Spring is here!

Soooo happy about this! We went on a nice walk yesterday around the neighborhood. Then Camille was able to work in the flower gardens, yippee! Then for dinner we made dutch oven potatoes and chicken mmmmm. What a great and sunshiny day. Zippitee doo da, hahaha

Family dinner date

We went on a family date night to sizzlers a few weeks ago and our sister Tami came and said hi. That was a great surprise. She was there with her sisters and her twins birthmom. It was wonderful seeing them and getting to meet the birthmom, whom is planning on blessing them with another baby :), she is very nice and happy. We love birthmoms' they are blessings from Heaven.
Adoption has brought many miracles to our family. We think often of Max's birthmom, whom we are in contact with, she has blessed our lives greatly with the gift of our son. He is our sunshine and a great joy to us.
We have heard of a birthmom who is thinking about us....and we thank you for that. We pray for you daily and hope that you are doing well.

Max turns 7

So, these pictures are a bit late....he turned 7 in January. I know I am a big slacker. Anyway we had a party for him, with some of his friends. For the past few years he has really wanted to have a pinata but alas January is usually too wet and cold....but this year he got his wish! They had a great time smashing up a fire truck. He also got to invite his crush to his party, last year was an all boy one and he was greatly upset that she could not be there. Max got a huge cuddly dinosaur and of course transformers. He wanted to eat a cupcake at his party so we saved his cake for the next day. He had the choice of eating out or at home. Of course he chose eating out and Wingers was where he wanted to go. When it came to cake time we sang and he blew out the candles. He was very carefully eating his cake....so mom just had to help him a little ;)

Max was Mr. Incredible for Halloween.....he was cool and tough. He made quite the mess with the finger-painting on the table and then grandpa gave him the idea of putting hand-marks on the window....that was fine until he started to splat on the window and the paint got all over the walls and ceiling and some on the curtains. It took some scrubbing to get it all off, Max did not enjoy that part so much. Christmas came and we all had a great time. Dinner and parties at families' houses and of course Santa came to visit. At the ward party Max got to sit on his lap and Max was astounded at how soft his beard was! He stared at him for quite some time. Max loves his legos that he got, he and Camille build lots of houses and trucks with them. Brandon got a fireman figure that was a surprise for him, he is happy to have it. Camille got lots of chocolate....of course it did not last long :)

Found some more fun pictures of things that we did in 2010. Sadie enjoying the few leaves that were on the ground after Brandon raked them up. Max and Sadie played in the sprinklers a few times and that was fun. Max took a picture of Brandon up at camp bartlett by the lake and he looks handsome. Camille and Max went to the fair, Brandon was working this day, and they got to ride on the merry go round. Max also got to go down the slippy slide on a potato bag he thought that was a blast.

On this day we visited Brandon at the fire station. We played badminton in their indoor court, that was certainly a lot of fun. Max and Camille went on a call with the firemen and Brandon drove the fire engine. When Max was about 3 he was very scared to ride in the engine going lights and sirens but this time he really enjoyed it. Max took pictures of us sitting on the back of the fire engine, of course the only one that was not blurry was the goofy one :) Also Max sat in the back driving section of the tiller truck and pretended to drive. What a great little firefighter!

Just for fun. And no he will not be dressing up as frankenstein......

Pumpkins

For family home evening we carved ourselves some pumpkins. Max was super excited to get started but once he put his hand in the big orange ball for those seeds he was not as excited anymore. It seems like we forget all the fun details of carving pumpkins. He drew the face he wanted on it and with the help of mom and dad he cut out the pieces. He also wanted it to have a super hero mask!

Brandon did a thunder cats emblem on his. It turned out looking awesome!

Camille did a silly face and the dad of the group thought she had messed up and felt bad for her until she let him know that it was on purpose :-)

We did have a good time. The first thing Max said the next morning was "The pumpkins are all ready for Halloween!" He must have dreamed about them all night.

Summer Fun

Summer time is over but we had a great one. We went camping, swimming, horse-back riding, parade watching, we had water balloon fights and ran through the sprinklers. We also spent lots of time with friends and family. There were many family reunions and bbq's with friends.

This is a snake that was painted onto Max's face when we were at family camp this year. He thought it was so cool. We had a fun time camping. Brandon went river rafting, repelling, and enjoyed other fun activities. Camille hung out with the 3 and 4 year olds and got to make lots of crafts, nature walks, blow bubbles, play on the slides, and went to the nature lodge where they got to pet a bunny. Max learned all kinds of new things like swordplay with wooden swords, made a rocket and got to blast it off, learned about the food pyramid and first aid stuff, he also got to go swimming and went in a row boat. Lots of great fun.

Dentist visit

A visit to the dentist can be so fun! ;) Max needed some teeth pulled out so his adult teeth could grow in more evenly spaced. He was a good sport but mostly because he got to watch a movie.
He also wanted a mo-hawk and this is the best we could do. We are still waiting for some of the teeth to start showing themselves. Max says that right now he looks like Spongebob, and to him that is pretty cool.

Mmmmm brownies

This is Max helping make brownies! He gets the fun part and all the good stuff. Being a kid is the best......especially when you can eat as much of this stuff you want......of course after a good meal.

Horses are cool (May 22)

We decided to go horseback riding and Max was not very excited about this. He is really scared of them. They are too big. This horse in this picture is named Goliath. So of course he did not want to get on. (He has a hard time trying new things like: four wheelers, tractors, no training wheels, etc.) Camille is the same way, so he must have gotten it from her. Well we finally got him up on the horse in front of Camille and we started off on a slow walk. After about 2 seconds he was saying he wanted off! This went on for about 15 minutes and then we put him on the other horse with Brandon. This lasted about 15 minutes with him saying he wanted off as well. When we were putting the horses away Max got stung by a wasp, what a day he was having.

A few days ago Brandon mentioned that we were going to go riding again and Max said "I like riding horses they are fun!"

We shall see if this is true. :)

No training wheels

Max learned to ride his bike without training wheels recently and he gets better all the time. He was really scared at first but with dad helping him and mom cheering him on he soon got the hang of it. He loves to go on bike rides any time it is sunny outside. He was riding it around the house today while his cousin Conner was over. Max is getting better at getting on it and started out by himself.

Conner and Max played transformers, swung on the swings, and with the water guns. Conner lives in Alaska and is visiting for only a few weeks; we are glad that he was able to come over and play even for just a short time.

Fireman!

He is the fireman! Brandon is great at his job. He is an engineer firefighter, meaning that he is first an engineer and second a firefighter. Brandon first got hired on the fire department as a firefighter and then moved up in rank to engineer after more training and years on the department. He drives the engine or truck on the calls and sometimes he sits in the captains seat when he is in charge for the day. They go on all kinds of calls, yes including cats stuck up in trees! We visit him at the station sometimes and go on calls with him. We saw a building on fire and got to go lights and sirens on the way there. Brandon loves his job and he gets to see and do amazing things all the time.

IFly

The Venturing Crew in our area and I went and did some indoor surfing and then did the IFly! We had a lot of fun. I did try the surfing as well but that was not as much fun. My favorite activity was the IFly. You are instructed as to the rules and what you need to do, then they put you in a jumpsuit with helmet and goggles, also wear earplugs and lace up shoes, then you go into the chamber and they shut the door. The instructor with you helps you to get your posture right and then you may get some air time by yourself in the wind tunnel room. Was a great feeling. But as for real skydiving.....I think I'll keep my feet on the ground. :)

Max the soccer dude

This was Max's second year playing soccer and he loved it! He had the same coach and some of the same kids on his team. They all got along and his coach was so good with the kids. This picture is great because they are all standing there, arms folded, waiting for the game to start again. Max is already wanting soccer to start again. We do not know if his team won because it was more enjoyable to watch him have fun!

Sadie

Our Sadie is now over a year old. She is a good dog. She is great at playing fetch and likes to give you kisses, even though the licks are not our favorite because they are slobbery. She has a pack that she wears when we go on bike rides, these are one of her favorite activities as well. She does not like water but if we are watering the flowers she tries to get the water by jumping at it and biting it. That is hilarious to watch, Max busts up every time.

The Coop

This is our coop that we made as a family and with the help of a great friend! Max did a great job on staining. Of course he was wearing his batman pajamas the whole time! Such a fun boy! We later built a fence around it and a ramp for them to come out the little side door.

New CHICKS!!

We added to our family yesterday! 4 new members who will in 6 months lay us some eggs. You guessed it...we bought some baby chicks. They are pretty cute and we have started holding them to get them to know us a little more. Max says he could hold them all day. Hopefully he will be just as excited about them when they are older. Easter will be here in a few weeks and Max is looking forward to of course finding eggs in the clever places that the Easter bunny leaves them. And most importantly we love to have a special day set aside to celebrate the the Savior, Jesus Christ and His resurrection. He is amazing!
Also my brother and sister in law are expecting their second child! So excited for them and for our family to welcome in a new member in 7 months. We love all of those little ones that come into our family. So far we have 12 nieces and 8 nepehws on Camille's side and 2 nephews on Brandon's side. Big party when we all get together. Families are very important and we love every one of them.
We are continuing to hope that we will grow our little family through adoption.

Jazz Game!

Brandon and I got to go to the Jazz game last weekend with some friends of ours. Max went and stayed at his grandparents house, he had a great time! They have Mario Brothers on their wii. He is pretty good at it and enjoyed showing us how well he plays. The game was fun and especially so with the friends we went with. We had a ticket for their daughter who is in the Young Women in our ward. Camille is the Beehive leader and gets to spend time with the great girls there. The Jazz Bear was great to watch, he's pretty goofy. He stuck a light on top of a bald man's head and then put a basketball hoop on his head and tried to make some baskets. Of course the man was a good sport. We went out to eat before the game at a Mexican restaurant and we ate the chimichungas (we found out from our friends that chunga in Spanish means female monkey behind, gross). Anyway the evening was great. And we are going over to their house tomorrow night and having dinner and game night. We always have a great time with them. Good friends make life even more great.

Max and his friend Sadie

Max and Sadie have some great times together. Sadie loves to catch snowballs in her mouth and will jump up really high to catch them. Max has shown her how to dig and when they are playing he will say "dig, Sadie dig" and she will. She is also very protective of him and wants to be with him. She is still a puppy and very hiper but she is learning to calm down some. We are looking forward to summer time for bike riding, camping, gardening, etc. Summertime is very much needed :)

Max's Birthday

Happy Birthday to Max!!! He turned 6 today! Yesterday he had a Transformer party with his friends. They played all kinds of games. It sounded like a stampede of elephants with all that energy running around. The party was sure fun. He also picked out some balloons that are all kinds of colors, some have polka dots, one with tiger stripes, some that say happy birthday, and one that is multicolored. We did not know they came with so many designs. His cake was a transformer cake, of course. Later we went bowling with some family members and had pizza. Max likes to go bowling and this is the activity he chose for us to do. Then met back at our house for cake and ice cream. He got lots of fun presents but the ones he seems to like the most are the art portfolios his grandparents gave him. This morning he wanted a "special breakfast". When mom asked him what he wanted he said "It will be a surprise and that will make it special" what a great boy. We went to church and the Primary gave him a little gift with his picture and a picture of the Savior. They also sang happy birthday to him. He opened more presents today and wanted to have some brownies. He likes those too. It is amazing how time flies....it seems like we were at the hospital with him a short time ago. He surely is our greatest blessing and we are grateful to all those who made it possible for us to be his parents. We love him more than words can fully express and we thank our Heavenly Father for him every day.