Trip to Dahlanega, Georgia

We took a trip Friday night up to North Georgia in Dahlanega where Tommy is doing some restoration work on some streams and rivers and ponds and things on this huge piece of property. we stayed up there for the night and tromped around on saturday and had a lot of fun on the mule and traipsing around.

Here we are getting ready to go.

Gabe's ready to drive this big thing already!

the girls with our dog, Chloe around one of the ponds. Right after this, we let chloe off the leash and she had sooooooo much fun running around and playing in the river that is coming up!

Here we are having a little walk around the pond.

this is the Chestetee River. The girls had a ton of fun getting all wet...while it lasted. Right when they were done, they were super cold. We were in the mountains after all!

they had a whole heap of fun running through the water. Chloe was super excited and kept running up and down and back again!

Here is Aiselyn finding some warmth in the warm sand after soaking herself in the river. she and abby were soooooo dirty and covered in sand. there was a little beach of sorts on the bank of the river. It was really neat. On the property, right next to this river there used to be an old Indian resevation or whatever and you can still find broken pottery and arrow heads in the ground. It was fun trying to spot some on our little walk to the river. Chloe had so much fun running around she didn't even want to get back into the mule to ride home, she insisted on running behind us all the way back. I was impressed with our little puppy for never even wanting to run away and for getting so much excercise! We had a fun trip and came home in time to get clean for Church today where the kids had their primary program. It was awesome. the kids yelled..I mean sang their little hearts out especially Aiselyn! All in all, it was a GREAT weekend!

Aiselyn's birthday and Halloween!!!!!

These pictures are all out of order. My computer won't let me drag and change the order. That or I'm just retarded, take your pick!

Here are all of us in our halloween outfits. Abby is an alligator/dragon (it depended on the day you asked her which one she was, but I think she did say she was the alligator on halloween day!), Gabe is a little lion, and Aiselyn is Cinderella! Aren't they just so cute?!

Tommy and I are ceiling fans!

Here is Gabe eating a sucker and making a royal drooling mess but looking incredibly adorable!

Aiselyn turned six just before halloween and we had a huge turn out for her party. we invited almost the whole branch worth of kids and they all pretty much came. It was awesome, but very loud! Aiselyn chose these colors on her polar bear cake and I made an extra cake since there was going to be so many people. it was really cool. she had a blast. thank you all for coming and sharing this day with her!

We carved pumpkins for Family Home Evening one night. That was a lot of fun! The kids enjoyed themselves and chose the patterns with help of course!

we got a puppy!!!!

Some friends of ours were trying to down size their animals---they had quite a few---so we offered to help them out. This is 5 month old Chloe. She is a mutt---beagle and boxer at least---and is a lot of fun and really good with the kids and of course house broken or she wouldn't have come home with us. These were taken on her first day with us. I'm glad she likes us and our kitty although Chloe likes to try and get the kitty to play with her and Tommy cat doesn't like that too much. He is still miffed at us most of the time for bringing in another animal especially that is so much bigger than he is. Welcome home Chloe!!!

My Cute Kids!!!

We went to Tanger Outlet Mall the other day to look around and I found these hats in the clearance bin. How cute are they? The girls are just adorable in them. Here are some fun pictures of them! We took a bunch more of course but I don't want to wait for the uploading of course so here are a couple of good ones of both of them together!

Gabe likes to play the piano. He's starting early! If he keeps it up, when he gets a little older, he will be a real heart throb. Every girl likes a boy who can play the piano to them. Watch out!!!!

He especially loves to play while I am playing. I always need to keep the piano open so that he can crawl...yes, he is still crawling at 14 months...up to the piano and plunk around. It is so precious!

Here is Gabe and me!

Don't you look dapper?

I got this little outfit from a friend of mine, and I scheduled for Gabe to get his picture taken at Target for turning 1. I tried it on Gabe to see how it fit and just knew that he needed his pictures taken in this outfit. I went cheap and just picked one pose at the store but couldn't get enough of how cute Gabe is so I took a bunch more of him at home. I love this little man. He is so fun to have around and he is now starting to give actual hugs and loves and it is so PRECIOUS! He came down with a cold today that he must have caught from his sisters so he has a fountain instead of a nose--poor guy! The girls love school, to say the least, and it is so fun to have one-on-one time homeschooling Abby. I need to take more pictures of them, but they are always so busy playing and whatnot that I just forget. oh well! enjoy these fun pictures of Gabe!

hair cuts!

so we all finally got our hair cut. this isn't the best picture of the kids of course but it was at least right after it was done. Gabe-we actually cut last weekend. I have more fun pictures of him to come. Mom, this is especially for you to see what I did to my hair. I like it because it is a little different than I had it as an A-line, but of course I can't make it look quite like my hair dresser did. It is still fun though!

Bowling with the Trauts

This past weekend we had the pleasure of having Tommy's cousin and his family (Tim, Lauren, Jordan, and Brandon) stay with us. We had a blast with them. They drove down from Pennsylvania on their way down to Disney World. It was so much fun. Here we are eating breakfast as Aiselyn goes off to school and the Trauts drive on down to Florida. I hope you guess are having fun and don't sweat to death!
we finally went bowling. I have been wanting to for a very long time. We all had a blast. Here are some pictures to show for it!

Aiselyn's first day of school!

The big day has finally arrived! Aiselyn went off to school. She is so big and grown up now. The whole week before she kept saying how nervous she was, but Tommy had a little talk with her last weekend. she wanted to go with me to take dinner to the Godwins who just had a baby and on the way over she kept saying to me how she wasn't nervouse anymore. I asked her what changed basically and she said Dad talked to her. I tried to get out of her what he said but I never really got an answer. well, turns out that he told her how he would give her a father's blessing and that took all the worry away...just the knowledge that he would do that for her. I love Tommy and his desire to be a good priesthood holder and for Aiselyn and her budding faith in our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ.

She ended up having a great day at school that day and everyday since. Good job, Aiselyn!
Here they are eating breakfast before school.
Aiselyn as she left for school.

Aiselyn in front of the school. I love you, girl!

Gabe turned ONE!!!!!

Gabe turned one last week! we are soooo excited! He is still a joy to have around. He recently started his mommy separation anxiety but he is usually quite happy. I am so glad the Lord saw fit to put him in our family. He is such a delight in our home.

Here is a little video to enjoy from his birthday-day since we actually had his party the day after.

Trip to Colorado

Denver Ranch:
On our way out camping for our family reunion with my family, we first stopped in Dallas, TX to spend the weekend with the Foulgers. we had a lot of fun and are so thankful for them letting us stay and visit with them. Somehow we didn't take any pictures but we did have a lot of fun swimming while burning, and seeing UP in 3d that was awesome!

We then drove up to Denver where coincidently Sarah and her family were there for her friend's wedding and spent a day with her with the hospitality of the Braherds. It was so nice to meet them and see all their animals. Here are some pictures of some of them.

FISHING:

Eventually we made it to camp and had soooo much fun with everybody. The girls of course loved spending all day with their cousins, running around, and getting filthy everyday! Here are some pictures of when we went fishing.

S'MORE FUN:

Of course we had to make s'mores...camping just isn't camping without s'mores. Here are some captured moments.

We went camping at Jellystone Park in Estes Park so of course the girls needed a picture with Yogi! My parents got all the grandkids lunchboxes with Yogi, Boo-Boo, and Cindy Bear on the front.

HIKING:
we were camping right next to Rocky Mountain National Park so we did some hiking up there in the mountains and had so much fun. The kids did amazing and actually had very little complaining about the distance and such. It was awesome!

Here are Aiselyn and Abby with their cousins Lydia and Elyse.

Lydia, Connor, Ethan, Aiselyn, and Abby by the river.

Here's me diving off a huge boulder to the rapids below!

Not really, I was scared out of my pants being that high and close to the edge. I don't particularly care for heights, to say the least!

Here's my muscle man!

Here's some of us hiking.

This is us on a boulder by a waterfall we hiked to.

Here is us by the waterfall with my parents.

SCENERY: