Blog, what blog?

When I wanted my sister, Michelle, to see our dog she told me to post pictures on my blog. I forgot I even had one!

Here's a few highlights of what we have been up to the last year...

A few significant birthdays:

Lindsay turned 8 last January but waited until March to be baptized because Austin turned 16 in March and got to baptize her. It was a beautiful day!

For Ausitn, with 16 also came dating and driving. I am nervous everytime he drives away and dating makes me a little nervous too but I try to be reasonable!

Arianne turned 14 that brought church dances and high school. She was nervous to start HS but was pleasantly surprised at how much she loves it. She played soccer on the JV team this fall and is in the middle of basketball now.

Darrell turned the big 4-0! Yikes that man is getting old! He just gets better with age, it's not fair.

Then there's me... 21 again.

That's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

We took a great vacation to Utah this summer.

Darrell's brother Carl and his family live right near Park City so we spent some time there (GORGEOUS!). We had a great time with them and their cute kids! We hit a couple of water parks, temple square, Austin got to tour BYU, Lagoon, spend time with cousins, Darrell and I got to do a session at the Salt Lake temple (It was unbelievable! I can check that off my bucket list!), visit Darrell's grandma...

It was a great trip and we'd love to do it again. Usually, our vacations are relaxing with lots of laying by a pool and sleeping in. This was definitely not that kind of trip but it was a lot of fun.

Maybe I can try this again before next year, we'll see!

Our kids dream come true!

This is Baxter.

Our kids, especially Austin, have been begging for a dog for years. We have always answered with a firm, "NO!". Then a year or so ago, we thought we might have to move. As a peace offering to the kids, we told them that if we had to move, we would get them a dog. Well, we didn't end up having to go, but the dang kids wouldn't let the dog thing go and hounded us harder than ever! I was softening, Darrell was holding strong. Secretly, my wish was to find a dog at a shelter, but I never dreamed that the perfect dog for us could be at a shelter... it had to be good with kids, patient with Lindsay, no shedding, little and cute... the list was long.

Long story short... My friend is the animal control person for Chehalis and told me about Baxter. She had picked him up and taken him to the shelter. He had a sweater on, a short haircut, he was clean... We were sure someone would call about him but a week later, no one had called. I talked Darrell into taking a little visit to see him. It was love at first sight! (for me, not Darrell). Austin was with us but the girls weren't. We told Arianne that afternoon but surprised Lindsay a couple of days later when we went to pick him up.

We are all shocked that our family has a dog! However, we love him so much!

He plays fetch (over and over and over and over) He stands on his back feet and claps his paws when he wants to be picked up, he finds his ball and drops it at your feet when he wants to play fetch (which, did I mention he likes to play OVER and OVER!?) When you ignore him, he takes a little squeaker toy and pushes it against your leg to squeak it. He's the cutest dog in the world!

I am so in love! I thought we got him for the kids, but nope... he's all mine!