Family Party

Melissa and Zach came down to visit us from Oregon and we all got together to celebrate Melissa's birthday. It was a BLAST! After we had the requested Italian dinner, it was off to the best part...the presents!
The last present she opened was the package of fake mustaches Timmy gave her. It was a inside joke we had, and when he saw that he could buy a package of 20 on line, he had to get them;) There was enough for every one, so we all wore one. I don't have pics of everyone in theirs since my mom took most of the pictures on her camera:(

For dessert we had her favorite Marie Calenders blueberry pie (the pie infront of her is the germanchocolate:). Great way to end the night!

Little Sisters Bday!

Melissa is the greatest sister! She just turned 28, and I just want her to know how glad I am that through everything we have been through we are still close.

Our favorite thing to do when we are together is laugh! We are so different in many ways, but we share the same sense of humor and that is what makes us great friends:) Some words that describe Melissa are;funny, sweet, thoughtful, punctual, intelligent, reliable, and strong willed. Love you Lissa!

Ava Started Preschool

We went out for hot chocolate at Flour Girls Dough Boys, where I stalled and kept her busy talking:) Then she finally got her way and we headed off to her preschool. I felt like I was taking her to kindergarden, and it was kind of sad! She goes to a trailer behind a elementary school, m-th 8:30- 11:30. She was soo ready!
She LOVES her teacher. I was so impressed with her as well.Ms. Mallory is so talented with children! Ava's favorite part of her day was getting her own purple tooth brush and getting to brush her teeth;)

Lagoon!

After the boys saving up all summer Tony and I took the boy's to Lagoon in Sept. We talked about making this a sept tradition because we had so much FUN! The weather was awesome, and 4 people was the perfect # for rides. I am sure we will bring the little ones next year though;)
This was the only ride I sat out on. We had to hide our stuff in the bushes since they will not let you carry anything on, and so the camera was not out very much to get pics. It would have been mostly ones of us waiting in lines any way though:)

This is the scariest ride by far! The boys were refusing me when I asked them to turn around for a picture. They were leaning forward (putting their hoods on), trying to lay down on the seat..All this while being who knows how many feet off the ground and no seat belt! It was a mothers nightmare.

We got hungry towards the end of the night, and decided to get a quick snack to share. We split a Arby's sandwich in 4, shared a fry and hurried back to the rides. After we left the park at 10pm we went to I-Hop and got hot chocolate, and pancakes:)

Some Funny 2010 Pic's

He'll show me, that locking him in his room is not the best place for time out! He seriously looked like this when I opened the door to let him out:) As you might know, books are so fun to put away...This room WAS clean!
Tony showing us some of his old tricks;)
Tavas leaned forward and took this picture (blindly) of 2 kids passed out in the back, and I think it turned out pretty good!
I LOVE this picture! I laugh so hard every time I see it! It was not really this year (dec 09') but I had to include it. We were doing our annual Christmas program, and Ava was so excited to be Mary. Tavas looks thrilled! He didn't like the way he looked...I don't see the problem:) (Taiden was the donkey,and Ava got to ride on him:)
This was Easter. Miles was found hiding- with out his clothes on, pigging out on his Easter candy.
Ava mastered the art of puzzles this year! She had to be on display with them.
All four kids hid from me in the closet, and when I found them I had to get a picture:)
I walked in on Ava pampering her little brother. It is so funny how natural the desire to nurture is in girls.
Tony having a little to much fun at Taiden's birthday, cutting this gigantic pizza at Pirate Island:)
I walked in on Ava sitting in the window listening to the song "The sun will come out tomorrow"from her favorite Annie sound track.
Ava got home from dance and went straight into the kitchen, helped herself to a huge spoonful of peanut butter, and layed down where I couldn't see her to eat it:0
Soo cute!
Taiden barely ever go's on time out anymore. This is one of maybe 2 times this year. He is 10 so he went on for 10 minutes, and ended up falling asleep... Can I please go on time out next!
I was very surprised Tav let me take this picture of him. I probably had to bribe him to leave it on for a picture:)

Some 2010 Pictures!

Some one needs to teach me how to collage! I decided to just post a bunch of pictures from all the months I missed this year, for journaling reasons of course;) I tried to narrow down which ones I would put on here so this is what you get:) The picture above was miles first haircut and miss Ava took the pic. She is obsessed with taking pictures. Sadly I didn't get a pic in to the mix of when Marcia and Gaylen left on their mission...
Ava turned 4 in Jan. and had a big princess party. All the girls came dressed as Disney princess characters, and they were soo cute!
This is the pug we had for a week. Basically the animal lover in Tony saved it from dying, while he was volunteering at the animal shelter in St. George. He surprised me and brought it home and I said something to the effect of "um, no." We found it a good home;)
Taiden turned 10 in Feb. and had his party at Pirate Island. They have the biggest pizza slices I have ever seen!
I got my birthday present from my mom on Valentines weekend and we headed to San Fransisco for some sight seeing, and to see Wicked. It was so much FUN! Best play ever!
Having my big birthday gave me somewhat of a mid, mid life crisis and I needed a change....

Miles learned how to ride his 4 wheeler. He would do this all the time if we let him:)
My dads family came to visit us for Easter, and conference weekend. We had a lot of fun and we got to celebrate my youngest sisters 10th birthday.
Pine wood derby! Taid won 2nd place over all, and we were very proud of him. He did the car mostly all by himself. Tavas also did very well and got 2nd place in his den.
My cousin Tayla got married. She has been coming to dinner at our home almost every Sunday since she started going to BYU, and we will miss her! The 2nd best part of this weekend was I got to see her mom (one of my best friends) and we had almost the whole Phippen side staying with us. It was so much fun!
Ava was a frog in this years dance recital. Her song was to a song from princess and the frog:)
This was our celebration to school ending this year. We roasted hot dogs, and smores, then Tony slept out on the trampoline with the 3 oldest. I stayed in the house with Miles- where it was warm!

Taiden was on the HAST summer swim team again this year. He love it, and is getting very good. He took 1st place in one of his races!
Tav turned 9 in June, and he wanted a Harry Potter birthday. We had a lot of fun with that theme, and divided the boys into 3 houses by what scarf they were wearing and then they had their classed in: the dark arts, dis figuration, levitating, and a game of quitach;) We had a lot of boys show up which made it so much fun.

I love how in Utah if a celebration like the 4th of July, or Halloween falls on a Sunday, we celebrate it on sat. Parades, trick or treating, etc. gets moved to Saturday:) So this picture was taken on the 3rd of July at Thanksgiving Point. This has been our tradition to come here with our chairs and blankets and dinner, play Frisbee and football, passing time till it is dark enough for fire works to begin.We all wore our shirts(including Tony), sent to us by grandpa and grandma Rogers:) It took a lot to get us on this big fake rock, and in every picture the boys are trying to give someone bunny ears, a tiara, or antlers...Its a fun phase, that they will probably never grow out of.

We did some of our own fire works on the actual day;) Along with a bbq.
Grandpa and Grandma Phippen returned a second time this summer to bring my sister Emily to live in Provo. She is attending beauty school at Paul Mitchell.
This is Ava getting the stitches taken out of her head. This was a very preventable injury. Basically while she was jumping on the trampoline, her brother Tavas thought of a fun game to play while he was "weeding the garden". Rock dodge ball of course! Ava didn't dodge very well and one big one got her right in the head, and we were off to the ER.
Tavas tried out for the play Music Man, and that was a very big part of his (and my) summer. He had many 4 hour rehearsals in which he was singing and dancing. Then 4 performance nights. Tav was very dedicated and took it very seriously! The cast did such a good job, and it was such a great production.
We got invited up to Aunt Davidene's cabin in Park City and it was soo fun! The kids loved riding in this Ranger. Some of Tony's cousins and their kids were up there too which was even more fun. We played games, went on some walks, hung out at the huge tree swing taking turns, and we ate lots of good food. One of the nights Davidene stayed home with ALL the kids (most of them asleep) and we all snuck off, out of the wilderness, and to town to see a movie;)

Although just Tavas and his wet shirt are in this picture, all 6 of us made it to the Aquarium this summer for the first time.
We got a cat this year. I know we are not cat people, but the kids wanted a pet and we are not getting another dog till Tony graduates. Her name is what ever you want it to be, around here she is called; Rory, Sookie, Babette, and Penny (gilmore girl fans!). We decided after having her indoors for a bit to make her a out door cat, and this really stressed Taiden out. He was so worried that she would run away that he convinced his dad to help him make something to keep her in...After seeing this, I convinced them to make it a boy's club house:) Sookie is still hanging around the house months later.

The kids loved the Hogle Zoo. Ava and Miles had never been and were the most impressed. I think it is good they are young and don't have anything else to compare it to like I did when I first went. Growing up next to the Wild Animal Park, and the San Diego Zoo makes it hard for me to not compare;) Seeing my kids enjoy seeing all the animals makes it all worth it. They do have a pretty good bird show too!

Surprisingly the Highland parade was the only parade we went to this year. My theory is me and Tony were just to busy getting ready to go to UVU this fall, and parades were on the back burner:(
We took all the kids fishing and although Ava was the only one to catch a fish (2 to be exact) we had such a FUN time! We ate dinner on the boat and took some time to ride around the lake before fishing. Ava named her fish Teddy(after my first fish I ever caught), and Lilly. It was only after the boys went to clean them out, that she realized they were not going to end up pets. She asked Tavas where her fish were and he looked at her and shouted "We killed them!" After the tears subsided and we were home she saw her fish in a zip lock bag and said "I thought they were dead?" I am not quite sure what she thought they would look like:)