The Chamberlains

I'll be honest, when we started, I didn't think this was going to work out. I had decided to do a Plan of Salvation lesson. Kids were rowdy. Milo was screaming and crying because he didn't know the words to the song, or because he didn't fold him arms in time for the prayer, or for any other reason you can think of. Park was building forts with the couch pillows. Indie was going crazy with a light saber, Annicka was reading instead of listening, and Ever was toddling around like a 2-year-old does.

Once we finally got things settled down it did go fairly smoothly. The big win was that Indie and Milo remained engaged the whole lesson. That has never happened before. All the kids helped tape the different components to the wall as we talked about and explained them. The even bigger win is what has happened the last couple of days.

Milo has been drawing his own Spirit worlds, bodies and spirits, and bananas and carrots and the like (and has insisted that we put them up with our plan on the wall). And Indie will talk about what he learned and re-explain things every time he walks past the plan! Parenting/FHE win!

 We decided to take the kids horseback riding in Ensenada. What an experience! We really enjoyed it...except for Park. We could get him to sit on the horse, but that was it. He stayed behind and played on a computer.










 And a nice dinner with just Scott, me, and Ever to round out our trip while the other kids were playing in the youth zone.
What a great, memory making, fun trip! We really all enjoyed ourselves. I really enjoyed not having to cook or clean. :) Good times!

 10 hours! Kids managed well, until we hit traffic in LA and Milo decided he was car sick and threw up in the back seat. Blah!
 Lunch in a Las Vegas park. There were geese that followed us around hoping to get some food.
 Sharing of french fries when kids were done eating them.
 Once we got the Doug and Emily's it was all about playing with cousins, inside and out! When we left Utah it was 12 degrees outside. The few days we were in LA it was about 80. We spent lots of time in the yard soaking up the sun! Scott even did a magic show for Family Home Evening with lots of friends and neighbors.
 And Ever just loved Rosco the dog. She liked to feed him his food.

 The day we got onto the boat Indie said, "I miss Simon!" These two were great buddies.
How cute is Milo pushing Ever on the swing?