A little summer vacation.....

We had not been to Kentucky for a while so this summer it was at the top of our "MUST DO" list. May I say We had a blast! We decided to fly into Lexington this time. It truly is beautiful horse country. Another cool thing about Lexington is this castle. It was once rumored to be built by Lee Majors (The Fall Guy) an actor from the 80's, who was building it for Farrah Faucet. That was just a rumor from fairy tail land. It was really built by a wealthy developer for his new bride. They had traveled to Europe for their honeymoon. She fell in love with the castles so Mr. Martin (the wealthy developer) built her one.
The homes are so beautiful.


One thing we did this time was go to "Dale Hollow Lake" and go camping and cruise the lake. We had SOOOOOOO much fun. We had a picnic on the lake and the girls got to do some tubing. My cousins even got to ski. Emma wanted to but her feet were too small for the ski's.

After the lake we drove over to my Aunt Sue and Uncle Malcolm's house. It was so nice getting to visit with them. My Uncle is amazing cook and has many cook books from all over. My Aunt was born with a green thumb and has plants that I could never imagine so big. I really enjoyed spending time with them.

That same day we took the girls to the ferry. This is the only working free ferry in the State of Kentucky.

Here is a slide show of the fun!

Emma turns 9!!!!

This year Emma wanted an "Alice in Wonderland" themed party. It was a lot of fun putting it together and turned out super cute.

This is a candy bar we did.

Then of course the food bar.

Picture of her opening gifts with some friends. They have bathing suites on because we did a 30 foot water slide down the back hill. They had the best time with it. I think even a few adults got in on the action.

Here is the party tent prior to party.

We even did the cupcake route. Just like the movie.



Here she is on the actual date of her birthday. That is granddad sitting in the background.

Emma wanted to go to the Japanese Steak House.....this is the "cake" they brought out to her.
They even TRIED to sing Happy Birthday. It was so funny, but very thoughtful.


Emma and Grace waiting for the rice. :)

Happy Birthday Emma! I hope you have at least 90 more! Love you lots!

Us and our 32 kids go to Nauvoo!

Justin and I were bless to be able to go to with the Stake Youth to Nauvoo. We pulled the luggage and food trailer with our truck. The trip was an amazing experience and we loved every minute of it. It was such a testimony builder of the Early church history. Here are a few things we got to see and do...





We took a little side adventure through Nashville. We got to see "Music Row" and the "Ryman" aka Original "Grand Ol' Opry".

We got to drive by the St. Louis Arch.

One of our greatest moments was to be able to work in the Nauvoo Temple.

We also got to go to Carthage and see the jail that Joseph Smith was held at. He fell out of the 2nd story window after being shot. We also got to see the original door that has the bullet holes through it.
Justin and I standing in front of the Nauvoo Temple.

One of Justin's highlights was visiting the "Browning" house. This is the home of Jonathon Browning the Founder of Browning Guns. We got to see his work shop and some of the early weapons he built.

One of the highlights for the girls was getting to see the BYU Ambassadors.

The most difficult thing we did was going on a 3 mile Trek. It was a huge struggle. I have so much respect for the early saints who had to pull a hand cart. I really don't know if I could have done it.

This picture was taken right before we got our carts and the journey began.

Here is what the carts looked like.

This is just a small sampling of what we ALL went through.

The trip was one of the most exciting trips I have ever been on. We learned a lot and enjoyed spending it with the youth. Justin and I are looking forward to taking our girls back so they can experience the same feelings and things we did.

End of the 2009 -2010 School Year

Another school year has past and the girls will be moving on to the 4th and 2nd grade. This year I did these cute shirts up for them. Their classmates got to sign the back.

Because the girls school does a form of tag teaching they have two teachers each. Theses are the gifts we did for them...

For the past 3 years we have had Karyn as our PTA President. She has done an amazing job and will be greatly missed. It is official now and the torch has been pasted on to me.

This is a gift that was given to Karyn to say thanks for all the hard work. It is a quilt of t-shirts that have been used at the school while she has served in the PTA.

The Florida Keys

Our company was invited to attend a pre-bid in Marathon, Florida. That is right in the middle of the Florida Keys. And since it was the day before Memorial Weekend we thought we would make a mini vacation out of it.



We stayed here.....The Hammocks.

This is the view from our room....




We wanted to do something different so we decided to rent a boat and go snorkeling.


Here is a picture of the girls as we are going out to "Sombrero Reef".

When we got there (4 miles out) it was busy. It is an amazing place to see LOTS of fish.

All 4 of us snorkeled.

Here is Justin...

Emma and Grace

On our way out a whole group of dolphins played with us. They thought it was fun to swim around us.

At the resort they had Large Lizards everywhere....

We also got to see a couple of Mermaids.

Even though the kids were "Crabby" (LOL Get it??) we all had a great time!

Tim and Lady A

Tim McGraw and Lady A came into concert on Friday. My Mom was able to get us a couple of media passes so the 4 of us had awesome seats and even had access to the Sound Mixer area for some great shots directly infront of the stage.

May I say Lady A sounded super fantastic. They are one of my favorite groups!

What happens in Vegas......beats you back home!!

Justin and I took a little mini vacation to Vegas to celebrate our fantastic years of marriage together. We had a lot of fun but missed the girls so much. It was our first get-a-way without them. 9 years ago this past March was our last vacation with just the two of us. The longest we have ever gone without our girls in a night. But needless to say we survived and had a great time. We met up with some friends of ours. Robin, Shawn and Kim. They are from Kentucky and had never been to Vegas like us. Together we had a ton of fun, laughed a lot, walked a lot and did a lot of U-turns......A LOT! (Most of you will not get that but they will. LOL)

We not only visited the "Strip" but also visited the Hoover Dam. It was amazing. While at the dam we took some "dam pictures", had some "dam ice cream" and seen some "dam expensive gifts". But all-in-all we had a "dam good time".

Justin and I also took the opportunity to visit the Las Vegas Temple. It was so pretty. We are so glad we were able to work this in.

If you watch "PAWN STARS" then you probably recognize the sign below. We went to the pawn shop where the show is filmed. We did get to see the "Old Man" and a few items that have been on the show.

Here is a picture of the Stratosphere. We saw 2 people bungee jump off.

Here is a picture of the hotel "New York, New York".

This is the Luxor. We went to a Carrot Top show here. He was very funny.

This is the Excalibur. It sits right next to the Luxor.

This is the Bellagio where you always here about the fountains. We got to see 2 fountain shows.

This is a picture of the INSIDE to Paris. It is so beautiful.

This is Caesar's Palace. It think it was one of my favorite.

This is also inside of Caeser's Palace. Cher does a show there. In Vegas this show is known as C--Her. They had some of her clothes on display. All I can say....Oh my!