Earth Day

We decided to celebrate Earth Day in a few small ways. Here are some of the fun activities we did...

Recycled plastic bottles at the Disney Store and got these cool Earth Day bottles.

Went and recycled the rest of our bottles.

Went to the movie theater and watched earth. It was a very interesting movie, but next time we won't be bringing our 18 month old :). For each ticket bought THIS WEEK Disney will plant a tree.

And...(drum roll)...

Our family's BIGGEST contribution to EARTH DAY was.......

We officially put Jayden in UNDERWEAR this week.

That's right...we are finally attempting the full out POTTY TRAINING!!!

Jayden has worn underwear for 5 days in a row and has only had 2 accidents. Jayden has helped us save at least 20 diapers so far. Way to be GREEN Jayden!

Look how excited he is to be a BIG BOY...

And my personal favorite....

On a sad note...here's a picture from earlier today. Jayden was sitting on the potty and fell off while leaning forward in attempt to aim his "pee pee" down. Poor kid! It was mainly our fault though. His legs were pinned together because we left his pants and underwear on, so he wasn't able to straddle the toilet like he is used to. His face hit the corner of the step stool and cut his lip. We didn't get a picture of the inside of his lower lip, but it looks worse than the top lip.

Sad boy :(

It hasn't seemed to get in the way with his potty training though! Keep it up Jayden, we are so proud of you this week!

Happy Earth Day everyone!

Jayden's 1st Primary Talk in Church

Today Jayden gave his very first talk in church. Of course, Shane and I were totally excited! He did such a good job! He walked right up to the pulpit and was ready to go. He wasn't scared at all. Here's his talk and a video of Jayden practicing it at home....if you listen closely you can hear his cute little sister trying to copy everything he's saying :)

Here's his talk...

My mom used to draw all of our talks when we were little. I still remember the talk she drew for me when I was a Sunbeam. Thanks mom for the idea...Jayden loved being able to read some of his talk!

And here he is practicing his talk...

GOOD JOB Jayden, we are so proud of you!!!

Happy Easter!

Hope everyone had a fabulous Easter! We Love you tons!

Tia, Jayden, Aspen, & Sage (cousins).

This was a spur-of-the-moment picture. We were playing at the mall & saw this near the play area. We thought it would be fun since we had the cousins with us. Tia didn't think it was too much fun, but we at least got 1 picture of her not crying or running away :).

Our UTAH Trip!

Here it is...our UTAH post! We spent all of March in Northern Utah! Shane scheduled his last rotation with a Veterinary Surgeon in SLC, so that we could be near family. My brother Joe was so kind to let us stay at his house! It was awesome spending a whole month with our families before we take off to Japan! Thanks everyone for having fun with us! Here's a little of what we did...

Had fun with family!

Jayden, Carson, & Lauren "hanging out."

Playing at the University Mall.

Can you find the 3 hidden kids?

Jayden, Carsen, & Tia playing with all of Carson's stuffed animals.

More fun with cousins.

Jayden and his cousin Kaitlyn having a great time together.

Playing at Casey's in St. George.

Had an early Easter Egg hunt at Aunt Tiana's. The kids had a blast...thanks Tiana!

Riding the 4-wheeler with Uncle Sam.

Had a blast getting together with the Bennetts (my cousins). Thanks guys for a fun night...we love you guys! We took the picture too late and missed more than half of the family..oops.

Played in the SNOW!

Jayden LOVED it!

Tia loved to EAT it!

But Tia DID NOT love it when she realized she was cold (because she ripped her gloves off earlier to play in the snow).

And here is our cute cousin Carsen (we stayed at his house).

And we visited friends!

This is my good friend Emelie! She was my mentor when I started teaching Special Ed. I learned so much from her. It was fun seeing you again Emelie!

Jayden sumo wrestling with my friend Audrie's son (Kyle).

While in Utah I discovered that my dear friend Li Yin had just moved there. We taught Li Yin the gospel 8 years ago on my mission in Taiwan. She was only 15 then. I was SOOOOO excited to catch up with her. She is such a beautiful young lady. Last year she returned home from her mission and was attending school in Hawaii until she met her (now) husband Weston :).

This is Li Yin, her husband, and her parents at their wedding reception. I was so excited I could be there for it! I had a fabulous time getting to know her parents!

Denise Oh (my former mission companion), her adorable daughter Mia, Li Yin, & I.

Jayden & Kimball (Denise's son) playing Kung Fu Panda. They got along so well! I wish we lived closer Denise!

We had a FABULOUS month in Utah! I didn't get pictures of everyone we saw, but want you all to know that it was great seeing you again! We sure miss being up there by everyone, but love it when we get to visit! Know that you are all welcome to come and visit us in Japan :) Hope to see you all again soon!

Dinosaur Museum

While in Utah we took the kids to the Thanksgiving Point Dinosaur Museum. We had a great time! Here are a few pics.

One big dinosaur leg.

Jayden making his own Dinosaur skeleton.

Jayden's TWO-headed dinosaur.

Here the kids are building mountains, rivers, lakes, making floods, having dinosaur fights, etc. This was by far their favorite part.

The one dinosaur that they were allowed to climb on.

Big ROAR!!!

little roar!

Shark Attack!!!

Discovering our own dinosaur bones with little brushes.

Shane's b.day Part 2

Shane's birthday gift from me (and my family) was a little weekend getaway....all by ourselves...no kids!!! This was the first time we've left our kids for more than just a few hours. Thanks Joe and Jamie for watching them...they had a blast with you guys!

Shane and I felt like we were on our honeymoon again...it was SOOO AWESOME!!!

1st Day

Shopped, ate, & went to the movies at the Gateway Mall in Utah.

(DO NOT see Knowing---way LAME ending!!!)

Had a fabulous stay at the Marriott! THANKS SO MUCH MOM & DAD--it couldn't have been any better!!!

2nd Day Went SNOWBOARDING at Snowbird all day Saturday-WHAT A BLAST-we felt like we were in highschool again! I actually hadn't been since highschool (yeah...that's 12 1/2 years-WOW) and this was Shane's 1st time. When we got to the top of the hill we sat there for about 10 minutes because we both didn't dare go down :0. It would have been funny to watch us that day. We are both a little bruised and sore, but we had an ABSOLUTE AWESOME time! Shane, you are a natural!

Me catching my FOOT of air :)..ha ha! If you knew how scared I was you'd laugh!

And then we had a relaxing dinner at...

Thanks again everyone (you all know who you are) for helping this weekend turn out so awesome! We love you all!