Last day of school

Alexis has been counting down the days until her last day of school, and today was finally the last day. Since her birthday is a week after school gets out, her teacher said that we could bring treats and celebrate it today. Alexis wanted chocolate donuts. We bought some this morning and then went a little early to bring them into her classroom. I was glad that we did because it gave me a chance to talk to Alexis's teacher and tell her how much we appreciated her this year and how much we would miss her. Alexis gave her a present too, and I took a picture. Her teacher (Mrs. Griffith) started to get all teary, and she told Alexis how much she would miss her. She said she calls Alexis her little "mini me." (Her name is Alexis too). At the end of the day I picked up Alexis fully expecting her to be excited and ready for the summer. But I was greeted with a sad little face. When we got home Alexis started to sob, and climbed in my lap. She said that she was going to miss Mrs. Griffith so much. I remember crawling into my mom's lap and crying when I was in 2nd grade, when a teacher that I loved left to go to another school. I still remember the sadness I felt. I am so glad that Alexis had such a great teacher and a great year

A Great Weekend

***THIS IS A VERY LONG POST WITH LOTS OF PICTURES***
This past weekend was a blast! It was Katie's high school graduation, and so Cindy and AJ came down from Utah, and Daniel came down from selling pest control in Texas. It was such a fun filled weekend, and we were so sad when it was over. Saturday was Katie's graduation. Brandon ended up having to work, so he couldn't come (he felt so bad!). I was kind of worried how the kids would do, but they did great! I can't believe Katie is already graduating. It seems like just yesterday that I was, but it was eight years ago! Boy how time flies. Here are some cute pictures we got after it was over.


Future graduate
Mason and Levi are so silly. If someone is holding one of them, the other one has to be being held by the same person. David was so nice to humor them. Since Brandon couldn't come AJ drove my van. Here is Cindy sitting in the front seat. This picture was taken by Tori. She did a pretty good job!
Daniel and I sat in the back seat. Here he is trying on Tori's visor that she got from Dance class. It was so fun to have Daniel home. It feels like we never get to see him, and he is so fun to hang out with. He is so sweet with the kids. They just love him. He only got to stay for one and a half days, but it was fun to have him.
We went to Marie Calendar's after graduation which is what we have done after everyone's graduation. When we went there for Kristalyn's graduation the food was so yummy, so we thought it would be the perfect spot to go every time. Every time since, the food has been kind of nasty but we can't break tradition! I didn't get any pictures, but you can look at Cindyor Katie's blogs for pictures from there. After graduation we went to my parent's house to hang out for the rest of the day. Grandpa Park planned a really fun treasure hunt for the kids. They had so much fun. They started out with a treasure map that led them all over the house, and finally into the living room where they found another map, and little pouches with each of their names on them. Here they are with their pouches looking at the second map trying to figure out where to go next.

They were led to the back yard, to the big tree, the garden, and the corner of the house.
The final destination was the sandbox.

In the sand box were five X's made out of sticks. One for each of the grand kids, (including Carter). They each started to dig at their designated spots and they couldn't believe what they found!




Yes that is a five dollar bill! There was one buried for each of them along with a one dollar coin for each of them and lots and lots of quarters, dimes nickles and pennies. When Alexis found her five dollar bill the first thing out of her mouth was, "Now I can go to Hawaii with Katie!" We all got a kick out of that.
Here is Tori with her five dollar bill. It took her a long time to find it, but with a little help from everyone we found it. Mason collected coins for himself and Carter. Once he filled up his bag he would dump it all out and then fill it up again. What a fun thing for Great Grandpa to plan. The kids had such a fun time. They were still finding coins for the next few days, and I am sure we will continue to find more in the months to come.

On Sunday David blessed Carter. He gave him a beautiful blessing, and we were so glad that we could be there. Levi, Mason and Carter have all worn the same blessing outfit. I am sure we will be passing it along to many other little cousins to wear as well. Here are some pictures that we got afterwards.

Here are some more pictures form the weekend. The guys set up a badminton net in the back yard. We all had a blast playing. One night we decided to have the girls play against each other. We all did terrible! We sure had a lot of good laughs though.
Here is Levi sitting on my dad's shoulder's watching a movie. I have a similar one like this of Tori from Christmas.

On the last night we just sat around and talked for hours. Finally around 10 pm, we decided we better go home (considering Alexis had school the next day.) I called in Alexis to get her pajamas on, and she didn't want to, so Uncle AJ decided to put them on instead. =)


It was such a fun weekend, and we all went through a little bit of withdrawal when it was over. I am so thankful for my family and the close relationship that we all have with each other. Even though we all don't live here, everytime we get together it feels like no time has passed in between. Everyone fits in perfectly with one another. We can't wait for the family reunion this summer!

Tori's Preschool Program

Tori has had a busy week. First her Dance recital, and then tonight her preschool program. One would think that a 4 year old would never be able to learn so much material to perform, but not our Tori. She new every dance step for her recital and every song for her preschool program. She was so stinkin cute tonight. We took a ton of pictures, and I am having a hard time deciding which ones to post. So I am just going to post a lot =) This first one is outside the church before the program. When Alexis had her program when she was in preschool, we didn't get there early enough, so we got horrible seats. We were not about to make the same mistake. We got there in plenty of time. In fact, we were the first ones there. Her teacher wasn't even there yet! Here is Tori sitting in her spot on stage.
This is Tori with her little buddy Jayse. They are such cute little friends. Jayse is kind of Tori's security blanket at preschool. =) We thought it was so cute how Tori was crossing her legs in this picture. We didn't even tell her to do that.
We had to snap a picture of these cute buddies. Kaebren is Jayse's little brother, and him and Levi get along so well.
Here are a bunch of the pictures we got. Tori smiled the whole time, and sang every word. It was adorable. Getting there early sure paid off because we were able to get a front row seat right in front of her.
Here is Tori cracking up in the middle of a song. They sang a lot of silly songs, and the kids sure got a kick out of it.

Here is Tori with her wonderful teacher Miss Patti. We just love her. It amazes me how much she teaches the kids. She is so sweet with the kids, and they all love her so much. Tori will sure miss her next year.

Tori's Dance Recital

Yesterday Tori had her spring dance recital. She was so cute, and did so good! Brandon took off work to come, but came down with a bad case of food poisoning from a nasty burrito he bought from a gas station that morning. He was so sad he couldn't come, but I video taped the whole thing, and my mom took a ton of pictures with my camera. Tori was so thrilled that Katie and my mom came to watch her. Here are some of the cute pictures that my mom got:

They performed quite a few songs. I was amazed that they learned that many! At the end their teacher Ms. Muffie gave them purple visors that she made for them that said I Love Dance. Here is Tori with Ms. Muffie.
Here's Tori and I after it was over. This is the last picture of me with long hair. Later that afternoon I got 8 inches cut off! More pictures of that are to come.

We are so proud of our cute little ballerina. She loves her dance class so much, she has a quite a few little friends from church that are in her class, and it has been so fun for her.

Planting Flowers at the Temple

This past Saturday we had the opportunity to go to the temple and plant flowers with our ward. I debated going because I had so much to get done, but in the end I decided that it would be a good experience for the kids. Brandon had to work, so he didn't get to come with us. Here is Alexis planting some flowers. She got right in there all by herself and didn't need hardly any help. (Notice she is wearing her medal from field day) Here is Tori. She loved planting flowers most of all. She also loved collecting all of the little tags from all of the flowers. She was very sad when we had to leave. She said, "mommy, I just love planting flowers at the temple."
Here is Levi patting down the soil around a flower. He liked it at first but after a few flowers he lost interest. He thought it was more fun to smoosh the flowers once they were planted. I put an end to that fast.
I am glad that we took the time to come to this fun family activity. There is always a sweet spirit at the temple, even just on the temple grounds. Hopefully we can go back again next year!

Field Day

I have so much blogging to catch up with, I just need to sit down and do it! I will start with Alexis's field day. Last Friday was Alexis's field day. The theme was "Survivor", and each of the classes had a different colored shirt and a different Tribe name. Alexis's tribe was name Kalapike, and they had white shirts. Here she is all ready to go before school. Tori and Levi were very excited to be able to come and watch. All of the kids got a tattoo to wear and Alexis wanted hers on her face. I finally gave in, but when she got to school and noticed that none of the other kids had theirs on their face she quickly wiped it off. Silly girl. There were a number of different events. Some of them were individual and some of them were team events. (they were competing against the other 1st grade classes). Here is Alexis in the racing event. She came in third, but she would have been 1st or second, if one of her classmates didn't cut her off at the bend =)
Here she is on the timed run around the bases. She got second fastest in her group. (sorry it's kind of blurry.)

Here is one of the team events. They had to see who could stand on the can the longest. I just realized that I uploaded the wrong picture. I had a close up of Alexis on her can, but I am too lazy to change it. She is in the back of this picture. If you click on it you may be able to see better. She fell off towards the beginning, but she was such a great sport about it.
Here is another team event. They had to stand bare foot in a little wading pool. On the bottom of the pool there were marbles, and they had to pick up as many marbles with their feet at they could and drop them in the bucket. Alexis was on a roll! She mastered picking up several at a time!
Here is Alexis's whole class at the end of the day. Alexis is standing right next to her teacher. She has loved her teacher, Mrs. Griffith, so much this year, and her class. She is a little social butterfly, and has made a lot of great friends. Hopefully she will have a few of them in her class next year, but since there are 5 2nd grade classes who knows!
Here is Alexis wiped out at home after a long hot day. She got a silver medal for the day. She was so excited, and wore it for the next few days.
Although it was a long tiring day, I was glad that I could go and watch. I was so proud of Alexis, not only because she did great, but more importantly because she was such a great sport the whole day! There were quite a few tears throughout the day from her fellow classmates, when they didn't do as well as they hoped, but never once did Alexis stop smiling. Even when she was one of the first ones to fall off her can. She had so much fun, and that's what is the most important thing. At the end of the day, she said, "This has been the best day ever!"