Snow, Snow, Go Away...

We've had a lot of fun playing in the snow since we moved to Twin Falls...

Building snowmen together...

Having snowball fights with Daddy...

and sledding down the hills.

But we are SO ready for SPRING now!

Hopefully it gets here soon!

"Really Kitty Funny News" or...The Many Adventures of Kate and Sam

Kate's Birthday Bash!

Kate turned 6 a few weeks ago and we went back to Boise for a big family bash with LOTS of cousins, aunts and uncles, cousins, and good friends! She had so much fun and is finally starting to come out of her shell. She is naturally a very quiet (we try to avoid using the word "shy") person so we had a fun little worksheet for people to fill out about her to get to know her better. Here were her answers:

Favorite Color: all the colors of the rainbow

Favorite Food: healthy food

Favorite Treat: zingers

Favorite Movie: any Barbie movie

Favorite Hobbies: anything with coloring or art, singing, playing piano, dancing

Favorite thing about School: all of it

What she wants to be when she grows up: a fashion designer, a model, a mom, a teacher, a ballerina (Pretty ambitious!)

The beautiful princess castle cake

Kate has planned on having this cake almost a year ago when she saw it in a magazine and has talked about it ever since. She was so excited! Of course my good friend, Carlie, made it perfectly...complete with a moat and edible chocolate rocks!

Opening presents with help from her best friends Liv and Anna.

Then Daddy came in with a brilliantly wrapped present from Mom and Dad and the Grandmas and Grandpas....a new bike!

We ended the party taking turns swinging at the pinata. I think everyone made off with a pretty good haul of treats and trinkets! We all had lots of fun!

Our Day Trip to Utah - Part 2

Oops! I forgot to post Part 2 of our quick little Utah trip. But better late than never!

After the Dinosaur Museum and Ikea we took the kids over to Temple Square.

They loved seeing the big Salt Lake Temple. No matter how many times we told Alice

that it was the temple, she kept calling it a big princess castle.

We took them over to the Church History Museum for a little play time

in the newly remodeled children's exhibit. They had a lot of fun.

And we couldn't leave the museum without seeing the replica of the

statue of Moroni...or as Sammy says, "Moro-knife."

Kate loved having her own camera to document our little trip so she could

make her own scrapbook with her pictures.

She took this one... a view of the temple from the Christus.

OUR FOREVER FAMILY

All in all, we had a really fun little trip and enjoyed spending the day together.

Our Day Trip to Utah - Part 1

A few weeks ago we took the kids down to Utah on a day trip.

Our first stop was the Museum of Ancient Life

Dinosaur Museum in Lehi. They had a lot of fun learning about

the different dinosaurs, seeing the fossils, and taking lots of pictures.

YIKES!

Kate's reaction when she first heard the "dinosaur noises" over the speakers.

Sammy said, "It's okay. The dinosaurs are all stinked anyway."

Kate's first sight of her favorite dinosaur, T. Rex!

The Allosaurus and the "Alice-aurus"

Building mountains out of the sand at the erosion table.

This is their genuine reaction to the shark attack.

(Kate took this picture.)

Digging in the fossil beds.

Our second stop was to Ikea for shopping and some lunch...sorry no pictures of that though!

A quick peek back at Christmas

This is our Charlie Brown Christmas tree.

We let Kate pick out the tree this year.

We were more that pleased with her choice

...especially because it was only $5!

We ended up waking up our sleepyheads

on Christmas morning. How many parents can say that?

That was our merry little Christmas in a nutshell. Hope yours was wonderful too!

Joe's Graduation

Here's a look back at the day Joe officially became an Idaho State Trooper...

All dressed up and ready to go to Daddy's graduation in the Rotunda at the Capitol Building.

ATC Class 37: Joe Chandler, Ben Comorosky, Dan Choma, JD Law, Tagg Williams and Brian Strading

Joe gave a speech as the class president.

Wearing his campaign hat for the first time.

Governor Otter presenting him with his certificate.

The wives each pinned their Trooper with the Idaho State Police badge.

I love my Trooper!

Most of the family who came to support Joe on his graduation day.

The newest Troopers in Idaho.

Congratulations, Trooper Chandler!

It was a lot of hard work and sacrifice to get here,

but we are very excited to be starting on this new adventure!