Madi's Baptism

This girl was so excited and ready to be baptized!  I have been very proud of her this year, she has really grown up in the last 6 months and has been trying so hard to be good!  She has come so far from the fit throwing 7 year old she was a year ago!  She truly wants to choose to be good and to choose to be happy.  She is very sweet and tender and always wanting to do something to make someone else happy.  When I had her last parent/teacher conference of 2nd grade her teacher told me, "she is so compassionate."  Wow, a proud Mom moment for me!  She was such good student and always going out of her way to be kind to the kids in her class.  She had a classmate with some learning disabilities and Madi was always the one to help her and to stand up for her when the boys made fun of her.  She would finish her own work and then always help Cami do her work.  There was a little girl in our ward for a time who was in a wheelchair and Madi met her in the hall one day, she was always thinking about her after that and on Christmas Day she took a card to her.  Ellen's dad later told Ryan that she loved the card so much she carried it around in her backpack on the back of her wheelchair every day.  She also loves to make cards and write notes to her friends and especially at home for Mom and Dad, I often think, when I see a new note she has tapped up somewhere, everyone needs a little girl to bring this kind of sweetness to their life!

Before her baptism I took her to the temple to do a photo shoot in her new white dress.  She had seen me do this for 3 of her friends and so she was so excited to finally get her turn!  We had a great time, here are some favorites...

The Big Day

 Getting ready with Daddy

Our close friend and family who were there to support Madi and celebrate with us...

 The Hansens - Ash, Baby Roam, Jet, Cora and Kurt

 The Eves - Kelton, Logan, Ellie, Bridger, Thatcher, Aunt Carolyn

 The Halls - Aunt Crystal, Brooke, Ammon, Dallin, Harrison, Matthew

 Grandma

 Great Grandpa Jens - I was so grateful for my Grandpa coming down!  So nice to have someone from my Mom's family to be here, and especially to have a Grandpa here! Grandpa was so sweet and didn't hesitate to say he'd make the drive down for Madi's baptism.  He was one of the witnesses.

 Best Friend Annie

 Annie's Family, The Woodburys - Kathryn, Jack, Annie, Grant, Heidi and Dustin

 Hannah, Bowen, Aunt Deli and Jackson

The Brooks - Grandpa Sam, Joey, Julianne, Sarah, Bishop Joe, Grandma Carolyn and Tommy.  We love the Brooks family and are grateful for their friendship, Bishop Joe was the 2nd witness and we loved having their Sam and Carolyn join us, we have grown to love them as we have gotten to know them over the years of them visiting Joe and Julianne.  

 Jens was throwing a fit for our attempted family picture so this is the best we got  - Mom and Madi

Madi's friend, Aubrey, was also here for the baptism but left before we did pictures, we also had Bro. McAffee and Sis. Christensen from our ward there.

After the baptism we invited everyone over for a delicious dutch oven dinner,  it was amazing!  Kurt and Ash's brother in law cooked it for us and it was so nice to have someone else do the cooking!  Dutch oven potatoes, beans and pulled pork, they were delish!  Mom made coconut cupcakes that were pretty much the best ever and Kathryn was so nice to make these adorable and unbelievably soft and delicious sugar cookies!

We were grateful for our family and close friends that were there with us on Madi's special day.  We missed a lot of the family that didn't make it and we really missed the ones that we know were watching but we couldn't see, Grandpa and Grandma Kathy and Todd.  Madi had a wonderful, special day, she was a little sad when it was over, she told me that she just wanted to remember exactly how she felt when she was in the water!  She was beaming and so happy, we were so proud of her and so happy that she chose to be baptized!

Baby Chicks

Pierson's 5th Grade class got to  hatch baby chicks in their classroom this year, he had been coming home each day and telling us all about it!  I told him we could bring two chicks home, only if Aunt Crystal would be willing to take them when they got to big to have in a box.  We were able to bring two home and keep them for the week of Easter.  The kids loved it!  Pierce has wanting a pet again ever since our kitties all disappeared a few years ago, and much to his disappointment Mom keeps telling him no.  I thought this was great, a pet for a week!  The kids really enjoyed checking on them each morning, feeding them and especially holding them.  I have to admit they were pretty darn adorable!  They were so tiny and cute and their little chirping was pretty cute too!  I started feeling terrible about eating chicken they were so cute, too bad they have to get so big and ugly so fast!  On the day that we took them to their new home at Aunt Crystal's neighbor was a tough one for Pierce, my trough and tough  boy is really so tender and he was so sad to give them away, he cried and I felt like a terribly mean mom for not letting him have a real pet.  We survived though and we have some pretty sweet pictures to remember our cute little pets for a week.  

 This one went through several name changes so I'm not sure what to call him.

 This little guy is Twix.

 Hard to say goodbye to such a cute little thing.

 My favorite thing was probably hearing Jens copy me saying to them "come here 'wittle' guy", he just loved petting them and holding them!

Pretty cute stuff, sweet kids.

Madi's Easter Birthday

This girl had been excited for her birthday for a year!  Well, not all the kids aren't excited for their next birthday as soon as one is over, but she was especially excited for this birthday all year, since we had realized on her 7th birthday that her 8th birthday would fall on Easter Sunday!  She was SO excited and I was so happy for her to have such a special 8th birthday!  Since it was on Easter, it turned into a 3 day party, Friday friend party, Saturday traditional Cousin Easter egg hunt and Sunday the big day - Easter and Madi's big day!  It was a fun filled 3 days for this birthday girl and she loved every second of it!

Friend Party

We had a fun Easter themed party and did a little Easter Egg Hunt for the girls, we gave them a list of 8 things they each had to find hidden in the yard and cute Easter baskets.

 Bro thinks he's so cool.  Evey, Annie, Aubrey, Ella, Ava, Madi  Cute neighborhood friends!

Hunting around the yard..


Playing "Egg, Egg, Chick"...


Present Time!

 Evey, Madi and Ella, she loved the Baby Ana doll they have her!  She was hoping for "Frozen" Barbies but they have been sold out for months, so she was excited for something that was "Frozen"!


Cousin Easter Egg Hunt

The McDermotts were here for our annual Cousins Easter Egg Hunt at the Hall's home, this was especially fun because we got to do this on Cousin Lily's birthday!

Celebrating our two cute 8 year old cousins!  Madi and Lily were born 12 hours apart, Lily on the night of the 19th and Madi on the morning of the 20th!  

Let the games begin! 

 Sissy is so good to this sweet boy, I love this so much!

 Cute Cousins!

 Brock, Logan, Dallin, Kelton, Davis, Ellie, Brooke, Ammon, Calli, Pierce,
Bridger, Gracie, Jens, Madi, Lily, Harrison, Thatcher, Matthew


Easter Morning

 Special Birthday breakfast, Yum!  (Pumpkin Spiced French Toast, so amazing you need to make it!)

Present Time!

 I got this book for Madi, "Waking Beauty", I heard it and thought it was the cutest story.  She has loved it and practically had it memorized within a day or so.  She was loving it so cute and since it's a short story I told her she should work on it and do the story telling festival next year.  She has it memorized and recites it often and her expression is getting better and better!  She is going to be beyond ready to perform it!

 LaLaLoopsy Fun House!  A fun surprise from Mom!

And the biggest excitement of the day....

 Patiently waiting for his cake.  Love this face.

 Birthday girl and her candles!  Love how this shot turned out!

Make a Wish!

This girl had a delightful day, I think it was everything she had been dreaming about all year.  She loved being sung to in Primary on her real birthday and she loved wearing her new, special baptism dress to church.  (Pictures of her Baptism shoot coming up soon!)  It was a very special day for our special girl!

My Little Superman!

March was a wonderful, glorious, fabulous month for me!  Jensen decided he was ready to potty train!  WAHOO!  SO happy to be diaper free!  He had teased me last summer and I thought he was going to do it just after he turned two, but it only lasted a few days.  Over the past 7 months when ever he wanted M&M's he would go pee on the potty but that was it.  I was so happy that HE finally decided he was ready!  He did it really fast and had the pee thing down very quickly, I used a timer and would just take him potty each time the timer went off, increasing the time each day and he did so awesome with this method!  "#2" was a little hard to get the hang of so he eared a new "Jake" sword and telescope when he finally did it, and then we were all happy,  so, so happy.  Of course I think seeing him in this little super hero undies is one of the cutest things ever, so of course we have photos.  I'm sure he will love me for this when he is older.  (So for the record he also has Jake, Cars, Thomas and Cookie Monster undies that he loves)  This day was perfect for snapping pics of him proudly showing off his undies, a pile of pillows in Mom's room was the perfect setting!

 Proudly showing off his Underwear!

FUN jumping into Mom's pillow pile!

 I love this face more than I can say.

 His new "Jake" telescope...

 Putting it to good use.

 This boy melts me.  To the world this looks like a little boy in his underwear, but to me this little boy in his underwear is the world!