

All three boys
Danny at the Lion fountain

It was such fun to spend the afternoon with Alyssa and the boys. Our boys play so well together. They're sure they are cousins. It was so nice to go to the zoo with no diapers and no strollers!!!

Saturday morning

It was sleep over night at the Fishes.

Brady had Logan White sleep over and Natty had her friend Shay Sudbury.

Natalie is beginning her 3rd summer working for the UQHA (Utah Quarter Horse Assoc.). This year she was able to invite her friend Shay to work with her at the race track. So every other Saturday for the next two months they each get paid $50 buck a day to work the entrance gate and charge the cars. Lolly was able to fill-in there last year and they needed her help today too so she'll make $25 dollars as the photo runner. Pretty fun stuff! And BIG money when your their age!!

Breakfast at the Fishes!

Lolly, Bones, Logan, Natty, Shay, Danny Boy

Pajama Dan

Yesterday I came home from working out and Danny ran out to the van to show me something funny.

He had put on 8 pairs of pajama bottoms. He was laughing so hard as we counted each pair.

He is so extremely ticklish that as I tried to push down each pair for the picture he would roll into a ball and giggle. It was so funny.

He is such a love!!

Family Home Evening

This past Monday we had a great time having FHE at Copperton Park. It's one of our favorite places. We packed a picnic of PB&J's, chips, grapes, cookies, and bottled water. Then we just played like crazy. I've noticed that having a blog has really increased the amount of pictures we take and I'm so glad. Here are several fun shots from our outing.

Danny and Bones racing down the slide

Nat, Danny, and Lolly
Pretty Lolly Loo
Natty cutie pie

I love this shot. This park was built by Kennecott and these old tires are always a hit!
Say Cheese! My favorite!!

What a fun evening! We love going to the park!

The Diabetes Walkaway

My Father-in-law and brother-in-law are raising money for the American Diabetes Association. This past Saturday they embarked on a 26 mile walk to advertise their cause.

In April of 2009 they will be walking from Sacramento CA to Salt Lake City, UT for this purpose.

Here's a great photo of the beginning of that long trek in the early morning hours last Saturday.

Jon B. Fish - Father Gavin Fish - Son

Here's a small quote from Dad's report to us

"The numbers showed we had walked at a 3.2 mph speed the entire way (averaged out) and that we had walked the 26.5 miles in less than nine hours. We felt real good about that. That probably won’t mean much to runners, but it means a whole bunch to me – as I am only a few months removed from my 60th birthday."

A map of their route

Check out the website for more information.

http://www.thediabeteswalkaway.com/

Pretty amazing I thought!

It feels like Christmas

Der has this friend named Lenny at work. Lenny has been researching Plasma TV's for about three months now. Well Thursday he informed Der that he had finally bought a TV and it was being delivered Saturday morning. He told Der that if he would come and get his old TV out of his house for him he could have it. So Der and I picked it up Friday night and got it all hooked up. It's about 8 years old but who cares? It is in perfect condition and has already been a lot of fun.

By the way, he lived on 6515 West in my old stomping ground!!! About 3880 South. Right around the block from where I grew up. His house was the same floor plan as Hansen's next door to us.

We rented a movie for the family to watch and ended up with one entitled "Dinotopia". We didn't get started until after almost 9pm. By 11 I was wondering if it was ever going to end. It was enjoyable, but I had worked out that day, Der and I had moved a big screen TV twice as well as other furniture to make room for the TV. Not to mention he and I stayed up until 3am talking the night before. I picked up the DVD case to see how much longer we had. Would you believe we rented a mini-series? 5 HOURS LONG!!!! We promptly went to bed. But the kids continued to watch it in the van both directions for our Thanksgiving Point outing the next day. Then they finished once we were home. It was really good. Just loooooong!!

The Tulip Festival

We spent a great day at Thanksgiving Point yesterday. It was the annual Tulip Festival and we hoped to get a taste of Holland today. We were not disappointed!

Derek dropped us off at the entrance because parking was crazy. The kids started off by sitting and waiting because they were tired of standing (not a good sign.)

This is a cute picture of the kids while they waited.
We breezed past the long entrance lines thanks to our annual membership from my folks for Christmas. We began our adventure and started out through the miles of walking trails. This is a cute bridge just behind the Rose Garden.

Several hundred feet later we got this great pictures at the top of a hill we felt like ancient Romans on a picnic here.

The kids forgot all about tired feet and really just enjoyed the outing. At the top of this hill we were able to get a great shot of where we had come from and the ultimate rolling hill that we promised to visit at the end of the day. The visitors center and shops are at the top of this photo. I love this picture.

This structure was so cool. At the bottom is a giant caterpillars head and this formation is his body. The kids ran up and down the hundreds of steps and had a great time of it.
At about the halfway mark we stopped at the giant commons area where several vendors had set up tents. We had Stroop Waffles (a dutch cookie) and water bottles. IT was a great break and Nat and Lolly loved checking out all the vendors shops. From here we headed into the Children's Discovery Garden.


Our first stop was the maze area. Giant bushes make up a maze right out of a Shakespearean story. The kids were paired like they always are, Natty with Bones, and Lolly with Dan. They loved ditching their parents in the maze. When we got out, just seconds after they did, we found them all lounging on the grass and in unison they sang out, "What took you so long." That was cute.



This is a cool Naoh's Ark. It looks like there all all sorts of fountains and water spots where you can cool off in the heat of summer. The water wasn't on yet.



I think Brady's favorite was this lighthouse. There was a ladder inside where you can climb clear to the top. They had a fun few minutes in there. By this time Der and I were beat. I had already worked out that morning and walked two miles before we even got here. Plus, has anybody noticed, WE'RE OLD!! Just ask our kids.




Danny waited all day for the Secret Garden. Here are the kids at the entrance. It was very pretty inside. I look forward to coming back throughout the summer to see the progress of all the plants and flowers.

Der and I are about out of steam. Dan looks pretty tired too!

We made good on our promise and finished up at the ultimate rolling hill. Here you can see all our kids doing something different. I love how Lolly is helping Danny up the hill. What a great big sister. You can see the vendor tents in the top center of this photo. These gardens cover over 500 acres!


Here's another great sister. Yep, Natty carried him all the way from the river at the bottom !!! What a kid!!


It was a wonderful and exhausting day. I love my family. I think we probably walked 5 miles or so. It was so much fun.

What a great day!!

We had the best day yesterday. The day started off with me at the gym. I walked 2 miles then worked out with the weights. I'm trying to work out twice a day this week to give my metabolism a boost. Wish me luck! Once I was home I worked on the blog and Lolly made a picnic lunch for us. We headed over to Hunter park and stayed for hours!!! We rolled down the "mountains", and then I relaxed and read a magazine while the kids played tag around the playground. We left just in time to get Nat from school. I stopped at Arctic to get the kids a cone on the way home. We came home and relaxed a bit (I should have been doing laundry). Der came home and had a short nap then we had dinner on the patio (pigs in a blanket, fruit, chips and salsa.) We all made our way over to the church parking lot so the kids could cruise around on their scooters. You should see Danny go. He coasts around on one foot and you can tell that he thinks he is totally cool. After an hour or so at the church we came home and had a popsickle. Then we played basketball and that eventually turned into a game of tag. Can I just say that I tagged Bones and as I was running (yes I was running) away he said, "Wow Mom, when did you get so fast!" That could have been the best moment of my life LOL!!! Somebody told me I ran fast!! Never mind the fact that he has 60 pound feet. We didn't come inside until way after dark. It was a great day!! Oh, and we all slept like logs!!!

For you Yoga lovers

This is what you get when you let the kids run off with your camera!!
Remember when you could do this?

"Has anyone seen my Mom?"

Conference Weekend

This conference ran a little different than usual for our family.

Saturday morning Der and I headed out to Grantsville where he spoke at the funeral of a co-worker who died earlier in the week from her injuries in a car crash that Monday.

Derek did a wonderful job as usual. Plenty of Boeing employees were there to support her family. This has just been a very sad deal!!

Der left later Saturday afternoon for a burger with my Dad before they went to Priesthood session.

This is what we did the ENTIRE time he was gone.

That's right LEGOS!! One of my favorite things.

You can see in the picture that Nat is nursing a pretty serious sprain. She spent a week on crutches. What a pain.

Sunday scored a little higher on the Mormon scale. We watched the first session. It was the best our kids have ever done. They loved the activity books and game I put together for them. Once the session was over we continued our tradition of going to the park to get our wiggles out before the afternoon session. We ended up getting lunch on the way up to Copperton Park (our fav) and stayed way too long. It started to snow so we headed home and the kids put in a show and Der and I had a nap. That was spiritual enough for me. Hey, we get the Ensign right?

Please don't tell me one of the afternoon talks was on "appropriate Sunday activities and keeping the Sabbath day holy!!"

It was a nice weekend.

Does this look comfortable?

Danny's my buddy. I could even say he's my "Bum Buddy" because he literally walks as if he was attached to my bum. And if someone says "Hi", look out because that forehead is going straight to my bum. You could say he is a "Special " child ;-)

Well here is just one example of how he attaches himself to me. I was downstairs cleaning out the office and working on a Conference packet for my primary class. In case you can't tell, yes, he is in the office chair with me. He frequently crowds me right out of the chair and then asks me why I got out? Danny is so helpful!!

I found a really cute General Conference game on http://www.lds.org/ If you want to download it, go to the website and search: Conference Squares in Magazines. It's a cute activity. If you would rather me email you the game, post a comment on this post and let me know that you want it. It's really cute, I'm making it for my Primary class and their siblings. I was going to buy a big bag of Skittles or M&M's for the game pieces too.