Being Green

Overheard in the kitchen today: 

Ellie- "this family needs to be a little bit Greener!"

Paul- "we are green- what are you talking about?"

Ellie- "You always leave the faucet on and I have to turn it off!  We need to love the earth more."

Paul- "I'm the greenest person I know!"

Ellie- "that's because you don't know anyone."

Lemonade Stand

Well, my kids had a lemonade stand.  I tried to put it off as long as possible, but when Paul wants to do something he doesn't stop talking about it till it's done.  And he needed money to buy fish for his fish tank.  So when we had 1/2 a day of nothing to do - I let them do their lemonade stand.  My floors have not been the same since.  My camera battery went dead when I tried to take a picture of the kids lemonade stand- so I took.  At least I got the sign.  

Lemonade!  You can get 5 glasses of Lemonade to put in your car on your way home for only $2.00!  Or .50 cents each.  Pink or yellow!  Buy 2 cups and get one free!  And only 3 g. of Shuger per glass!  

And guess what?  They made $35.00 in about 2 hours!  That's why I like living in Florida! They had one guy give them $5.00-  when they offered him lemonade he said, "no thanks, I don't want to get my car dirty".  LOL  nice guy.  Another guy gave them $5.00 too- but he took the lemonade.  Thanks nice people for supporting my kids- where ever you are!

School 2012

Well, school has started.  Why is it that every year I don't feel ready for school to start?  And every summer I don't feel ready for them to be out of school?  Regardless of whether I am ready or not school starts and stops.  This year the kids were all so excited.  They all have great teachers.  I am so grateful for that!!

Ellie and her teachers Mrs. Brintnell, and Mrs. Hogue.  They are so nice!

Kyle and his teacher - Mrs. Rossini- we love her! 

Paul and his teacher Mrs. Salmons.  She is a great teacher!

Living with Darren

I love Darren.  Living with Darren is an adventure. He is funny, witty, adventurous, and is always coming up with clever, crazy things to keep our family entertained.  He has me laughing all the time.  He can make make me laugh, cry, or get so mad at him.  I can never stay mad at him long though.  He will get me soo mad and then say something like, "your so cute when your mad!", or "your just so hot!"  And then I laugh and can't be mad anymore.  

On Sunday Kyle was sick, so I wasn't going to go to church.  Kyle asked Darren why I wasn't going to church- instead of a simple, "because your sick, mom is going to stay home with you."  Darren has a completely crazy answer- here is their conversation:
Kyle, "why isn't mom going to church?"
Darren, "don't you know?  The policeman told her she couldn't go!  He pulled her over yesterday and told her she was to stinky to go to church.  She can't go cause she smells to bad."
Kyle, "DAD!!"
Darren, "He told her not to go!  She would stink up the whole church and they would have to cancel cause it would smell so bad in the church!  The policeman told her not to go!"
Kyle, "DAD!"
I just sat there laughing.  How does he come up with these things?  I would have to think about something funny like that- but not Darren, he says funny stuff like that all the time.
So, Darren went to church, and I stayed home with Kyle.  It happened to be Stake Conference, our church is not the Stake center, so they needed to broadcast it to our church. But I gues they had problems broadcasting it.  About the time Conference was supossed to start I got a text from Darren.
-They are having tech difficulties...church might not be true....more to come...
a few min. later
- Working....church must be true...but byu lost last night so not true....
I got a good laugh from it.  We decided it is true even if BYU lost.

Baptism at the beach

We had the great opportunity to attend a baptism for one of Darren's friends, Colton. He is a mid 20's local that grew up in Naples.   He was introduced to the church by some members here.  We were priviledged to go to the baptism on a beautiful Saturday night.  Darren was one of the witnesses. 

We got there a little early so we could visit and take family pictures- it was the perfect evening.

Here are the "pews".  People just visiting before it started. I haven't ever been to a baptism on the beach- and who knows if I'll ever get that chance again. 

Darren and Gabe

There were a couple speakers, the program was wonderful and the setting was spectacular.  We sat and listened to the speakers as we watched the sun set behind them. I just soaked it all in and.

They guys heading out to the water.  We actually had to think about what Darren should wear-we figured khakis would be nice enough, but wouldn't get ruined by the salt water like a suit pant would.  The missionaries reminded the guys NOT to wear swimsuits.

It was PERFECT timing- they baptized him just as the sun set.  The Spirit was so strong.

Darren and Colton.  Thanks Colton for letting us be a part of such a beautiful evening.  

Gotta love the musical number by the missionaries- a ukulele song at the beach at sunset after a baptism- it doesn't get any better than that!

Dreams

What do you dream about? 
I love living in Florida and during the day I have a good attitude and enjoy it.  But at night my subconscious thoughts come out.  Last night I dreamed we lived in a cute little house.  It was fall time.  I was decorating my front porch for fall.  I put out a bale of hay, and pumpkins.  It looked so cute and festive.  Then I woke up.  I have had several dreams of having my own house again and doing fun projects.  Seriously, who dreams about decorating their front porch??  Me!! It is what I want so bad. Why can't I just be content going to the beach? Someday, when we move from here I'll live in a cute little house.  I'll put out a hay bale and pumpkins and I'll smile.  Then, that night, I'll dream of going to the beach.

Sanibel Island

Last week Darren took a day off and we went up to Sanibel Island.  I've heard it is beautiful.  But it poured rain, then when it cleared up it was about a billion degrees.  It was honestly miserable.  I had sweat dripping off my nose and chin- from sitting in the shade on the beach.

This was me trying to smile and make the best of feeling like I was in an oven.

We got in the water to cool off- it was like getting into a warm bath to cool off. 

My family is still cute though- no matter how hot it was:)

Lesson learned.  Don't go to the beach at 1 pm. in August in Florida again.  The morning or evening is ok- but the middle of the day with a baby- not fun.  Still love the beach- just at different times:)  And I am going to have to make a trip up to Sanibel Island in the "winter" when it's 85 and beautiful.

Paddle Boarding

Have you ever been paddle boarding? Do you even know what it is? I didn't really know what it was till we moved to Florida. It's a pretty big thing here. It basically like a big surf board you stand up on and paddle around on. They are super fun. We went to the beach with some friends and tried out their paddle boards. We had a blast.  Darren saw a jellyfish, a sea turtle, some manatees, and some dolphins.  I didn't see anything- but I didn't go out as far, cause I'm kinda scared on the ocean.
 

Here's Darren and Ellie out in the water.

Darren and Ellie, and our friend Jillian with her 3 kids, and Kyle up front.

Darren and Ellie riding the waves.  We really don't get waves or riptides here.  I love it, it makes me not worry as much about my kids in the water.

I love this picture, notice little Kyle in snorkeling in the water.

Darren and Paul

Kyle and Ellie trying it themselves.  Not sure if you can see him- but that's our friend Ryan over on the side there.

Go Kyle!

And Ellie!

Awesome kids!

Where's Paul all this time?  Fishing of course! With our good friend Micah.  Micah is like a nature dictionary.  He knows EVERYTHING about the wildlife here!    He knows the names of all the different shells, fish, plants, coral, bacteria etc. He and Paul get along great.  LOL 

Darren and Micah with Ryan in the background

Paul having a great time.

Paul brought his cast net.  Micah threw it out and caught like 30 little fish!  I wish I had my camera.  Here they are in the bucket.  This is how it works.  They use the cast net to catch these little bait fish.  Then they put the bait fish on their hook and throw them out in the ocean.  Then a bigger fish sees the little fish struggling and boom you catch a big fish!  That's the plan anyways.  We didn't catch any big ones today.

This is our good friend Alisha holding Gabe for me.  That's her little boy Hunter, and Tess is Micah and Jillian's little girl.

Looking down the beach there were so many fun colored beach umbrella's I had to take a picture. 

We had a great day at the beach.  I am just loving all the fun things we get to do here! 

Darren's Birthday

We had a little birthday party for Darren in June.  Pretty much just our family, and Paul decorated the cake. 

Happy Birthday dad!

Paul got to choose what kind of cake I would make for Darren.  He chose a Spinosaurus cake.  I cut it out and he frosted it.  

I think every present Darren got he was already using.  We just put it all back in bags so he wouldn't feel bad.  It worked.  

baby teeth!

Not a day goes by that I don't thank God for my beautiful little baby.  He has brought so much joy and love to our family.  These pictures were taken in June- when he was 4 months old- but I just had to get a picture of his first tooth!  Now he is 7 months old and has 6 teeth! I'll have to get a picture of his cute teeth later.  But for now lets just enjoy these cute pictures.

Can you see that little tooth?

Oh, I just had to add this one.

I am in love with this baby!

Oh boy, I'd better stop looking at these pictures or I may just go wake him up so I can kiss that cute little face in real life.  And yes, he is that beautiful in real life:)

A taste of the ol West

I was going through pictures and noticed I missed some things from the summer- One thing we did that was fun was go to a birthday party for our neighbor and friend, Ellison.  It was Western themed and the kids had a blast dressing up.  Here are some picts.

Love these tough kids!

Me and my cute hubby.

Ha ha, I love Kyle's mustache

Just being funny

Ellie and Paul with Ellison

Paul wanted a picture of just him and Ellison- I think someone has a crush?

Ellie is 9!

Ellie's 9th birthday came- we had 2 parties like we always do.  A family party and a friends party.

Here was her family party birthday cake.  It was a money cake- remember those?  The kids wrapped up coins and we threw them in the cake batter. Darren was disturbed by the idea and insisted we did not do it for the friends birthday party fearing someone would choke.

Blowing out the candles

Ellie had some neighbor hood friends over for her friends party.  I had enough of the huge parties and inviting everyone, so I limited it to 12 kids.  It was much better not having 30 + kids.

 Ellie wanted the theme for her party to be Webkinz.  She wanted a cake that looked like her little Webkinz mouse, Whiskers.  This is what we came up with.  Her poor little mouse didn't get to come to the party because she lost Whiskers in Utah.

Cute kids

It's Whiskers!

I think we ended up having 12 kids come. It was perfect.

Opening presents in the living room.

After the food and cake, we headed over to the pool for some swimming.  This is my friend Kam and her cute little girl Alice.

Me and my friend (and next door neighbor) Ellison.

Me and my other friend Jane

Fun banner I made.