A little pool

We had a fun evening. Chris blew up the little swimming pool we bought at Costco and we played and splashed for a couple of hours. It was wonderful. At first I thought the water straight from the outside tap was going to be too cold but it was SOOOO nice and refreshing! Ryan and Chris splashed each other relentlessly! The kids did somersaults in the water, turned the 'benches' on either side into slides, and had swimming races from one side to the other. Even Chris tried a somersault. The kids were so amused... especially that he sat up complaining that he got water up his nose! After the whiney 'Don't splash me' people got out... (Megan, Emily and Mom)... Ryan and Katie put the sprayers on full blast to play. It was a great 87 degree evening. I'm sure we will put the little pool to use several more times this month!

Emily Girl

Our little 'almost five year old' sweetheart, Emily. For some reason, everyone loves taking pictures of her. My brother, Mike, (photographer extraordinaire) took these of Emily when we were together in Idaho and I just love them. Thanks again, Mike.


Emily's favorite things: playing on the computer - dressing up in princess dresses with matching shoes - playing anything with Megan - drinking chocolate milk - coloring pictures - listening to musicals in the van (mostly Wicked and Joseph and the Amazing Techno colored Dream Coat... she'd rather do that than watch movies) - reading Dick and Jane books (she thinks they're hysterical) - playing Bitty Babies with Megan - talking about the baby in my tummy... EVERY day she looks at the color of my shirt and tells me what the baby is doing... Red: the baby is eating apples. Blue: the baby is swimming etc. So funny) - staying up late and watching movies on family movie nights - playing Gamecube with Ryan - singing songs - playing Guess Who or Candy Land or Chutes and Ladders with Mom - having her hair done (she doesn't like me brushing her hair but she likes it when her hair looks pretty) - having her back rubbed - wearing her brown GAP shirt or her pink American Girl shirt.

My favorite recent Emmy stories: A couple weeks ago Emily starting asking questions about death and heaven. "What would I be wearing, if I died?" I said I didn't know and then asked her what she thought. She said, "Well, I hope I wouldn't be wearing this! I don't have on the right matching skirt." She was wearing her whale shirt but didn't have on her whale skirt and was quite panicked about it... it was so funny. After we discussed death for a while I said, "Emily, don't think about this. You are not going to die." She thought about it for a minute and then said, "Ya, because we moved to Georgia and I don't think the bad guys know how to get here."

Meeting Baby Haylee Graham

We got to meet our new little cousin only one week after she was born. Perfect timing for a weekend in Utah! She's beautiful, Lindsey!







Miss Haylee, Papa Rob and Chris' sister... new Momma Lindsey

Happy 60th Anniversary Grandma and Grandpa!

We just got back from our trip to Idaho where we gathered to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of my Grandma and Grandpa... Ken and Naida Walton. On Sunday afternoon we got together in the big family room to pay tribute to Grandma and Grandpa. We sang funny songs and laughed, and shared our feelings and cried. At the end of our tribute we presented Grandma and Grandpa with two special gifts.

As long as I can remember Grandma has signed every card, letter and note with the phrase 'Love you 50 bananas'. Beside that was a picture of a banana colored yellow... every single time. To honor this great tradition we presented her with a 'Love you 50 Bananas Hat!' She loved it.

Grandpa is not without his own little quirks. Again, as long as I can remember, whenever we sat down to eat Grandpa would scan the dinner table and with a twinkle in his eye would exclaim "I think I'll stay!". For his gift Mike designed him a "I think I'll stay t-shirt". It's perfect.

Happy 60th Grandma and Grandpa!

Highlights of our Walton Family Reunion

- 4 wheeling and playing around at the Sand dunes
- listening to Scott play the guitar around the campfire
- watching Mike do the 'Sasha' pose everywhere we went
- watching Molly fall off her bike and lay there waiting for help
- joking around while waiting for Old Faithful to blow
- playing extreme Bocci with Amy & Travis through the barn
- watching Molly and her reaching arms
- seeing the Rexburg Temple and a tour of the BYU Idaho campus
- taking pictures of animals in Yellowstone
- hanging out and visiting with cousins, aunts and uncles
- singing all of Grandma and Grandpa's favorite songs
- playing on the curly slide from upstairs into the kids bunk room
- celebrating Molly's first birthday
- being stuck in Yellowstone and eating at the 50's diner
- seeing the rainbow at the Mesa Falls
- staying up late every night playing Ticket to Ride and Settlers
- having a picnic and playing in the Warm River
- teaching the kids the 'vroom vroom' medley for our tribute to Grandma and Grandpa

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6 months down... 3 to go!

9 Reasons I Love Being Pregnant

1. I love picturing my cute husband with a new baby in his arms. He is the best baby Daddy ever.

2. I love my kids curiosity about what the baby will be and what it will look like, and what we will name it. I love that they are just as excited as Chris and I.

3. I love the baby's constant kicks as I lay down in bed each night.

4. I love that I get to eat whatever I want without the slightest bit of guilt!

5. I love it when people ask me if this is my first one! ...And then the looks on their faces when I tell them it's my fifth. Makes me laugh.

6. I love that Chris is pretty much required to do anything I ask of him... but really is that any different when I'm not pregnant?

7. My pregnancy book says that "a pregnant woman's body is working as hard as someone climbing a mountain." I love that I can say "I'm climbing a mountain here!" and it gets me out of anything I don't want to do.

8. I love picking out new Pottery Barn baby bedding. This time it's cute trucks for my little guy!

9. I love being pregnant because it means I'm going to have a baby!... and I love having a new baby.

(I'll do the list of '100 reasons I don't like being pregnant' later...)

A few new pictures of the house

I finally got my scrapbook desk organized. It's in a corner of my closet and you can see the bathroom to the right. My jacuzzi tub is just right around the corner. Definitely my little area of the house!


The master closet. The middle drawer thing they built for the room. It has drawers on both sides. You can see where my scrapbook desk is in the right corner.


The kitchen table area. I still need to print out pictures for the frames but thanks to Chris being so anxious - they are already up on the wall. The door on the right leads right into Megan's room (for now... it will be the new baby's room)


Megan in the bonus room.




A view from the entry way... through the empty dining room into the kitchen.

Book of Mormon Stories

We've been having fun drawing Book of Mormon stories for a few recent Family Home Evenings and Sunday afternoon activities. The kids have LOVED it and I can't help but want to save their cute drawings. Megan is eager to have her own paper and draw as well. She even loves to show everyone her colored scribbles but I didn't scan any of hers! Sorry Megan. Here are a few of my favorites!


Here's Emily's picture of the Anti Nephi Lehies burying their weapons of war... it looks like their shields are not going to fit though.


This one is Ryan's complex version of the Nephites, Lamanites and Anti-Nephi-Lehies.


Have you ever seen cuter wicked Lamanites than this? I love it. This is Emily's as well.


This is Katie's picture of the mother teaching her stripling warrior sons.Katie said she was trying to make the Mom sit down but forgot to draw her chair. The sons are leaning 'because they are trying to listen!' I wish my kids listened so intently.


Ryan's. Obviously, the Brother of Jared story. Every kids favorite!


These are Katie's barges -- more like submarines if you ask me. I guess submarines are 'tight like a dish', aren't they? And there is the brother of Jared peeking out of one of the windows!


This one cracks me up. Tonight we talked about 3rd Nephi 17 where Jesus, after being resurrected, comes to visit the Nephite people and takes the children and blesses them. I told them to draw themself with Jesus. Ryan drew Jesus giving him a blessing while they argue about who loves eachother more. Ryan is saying "I love you more than {a ridiculously large amount of money}" and then Ryan continues "I love you Soooooooooooooooooooo much" and then Jesus says "I love you more than you said you love me."

When it rains, it Pours!

We had another downpour the other day coupled with thunder and lighting. It rains so hard that we all run out to the patio to just watch it. It's just amazing. The raingutters on top of the house get full so fast that pretty soon the water is just pouring off the roof in every direction -- even though the rain spout is empting water as fast as it can.


As you can probably see in this picture, it seemed there was a river running through our backyard. It actually did a lot of damage to our expensive 'pinestraw' towards the back of the yard. We could see the water just carry chunks of it away with it, towards the forest.


The kids had so much fun watching it. Where they are standing, even though covered, they were getting wet. The kids wanted to go running throught it -- maybe one of these times I'll let them. The rain only lasted about 20 minutes... but we had so much water.

It's still a boy!

I had my official ultrasound this morning. They wanted to get me in quick since I am already 25 weeks along so they sent me to the Columbus Diagnostic Center instead of the hospital on base. It was the quickest and best ultrasound I've ever had. (I mean the long offical ones honey, not yours!) ...mostly I didn't go in with a full bladder like you're suposed to so I just relaxed in the dimly lit room and almost fell asleep as she gave my tummy a massage. The baby was moving around a lot and kept yawning or opening and closing his mouth. It was fun to see. Here's a picture of his profile. They took a picture with a big arrow pointing to his 'you-know-what'but for the little man's privacy and so that I'm not flagged for inapropriate material I will leave it off. But I will have you know.... It's still a boy!

The first day of School

Seems crazy we are starting the school year already. Never before have I taken my kids 8:30 am 'first day of school pictures' in 88 degree weather with 80% humitity. It was pretty hot! The kids were so excited for school. Their teachers are both great. Their school is Eagle Ridge Academy... but it is not quite finished being built. They will transfer over on October 1st. Until then they have organized the classes so that Ryan and Katie's whole class with teacher will be moving over to the new school. I think it's going to be a great year.


Quotes from Katie's first day of school journal entry:
My teacher is Mrs. Jordan. She’s nice to me. My teacher is pretty. I like to write letters to her and I’m going to email her. My teacher has blondish-brownish hair. She can’t remember my name that well yet. At the end of the day she had to say “What’s your name again?” and I said, “Katie” and she said “How can I not remember that?”. My table is called the Monday table. There is a little store in our classroom and if we are good we get a little money and we can buy stuff… there is nail polish… I think I will get that. Some of the people in my class are Allie, Keke, (she’s the one that’s mostly bad at my table) Sara, (she’s at my table, she’s the nice one) Hunter, and I don’t really know anymore. Pretty soon I’ll know all of their names.


Quotes from Ryan's first day of school journal entry:
My teacher’s name is Mrs. Ward. I think she’s going to be the greatest teacher I’ve ever had. Whenever I’ve had a new teacher they get to be the best. In my class we did fun activities all day. In the morning we stopped and had lunch, well, we had brunch. I ate at 10:00 in the morning and they said that we should bring snacks for the afternoon but not if it’s bad for your body. You can’t have any sugar drinks only water or crystal light. There was only 2 boys on the table I was on. I did not like being around all those girls. They were girlie and yucky… not like Tori. We didn’t have any recess.

All about Megan

Age: 2 years 4 months
Favorite shows: Dora, Strawberry Shortcake, Princess movies
Favorite toys: Kitchen and play food, her animals, her Princess puppets, Jumbo legos, her Fisher Price doll house and little people, and her Bitty Baby (right now named Baby Leah after a cute new cousin)
Favorite things to do: Play with Katie, Emily and Ryan, be silly, drink chocolate milk, watch Dora, sing songs, have baths and showers, run as fast as she can, jump really high and fall to the floor, go to nursery, play dress-up, give hugs after family prayer, be chased, rub her chin and say "Hmmmmmm" when she's thinking of something or deciding something, wear dresses everyday ("Mommy, I wear a dress so I be a princess!") act like a doggie, play with her 'chicken' (she means kitchen and she knows she's saying it wrong but she can't say it) watch emily play "dot com" (anything on the computer), sit on mommy's bathroom counter and talk about animals while she gets her hair done, walk "by self" in the stores, point at things and say "that's so cute, Mommy", sing the songs of Wicked, watch a 'mooney' (movie) and do everthing herself.




Megan is entering the silly toddler stage. It doesn't help that she has three siblings who laugh at EVERYTHING she does. She is liking the attention and now tries to come up with silly faces, silly dances, and silly poses... all to make them laugh. On this night when I had the kids run and get their pajamas on, she ran too and came back with pajama pants and her favorite pink flowered hat to go with it. When the girls saw her ensemble they giggled and it made her act silly for a half hour!

Backyard Wildlife

It's been fun to look out my kitchen window and see the wildlife. There's a big open field and forest to the left. We've seen a deer - with big antlers and everything!, blue birds, the tiniest lizard I've ever seen, lots of humming birds, a big spider or two, a whole flock of birds, (Katie and I counted 35 on our lawn... yep, it's a big lawn) steroid using bees! - they're massive! and my favorite... huge beautiful butterflies. Anytime anyone sees one we yell it through the house and go running out to see them better. They love the bushes right outside Ryan's room window so he sees them all the time. What fun new pets we have!

Emily, You're Amazing!

Emmy is a swimmer! We practiced twice in Utah and she made good progress. She didn't love practicing but knew Mom and especially Dad would make her try to swim a little bit every time we went. Once Chris came to the pool late after golfing. As soon as Emily saw him walk in she said, "Oh great, you're going to make me put my face in the water, aren't you?" You got it... she mastered doggie paddling and we celebrated with ice cream... but she was still doing everything in her power not to get her face wet! Then we practiced torpedos over and over...(face in the water, arms straight, hands clapped together, legs kicking) with Mom holding on tight. "Mom, I love torpedos!" she said after we finally forced her to do it. Then when we were at Pirate's Cove with Scott, Elisha and Molly in Denver, everything clicked into place and she just started swimming, head in the water, coming up for breathes, and everything! Boy, was she ever happy. Thanks to Uncle Scott for spending tons of time helping her practice! Emily, you're amazing - we love you!
(If your computer is like mine you might need a couple minutes to download the slideshow. If the music stops and starts just push pause and wait a few minutes to let it download!)

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Pirate's Cove was so much fun. We all loved the lazy river. Ryan loved the waterslides. All the kids loved the fast little slides... especially Megan. She is a crazy watergirl who isn't afraid of getting her face wet. She slid down the slides, went under the water, stood up and headed straight for another ride... all with her tongue sticking out! Crazy girl. Thanks, Scott and Elisha for taking us and being such great hosts while we were in town.

Home Sweet Home

Just thought I'd add a few pictures of the house. We are still a long ways from being done but we are getting a little more organized. The living room is the only room done! But here are some pictures of the progress! I'll add more pictures as we get more done.





The Kitchen


Katie and Emily's room upstairs


The living room


The garage- that's everything that we are going to keep in the garage... our house has so much storage that we found places for everything else inside.


The kids lockers on the other side of the garage. I think we will get doors for them... we didn't have room for doors in the last house but we do here.

The bonus room... so far. This is half of the bonus room actually. The other half is a mess of toys and boxes full of books etc.

The family room... no furniture yet. Chris just bought his new flatscreen. It's not centered and mounted yet. Do you think the size looks ok? and who's going to fly out here and help me with these shelves?... I haven't done anything yet.

Our first Sunday in Georgia

As we drove out of our little neighborhood headed for church I stopped and had the kids get out by the entrance of our subdivision for a picture. The kids were excited to go to church to "see who their new friends would be". When we pulled into the parking lot, Ryan looked at the building and said, "This looks exactly like our old church." Let's see, what gave it away, the brick or the steeple? Isn't it so nice that at least the building, the meetings and schedule are the same. Makes you feel right at home the minute you walk in the door. We reclaimed our usual row and I sat and looked around. The Crawfords weren't in front of us, the Danielsons and Seaquists weren't to the right. Megan looked around but couldn't find Gabriella behind us to the left. It was kindof depressing actually. The people all looked nice but none of them looked like OUR friends.

The kids were excited for primary. We went and found their classes and sat down while I filled in the paperwork that the excited Primary President handed me. Then I dropped Megan off at the nursery. As soon as I walked in the nursery grandma looked up and said, "Who's this?" I said, "This is Megan. We just moved in." The nursery grandma opened her arms and said, "Megan, come give me a hug. We are so excited to meet you. You have a beautiful bow. You look like a princess... Megan, let me introduce you to all of your friends..." Megan didn't look back. What a brilliant idea to have a grandma in the nursery. As I picked up the kids from primary at the end of the meetings I asked the kids who had the best primary class. 'I did", "No, I did" they yelled as they shot their arms in the air... including Megan. Looks like it was a succesful first Sunday after all.