Spring is Here...

...and my tree is in full bloom. I love this tree. It only blossoms for a short week or so and I wish it were longer. It's so beautiful and my kids love to climb it. I thought this was a great shot of Jordan. I take one of them in this tree every year. They're finally at the stage where they'll actually cooperate...and by the end they were saying "mommy, how about this shot? Take one of me like this."



Kasey is in his "slant my head to the side, goofy smile" stage. But it's cute.



Two little monkeys sitting in a tree.



Where's Waldo? I mean Jordan? Can you see him????.....He's in there I promise.!


And for those of you who are going blind like me.....let's try this shot...... Ahhh there he is. !

Savanna's Baptism

We went down to NYC this past weekend for my niece Savanna's baptism. Maline did a great job with it all and Savanna was the sweetest little girl. She was so excited for her big day. You could tell she was extremely aware of the importance of this day and it was for sure a special one for us all. I'm so proud of Savanna and how much of a sweet young girl she is turning out to be. It was also good to see Grandma and Grandpa Gooch who we rarely get to visit with them.



The cousins minus Cooper dooper who of course can't stand still yet for a picture. He's a little spitfire. This is before the baptism.



Kisses from Uncle Scott.



Grandma and Grandpa Gooch with the kids.



Savanna's Grandma Lewis made her a Queen Amadala outfit. I was amazed she made this herself....it was amazing. Savanna floated around it in so proud..she looked so cute.



Later in the day, we went to The Shake Shack to eat and Central Park to play.



Jordan, Savanna and Kasey on the tire swing in the Park. It was a quick weekend. It's always a bummer to have to come home after only a quick day and 1/2 but we had a good time. Unfortunately, Grandpa Gooch got sick with Kidney stones and had to be taken to the ER, but in the end he was okay and that's all that matters. Since we are always so far away we are glad we could be there this time to help you through it. We love you Grandpa and are glad your okay.

Maline and Alan did a great job with the baptism and my kids just love playing with their cousins. Can't wait to go visit again soon.

Easter 2010

We had another great Easter this year. I love seeing my kids wake up and get all excited. I can't sleep the night before because I'm so excited to see the looks on their faces. I wonder how long this will last...because I just LOVE it. This is Jordan with his gifts. Legos of course.



Kasey was up first around 6:30 or so...ugh! We tried to keep him in our room for awhile so Jordan could sleep, but it didn't last long. Around 7:30 we went in to wake up Jordan and he says "why did you wake me up so early" (if I could only say that to HIM when he wakes ME up). Then when he realized it was Easter, he had no problem getting up. Here is Kasey with his Bionicles.


Me with my handsome boys all ready for church.



After what always seems like forever and a power struggle to get the boys to cooporate, we let loose and did a "funny face" I have to say though that the kids did MUCH better this year. We had conference this year on Easter which was actually nice because we could take our time getting ready and eating chocolate. In between conferences we went to my brother Aaron's house and ate, celebrated my Dad and Nephew Matthews birthday....and of course had our egg hunt. My brother Ernie and his family have moved back so it was the first time we all had Easter together in almost 20 years. The weather was PERFECT, and after all the hard times a lot of people had to go through this last week with all the flooding, including my parents, it was like a rainbow after the storm. It was a good thing to see so many people pull together to help out others in need.

Below is a video of the kids telling me that they did indeed HEAR the Easter bunny hopping past their door at night AND pooping out jelly beans. I love the innocence of children.

Hope you all had a happy Easter.

Cuddling!

Awwwww. Love, Love!!!

4-wheelin' in the Ocean State

My brother Ernie just moved back to R.I after living in Utah for some 20+ years. Along with him he brought his two 4-wheelers. Lucky for us...they can't fit in my mom and dads yard. So, they're now residing with us which makes my boys elated to say the least. Both Jordan and Kasey love 4-wheelers. Every day for the last week, Kasey has been sitting on them outside and asking me a million times a day when Daddy is coming home so he can go for a ride. So far, Scott has taken them just up and down the street. Today was THE day for the big outing!!!!
This is the boys in my back yard before leaving.


So, where do you go 4-wheelin' in RI you ask? There's tons of land back out behind my house to ride on. Lot's of dirt roads and woods along with tempting mounds of dirt. I was so worried about my boys falling off though, that Scott and I had to contain our temptation to go fast etc... ! BUT, after awhile they got the hang of holding on etc...and Kasey was asking me to go faster and faster to race with Daddy.


Me and the boys.


I was standing up here but I'm just so short,,,you can't tell. I had a lot of fun. I haven't ridden on one of these for a LONG time. Most of you know my track record with being accident prone so I was so relieved I came home without a scratch. I guess my age, my bad back and the fact that I have 2 kids now, has calmed my fearlessness.

Shout out to Ernie for letting us ride them! w00oo hooooo!

Gooch Family Ragnar Relay

So my sister Maline thought it would be a good idea to celebrate my Dad's 70th birthday by running the Ragnar Relay as a family in Arizona in February. What you do is get a team of 12 people and 2 cars. Each person on the team will run 3 legs of the relay race about 8 hours apart. We started in Prescott, AZ at 6:30am in the morning with 6 runners in one car and one driver. I was the driver for car 1. Each person in the car runs a leg of the relay, handing off the baton to the next person after they finish their leg. Each leg is between about 3 and 9 miles long. So after all the runners in car 1 have run their legs, we are about 35 miles into the race and we meet up car 2 at the next baton hand off. Once we are done with our 6 legs, then car 2 takes over and they run their 6 legs. While car 2 is running their legs, car 1 drives ahead to the next major exchange and waits for car 2 to finish all of their relay legs. This gives the runners in car 1 about 6 hours to rest up before car 2 is done with their leg. Both cars keep alternating until the team has covered the full 204 miles.


Here's car 1 just before the start of the race on Friday morning. From left to right is Steph (sister), David (brother) , Maline (sister), Deanna (Maline's friend), Ben (Brother-in-law), Shannon (sister and Ben's wife), and Me.
Here is most of the team at the first major exchange. This is about 6 hours into the race. They are Jeff (my cousin's husband), Ben (brother-in-law), Doug (brother), David (brother), Maline (sister), Steph (sister), Julie (sister), Steve (brother-in-law, Julie's husband), Danni (sister-in-law, Quinn's wife), Vince (my cousin's husband), me, Shannon (sister), and Quinn (brother). My cousin Jenna, Jeff's wife, is not in the picture because she is taking care of her new baby, and Deanna is out running her leg.
Here's the sleeping arrangements. Find some ground, throw out your bag and try to get some sleep. This was about 18 hours into the race.
Deanna passing the baton to Steph.
Steph passing the baton to Maline. As you can tell by this point in the race, the exchanges were pretty leisurely. Everyone was pretty tired by this point...
Maline to Shannon for Shannon's last leg. Shannon is smiling here but about 2 miles down the road, she was not quite so happy. The map for Shannon's leg said it was downhill the whole way, but after about 2 miles, Shannon accused the map of "lying to her."
Shannon to Dave for his last leg.
Dave to Ben for his last leg.
Most of the team at the finish line after 204 miles and about 34 hours of running, riding in cars, and sleeping on the ground. Looking forward to some showers.
After the race we meet up with the rest of the family at a mexican restaurant in Phoenix to officially celebrate Dad's birthday. It was a great time!

Celebrating Six!

We finally had Jordan's birthday party this weekend. We had it at the Kidz Kastle and the kids had a great time. Jordan couldn't wait until that day and had such a good time running around with all his friends and cousins. Here is the Lego birthday cake. Once again, Scott came through with doing a fabulous job. One of the mothers there even asked him if he would do her sons cake this summer. Just call him CAKE BOSS! He spent ALOT of time on this and Jordan was elated! He loves Legos and has been asking since his last birthday if he could some day have a lego cake.




Birthday boy digging in.


Two of his friends from school and Julissa!



Cousins and friends.



This my niece Caroline. She had a great time too....as you can see.....this is BEFORE.....



and this is AFTER.....!!! What a dirty bird!

My November thru February holiday/birthday/tons of stuff to do rush is 'finally' over. Whew...I'm exhausted! Thanks for coming everyone....Love you all!