Lake Powell

My amazing parents took their entire family on a trip to Lake Powell. We had such a good time. We never got bored and I felt like I could have easily stayed another week. It is such a beautiful place. I have posted a lot of pictures on here but I narrowed it down from over 500 pictures. So I hope what you see is enough to show what a great time we had.

Thanks again Mom and Dad!! Love you guys!

My Mom and Dad! Larry and Kathy

Craig, Debi, Alexys & Katie's foot and hand prints
Craig on the top of the houseboat.

Alexys' artwork. Katie as a mermaid.

Out Cruising around the lake on the houseboat. Beautiful day!

Craig's backflip off the top of the houseboat. Very patriotic don't ya think =)

Surfing behind Greg's boat. That's the houseboat in the background.

She loved the slide!

Backflip!! Alexys

Backflip!! Craig

Jumping off the boat with Dad

Jumping off the back of the boat alone!

SO much fun

A two second break from swimming

Lounging in the water and the sun.

Cliff jumping together Craig and Alexys

Having some fun while cruising on the Lake

Craig's first catch of the trip. A catfish.

Playing in the sand

Alexys basking in the sun.

Fishing at sunset

Hotel pool on our way home.

Yellowstone!

This is what I wanted for Mother's Day.

A trip to Yellowstone!!

It was well worth the drive. We saw so many things and really enjoyed our time together. We are a strange little bunch but at least we can laugh together. I never did get a picture of any humans but most of the animals we saw were photographed. I did not get the deer or the bison. =( But I did get all the rest.

Enjoy!!

Momma Grizzly and her two cubs

Crane

Momma Black Bear

Her two cubs

Elk with velvet

Fox

Wolf

Mountain Goats

Second Grizzly we saw (Picture from the back window)

Grizzly from the back side window of the car

It was a pretty good day to see some fun animals.
Happy Mother's Day everyone!!

April

Part One: D.Y.W.

Alexys has been working very hard these past few months preparing for the Distinguished Young Woman program. (Formally known as Junior Miss.) She did such a wonderful job. The only clothing she wore that we didn't get a picture of was her talent. But we did get a picture of the fitness and her everyday hero look, The Dr. She sang the song Someone Like You by Adele. She did a great job! So proud of her! Love you Alexys!!

Sunday after church she still looked beautiful. this is her dress she wore for the poise part.

You can see the sense of freedom in her face compared to the days prior to Junior Miss. It's good to have it over. =)

She has a great laugh

So pretty. This is a pin that belonged to my Grandma Hemming. It looked great in her hair.

Part Two: Easter 2012

Easter was good this year. I love Easter and wish that the spirit you feel during this holiday was with me all the time. What a wonderful thing we have in our lives. To know that we will all be resurrected some day and that this life is not the end.
Katie got some scarfs ( her favorite toy in the world) and a very bright orange and pink tutu. Alexys got a new purse and wallet set. You can't see them very well in this picture.
Katie loved searching for the eggs. this year she was prettu excited to find the money. Of course she talked about going to Big J's to eat every time she found more money. Silly girl.

We went to Grandma and Grandpa Housley's house for Easter dinner.

I hope you all had a great Easter and April. =)

Three months later...

So I will start this post from the most recent and go backwards.

Alexys went to the Sadie Hawkins dance on Saturday night. She had a great time. She went with a good friend of hers named Shad. They seem to have a great time together. They were being pretty goofy during these pictures. I took a lot of pictures and made a collage for each of them instead of spending all that money on the pictures they take at the dances. I will try to scan hers and see if I can post it later.

Bubba had to get in on the action with them.

My Alexys! So beautiful

Alexys turned 17 on March 6. It makes me sad to realize I only have her as a kid for one more year. She will be an adult on her next Birthday. =( This had been a long weekend for all of us so after she opened her gifts and blew out the candles we put the ice cream cake back in the freezer and we all went to bed. Pretty funny.

Craig got me a scope for Christmas this year. I have wanted one for when we go into Yellowstone. We have taken it out on the desert a few times to try and see some animals. This trip we didn't see anything but the one before we saw a huge moose. He was very impressive.

Katie turned 10 this year. She is getting pretty old herself.

Katie and my little Mamma share a Birthday so this cake was for both of them. Also an ice cream cake.

She was pretty excited for her big day. Such a silly little gal.

Well I hope that life will slow down a little more soon and maybe I will get a chance to Blog more than every 3 months.

Have a great Spring!!

The end of another year...

I always find New Years to be a bitter sweet holiday. I'm excited for the fresh start of a new year but also sad to see another year gone. We have had a roller coaster of a year and I can honestly say I'm glad we survived it. But We had some milestones this year that I can't believe I'm even old enough to experience. Alexys turned 16 and that just still blows my mind. Only two more months and she will be 17 and I will be counting down the last year of my baby being a child. =( It's a dirty trick that gets played on us parents....

Anyway here is my last post of 2011 and I hope you all have a great New Years celebration. Be safe and live it up!!

Looking for our Christmas tree.

Craig and Katie while looking for our Christmas tree.

It was quite the trek for us. We no longer have our Suburban so we had to go at it on foot this year. =( =)
Alexys taking a break after having walked all the way to the bottom of the canyon and back again. The rest of us only made it halfway to the bottom.

Christmas Morning!
This is the first year that Alexys was awake before me and Craig. I was actually sound asleep at 6:30 and that is amazing for me. I'm usually up waiting for the kids to get up. It was fun to be on the other end for once. We also managed to keep the opening frenzy at bay. We took just over an hour to open everything. It was a great morning.
Katie got some pretend ice cream cones so we had to take an ice cream eating break while we were opening gifts.


Craig got a new Tampa Bay football jersey and also a rugby ball. He loves both sports so it make sense to us. =)

Alexys had a good morning but she didn't get much sleep. Katie slept with her and woke up every hour to ask if Santa had come yet. LOL!! So we have Katie to thank for our wake up call. This is Alexys with her new zebra and bongo drum her Dad got for her.

Katie had a super fun morning. We had to calm her down a few times. She would have just opened all the gifts on her own otherwise. This is her with her giant caterpillar.

This was the final gift for all of us. The girls already knew what it was but they were still excited to finally get to open it and use it.

We finally joined the club of modern LCD televisions. We decided to go all out though and get the 3D one. It is pretty cool and I have to say that we live in an amazing time.

I got lucky on our countdown on the computer today and got a picture of this moment in time. My family will understand why I was so excited to see it. I love you all and hope that this next year brings great things!!

Happy New year!!!!

Alexys "Waitin' for the Man with the Bag"

Alexys on December 14 singing with the H.S. Jazz Band.

Merry Christmas!

Click on the picture to enlarge.

We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and that you have all the happiness that you deserve.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!!!!

How many can I make up for with just one Post???

Part 1 of this post.

I'm not sure why I haven't blogged in so long. I can only assume that my last post was needed by someone that only looks at my page every few months.

LOL! I know funny right? =)

Anyway that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Does anyone else have the problem where when you post to your blog everything suddenly looks like you put 5 spaces between each line? That drives me CRAZY!!

Anyway....

I have had a million things it seems that I wanted to blog and then I of course get side tracked and then it never happens.

I need better focus I guess.

Here is a short list of what has happened since my last post.

I may or may not get around to blogging all of it.

1.Alexys injured her shoulder while doing a back flip off a bridge.<

2. School started

3. Homecoming week

4. Alexys learned to play the drums in Percussion

5. Alexys me and my Mom went to General Conference =)

6. Spent a week in Park City

7.Hogle Zoo for Katie and me

8. Play rehearsals almost every day for two months

9. Put our house up for sale

10. And the most important of all, we survived it all =)

Now for part 2 of this post

Well Alexys just finished her first play with a lead role.

A little different lead role but a big role none the less.

She was the Narrator and sang throughout the entire play.

She has done a few other plays and even had a few speaking parts but she had a pretty big role in this one and I think she did a great job.

I'm glad she had the opportunity to do this. She has come such a long way since last year and her ability to get up in front of a crowd is amazing. She has nerves of steel.

Katie was able to be one of the children in the play too.

She really enjoyed doing it. She is a natural at it. lol.

Here is a picture of the cast after the bows had been taken.

Great Play and very talented group of kids.

Alexys with her flowers.

Katie got some too but she was already in bed when I took this picture.

Part 3 of this post:

Well I decided to change my music on here.

I love Christmas!

One of my favorite Christmas songs ever is I'll be Home for Christmas.It has been sung by so many different artists and every one of them has a different feeling for me. Well I decided to share all my favorite versions of it with you. So each of those on my list are the same song but different artists. So take a moment to listen to them and think how they all have a different feeling about them. Or don't I don't care. =) There are so many wonderful songs for Christmas that make me feel the spirit of the season. I could never say only ONE is my favorite. So many songs so many meanings and I love them all for different reasons.

This one I love because for me it makes me think that one day I will have my whole family together again for Christmas. It will be the best day ever.I hope you have that hope in your heart this year and always.

Have a great Thanksgiving!!

Finding Humility

Why is it we as humans are so slow to humble ourselves? I think all of us at one time or another (Hopefully more) have felt our Savior with us. Comforting, listening and loving us. So why do we not make ourselves available to Him at all times? It's an amazing feeling when he is near. That is not a feeling I can forget completely. I guess the problem is time. The longer we go between that feeling the harder it gets to remember it. I find myself getting so busy with life that I forget to take time to make time for Him. Some simply don't want to put in the time. The sorrow I feel for those that deny themselves the right to that feeling is greater than I can say.

I love My Savior.

I know he is there for us. I know he carries us through our darkest moments. Even when those moments are long. He will never give up on us. I'm thankful for this knowledge. Life would be too hard without it. I know that our Heavenly Father is waiting for us to humble ourselves a little everyday so he can bless us. I have had to humble myself a lot this past year and I am grateful for the opportunity to have done this. I have found a new appreciation for the scriptures and the messages in them. They are there for us to find answers and to comfort us so we know we are not alone. I know I will have to be humbled many times over in this life. That's how we grow and learn but how I wish it didn't have to be so hard sometimes.

I bear witness to anyone that may read this. I know The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is true. I know that God is at the head of it. I know that he loves each one of us. He is aware of our pains and joys. He wants us to be happy and has sent us a way to find true happiness. I'm thankful everyday to have been born into this Church and am grateful for my testimony. It makes life a little easier to know why I am here and where I hope to get to some day. I don't want to get to the end of this life and not have my family with me. I love them all more than anything and when all is said and done I hope they are all there too. I hope they are stronger than this world. When this life is over I want it all not just a glimpse of it.

Don't make his sacrifice for you be in vain.

I hope that for whatever reason I felt I needed to post this has helped someone. Or maybe it was to help me? Strong possibility. But go out today and think of all you have been blessed with an then do something for someone else.

That's the best way to thank Him.