I think she's CRAFTY!

My beautiful, amazing, multi~talented

girlfriend

AMANDA

is celebrating a birthday today...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

So I took a trip down memory lane and wanted to share a few really

great pictures

with all of you....

Amanda, I hope you can laugh

or cry at the pictures I chose

and know that I love and miss you!

New Years Eve party at Amy's

This night was alot of fun

Look at Amanda and Jason

gettin~crazy!

I think we had had lunch together?

So our kids could play?

I don't know, but we took a picture...

4TH of July party at Amy's




Going to see
~WICKED~
up in Chicago






'Jeans' party at Chelsea's house
It was as fun as it looks!
Chels, you and Amy
absolutely CRACK me up in this pic!

Carriage ride up in

CHICAGO
That was one of the best nights I had

out of the three years

I lived there!

How fun was that night girls!

Uhhh, whatever I'm doing

Ruth doesn't think it's funny

but Amanda is laughing!

Thanks Amanda, I could always count

on you to laugh AT me!

Goodbye skating party for

Chelsea and her fam...

Party, and believe it or not, we are all

SOBER???





Drugs? What drugs?

Swap meet...very HOT day!






Dinner at ??? I can't remember the name?
It was for Amanda's
birthday last year...






This is the last picture we took together before I moved to Utah...


Amanda, you are a wonderful friend!


I miss you ALOT


I hope all you wish for this birthday


comes true!
Love you

OH CANADA!

(Canada, Monica, Kasey, Me)

I have a darling niece named Canada! She is an amazing girl~ to say the least! She recently moved to the Midwest to go to College on a soccer scholarship! I am so proud of her and equally excited for her! What an amazing adventure for her!

She's already the star of the team! She's starting and she has scored, every game so far! The last game she played, she scored a goal to tie the game and her team chose her to kick the tie breaker. Although the goalie blocked her shot, her team has faith in her and that's worth everything!

The only thing that sucks about this situation is the fact that we just moved back home from the Midwest and she just left home to go to the Midwest!

I miss her!

(My Bro. Gavin, his daughter Canada, My Dad)

(My nieces McCall & Canada, Kasey, & Canada's friend Alex)



Again Canada and her favorite aunt~ Meg...

(Kas, Canada, Monica, Me, Alex)

A few days before she left for school, her Dad had a going away party for her at his house. It was alot of fun even though being around a bunch of darling 18 year old kids makes me feel ANCIENT!

Anyway, Canada had wanted to be baptised for many, many years.

Her parents wanted her to wait until she was older than 8 so that she could be sure that's what she wanted...

So at 18 years old, she took the missionary discussions and made the decision to get baptised.

Again, I am so PROUD of her! She made a very tough decision at what I think is a very crucial time in her life! Going away to College, being on her own, able to do whatever~whenever etc.....do you get where I'm going with this! What an amazing example she is to all of us, me ESPECIALLY!

She wanted my Dad to baptise her, but he felt like neither of them would make it back up out of the water if he tried to do it, so she asked my darling husband to do the honors...and it was truly an honor for him to baptise her!

It was so cute when I took this picture. Canada went to put her arms around the missionaries and they both stepped away from her like she had cooties! It was pretty funny! Maybe you had to be there, but it was funny none~the~less... and just in case you don't know why the missionaries wouldn't let her put her arms around them is because they can't! While on a mission you're not suppose to give hugs and touch the opposite sex any more than you absolutely have to!

Canada, I am so proud of you! And I love you so very much! What an amazing example you are to our family!

I look forward to watching you succeed in anything and everything you do!

I LOVE YOU

Here fishy~fishy

I have not had access to a computer since August 8, 2008...

Honestly, I almost didn't make it!

I don't know what I ever did before I

finally learned how to use the computer? I mean really, it's only been like two years?

I still can't believe I waited so long to learn!

~CRAZY~

Anyway, it's all fixed up for now

And I really love the computer! I think I'll call him

my boyfriend!

Now back to my husband... That is him, pictured above.

And may I just take a moment to let you all know

that I think my husband is

SMOKIN~HOT

especially in his baseball uniform!

Yes he is!

I absolutely LOVE~LOVE watching him play baseball!

He always comes over for a little love between innings...

And just to let you know, that's not a big

~CHAW~

in his mouth, it's just sunflower seeds...

thank goodness!

So the other day, My dad and I needed to go down to Provo

AKA 'Happy Valley'

to do some work with his paintings etc...etc...

And it must have sounded really fun

because everyone else wanted to come too!

So my Mom, Dad, Troy, Avery and I

took a trip down south...

We called it a mini~vaca

and we had a wonderful time!

we had a little lunch at

TGIFridays...

We went to the BYU museum of art
and the Springville Museum of art...
It was awesome! I love looking at art, especially with my Dad
because he knows so much about each piece
and about the artists etc... My parents are so wonderful! It was such a lovely
day, I wish we could do stuff like that
more often!
I love you both so very much!!!
I also need to say how absolutely beautiful
the BYU campus is.
GO BYU...



For our next adventure we headed North to SaltLakeCity for a family reunion.
The above picture is of
My Dad, his only living sibling Scott and their
cousin Truman...
My dad's father Shirl and Truman's father Chet
were brothers. They were also in a fire together,
that claimed my Grandpa Shirl's life. My dad was only two years old when he died.

So anyway, the party was wonderful!
We ate delicious food, shared stories of old, and learned
a little more about our family
from another perspective.

Hallie and Avery looking darling, as usual!
They had a great time at the party
playing with cousins they didn't even
know they had!

My sisters Cara & Colby~Me & our Mom...



Finally, we are at the end of this post.
And what would you think of me
if I didn't have a fishing trip to tell about?
Well never fear, because I do in fact have one to tell you about!
Yes~ Troy, Hallie, Avery and I
drove over to Echo Lake
yesterday to fish.
And true to form, we didn't even get a BITE!

Not even a nibble!

Avery thinks fishing means...
A. Drive to water
B. Put out your line
C. Sit around
D. Eat snacks
E. Hear mommy ask daddy how much longer?
F. Hear Daddy say words I will not print...
G. Go home
H. Eat leftovers


OH HOW I WISH WE HAD A FISH...

Lagoon, without the water...

Nana, Jett, my nephew Jake, Kasey, my niece McCall, Hallie, Avery, Me and Nicco who is not in this pic because she came a little later in the day...

Went to the only amusement park in the state of Utah called...

LAGOON!!!

Basically, Kasey, McCall, and Jake went and did their own thing

on the 'big kid' rides

while Nana, Hallie, Jett, Avery and myself

spent most of the day on the

'kiddie' rides...

Although the last few hours of the day, we did meet up

with the big kids, and took in a few

'big kid' rides ourselves...

all I have to say about that is

~WICKED~

It was a riot! I absolutely love, love going to Lagoon!

I couldn't even sleep the night before I was so excited!

The above picture is of Nana, Avery

Jett and Hallie
on the kiddie roller coaster...

Jett wasn't to happy about this one!

Hallie and Avery on some Dinosaur egg drop ride...

Avery was FEARLESS!

He wanted to ride all of the 'big kid rides'

but he was too little

I can't wait to go back when he's a few inches taller!

Jett was much happier on rides like this

And Avery was happy on any ride!
Those boys are so darling!


Here we are on the kiddie Tidal Wave...
It was a great day! Thanks Nana for taking us all!

~From Heaven with love~

We received a letter from Heaven the other day. It was from baby Mavryk.

It was his 1st birthday and he wanted us to come to his party and celebrate.

The party was held at his grave site,

and it was absolutely beautiful.

We had pizza, cake and ice cream~we talked and played and looked through scrap books, filled with pictures of baby Mavryk...

We all wrote a little something on a piece of paper, tied it to a balloon and sent them off to

Heaven for him.

In the above picture, we are blowing kisses to Mavryk.

I'm sure he caught each and every one of them...

~We love you sweet baby Blu~

Kan and Tyler, thank you for including us in the celebration of

Mavryk's birthday...

We love you guys more than you'll ever know!

Welcome to the Jungle baby...

My S.I.L. Kandace and B.I.L. Tyler finally decided

on a name for their new baby...

~AXYL~

He is absolutely darling! I am in love with him!

And I truly believe, I am his favorite Aunt already!

So yesterday we were getting ready to go see baby Axyl. I told Avery what we were going to do and he said he didn't know who that baby was?

I reminded him that he had held this baby at the hospital just the other day.

He though about it for a sec and then said to me...

"Oh you mean baby Ice cream"

Avery had given him the name Ice cream at the hospital because Kan and Ty hadn't named him yet! It was so funny! I couldn't believe he remembered that!

Baby Axyl and his mommy with his Uncle Troy. Maybe Troy isn't his favorite Uncle...

YET!

I think he just wants his Aunt Megan to hold him again!

I'll be right over!

So content with his cousins Kasey and Hallie...



Avery and Jett allotted me one quick pic, before taking off again!




Kandace and me with Grandma and Pa Hinckley.
Grandma wanted to know if holding Axyl made me baby hungry...

ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!
Any babies born beyond this point will be compliments of Kandace
and whomever Ty decides to make
babies with...
I know who I'm pulling for!

And just in case you're wondering if they named the baby after
Axle Rose
from Gun's & Roses
I don't believe so...
BUT
it does make a great theme...hence the
Welcome to the Jungle title!

4~tee SEVEN...

For those of you who don't celebrate the 24TH of July and are wondering why we celebrate the 24TH of July, let me tell ya...

In 1847 the Mormon pioneers
walked from Illinois to Utah.

Even way back then, they knew they needed to get as far away from that place as possible!

And come to the AMAZING and GLORIOUS,

"This is the place UTAH!!!"

We honor the Saints with parades, rodeos,

parties and fireworks...

This year we didn't make it to the Parade. It was just way to early for Avery and I,

but we did watch a little of it on t.v...

We did, however, make it to the 'Days of 47 Rodeo'

Originally our seats were in the nose~bleed section, but ten minutes into the show, one of the ushers came over to us and asked if we wanted to go down to the front row.

Of course we did and it was GREAT!

It got even better when we found out the very special guest in the audience...

Look closely to the above picture.

There is a man standing in the middle with his arms folded.

Go down a little to the right of him, there is a man in like a orange shirt and next to him a man is in a suit....

It's President Monson!

Yes, even the President of our church loves the Rodeo!

It was awesome!

Next it was pool time!

My niece Trista and her son Shay, who is pictured above with Avery, invited us to their pool for a little fun in the sun.

It was the first time I made Avery go into the deep and he
FREAKED OUT!
He loves water, as long as he can touch the bottom.

I don't know how he'll ever learn to swim!

(Troy, my Dad, my bro. Gavin)

Then it was party time at our house.
Well it's not actually our house it's my Mom and Dads...
but we inhabit the lower half of it
and we appreciate it
IMMENSELY!!!

Here I am with the newest addition to my side of the family
Baby Carson.
He is my niece Nikki's baby.

This picture is a little blurry, but it is so cute I had to post it!

(Kyle, Ryker, Avery, Hallie, Cassidy)
Out watching fireworks...

Avery was a little scared of the sparklers.
At first he wouldn't even touch them.
You can tell by the picture, he still isn't completely
comfortable with it.

Danya holding Nikki's baby Carson, Me, Colby my favorite sister who USE to comment on this blog regularly, but for some reason doesn't anymore??? And Nikki, who just had baby Carson two months ago and is already skinnier than me!

Yucky!