From 4 pounds to 4 years!!!

Happy Birthday, Hailey! It's hard to believe that our little four pound preemie is now four years old.

Here is a picture of her August of 2004....

And here is a picture of her today...


We had a really fun day. It's always fun when a birthday falls on Saturday! She started out with breakfast in bed. However, she was way too excited to see her new bike. I made her eat one bite before going downstairs. No words can possibly describe how excited Hailey was to get a new bike. She has been talking about it for months. Every time we go to a store, she has to try all the bikes out. This past week she even decided to cancel Chuck E. Cheese's (that's where she wanted to go for her party). At first I couldn't figure out why. She loves Chuck E. Cheese. When she said something about not being able to take bikes in Chuck E. Cheese, it all made sense.

So, we let her ride her bike all morning. She loved it!


It was a special treat for Hailey that we were able to babysit Morgan and Kayla most of the day. Hailey loves her cousins. In the afternoon, we went to the Herriman Splash Pad to celebrate with Grandma and Grandpa Whipple. We had the whole park to ourselves for awhile! The kids had a great time and as always, grandma spoiled them with lots of yummy treats!


Hailey at the beginning of the popsicle...
Hailey at the end of the popsicle... WOW! Her face was stained for the rest of the day!
Opening presents... She couldn't believe they were all for HER!


In the evening, we went to Chuck E. Cheese's. We were there for several hours. Broman, Rachel and kids came. Bergan and Brinden stopped by for awhile, too. The kids had a blast. Hailey loved the tick tock ride. Its funny how all Hailey cared about were the rides, and all the older kids cared about were whichever things gave them the most tickets.



We had Chuck E. Cheese come out and sing Happy Birthday to Hailey. She was so shy. She wouldn't even look at him. I think she really liked it, though.



Hailey was really spoiled with gifts and has LOVED playing with them. Here are the things she got...
A new Barbie bike and a snap and style outfit from the family
A Snap and Style Princess doll, Princess jewelry, ballet shoes, and a wand, and Disney Scrabble Junior from Grandma and Grandpa Whipple and Leslie
A Swimming barbie set from Morgan and Kayla
A porcelin doll, book and stuffed butterfly from Grandma and Grandpa Sillito
A Littlest Pet Shop set from Emily and Dave
A Little Mermaid Under the Sea Game from Corey, Cherice, and Raylee
Money from Luci, Tina, and Grandma B. (which she is using to buy new shoes for school)
A Lightning McQueen car from her friend Kai

We love our Hailey so much.

School Days!

Yesterday was the first day of 2nd grade for Tanner and Mickell. They seemed to really enjoy it (although they were to0 interested in playing with friends after school to give me any detail). It feels good to be in a little more of a routine now. I am really excited for both of them. I think that 2nd grade was one of my favorite years of school. I was thinking about it yesterday and it's amazing how many memories I have of that year. I hope their year is just as good. Tanner was really cute last night during family prayers. In the prayer he blessed that he would have a good day at school tomorrow and that he wouldn't get too hungry before it was time for lunch. I guess that it will be an adjustment not being able to have a snack whenever they get hungry. Here are a few pictures of them on their way to the bus stop.


On Sunday night we had a family home evening on the importance of learning and then Baylen gave each of the kids a father's blessing. The kids will probably always remember this experience because we did all this in the dark. Our power was off for four hours that night! Baylen gave Tanner and Mickell their blessings and then Hailey decided that she wanted one for preschool. After Hailey got off the chair, Ashlyn went over, sat on the chair, and folded her arms. It was so cute. Baylen gave her a little blessing, too. I really wish I would have thought to grab my camera.

Mirror Lake Rocks!!!

This past weekend we went on our annual Whipple family camping trip up to Mirror Lake. We had a lot of fun! As I was thinking about some of the different things we did up there, I realized that we kind of had a "rock" theme going. So here's a little about our "rockin" camping trip.

Playing on rocks
The kids had a great time playing on the rocks along the bank of the lake. They didn't seem to mind the freezing cold water at all. Tanner and Hailey both had a good fall into the water! Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera ready either time.


Posing on rocks


I caught this picture of Mickell sitting on a rock in front of the lake. Mirror lake is an absolutely beautiful lake.

Fishing on rocks

Tanner spent lots of time fishing on this rock.
Fishing was amazing this year. Both Hailey and Tanner caught their own fish.
This is Hailey "rolling" her fish in...

Baylen and Corey were able to take their float tubes out to the middle of the lake to do a little fly fishing. They had a great time and caught a ton of fish!


Painting rocks
Mickell and Hailey spent some time one afternoon painting rocks. They left a few really colorful rocks at the campsite for the next people to enjoy.


Imagining on rocks
Tanner, Mickell and Hailey spent hours imagining all sorts of things on this rock. One minute they were playing house and the next minute they were ninjas. I've decided I just need to get them a really big rock for Christmas!


Sleeping on rocks
Baylen accidently punctured our air matress with a zipper on the first night. He tried patching it with duct tape. However, we discovered, in the middle of the night, that duct tape doesn't work for everything. The next night Emily and Dave let us borrow their mattress (they had to go home that day). It's amazing how much of a difference an air mattress makes. We must be getting old.


We also had some "rockin" good food and enjoyed some "rockin" company. Here are a few more pictures from the trip.

Tagged

I was tagged a few weeks ago and had good intentions of doing it (it's kind of a fun tag). However, life happened and I never got around to it. Ashlyn and I are home by ourselves today and she is asleep. I really don't want to spend my "alone" time cleaning (which is what I should be doing). So, I thought I would do this post.

10 years ago...1998
I was 19 years old. I had finished my first year at Ricks College. It was an amazing year. In fact, it was probably one of the BEST YEARS. I made so many lifelong friends. I think my testimony was stronger than ever and I felt really good about where I was in life. My grandpa died that summer. That was a hard experience and I still (10 years later) miss him a lot. I'm sure I had a job that summer, but I can't remember what it was. I really enjoyed being home with my family for a few months before heading back up to Rexburg.

5 years ago...2003
We were living in Starcrest Apartments in Orem. Tanner and Mickell had just turned two. They were incredibly cute two year olds who kept me very busy. I think it was around that time that Baylen found out he had gotten into Nursing School. My good friend Cami had just gotten married and moved into my apartment complex. It was fun having her live so close again!

5 months ago...March
Nothing significant happened that month. We celebrated Baylen's birthday and Easter. The kids were still in school so we were in the school, homework routine.

5 things on my to do list tomorrow
Wow, I wish there were only five things on my list for tomorrow!
1. Vacuum and steam clean the carpets of our Astro (we need to get it ready to sale so that we don't have to renew the insurance on it in September!)
2. Grocery shop for our camping trip.
3. Fold and put away the piles of clothes sitting on the couch in my loft.
4. Totally unload my messy crawl space closet so that we can get the camping gear out of our crawl space (it's times like this that I really wish I had a basement!)
5. Take the kids to Back to School Night.

5 things I would do if I was suddenly a billionaire...
1. Pay off our house.
2. Add a few more rooms onto the back of our house, remodel my kitchen, and build a deck in the backyard.
3. Take my family (including extended family) on several trips including Disneyland, France, and Hawaii.
4. Give money to charities.
5. Buy a boat.

5 bad habits...
1. Not getting my kids to bed on time.
I hate doing the night time routine. It probably doesn't help that I have to do it alone most of the time. I'm making it a goal to be more organized about it this next school year.
2. I'm not sure what you would call this but I have the aweful habit of not cleaning the things that don't show. I do a decent job about keeping my rooms picked up. However, I'm aweful about cleaning my closets, fridge, oven, and drawers.
3. Stressing out about money.
All I can say is "poor Baylen". It is so hard for me to go to a restarant and order what I want. I always have to order the cheapest thing. I'm sure there has been more than one occasion when I've made Baylen feel guilty about ordering something a little more expensive.
4. Not exercising.
I have yet to find a form of exercise that I really enjoy. My friend and I used to walk. I loved that we were able to talk for a couple hours each day. But, I didn't like the exercise part of it. Baylen and I tried to play Dance, Dance. That didn't last very long either.
5. Laundry
I have the aweful habit of forgetting when I have clothes in the washer (relating back to the "it's out of sight" problem.) I can't tell you how many times I've had to wash a load of laundry more than once because I forgot about it and it started smelling like mildew.

5 places I've lived...
1. Bennion
2. South Jordan
3. Rexburg
4. Orem
5. Kaysville

5 things people don't know about me...
This one is hard!
1. I love country music. I personally don't think this is that unusual. However, I was talking about music with my neighbors one day and they thought it was the strangest thing that I listen to country. They said I don't seem like a "country music type person." I guess I'm not quite sure what a country music person is supposed to look like.
2. I'm kind of addicted to HGTV. I rarely watch TV. However, when I turn the TV on, it's always to HGTV. Once I've started watching, I have the hardest time turning it off. I get so drawn into it that I totally loose track of time.
3. I think that going to the movies is a total waste of money. I don't love movies and have the hardest time spending so much money on them. We take our kids to one movie a year (for our family activity night in December) and then one drive in. Those are the only times I can justify spending the money (this doesn't include the dollar theater). It's so crazy to me that it costs more for Baylen and me to see a movie in the theater than it would to actually buy the movie when it comes out. Baylen is just the opposite. He LOVES going to the theaters. So, to save money, I usually send him with a brother or brother-in-law. I would much rather spend my portion on decorations for my house.
4. I love working in my yard.
This is probably a surprise to people because my yard doesn't look all that fabulous right now. In fact, I think we have more weeds than flowers. However, when I have the time (that is the key), I love getting down in the dirt.
5. I've never been east of Utah. I know this is kind of sad since I am 29 years old. However, I have access to some pretty awesome vacation spots west of Utah! It is my goal, though, to at least make it across the border to Colorado sometime in my life!

Island Park- Part 2!

The last week of July, we had the opportunity to go up to Island Park again. This time it was for the Bird Family Reunion. It was definitely warmer the second time around! We stayed at the same place we did for the reunion 15 years ago. It was fun to think back on some of the memories from the past trip. For example, they still have the penny candies that we bought there 15 years ago.

Each family had their own little cabin to sleep in. This is a picture of ours.

We all hung out together at this big lodge. It was really nice!

We had so much fun together. I love how all the cousins are such good friends. I didn't realize, before this trip, how many girl babies there are around Ashlyn's age. Here are a few of them playing together.


Mickell loves playing with Claire. They both just happened to have the same shirt (and wear it the same day!) We had to get a picture of the twins!
Aunt Rebecca had some really fun crafts for the kids to work on.

Hailey had a lot of fun building domino houses with Uncle David.
Tanner spent lots of time riding bikes with the boys. For some reason I didn't get a picture of this.

On Tuesday, we took several rafts and tubes and floated down the river. Hailey was really nervous at first but started enjoying it a little more towards the end. Tanner and Mickell loved squirting water from water guns at the other rafts and tubers. We didn't dare take cameras down the river with us, but took a few pictures before we left.



Several of us floated down the river a second time. This time ended up being more of a rescue mission. As we were floating down, we noticed this really old lady in the water holding onto a branch. Everyone in our raft thought that she had been out in the water fishing. However, a few minutes later we ran into another lady that asked if we could paddle down stream and rescue their canoe. We went as fast as we could (while some of the other cousins rescued the ladies). We found their canoe right as it was going under water. Long story short- we took these ladies, as well as their granddaughters, all the way to the end of the trip. I'm really glad that we did decide to take that second trip so that we could help them.

On Wednesday, we went into West Yellowstone and out to Big Springs while everyone else went into Yellowstone. West Yellowstone was a lot of fun until we realized that Hailey wasn't with us. There were so many of us walking in and out of the stores together, that I guess I assumed she was holding someone else's hand. I don't think there are many feelings out there that are worse than not knowing where your child is. I ran up the main street, not even knowing where to start looking. Of course, all those worse case scenerios were running through my head. I was finally able to find her because I heard her in a store screaming. I knew that scream would be useful one of these days!!! She was really shaken up at the moment. But, she hasn't said anything about it since then. I'm hoping that's a good sign that she's not scarred for life because of this experience.

Here are a few pictures from Big Springs.




It ended up being a really fun reunion. We look forward to several more in the future!