Zion's National Park

Zion's had a get in free week, and two of my sisters and I decided to take advantage of it and go play. We had 11 kids between us, 3 of which were 1 and younger and the oldest kid was 10. It was way fun! We weren't able to go on a hike because we didn't have as much time as we thought we would, but we had a fun picnic and it was fun to just be together with my sisters and our kids. We got a lot of funny looks and comments because of how many kids we had with us. I would like to visit Zion's again one day with Jacob. Even though I've lived pretty close to it most of my life, I've only been there a couple of times, and mostly when I went on field trips in school. We are totally going to have to go back another time!

8 months

Kent turned 8 months old last week, and I've been too busy to post anything. We are playing in St. George with family for a few weeks and its been crazy and fun!

A few quick things about Kent at 8 months.

Kent weighs just over 23 pounds.

Kent is still in the 18 month clothes. He has been in this size of clothes longer than any other size.

Kent pulls himself up on EVERYTHING! He is such a busy boy!

Kent is a crawler and gets into anything he can.

Kent is a good little eater. He eats three meals a day and its usually what the rest if the family is eating for dinner, plus her nurses 4-6 times a day and lots at night.

Kent still wakes up a lot during the night and has still been sleeping with me, but that is going to change when we get back home. I'm going to work on getting him to sleep all night in his bed so that I can sleep with my other boy when he comes home.

Kent is a little more anxious about strangers than he has been before. It took him a little time to warm up to his grandparents. Not too much time, just a few minutes, but at first he just wanted to stick with his mama. He hasn't ever done that before this trip.

He is extremely active and loves to be bounced and jiggled and roughed up a bit.

He loves Rachel and follows her everywhere.

He loves his mama! I'm totally his favorite person.

He is a snuggler.

He can climb stairs.

He loves playing in water.

He is really funny because if there is something in his way he doesn't try to go around it, he tries to go over it. Instead of going around the table and chairs, he goes right through them and bonks his head the whole time. He climbs over legs and toys and has even tried climbing over his cousin Lexi who is about the same age as him but isn't quite as mobile.

He is the most happy chill baby ever. He likes to play and play and play.

I can't think of much else right now, but I'm so glad this Kent boy is in our family! He is such a sweet spirit and our family definitely wouldn't be complete without him!

Laundry

Look what climbed into my laundry basket all by himself! I love my funny wild wiggly boy! Sorry all the pictures are blurry, this kid is wiggly!!

Easter

Just a few pics from Easter. I keep forgetting to post them. 

Rachel sitting with the Easter Bunny at the breakfast/easter egg hunt that was put on for families of the deployed. 

Kent eating my bacon he snatched from my plate when my back was turned.

Playing at the park with friends afterwards. 

We had a really fun Easter. We had resurrection rolls for breakfast Easter morning and we had a fish dinner with rolls and honey that night. It was a very special day, and Rachel kept telling me about how she was so excited that Jesus was resurrected. We set a place for Jesus at dinner and put a picture of Jesus up so it was like he was eating with us and Rachel kept talking about him and to him and in her prayer at dinner time she said, "and please help Jesus to walk to our house and eat dinner with us for real." I taught Rachel some Easter songs and she has loved singing them, and still two weeks after Easter is still singing them. Just the other day I heard her singing, "He is Risen" to herself and I thought it was the cutest thing ever! 

I had to teach sharing time in Primary and it went so well. It really was a good day.

I love Easter, and I love my family!

Conference

Wasn't conference so wonderful? I look forward to conference every time it comes around. I wasn't sure how it would go with my two wiggly little munchkins, if I would be able to pay attention at all, and Rachel got super sick the day before. She was going at both ends. It was so sad to see her so sick. Thankfully it was just a 24 hour bug and she wasn't barfing during conference.

I switched my couch and table around so that we could have a comfy place to watch. When Rachel came down to breakfast on Saturday, she said, "This is so funny!"

Rachel was quite excited for conference too. She kept telling me how excited she was and she kept telling Heavenly Father how excited she was in her prayers too. Then when one session would end she would tell me, "I want to watch more conference!"

 Here are some of her drawings from conference. She is getting so good at drawing!

She told me she was giving President Monson LOTS of hair. :)

If you look where I'm pointing on this one, you can see where she drew herself next to the singing lady. I love that she is trying to draw now!

Kent got a little bored and was trying to escape.

I love him!

Making a fruit loop necklace.

I didn't know how much I needed conference until it started. There were so many talks that I just needed to hear. I know that every one of those that spoke were called of God. One talk that really stood out to me was the one by Sister Dalton about "What e're thou art, act well thou part." I had heard the line before, but it really stood out to me. It was a fun couple of days, and I'm already itching to read some of the talks again. 

I really missed having Jacob there to watch conference with us, but he has been listening to it in his spare time and it is fun to have that little connection even though he is so far away.