The Anderson Family

We went on a 3.5 mile hike in Snow Canyon to Three Ponds. It was so beautiful. The weather was perfect, warm and not a cloud in the sky. We hiked through tons of sand and finally made it to the end. The red rocks were truly amazing and it was so nice to be outside and not freezing to death.


Me and Sandi at Olive Garden, yum!!

Sara and Jessi, look at how much fun they are having!!!

• My great husband, Steve, is always so willing to take care of the kids so that I can get out and do fun stuff. He did have alot of help from our family this weekend though. Thanks to my mom, his mom, Kelli and Allyson, who helped take care of my kids so I could go. I really appreciate it alot. I am blessed to have such a great family!

• Even though it is fun to get away for awhile, there is nothing like coming home to my sweet family. Now I am hopefully relaxed and ready to get back into the daily routine of raising children. I do love my family so much. Being away from them makes me realize how lucky I truly am.

We FINALLY took Belle to get her first hair cut. She looks so cute. She is such a fun puppy!

Last week was spring break and the kids had the entire week off. Yeah!!! We were all really excited to have a week off of school, including me. It is fun to have the kids home and to change our schedules a little bit. We wanted to start it off right so we went to the Discovery Park in Pleasant Grove and had lunch on Monday. It was beautiful weather and the kids had a lot of fun, even though I think half of Utah County was there. We went with Sharla and her kids. Then, of course, the kids wanted to have a sleep over so we had Noah sleep at our house and Brenden slept at McKenna's. It was a fun day.

As we are getting ready to celebrate Kate's 3rd Birthday this week, I have been thinking alot about when she was born. I thought it would be fun to post some of the pictures we took of her when she was born. She was only 2 1/2 weeks early, but her lungs weren't developed so she had to spend 8 days in the NICU. It was so hard to watch our baby girl be so sick.

We had our ward Pinewood Derby on April 8th. It was a lot of fun. Brenden and his dad worked hard to make a really cool car. They made a neat design and then put a sweet flag decal on it that made it look really great. Everyone asked Brenden how he was able to paint such a neat car. Brenden's car had some technical difficulties so he didn't win any races, but he got the award for the All-American Car!! Way to go, Brenden!

This weekend was General Conference. It was so nice to be able to listen to our prophet and general authorities. It was really neat when they sustained our new prophet, President Thomas S. Monson. We actually watched all 4 sessions of conference. It was really amazing. We had Steve's family over for dinner in between the 2 sessions of conference and to watch the 2nd session. The kids did not want to sit and listen so I printed off some wordsearches and puzzles for them to do so they could at least be in the same room with us watching conference. It worked for a little while, but it is hard to sit still when they can play with all of their cousins.

Well, we started spring soccer today. At first I thought it would be a good idea to play soccer in the spring, but it was FREEZING. The kids didn't seem to mind though, it was just us that were on the sidelines that were cold. Brenden and Josie are both playing. Brenden's team is the Storm and Josie's team is the Fireflies. Since the weather has been so bad and we were out of town, neither one of them had even been to a practice. They were both excited and ready to play. Josie really likes her pink cleats and pink shin guards. The only problem is that of their 10 games that they play 6 of their games are at the exact same time. So today I went to Josie's game and Steve went to Brenden's. I only got pictures of Josie, but we will probably switch next time so I can get some pictures of Brenden. This picture is of Josie with her friend Aspen, who is in her kindergarten class. We didn't know that she was going to be on her team, so when she was at the game Josie was really excited. Josie scored a goal!! It was great. Steve said that Brenden played really well too. The 2nd grade league is getting so competitive. It is amazing how good the kids get when they are so young.

Today is Steve's 37th birthday!!! Wow, is he getting old. I am so glad that he is so much older than me. We had a really busy day with Josie's writing celebration and soccer games, but we had everyone over to celebrate his birthday. I made his favorite cheesecake. I have been trying to decide what to get him for his birthday for quite a while now. He occasionally surprises me with really nice gifts and I never do anything like that for him, so I wanted to give him something really nice this year. We have been talking about buying a laptop for quite a while, so I decided to get him one for his birthday. They were a little more than I thought so I asked his parents and my mom to go in on it with me. But I think that he was really surprised and he actually liked it. I am so proud. I am famous for buying him things that he doesn't like. It is something that our whole family is enjoying quite a bit. Now we won't fight over who gets to be on my computer. Happy Birthday, Steve. I love you and hope that you had a great day!!!

Last Friday night, we met the Rowleys, our DisneyWorld buddies, at Jumpin Jacks. It was really fun. We all have a great time when we go with the Rowleys, because everyone in the family has a friend close to their age. Taylor and Jordan are really similar. They both like sports and really enjoy hanging out. Brenden and Maddie are both really silly and goofy and they have tons of fun together. Josie and Morgan love to play together. Kate and Logan like to play, as well. In DisneyWorld they would walk around holding hands. It was super cute. They also have a 1 year old named Gabriella. She is really sweet and fun to be around. Then there is Steve and Justin. They work together and have been friends for a long time. Jewel and I have gotten to be good friends. I really like hanging out with her. After Jumpin Jacks we went to Dairy Queen for treats. It was really nice to see our friends again. They don't live by us so we don't get to see them as often as we would like. We like reminiscing about our trip to Florida last October.

Speaking of being hilarious, Brenden is definitely the clown of the family. He is always making everyone laugh. He has a quick wit and can always come up with one liners that really are funny and clever. He thinks that he is tricky with this silly face. I couldn't get my face to do it until just the other day. He was really proud of me when I could finally do it. He is a funny boy!

So, we went to Wendy's the other night for dinner, and little Miss Kate decided to put on a little show for us. She was being so silly. She decided that instead of eating chicken nuggets she would just eat the ranch. She thought she was so funny and wouldn't stop doing it. It was really gross, but she thought she was hilarious!! Her personality has been coming out more and more. She is so smart and comes up with some really clever things. Last night Steve was showing some clip on youtube to the kids. It was a little boy who kept putting his finger in his brother's mouth. He had an english accent and kept saying, "Charlie, you bit my finger, it hurts." Well, Kate thought it was so funny, she kept repeating it, in her version of the English accent. It was so funny, I couldn't quit laughing. She picked up on that accent and kept saying it. It was so cute!