Humanitarian Aid in the Four Corners

Jeremy and I took McKay and Jaxon down to the Four Corners area to do some humanitarian work with the Share a Smile Foundation over fall break. We were on the Navajo reservation in a town called Aneth. There were five dentists, nurses, doctors, optometrists, and two Eagle Scouts one worked on a garden for the elementary school and another one built a house. It was an amazing weekend and a great experience.

I learned a lot about Jeremy's job as I was his assistant. It was a yucky job and I appreciate Jeremy's job and the assistants at his office a lot more. The kids in Aneth had a lot of needs and it was great to help them out.

This poor kid. He had quite a bit of work done and needed a lot more. He was such a trooper. I had a hard time when the kids had to get a shot. The kids were trying to be so brave, but when they would cry (silent tears) it would break my heart and I would have to blink back the tears.

McKay and Jaxon were on the garden crew. You should have seen this place before they started working. It was full of prickly weeds and dead trees. McKay and Jaxon helped build a reading garden for the school (where we were set up). They put in planter boxes, a pathway, benches, tables and a fence. (I don't know how much actual work they did, but I know they did great.) Jaxon made friends with some of the kids at the school. One boy he met hadn't ever eaten an apple. Jaxon offered him one and he loved it--he ended up eating four!

While McKay was out working, he came upon a lizard. He caught it and named it Gary. He knew he couldn't keep it, so he wanted a picture with his lizard. I am sure that Gary is thriving in the new garden.

After our last day of work, we took off and headed to the Four Corners. We had never been, so we had to go check it out. Here is McKay in all four states.

And Jaxon in all four states.

Here we all are, standing so close, yet all in different states.

On the way home, we stopped just outside of Blanding and hiked up to some ruins called Dry Wash Ruins. It was a fun quick, but interesting, hike.

Here we are at the ruins.

The whole weekend was a great experience and we hope that we are invited to go serve again with Share a Smile. It was a great way to spend our fall break.

Celebrating 15 Years In Paradise

Jeremy and I celebrated our 15 year anniversary this year and decided it was time to get away and head down to Belize--just the two of us. We stayed on the island of San Pedro for seven fun, relaxing days. It was nice to get away, but I must admit, we missed the kids (by day six).

Our hotel was FANTASTIC. We stayed at the Belizean Shores. It was a nice little condo with kitchen. The pool was great and had beautiful views as it was right on the beach. We were also able to use the facilities next door as it was a sister property of our hotel. Their pools ware great--all of them. Above Jeremy and I are hanging out at the pool bar. We enjoyed a few pina coladas here (virgin of course).

This is the hot tub that connects to another pool. Check out that view. That is the beautiful blue ocean behind me.

In another pool, they had this great water slide. We had a good time going down the slide (man it whips you!), jumping off the rocks and just relaxing. Jeremy was brave and went down the slide head first. I tried it head first once and got lots of water up my nose.

One day we went on shore for an excursion. We flew off and on the island. This is the island airport and the airport's baggage claim. Let's just say that security was non-existent.

This is the view from the airplane as we flew in and out of San Pedro.

On our excursion we went cave tubing. We hiked up a trail for a mile and a half and then tubed down and river and through a large cave. They cave had a lot of stalactites and cave formations.

We even turned out our lights in the middle of the cave and experienced pure darkness. Jeremy decided to shoot a picture. In front of me you can see our tour guide, Mark. At the end of the cave, we continued to float down the river while it was pouring rain. It added to the experience and we enjoyed the whole thing.

Another part of the excursion was that we drove all the way to the Belizian border to see the Mayan ruins at Xunantunich.

Jeremy and I standing on the ruins.

At the top of the ruins, you could look out and see the country of Guatemala. It was only a few hundred yards behind us.

Back in the parking lot of the ruins, we came across some Holler Monkeys. Man they were loud. They were looking down at us wondering what on earth we were up to. I was wondering how on earth they managed to be so loud.

Jeremy and I love to scuba dive. When we heard of the diving in Belize, we knew it was our destination of choice. We did three days of diving. One day we went diving to the Blue Hole. It was a two and a half hour boat ride one way, but it was a beautiful dive. We went down 130 feet. We swam in and out of stalactites and stalagmites and we saw three bull sharks. One was 9 feet! What a great dive! Above is Jeremy and I just after we finished diving the blue hole. Behind us is the Blue Hole.

After diving the Blue Hole, we stopped and Half Moon Caye for lunch. We went on a hike to view the nesting grounds of some native birds. The hike was along the beach and was beautiful. We cam across a few hermit crabs. They were quite large!

The nesting grounds outlook.

While on our hike, we picked a coconut to take home with us. When we arrived back to the beach, our guides told us our coconut wasn't ripe (no wonder it was green). They peeled and cracked open a ripe one for us that we ate on the boat on the way back. We also kept a coconut to take home and show the boys. We picked up another coconut on our hotel beach and brought it home. (Here is some friendly advice if you decide to bring a coconut home from a tropical destination: Don't claim it in customs. What a pain--yet we ended up with both our coconuts and another piece of produce we bought in one of the markets on the island.) After lunch and hiking, we went out for two more dives near the blue hole. One dive was just like jumping into an aquarium. There were fish every where that followed us around the whole dive. It was amazing. We saw a couple of more sharks and sea turtles.

The diving was great! Here is Jeremy in front of some beautiful coral. Our water proof camera wasn't so water proof and most of our shots didn't turn out.

Here is me swimming along!

This is just one of the many nurse sharks we saw while diving. On one of the dives people feed the sharks and they swim right up to you and let you pet them. There was a big old black fish that kept looking at me wondering if I was going to feed it. I finally reached out and gave it a slimy pet. It left me alone after that.

We saw a lot of fish that were spectacular like this lion fish. I feel so bad our camera was so crumby. We won't be making a mistake like that again.

Overall we had a great vacation. We even got hit by Hurricane Karl one morning. We stayed in and read books and took naps. I can't wait to go back to Belize. It was wonderful! What a great 15 year anniversary celebration.

Cub Scout Awards

McKay has bridged from Cub Scouts to Boy Scouts. He received his Arrow of Light and also made the ceremonial journey across the bridge. We are very proud of him and can hardly believe he isn't a Cub anymore!

Crossing "the bridge".

McKay with his Arrow of Light award on the "other" side of the bridge.

Jaxon has been working hard in Cub Scouts as well and he has earned his Wolf award. He did a good job pinning on the mother's pin.

He is one proud scout.

Since Jaxon has moved from the Wolf den to the Bear den, he was painted with wolf paws at the last pack meeting. It is right of passage that the other members of the den get to do to the graduating wolf.

Way to go guys! McKay and Jaxon are both great scouters!

Ice Blocking

We needed an afternoon activity this last summer and decided to introduce the boys to ice blocking. There is a park near our house that has some great ice blocking hills. McKay and Jaxon invited some friends along and we had a great time!

The gang getting ready to ice block. Jeremy had to show them how it was done.

Jeremy and Kayden taking a ride down the hill. Kayden absolutely loved ice blocking and his facial expression here is priceless. (Just click on the photo to enlarge.)

McKay decided to try riding backwards....it didn't work.

Josh was pretty good at it after a few practice runs.

Sadly, I don't know how I missed it, but I didn't get any pictures of Jaxon going down the hill. It was fun to watch the boys slide down the hill and wipe out. They even had contest to see who could go the furthest without wiping out. It went from an afternoon of boredom to an afternoon of laughter and fun.

Guess Who Loves Legos?

After years of watching his brothers have all the fun with the Legos, Josh has found his love for them. He bought his first Lego set with his own money and put it together without much help. See?


(Man I wish Legos weren't so expensive!!)

Jaxon's Sleep Habits

I went in to check on Jaxon one night and found him like this:

Just his nose, mouth and one eye sticking out of the sheet and the rest of him was completely covered. Was he cold? I asked him the next morning. He said no. So, why? One of Jaxon's mysteries.

**Are you ever surprised what you find when you go and check on your kids at night?

Pioneer Day Fun

We found that we had no plans for Pioneer Day this last summer, so we made a few phone calls and invited Jeremy's family to come for a BBQ, games and fireworks. We had a great time!

How many big marshmallows can you fit in your mouth? The kids sure had a good time trying to find out!

Joshua apparently can fit a lot of marshmallows in his mouth!

We played a few "Minute To Win It" games. This one we had to flip marshmallows off a plate and catch them in a cup.

No Pioneer Day would be complete without a firework show. The kids loved it!

*I am slowly, but surely catching up on my blog posts.