Chris's Gift

For mother's day Chris got me this video camera.


This thing is incredible! It's rugged, small enough to carry in the diaper bag at all times, and it's water proof! Which is perfect for our water-loving family.

I love it so much and love him even more for getting such a thoughtful gift. As soon as I figure out how to get videos onto the computer and onto the blog I will share some.

First Swim

Sometimes I think Chris may have come to earth in the wrong form, he is a fish at heart. He would spend every extra minute of every day in the water beginning with the first day of April (if I would let him). He finally convinced me to take Rylee and go swimming with him and much to my surprise it was fun! Also much to my surprise that we have a heated pool in our community (which may have been the deciding factor in the fun part seeing as how the water would have been freezing). I'm glad to know that the money we pay to our HOA isn't just for landscaping. :)


Rylee was a natural and loved the water. For her first time I was expecting to need to ease in and go slow and maybe even just introduce her to the water this time, but not for that girl. She's definitely an all or nothing girl even at 7 months of age, which could mean trouble later but is fun for now.




Chris was the most adorable dad with her and was absolutely thrilled that she liked being in the water. She was splashing and everything. Overall, definitely a successful first swim!



And did I mention that she was by far the cutest thing at the pool! Oh how I wish my legs could look cute with rolls like that!

Home Town

Or at least the town where I was born (seeing as how I've lived in Mesa since I was 3). Whatever you want to call it, we only recently realized that Chris has never been to some of the most fun places in Prescott. I'm not saying that relatives houses aren't the most fun, but he has only been up there and to my Aunt Lenora's house after her daughter's baptism about a year ago and has never had the opportunity to experience Prescott for the quaint (growing) small town that it is. So we decided to fix that issue during conference weekend. My mom and dad were gracious enough to go up with us and be our "tour guides" of the town. We went to places that I had never even been in all my years of visiting.

We took the quads up to Spruce Mountain and made it almost all the way to the watch tower but there was still about a foot of snow up on the higher part of the mountain, but it was still a fun ride up and back.



Rylee even got to experience her first quad ride.

After we went quading (or four-bying as Chris calls it, we went to Goldwater Lake and walked around for a little bit. It was colder than I had anticipated and we left Rylee's blanket at my grandparent's house so Chris came up with a make-shift way to keep both of us warm.

Pretty clever!

We ate lunch at The Grill in downtown Prescott by the court house.

And Saturday morning Ty and Jade and Peighton drove up with Brook to meet us a Zeke's for breakfast. I have never seen such big pancakes and no reward for eating a whole one in a certain amount of time, but Chris didn't finish his anyways so we didn't feel too left out.

We all went and walked around Lynx Lake.



Smelling trees along the way...



Peighton trying to skip rocks like daddy...


And Rylee helping navigate our route...


We were going to walk all the way around until we got to the dam and realized there is still to much water in the lake and that there was no way we were getting accross with two babies and a stroller without getting wet, but it did keep the boys entertained for a while. What is it about signs like this that attract men? It's almost like a challenge. I mean if they really don't want people over there they should post a sign saying "Nothing to see here" or just post nothing at all.



Nonetheless, it was all fun and games, until Ty stepped onto an unstable log and got his only pair of jeans and shoes wet. So we turned the other way and walked back in the direction we came.


On the way back to grandma's Ty tried to get his shoes and socks dried (socks in the window, shoes from the driver's side rear-view mirror), but I don't think it worked.

We spent a little bit of time downtown Prescott which is so cute!


And then decided to head home.

Thank you nature for being so beautiful and giving us the perfect weather and beautiful places to go and amazing things to see! It's times like these that I'm glad I'm obsessed with taking pictures because it really does make me look at things differently. What a beautiful world we live in!



And thank you mom and dad for being our guides and being willing to help Chris and Jade get a different view of Prescott than they had before.

A grateful,