My Jack is 9

My Jack is nine today. He is such a great boy and I love how he is growing. He is becoming such a gentlemen and learning so much. Jack loves to play. He can make a game of anything and is very easy going and willing to try new things. He has no fear and such a soft heart. Jack is the biggest helper. He mostly does what he is asked and tries to always choose the right. He loves sports and wants to be in a band. He is getting pretty good at the piano but getting him to practice is very hard. But once he does he loves playing. Jack loves school because it is a social place to be, not because he likes to do the school work. He loves recess and reading but struggles with his math facts and comprehension. Jack loves to get his picture taken but to get him to smile normally is a very hard thing to do. He loves to make funny faces. Jack has had about 15 girlfriends this year. Which really worries me because he is only nine.
Jack is sweet and I am truly blessed to have this boy to raise.

Happy Birthday Jack!!!

The Black Diamonds

There is a new football team in town. The Black Diamonds. Jay has created this team and they are good. They never lose and play teams such as Show Low, ASU, Oregon, the Packers, the Patriots and even the Cardinals. In fact coming up on Saturday the Black Diamonds play ASU and the winner then will play LSU. Jay swears there is a team and wants to watch them constantly. When the game is on Jay will give you a play by play and let you know who is winning, who scored a touchdown and how many field goals were blocked. It is great fun to listen to Jay describe the team and the game. The best part though is to listen to Jay describe the uniforms. I was under the impression the Black Diamonds would have all black uniforms, but I was wrong. There are two uniforms. The first one has purple helmets with a green face mask and a red diamond on one side and a blue diamond on the other. These uniforms are mostly black but the numbers are brown. The other uniforms are orange and white with black helmets. At one point the uniforms had all of the colors of the rainbow on them. But I guess Nike was able to get new ones for the team. I hope he always has this good of an imagination.

Kate's dance

Kate had her first dance recital and it was so dang cute. I am in awe of what Miss Beverly can get the girls to do. Kate was so excited to go and when we walked into Stapley's auditorium she got scared and said she didn't want to do it. I dropped her where she needed to go but first had to snap a few pictures of her not smiling. The performance went off without a hitch, I am sure Beverly would disagree, but the girls did great and now that Kate has one performance under her belt maybe in the next one she will do that much better.

Kate at home before the performance, she was a mermaid.

 Kate not smiling with her friends, Jersi, Keelie and Trissy.

 Kate and Keelie after the performance Grandma Goodman gave them flowers and it made Kate's day.

So thankful

I have so much to be thankful for. This past weekend I was reminded once again how nice my life is. I love Thanksgiving. It is my favorite holiday. I love spending time with my family, eating and remembering what I have to be thankful for. I took all of one picture on Thanksgiving and it is of the girls. I love these girls. I have been blessed to have so many great examples of women who are strong and faithful in the gospel. Thank you for your wonderful example and service to me.

The next day I woke up way too early because I had gone shopping for Black Friday on Thursday night and got home around 2:15 and got to sleep around 2:30. Jay came into my room around 7am and was so excited to make posters that day. Jay and I were laying  in bed and talking when Jays says "mom, lets get some breakfast." So I say, "what you are making me breakfast in bed?" That was all it took and Jay was off to the kitchen to make me breakfast. I had to get a shot of him walking in the door and what my breakfast was, a bread and butter sandwich, banana and a cup of milk. It was yummy and I love that Jay did this. I even got to stay in bed a little longer so I wasn't nearly as tired.

 Later that Friday we got to drive up to Prescott Valley for Abby's baptism. I didn't get any pictures of her but I did get a shot of my family. We had such a great time going to visit the Platts and hanging out with my family. We were fortunate to get to stay the night and had fun hanging out watching football and chatting. Karrie was a great host and I can't wait to go back to visit. I told her to expect me for weeks during the summer.

On Saturday we got to drive up to Flagstaff for the Show Low High School State Championship football game. Unfortunately they lost to Blue Ridge but we still had a great time cheering on the Cougars and hanging with Ryan's family. The Ricedorffs are great and always make me laugh.

I had such a great Thanksgiving weekend and I have so much to be grateful for.

football

We had a successful football season. Jack's team only lost two games and we thought they would go further in the playoffs but lost in the first round. Jack was bummed but we had a great time cheering him on. In one game when there were only five players Jack got to play the entire game and had two pick sixes. He loved it.

Jay's season was not as successful but you could see a difference in the players from the first game to the last. I don't think Jay won a game all season but he scored two touchdowns and in one game he says he pulled "like a 100 flags." The two times Jay scored a touchdown he says "I looked back and saw a kid coming to pull my flag so I turned on the jets so he couldn't get me." He was so fun to watch and I know we will be watching many more football games in the future.
Below are pictures of Jay playing football. He improved so much and had so much fun.

Jack was the quarterback and said at the beginning of the season he was going to be the "next Rathen Ricedorff." Gotta love the confidence.

From here to there

We have moved from here

To there about a quarter of a mile from our old house.

Halloween

Happy Halloween

We had a great Halloween. We went to my parents ward party and met up with my mom and Matt, Julie and her family and Joe and his family. I always love seeing the family. We ate yummy chili and great fry bread (I think I had 4 pieces of the fry bread, it was that good), and then went trick or treating around the neighborhood. It was great especially listening to Kate and Keelie call each other Tinkerbell and Annalise. Once we hit all of the houses we wanted in my parents neighborhood we went back to my own neighborhood and met up with Jason and his family. Jack wanted to go to all of the scary houses and now Kate will not sleep in her bed at night. We had a great time and can't wait till next year to see what my kids will dress up as.

Jay (Vampire), Kate (Tinkerbell), Jack (Zombie)

Taylor and Jack both as Zombies I think.

The three little princesses.

The group of kids, minus Keelie, Jay, Jack, Ty, Wyatt, Taylor's friend, Taylor, Kyley (as a pregnant teenager), Hadlie and Kate.